SoylentNews

vux984 writes:

A self-driving Uber SUV struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona. It was in autonomous mode at the time of the collision, with a vehicle operator behind the wheel. Uber has suspended testing of its self-driving cars.

http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/19/technology/uber-autonomous-car-fatal-crash/index.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/uber-driverless-fatality.html
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/self-driving-uber-kills-arizona-171055918.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/19/594950197/uber-suspends-self-driving-tests-after-pedestrian-is-killed-in-arizona
https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-suspends-driverless-car-program-after-pedestrian-is-struck-and-killed-1521480386
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/19/17139518/uber-self-driving-car-fatal-crash-tempe-arizona
https://techcrunch.com/2018/03/19/uber-self-driving-test-car-involved-in-accident-resulting-in-pedestrian-death/

I couldn't find any good analysis of the liability situation here.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Nimbus Data has announced 50 and 100 terabyte datacenter SSDs with five years of "unlimited endurance" at the maximum 500 MB/s write speed:

Nimbus Data on Monday introduced its new lineup of ultra-high capacity SSDs designed to compete against nearline HDDs in data centers. The ExaDrive DC drives use proprietary controllers and NAND flash in custom packaging to offer up to 100 TB of flash memory capacity in a standard 3.5-inch package. The SSDs use the SATA 6 Gbps interface and are rated for 'unlimited' endurance.

The Nimbus ExaDrive DC lineup will consist of two models featuring 50 TB and 100 TB capacities, a 3.5-inch form-factor, and a SATA 6 Gbps interface. Over time the manufacturer expects to release DC-series SSDs with an SAS interface, but it is unclear when exactly such drives will be available. When it comes to performance, the Nimbus DC SSDs are rated for up to 500 MB/s sequential read/write speeds as well as up to 100K read/write random IOPS, concurrent with most SATA-based SSDs in this space. As for power consumption, the ExaDrive DC100 consumes 10 W in idle mode and up to 14 W in operating mode.

[...] Speaking of endurance, it is worth noting that the 100 TB drive comes with an unlimited write endurance guarantee for the full five-year warranty period. This is not particularly surprising because it is impossible to write more than 43.2 TB of data per 24 hours at 500 MB/s, which equates to 43% of the 100TB drive. For those wondering, at that speed for five years comes to ~79 PB over the 5 year warranty of the drive (assuming constant writes at top speed for five years straight).

Original Submission

takyon writes:

An "instant" pedestrian bridge at Florida International University in Miami collapsed on March 15, killing a number of motorists. A 174-foot, 950-ton span of the bridge was installed on Saturday, March 10 over a busy portion of Tamiami Trail called Southwest Eighth Street. The incomplete bridge suddenly collapsed on Thursday:

The bridge gave way suddenly while the traffic light for motorists on Tamiami Trail was red, so that the concrete span fell on top of a row of stopped vehicles. A woman stopped at the light who was heading westbound said the structure fell without warning. The woman, who asked that her name not be used, said it was immediately clear to her that several people were dead.

[...] The bridge crashed across six lanes of heavily traveled Tamiami Trail, crushing a still undetermined number of cars and killing a still unclear number of people. Police on the scene said at least six people could be dead.

From an earlier article:

The rapid span installation was the result of months of preparation. The bridge's main 174-foot span was assembled by the side of the Trail while support towers were built at either end. The 950-ton span was then picked up, moved and lowered into place by special gantry cranes at the intersection of Southwest 109th Avenue in an operation that lasted several hours Saturday morning.

[...] The innovative installation method significantly reduced risks to workers, pedestrians and motorists and minimized traffic disruptions, FIU said. The architecturally distinctive, cable-supported bridge is the product of a collaboration between MCM Construction and FIGG Bridge Design, the firm responsible for the iconic Sunshine Skyway Bridge over Tampa Bay.

[more...]

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

The World Socialist Web Site reports

[...] a former student of Anglia Ruskin University [...] is suing the UK institution for breach of contract and fraudulent misrepresentation.

[...] Graduate Pok Wong is claiming £60,000 compensation--her estimated cost of her university education--on the basis that her degree did not offer the "quality education and prospect of employment after graduation" claimed by the university.

This suit demonstrates the corrosive consequences of students being encouraged to view themselves as consumers entering into contracts with universities for economic advantage. The collective endeavour of learning is replaced by a purely financial and adversarial relationship between two parties, in which each is incentivised to push the other for maximum "cost efficiency".

