Under-shaved, brown-robed and jovial, Benanti is adept at explaining how technology can change the world, “with humans ceding the power of choice to an algorithm that knows us too well. Some people treat AIs like idols, like oracles, like demigods. The risk is that they delegate critical thinking and decisional power to these machines.”

AI is about choices. He points out: “Already a few tens of thousands of years ago, the club could have been a very useful tool or a weapon to destroy others …”

The Italians, not pioneers in the technology, warn that AI prefigures a world in which progress does not optimise human capabilities, but replaces them.

While I certainly do not side with the Catholic Church and their moralistic dogma, it is valuable to pay attention to a group that has made it their mission to think about how humanity is affected by various things. Never mind that they have their own bias in how humanity should be conducting itself. If instead, you treat them as a think tank with a relatively narrow focus, then we can make use of their work in this area.

I’m relieved to see at least one world leader though listening to an expert on technology. The US Congress had a department just for interpreting and researching various high technology concepts, but in their infinite wisdom they decided they knew better and disbanded the department.

One may disagree with the Catholic churches interpretation of their explanations of how AI technology can affect humans, but we would be fools to completely disregard their reports and findings.

Ok, first, it only applies to Type 2 diabetes.

In a remarkable medical breakthrough, Chinese scientists have successfully cured a patient of type 2 diabetes through an innovative cell therapy approach.

Second, it was done on a case-by-case basis. Each person has their own therapy tailored for them. This does not appear to be a mass-solution.

The groundbreaking treatment involved transplanting lab-grown replicas of the patient’s own insulin-producing islet cells into their body. This ingenious approach effectively restored the patient’s pancreatic islet function, enabling the body to regulate blood sugar levels naturally without external intervention.

From the linked article:

According to a South China Morning Post report, the patient underwent the cell transplant in July 2021.

…

The new therapy involves programming the patient’s peripheral blood mononuclear cells, transforming them into “seed cells” to recreate pancreatic islet tissue in an artificial environment. This approach leverages the body’s regenerative capabilities, an emerging field known as regenerative medicine.

WINNING! /s

You give your top talent what they want. The problem is that they hired a consultant to find out what that was. The consultant, knowing on which side his bread was buttered, told the board what they wanted to hear, which is, after all, why they hired a consultant instead of just asking.

Wearing a hoodie with the words “We use Math” on the front, Google search boss Prabhakar Raghavan had an important message for employees at an all-hands meeting last month. But he first wanted them to settle in and get comfortable.

…

Raghavan said Google’s digital ad business had become “the envy of the world.” He noted that over the last three years, annual revenue has grown by more than $100 billion, exceeding Starbucks, Mazda and TikTok combined.

Does this mean you’ll be using math to pay them more for producing more? (have to add /s)

There was a discussion a couple of years ago around gasoline taxes and how they are supposed to pay for roadway maintenance. The question came up about EVs. There were discussions about how to include EVs in the taxation system so they would pay for their fair share of the road. One of the options was to impose a tax attached to your vehicle registration based upon the weight of the vehicle. The greater the weight, the more wear and tear it produces on the road surface. This might be one solution to the barrier problem, namely moving the extra cost to the reason for the extra cost.

Time to find a replacement, I guess.

Oh, I know it’s impossible to do something like that. There’s a reason that whenever I upload a photo I always crop it. That way, if there’s ever a question about copyright, I can simply reveal a portion that was cropped. Likewise, someone taking such a photo should keep the untouched, uncropped original in a safe place. You know spicy photos will be used in a questionable way, so this will make it easier for the original owner to refute any modifications.

watermarks and metadata

It’s a start at least. Now make them impossible to remove.

It’s so nice of them them to give me another incentive not to visit.