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Robot

AI program taught itself how to complete its task by 'cheating' its human creators

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Fri, 04 Jan 2019 12:28 UTC
Artificial intelligence
When most people think about the potential risks of artificial intelligence and machine learning, their minds immediately jump to "the Terminator" - a future where robots, according to a dystopian vision once articulated by Elon Musk, would march down suburban streets, gunning down every human in their path.

But in reality, while AI does have the potential to sow chaos and discord, the manner in which this might happen is much more pedestrian, and far less exciting than a real-life "Skynet". If anything, risks could arise from AI networks that can create fake images and videos - known in the industry as "deepfakes" - that are indistinguishable from the real think.

Who could forget this video of President Obama? This never happened - it was produced by AI software - but it's almost indistinguishable from a genuine video.

Well, in the latest vision of AI's capabilities in the not-so-distant future, a columnist at TechCrunch highlighted a study that was presented at a prominent industry conference back in 2017. In the study, researchers explained how a Generative Adversarial Network - one of the two common varieties of machine learning agents - defied the intentions of its programmers and started spitting out synthetically engineered maps after being instructed to match aerial photographs with their corresponding street maps.

Comment: So while AI may be helpful in automating some tasks and removing humans from the equation, it seems like just as much (if not more) human oversight would be needed to ensure AI is doing what it's actually supposed to be doing. So the question is, how much do we trust these systems in such things as:

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Cross

Social media outraged after German cardinal claims homosexuality and sex abuse are 'linked'


RT
Sat, 05 Jan 2019 11:02 UTC
gay protest Catholic
© Reuters
It is not the Catholic Church that should be blamed for child sex abuse by priests but modern public morals and the spread of homosexuality, one of the top Catholic prelates alleged, sparking outrage on social media.

Sex abuse in the Catholic Church has recently become a burning issue, casting a shadow on the Church's reputation in light of numerous scandals regarding harassment and rape. However, Cardinal Walter Brandmueller believes the public outrage over the issue is "quite hypocritical" as the abuse is not some institutional problem but a mere indication of a malady that has gripped modern society as a whole.

"What has happened in the Church in terms of abuse is nothing short of what has been happening to the society as a whole," Brandmueller told German dpa news agency. He then designated growing sexualization as the root cause of the problem and said that the real scandal consists in the fact that the Church failed to distinguish itself from the rest of society.
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Stop

Pennsylvania bans tobacco products and vapes at 6 state hospitals

Jeff Himmler
Trib Live
Sat, 05 Jan 2019 11:02 UTC
Vape smoke
Tobacco products and vape devices have been banned at Pennsylvania's six state mental health hospitals, including Torrance State Hospital in Derry Township.

"Smoking is a contributing factor to the shortened life expectancy of individuals with a mental illness," Department of Human Services Secretary Teresa Miller said Monday in a statement announcing the ban. "This initiative will further support health, wellness and recovery within these communities."

The hospitals will be posted to advise patients, staff, visitors, contractors and tenants that the campuses and buildings are tobacco-free zones. The facilities will offer smoking cessation programs and support as needed, including nicotine patches and gum. Information about cessation support groups and programs will be posted online for employees.

Comment: Also see:

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NPC

The rise of 'victimhood culture' and how it's used for social control

William Nardy
The College Fix
Sat, 05 Jan 2019 11:02 UTC
Victim Culture
In 2014, Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning, associate professors of sociology at Cal State Los Angeles and West Virginia University, respectively, published a scholarly article titled "Microaggression and Moral Cultures" that detailed the rise of a "victimhood culture."

Sure enough, a paper that discussed microaggressions in what many perceived as a negative light was denounced as - wait for it - a microaggression.