In comments to the Sunday Telegraph, Wong explained her hopes that the case would "set a precedent so that students can get value for money, and if they don't they get compensated".

Her comments accept the principles of marketised education and attempt to leverage them for individual students' self-interest.

[...] Wong refers in her legal papers to Anglia Ruskin's claim to carry out "world-leading research". In fact, the university is ranked in the 301st-350th bracket for quality of research by Times Higher Education. A number of other institutions have promoted themselves with similar lies or distortions.

Last November, the Advertising Standards Authority watchdog ordered seven universities to change false claims about their status made in advertisements to students. The University of Strathclyde, for example, was told to change its claim, "We're ranked No. 1 in the UK" for physics. Teesside University had to stop calling itself the "Top university in England for long-term graduate prospects".

[...] in 2013, [...] replies to freedom of information requests at 70 universities found that [...] Anglia Ruskin was listed as one of a number of institutions, particularly newer ones, whose spending [on marketing themselves] skyrocketed in these years. It spent £1.76 million in 2012-13, about £1 million more than in 2010-11.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd

The startup accelerator Y Combinator is known for supporting audacious companies in its popular three-month boot camp.

There's never been anything quite like Nectome, though.

Next week, at YC's "demo days," Nectome's cofounder, Robert McIntyre, is going to describe his technology for exquisitely preserving brains in microscopic detail using a high-tech embalming process. Then the MIT graduate will make his business pitch. As it says on his website: "What if we told you we could back up your mind?"

So yeah. Nectome is a preserve-your-brain-and-upload-it company. Its chemical solution can keep a body intact for hundreds of years, maybe thousands, as a statue of frozen glass. The idea is that someday in the future scientists will scan your bricked brain and turn it into a computer simulation. That way, someone a lot like you, though not exactly you, will smell the flowers again in a data server somewhere.

This story has a grisly twist, though. For Nectome's procedure to work, it's essential that the brain be fresh. The company says its plan is to connect people with terminal illnesses to a heart-lung machine in order to pump its mix of scientific embalming chemicals into the big carotid arteries in their necks while they are still alive (though under general anesthesia).

The company has consulted with lawyers familiar with California's two-year-old End of Life Option Act, which permits doctor-assisted suicide for terminal patients, and believes its service will be legal. The product is "100 percent fatal," says McIntyre. "That is why we are uniquely situated among the Y Combinator companies."

Source: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/610456/a-startup-is-pitching-a-mind-uploading-service-that-is-100-percent-fatal/

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

The Wikimedia Foundation writes in its blog that even now, after ten months, the people of Turkey are still denied access to Wikipedia by the current Turkish government.

It has been ten months since the block of Wikipedia in Turkey. For almost a year, the 80 million people of Turkey have been denied access to information on topics ranging from medicine, to history, to current events on Wikipedia. After ten months, and in the midst of the school term, the need to restore access to Wikipedia in Turkey becomes more urgent every day.

The blog post is light on information but does go on to mention ongoing efforts to negotiate removing the ban. Though mostly it concentrates on what the foundation sees as the benefits to lifting the ban.

Original Submission

fritsd writes:

The Guardian has an article about a whistleblower from Cambridge Analytica, who claims to have devised a strategy to "weaponize" Facebook profiles, in order to use those profile for targeted advertising to sway the US elections in 2016.

The Cambridge Analytica Files: ‘I created Steve Bannon’s psychological warfare tool’: meet the data war whistleblower

(The Guardian headline titles are often crap). I read a few older articles, presumably by the same author: she had a series of articles in March--May 2017 about Cambridge Analytica being used as a weapon to convince British voters to vote for Brexit in the referendum. It seems that her investigative journalism encouraged this wistleblower to "come out" and be interviewed by her.

Here's one: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/07/the-great-british-brexit-robbery-hijacked-democracy

Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others (Churchill), but when does advertising cross the line into psychological warfare against your own population?

Additional coverage at The Register

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

There's no need to freak out yet, however. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), NASA and the National Nuclear Security Administration are on the case, and they're thinking about wielding a big Hammer.

Hammer stands for "Hypervelocity Asteroid Mitigation Mission for Emergency Response," which is an impressive name all on its own. Hammer's a concept at the moment, but if built, it would be a 30-foot-tall (9 meter), 8.8-ton spacecraft that could act as either an asteroid battering ram or as a delivery vehicle for a nuclear device. Let's call it the "nudge or nuke" option.  

Bennu is a beast, according to the national lab. It's 1,664 times as heavy as the Titanic and measures more than five football fields in diameter. If it hit Earth, the impact would unleash 80,000 times the energy of the atomic bomb used on Hiroshima in 1945. It would be devastating.

