No humans required, the fully autonomous AI running a Wall Street hedge fund
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Companies that use artificial intelligence to augment their human workers is nothing new, but companies that are run by artificial intelligence, without any human input, are. I’ve been documenting the emergence of fully autonomous organisations – organisations that are able to run and scale...
China guns for dominance in AI, builds out national labs
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Artificial intelligence is the world’s next key battle ground, and China wants to lead it. The Chinese government, who recently announced they want to build AI based cruise missiles and a new nationwide Social Credit Scoring system, has approved a plan to create a...
Softbank CEO predicts the Singularity will occur in 2047
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The Singularity, the point at which we see runaway technological growth that result in unfathomable changes to human civilisation, is approaching, and we need to be prepared. In 30 years, the Singularity, the point at which we see runaway technological growth that result in...
JPMorgan unleashes artificial intelligence to automate its legal work
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF With massive technology budgets and a paranoia of startups stealing a march Wall Street is going all in on innovation and automation. With companies like LawGeex and ROSS Intelligence trying to automate the legal world it was only a matter of time before the...
Microsoft’s AI has learnt how to write it’s own code and create its own programs
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF An AI that can code and build new computer programs from scratch could change the world, give rise to a whole new generation of entrepreneurs. And put a lot of people out of jobs… For many of us the digital world’s an alien place....
Researchers use artificial intelligence to automatically age faces
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The ability to age people accurately is one of the cornerstone abilities that can help people find missing persons. People have been fascinated with age ever since, well, perhaps forever, and for many people being able to get a glimpse of how they’ll look...
Google let its AI loose on the internet to slaughter gamers
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Compared to the sterile environment of a lab, for an artificial intelligence the internet must seem like a playground. If you ever wondered what would happen if an artificial intelligence (AI) ever got online then you’re about to get your answer thanks to Google...
Hunting terrorists and preventing suicides, inside Zuckerberg’s plan for AI
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Facebooks human operators can’t police everything on the network fast enough, so Zuckerberg is prioritising artificial intelligence In a letter published earlier this week Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook, the company that one day wants to be the world’s largest telepathic network, will be...
Artificial intelligence diagnoses disease by listening to your voice
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Your voice can tell people a lot about how you’re feeling, but now machine learning is taking diagnosis to the next level. Over the past few years technology has been finding a way to produce more and more innovative ways to diagnose disease, but...
Google RAISR sharpens photos and gives you super vision
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Sight is one of our most crucial senses, now one technology promises infinite zoom and super crisp images. Let’s face it – the last thing many of us want it to take what we think is a great family photo only to find out...
Google tests AI’s natural killer instincts, discovers society must be very, very careful
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As artificial intelligence is embedded into more of our world’s digital fabric inevitably AI’s will come into conflict with one another, but rules might help us stave off armageddon – or bring it about. If climate change, nuclear weapons or pandemics don’t kill us...
Nowhere to hide for Goldman’s elite as AI culls jobs
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Banking is one of the world’s oldest professions, but people only have a profession if they have a job, and as Wall Street drives to full automation there are fewer jobs to go round. At its height back in 2000, the US cash equities...
New mind reading machine lets people with locked in syndrome communicate
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF People who have locked in syndrome, like ALS have the worst of both worlds – being alive but unable to communicate, now a breakthrough gives them their “voices” back. For decades, one of the most troubling difficulties of treating patients with certain types of...
Liberatus AI whips world’s top poker players to take $1.7m pot
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Poker is unpredictable, and noone predicted an AI would beat four of the world’s top players – not even its creators. An artificial intelligence (AI) called Libratus from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) has beaten four of the world’s best poker players in a gruelling...
UK’s NHS gives millions of Londoners their own on call AI doctor
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF For better or worse, more and more healthcare services are being augmented and automated using new artificial intelligence services, only time will tell what the results will be. A few months ago Baidu rolled out a limited trial of a new virtual doctors service,...
Google’s AI’s are learning how to build new AI’s
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Logically speaking getting AI’s to build AI’s makes sense, but as AI’s continue to proliferate and be woven into the digital fabric of our society it opens up a dangerous pandoras box. As many companies, large and small will tell you, creating a good artificial...
Zuckerberg wants to turn Facebook into the world’s largest telepathic network
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Telepathic communication is the stuff of true sci-fi but we’ve already demonstrated that we can achieve it using technology, now Zuckerberg wants to plug that telepathic tech into Facebook and turn the social network into the world’s largest telepathic network. One of my favourite...
Researchers new artificial nervous system helps robots feel pain
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Pain plays a vital role in shaping how we interact with our world and each other, and it plays a pivotal role in helping us determine what’s safe and what isn’t. By helping robots experience pain it’s hoped that it will help them too stay...
Bach lives again, in AI form
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Trying to emulate human skills and talents isn’t easy – even for humans – but increasingly AI is muscling in on what we once considered to be unique human traits. Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasing parking its caravan on humanity’s lawn. Traits that we...
Japanese insurer announces it will replace office workers with artificial intelligence
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF More and more companies are experimenting with AI as a way to automate away jobs, and as the human toll continues to increase this is just the beginning Fukoku Mutual Life, a Japanese insurance company with a turnover of $6.8 Billion in 2016, announced...