Critics took umbrage to their "victimhood" terminology, with one reader calling their paper "tenuous and capricious" and that it "is itself a microaggression," actually "closer to a real aggression."
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Pirates

6 Russians kidnapped after pirates attack vessel near Benin


RT
Sat, 05 Jan 2019 21:02 UTC
water army
© Reuters
FILE PHOTO
Six sailors were kidnapped when pirates attacked a ship with a Russian crew off the coast of Benin in West Africa, Russia's Maritime and River Transport agency confirmed.

A group of seven to nine attackers, armed with firearms and blades boarded the Panama-flagged MSC Mandy on Tuesday night, according to the maritime authority and the Russian embassy in Benin. The pirates pillaged the ship for two hours before leaving and taking six of the sailors on board with them.

There were 23 Russians and one Ukrainian among the crew members, according to the Russian maritime authority. The embassy, citing the Benin Navy, says there were 26 people: 20 Russians, four Ukrainians and two Georgians.

Comment: See also:

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TV

Yellow Vests demand reduction in taxes, Macron's spokesman claims they want 'to overthrow the government'


RT
Fri, 04 Jan 2019 19:29 UTC
yellow vest
© Reuters / Stephane Mahe
File Photo: A Yellow vest protester during a protest in the French city of Nantes, December 22, 2018
The Yellow Vest movement has become full of agitators who only want to "overthrow the government," a spokesman for President Emmanuel Macron's government said of the protests that gripped France since November.

Benjamin Griveaux made the comments following the government's first Council of Ministers meeting of 2019 on Friday, as cabinet members returned from their two week Christmas break.

He addressed those "still mobilized among the Yellow Vests," saying the movement has "become the act of agitators who want insurrection and to overthrow the government."


Comment: The Yellow Vests have been supported by the public the very beginning, and even now, following weeks of political diversions and state violence, 75% of the public still support them.


Griveaux added that the government was "ready to discuss with sincere people who do not turn the difficulties of fellow countrymen into a political instrument."

Comment: RT reports what the protesters are actually demanding:
Stop treating people like beggars or face hatred - Yellow Vests to Macron

A group associated with Yellow Vests has written a fiery open letter to Emmanuel Macron, warning the French president against treating people like beggars, rejecting his nationwide debate, and demanding a major tax reduction.

The missive was posted in the Angry France group on Facebook, which unites almost 300,000 supporters of the Yellow Vest movement, and was also sent to the local media late on Thursday.

"Anger will turn into hatred if you continue, from your pedestal, you and your associates, to look at little people like beggars," the protesters warned Macron.


The 3-page manifesto by Angry France also turned down Macron's invitation to take part in the national debate, which the president ordered in response to the violent protests that gripped the country every week-end since November.

The debate was a "political trap" designed to drown the issue that "terrifies" the head of state so much, the letter read.

The Yellow Vest activists also demanded a "significant reduction in all taxes on essential goods" for the French people paired with an equally significant reduction in pensions and salaries for the elected politicians and senior civil servants.

Protests in France appeared to be calming down recently, but Yellow Vest activists have been posting calls on social media for new rallies to take place on the first Saturday of 2019 in Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Strasbourg and other cities.

The Yellow West movement, which got its name after the high-visibility jackets worn by the demonstrators, kicked off in November over a proposed hike in fuel taxes. As protests got increasingly violent and spanned more and more cities, the government dropped the planned increase.

Demonstrations continued due to the movement already morphing into wider discontent with Macron's pro-business agenda, decline in living standards and growing inequality.
Macron's government are trying to deflect from the real issues, because the majority of Yellow Vests agreed to and provided a clear manifesto of what they want implemented, and they need a government to do that. However It is true that they want Macron, who represents the very elites and policies destroying France, gone (although you'd never know that from watching mainstream French news).

See also:

The Yellow Vests are out again today, Saturday 5th January, which makes it 8 weeks since the protests began:





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Attention

Woman in long term vegetative state suddenly gives birth, sparking sex abuse investigation


RT
Sat, 05 Jan 2019 08:28 UTC
hospitalized
© Global Look Press / Jacek Sopotnicki
The unexpected birth of a baby boy to a woman who has spent the last 14 years in a vegetative state has sparked a sex abuse investigation at a Phoenix nursing facility.