Hammer is designed to launch using NASA's Delta IV Heavy rocket. Researchers at Lawrence Livermore published a paper in the journal Acta Astronautica in February that evaluates the options for using the spacecraft to successfully encourage Bennu to redirect from Earth.

The researchers say ramming the asteroid to change its course would be ideal, but it would need to be a "gentle nudge" that doesn't cause it to break up. It's a complicated proposition. 

The team looked at a variety of scenarios. For example, if Earth started launching Hammer missions just 10 years before impact, "it was determined that it could take between 34 and 53 launches of the Delta IV Heavy rocket, each carrying a single Hammer impactor, to make a Bennu-class asteroid miss the Earth," the lab reported on Thursday.

All of this makes it sound like a gentle nudge might not be the best solution for big asteroids. 

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

Common Dreams reports

Nordic countries with strong social welfare structures fared best, as they have in previous years, on the United Nation's annual accounting of global happiness--while the United States finished in 18th place, down four spots from 2017.

Finland was ranked number one on the World Happiness Report, compiled by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. The country was joined by other Scandinavian nations--Norway, Denmark, and Iceland--in the top four, followed by Switzerland, the Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, and Australia.

[...] the United States finished in 18th place, down four spots from 2017.

takyon writes:

Brazil's interim membership in the European Southern Observatory (ESO) has been suspended after the country failed to make the necessary payments:

Brazil's hope of joining the European Southern Observatory (ESO) came to an apparent end this week, as the 15-nation astronomical research consortium announced the suspension of a 7-year-old deal that would have allowed South America's largest country to become its first non-European member state.

In December 2010, with the support of Brazil's then-President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the ESO Council approved a plan, known as the Accession Agreement, in which the country pledged to pay €270 million over 10 years for full member status. The deal was approved by the Brazilian Congress in May 2015, but by then the country had new leadership. Neither of the nation's presidents following Lula—Dilma Rousseff or Michel Temer—ratified the agreement and Brazil never made any payments to the consortium. Critics of the agreement, including many politicians and some astronomers in Brazil, thought the original pledge of funding was way above the pay grade of the national science budget, especially as the country's finances worsened.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

More than 500 genes associated with intelligence have been identified in the largest study of its kind.

Researchers used data from the UK Biobank, comparing DNA variants from more than 240,000 people. Their analysis identified 538 genes linked to intellectual ability, and 187 regions of the human genome that are associated with thinking skills. Some of these genes are also linked to other biological processes, including living longer.

However, even with all these genes, it's still difficult to predict a person's intelligence from their genomes. When they analysed the DNA of a group of different people, the team were only able to predict 7 per cent of the intelligence differences between those people.

Source: Found: more than 500 genes that are linked to intelligence

A combined analysis of genetically correlated traits identifies 187 loci and a role for neurogenesis and myelination in intelligence (open, DOI: 10.1038/s41380-017-0001-5) (DX)

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

A half-hour power outage at Samsung’s fab near Pyeongtaek, South Korea, disrupted production and damaged tens of thousands of processed wafers. Media reports claim that the outage destroyed as much as 3.5% of the global NAND supply for March, which may have an effect on flash memory pricing in the coming weeks.

The outage happened on March 9 and lasted for about 30 minutes, according to a news story from Taiwain-based TechNews that cites further South Korean reports. The report claims that the outage damaged 50,000 to 60,000 of wafers with V-NAND flash memory, which represent 11% of Samsung’s monthly output. The report further estimates that the said amount equates to approximately 3.5% of global NAND output, but does not elaborate whether it means wafer output or bit output.

Samsung uses its fab near Pyeongtaek to produce 64-layer V-NAND chips used for various applications. The fab is among the largest flash production facilities in the world and therefore any disruption there has an effect on the global output of non-volatile memory. Meanwhile, since production lines have not been damaged and the fab is back online, the significance of such an effect is limited.

Source: TechNews

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

People's willingness to use a Zika vaccine when it's available will be influenced by how they weigh the risks associated with the disease and the vaccine, but also by their misconceptions about other vaccines, a new study has found.

While a Zika vaccine is in development, the study by researchers at the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) of the University of Pennsylvania examined factors that will affect the eventual acceptance or rejection of such a vaccine.

The study, published in the Journal of Public Health, found that people's erroneous beliefs about an association between the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism were a predictor of people's lessened intention to get a Zika vaccine. The study also found that people's perceptions of the severity of the Zika virus as well as their general belief in the power of science to solve problems increased their intention to get the vaccine.

