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    Unfair Decisions by AI could make us Indifferent to Bad Behavior by Humans

    November 15, 2024, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Anggalih Prasetya / Shutterstock

    Artificial intelligence (AI) makes important decisions that affect our everyday lives. These decisions are implemented by firms and institutions in the name of efficiency. They can help determine who gets into college, who lands a job, who receives medical treatment and who qualifies for government assistance.

    As AI takes on these roles, there is a growing risk of unfair decisions—or the perception of them by those people affected. For example, in college admissions or hiring, these automated decisions can unintentionally favor certain groups of people or those with certain backgrounds, while equally qualified but underrepresented applicants get overlooked.

    Or, when used by governments in benefit systems, AI may allocate resources in ways that w...

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    Unfair Decisions by AI could make us Indifferent to Bad Behavior by Humans

    November 15, 2024, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Representation of AI
    Anggalih Prasetya / Shutterstock

    Artificial intelligence (AI) makes important decisions that affect our everyday lives. These decisions are implemented by firms and institutions in the name of efficiency. They can help determine who gets into college, who lands a job, who receives medical treatment and who qualifies for government assistance.

    As AI takes on these roles, there is a growing risk of unfair decisions—or the perception of them by those people affected. For example, in college admissions or hiring, these automated decisions can unintentionally favor certain groups of people or those with certain backgrounds, while equally qualified but underrepresented applicants get overlooked.

    Or, when used by governments in benefit systems, AI may allocate resources in ways that w...

    Read More

    Hubble Sees Aftermath of Galaxy’s Scrape with Milky Way

    November 15, 2024, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A whitish, whirlpool-like galaxy at middle of top edge, and a tadpole-shaped structure sweeps from left to right across lower half. A label pointing to outer, left of galaxy reads “Earth.” Faint, purple haze labeled “Milky Way Halo” surrounds galaxy and stretches to graphic’s edges. The tadpole-shaped object is the Large Magellanic Cloud, or LMC, with its own halo and streaming tail. Semi-circular, progressively darker layers of purple labeled “LMC Halo” surround the LMC, which appears roughly circular, with a central, light-yellow bar. Cloud-like features sprinkled with white specks surround this bar. Trailing the LMC is a large, tail-like feature labeled “Stream.” At the bottom left corner of graphic are several small, bright points of light labeled “Quasars.” Three light blue lines point from the label “Earth” through the LMC’s halo, and to three corresponding quasars. At the bottom, right corner is the label “Artist’s Concept.”
    This artist’s concept shows the Large Magellanic Cloud, or LMC, in the foreground as it passes through the gaseous halo of the much more massive Milky Way galaxy. The encounter has blown away most of the spherical halo of gas that surrounds the LMC, as illustrated by the trailing gas stream reminiscent of a comet’s tail. Still, a compact halo remains, and scientists do not expect this residual halo to be lost. The team surveyed the halo by using the background light of 28 quasars, an exceptionally bright type of active galactic nucleus that shines across the universe like a lighthouse beacon. Their light allows scientists to “see” the intervening halo gas indirectly through the absorption of the background light...
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    Minimally Invasive Neural Interface Allows Brain Access Without Skull Opening

    November 15, 2024, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    jacob robinson
    Their experiments showed that the catheter electrodes could be successfully delivered and guided into the ventricular spaces and brain surface for electrical stimulation. Image courtesy of Rice University.

    A team of researchers led by Rice University’s Jacob Robinson and the University of Texas Medical Branch’s Peter Kan has developed a technique for diagnosing, managing and treating neurological disorders with minimal surgical risks. The team’s findings were published in Nature Biomedical Engineering.

    While traditional approaches for interfacing with the nervous system often require creating a hole in the skull to interface with the brain, the researchers have developed an innovative method known as endocisternal interfaces (ECI), allowing for electrical recording and stimulation o...

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