Staff at Hacienda HealthCare were reportedly unaware the woman was even pregnant "until she was pretty much giving birth," a source familiar with the situation told KPHO. "From what I've been told she was moaning. And they didn't know what was wrong with her."

The baby, a healthy boy, was delivered on December 29.

The mother has "lived" at Hacienda ever since a near-drowning incident left her brain-damaged over 14 years ago. She requires 24-hour care, meaning many of the facility's staff would have had access to her room, and is incapable of communication or voluntary movement.

Since the birth, Hacienda has adopted a policy requiring female employees to accompany male employees to female patients' rooms, most likely mandated by the Arizona Department of Health Services, which said in a statement that it has implemented "heightened safety measures" that include "increased staff presence during patient interactions" as well as increased surveillance of patient care locations.
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Smoking

The moral theater of the anti-smoking campaign is now taking target at the mentally ill

Will Truman
Arc
Thu, 03 Jan 2019 00:00 UTC
smoking mental illness
Pennsylvania has decided that unless you are willing to quit smoking for the duration of your treatment, you don't deserve mental health treatment from the state:
Tobacco products and vape devices have been banned at Pennsylvania's six state mental health hospitals, including Torrance State Hospital in Derry Township.
"Smoking is a contributing factor to the shortened life expectancy of individuals with a mental illness," Department of Human Services Secretary Teresa Miller said Monday in a statement announcing the ban. "This initiative will further support health, wellness and recovery within these communities."
The hospitals will be posted to advise patients, staff, visitors, contractors and tenants that the campuses and buildings are tobacco-free zones. The facilities will offer smoking cessation programs and support as needed, including nicotine patches and gum. Information about cessation support groups and programs will be posted online for employees.
We are, apparently, so concerned with moral theater that we are willing to act at the expense of mental health. State officials can argue that the goal of this new policy is to encourage healthy choices, but they will in effect be denying care to those who don't make the state's preferred decisions.
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Smoking

Malaysian waiter slapped for enforcing smoking ban


The Straits Times
Fri, 04 Jan 2019 07:32 UTC
Malaysian waiter slapped for enforcing smoking ban
© The Star/Asia News Network
A mamak restaurant waiter who politely told a group of three men to stop smoking in the eatery got a rude shock when he was slapped and scolded.

Mr M. Selvam, 25, from India, was merely doing his job in reminding customers of the newly imposed smoking ban when one of the customers slapped him.

"It was around 12.30 pm on the first day of the ban on Jan 1. We had placed 'no smoking' signs but some customers were still smoking.

"I went over to a group of three men who were smoking. I politely told them to stop smoking but one of them got up and suddenly slapped me. I was shocked. They then left," he said, speaking at the restaurant in Seksyen 25 in Shah Alam on Thursday (Jan 3).

Comment: See also: Smoke, Lies and the Nanny State

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Control Panel

Facebook tracks users using Android apps - even if they don't have a Facebook account

Anthony Cuthbertson
Independent
Thu, 03 Jan 2019 00:00 UTC
thumbs down facebook
© Rex Features
Facebook is under increasing pressure to make major changes, both to its platform and its leadership
Report from Privacy International reveals how social network tracks people through popular apps like Skyscanner and Duolingo

Facebook's data collecting practices have once again been called into question, after a new report revealed that it "routinely tracked" people who do not use the app.

Privacy International analysed 34 apps on the Android mobile operating system with user bases of between 10 and 500 million.

The charity began the study after the scandal surrounding the now defunct London based political consultancy Cambridge Analytica, which was accused of improperly obtaining personal information on behalf of political clients and using it to influence the outcome of the US 2016 presidential election or the UK Brexit referendum.

Comment: See also:

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