"When a new disease arises, people who lack understanding of the new threat may extrapolate from their knowledge of other diseases," said Yotam Ophir, a Ph.D. candidate at Penn's Annenberg School for Communication who co-authored the study with APPC Director Kathleen Hall Jamieson. "We found that the misbelief about the MMR vaccine's association with autism was more influential on the decision of whether to get vaccinated for Zika than even perceptions of Zika itself, which is worrisome, especially in light of the persistence of that misinformation."

[...] The bogus association between the MMR vaccine and autism has been disproven in numerous studies. However, the argument is still prominent among people who oppose vaccinations. "Scientists often look at the effect of misinformed beliefs about the MMR vaccine on people's intention to vaccinate children with the triple vaccine, but they don't as often look at the dangerous spillover effects that these misbeliefs can have," said Ophir, who will be joining APPC as a postdoctoral fellow.

He said that prior research has shown that it is very hard to completely debunk misinformation, such as the mistaken belief that the MMR vaccine causes autism, but the study results suggest that accurately communicating about the risks of Zika can help lessen the detrimental effects of the misbelief. "Even if we can't change what people think about the MMR vaccine, if we can give them an accurate picture of how vulnerable they are to a disease such as Zika, they can make a more informed decision about it," Ophir said.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow9228

As of this month, the US satellite Vanguard I has spent 60 years in orbit and it remains the oldest man-made object in space. Vanguard I was the fourth satellite launched into orbit -- following the USSR's Sputnik I and II and the US' Explorer I. But none of the first three remain in orbit today and though Vanguard I can't send signals back to Earth anymore, it's still providing valuable data for researchers.

The first two attempts to launch the first Vanguard satellite failed, but on March 17th, 1958, Vanguard I was successfully placed into orbit. It was manufactured by the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), which published a lookback this week honoring the satellite's 60 years of service, and was part of a project that aimed to study Earth's geophysical phenomena from space. The Vanguard Project was established as part of the US contribution to the International Geophysical Year -- a multi-national effort to study geophysical phenomena during a period of time when the sun's sunspot activity would be at a peak.

Once in orbit, Vanguard I began collecting a trove of data. "Vanguard's orbital data proved invaluable toward the understanding of upper atmospheric physics, geodesy, geodynamics, solar terrestrial relationships, dynamical astronomy and exospheric structure," said the NRL. "Additionally, Vanguard I returned a wealth of information on air density, temperature ranges and micrometeorite impacts as well as revealing that the earth is slightly pear-shaped rather than round."

Vanguard I was the first satellite with solar electric power and while its batteries lasted just 20 days, its solar cells kept the satellite powered for seven years. Vanguard I stopped sending signals back to Earth in 1964, but since then, researchers have still used it to glean insight into how the sun, moon and Earth's atmosphere affect orbiting satellites.

Source: https://www.engadget.com/2018/03/16/vanguard-i-six-decades-orbit-oldest-man-made-object/

Original Submission

Fnord666 writes:

On Wednesday, the New York State Public Service Commission (PSC) ruled that municipal power companies could charge higher electricity rates to cryptocurrency miners who try to benefit from the state's abundance of cheap hydroelectric power.

Over the years, Bitcoin's soaring price has drawn entrepreneurs to mining. Bitcoin mining enterprises have become massive endeavors, consuming megawatts of power on some grids. To minimize the cost of that considerable power draw, mining companies have tried to site their operations in towns with cheap electricity, both in the US and around the world. In the US, regions with the cheapest energy tend to be small towns with hydroelectric power. (Politico recently wrote extensively about the Bitcoin mining boom in Washington state's mid-Columbia valley, a hotspot for cheap hydro.)

But mining booms in small US towns are not always met with approval. A group of 36 municipal power authorities in northern and western New York petitioned the PSC for permission to raise electricity rates for cryptocurrency miners because their excessive power use has been taxing very small local grids and causing rates to rise for other customers.

[...] Ultimately, the PSC decided that municipal power authorities will be allowed to increase rates for customers whose maximum demand exceeds 300kW or whose load density "exceeds 250kWh per square foot per year."

Singling out a power-hungry industry for rate increases isn't without precedent. In Boulder County, Colorado, for example, marijuana growers are charged an extra $0.0216 per kWh because they use so much power to run grow lights, ventilation systems, and air conditioners for their plants.

Source: Ars Technica

Original Submission