AI:
We know artificial intelligence will be the central element of change in the world in the near future.
– UN Secretary-General António Guterres
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, says that artificial “superintelligence,” a machine much smarter than humans, could be with us “in a few thousand days.” https://ia.samaltman.com/
Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta, says we will soon have AI that matches or surpasses human intelligence https://www.youtube.com/live/GK5X6B_sQ3M?si=F_gtBpUihWjKnWHg&t=2266
“In August 2024, 39 percent of the U.S. population age 18-64 used generative AI. More than 24 percent of workers used it at least once in the week prior to being surveyed, and nearly one in nine used it every workday. Historical data on usage and mass-market product launches suggest that U.S. adoption of generative AI has been faster than adoption of the personal computer and the internet.” https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2024/09/the-rapid-adoption-of-generative-ai.html
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai says Google are scaling up their compute infrastructure and working on 1 gigawatt+ data centers, while exploring options for powering them including small modular nuclear reactors https://youtu.be/rA9ysJpeD-c?si=ChPnveejN0x0tkDy&t=2177
Dane Vahey of OpenAI says the cost per million tokens has fallen from $36 to $0.25 in the past 18 months, and as such AI is the greatest cost-depreciating technology ever invented https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_5eeDNNvCA
AI’s Hungry Maw Drives Massive $100B Investment Plan by Microsoft and BlackRock https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/09/100-billion-ai-infrastructure-fund-launched-by-microsoft-blackrock-uae-firm/
LLMs Still Can't Plan; Can LRMs? A Preliminary Evaluation of OpenAI's o1 on PlanBench — “…while o1's performance is a quantum improvement on the benchmark, outpacing the competition, it is still far from saturating it.” https://arxiv.org/abs/2409.13373
22 minute video of OpenAI researchers talking about their experiences working on strawberry https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEzs3VHyBDM
Creating and commercializing mathematical superintelligence (MSI), artificial intelligence with mathematical reasoning capabilities greater than that of all humans. — “Harmonic is designing a large language model that can generate its own Lean proofs. The Lean code it generates is not always perfect. But through trial and error, it can learn to verify a solution.” https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/23/technology/ai-chatbots-chatgpt-math.html [no paywall: https://archive.is/iZ6TG]
A basic systems architecture for AI agents that do autonomous research https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/6cWgaaxWqGYwJs3vj/a-basic-systems-architecture-for-ai-agents-that-run-code
ASIs will not leave just a little sunlight for Earth https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/F8sfrbPjCQj4KwJqn/asis-will-not-leave-just-a-little-sunlight-for-earth
Classic linear programming problems are one of the most foundational problems in computer science, yet today’s approaches struggle to scale. Google presents PDLP, a new solver, based on first-order methods, for large-scale linear programming https://research.google/blog/scaling-up-linear-programming-with-pdlp/
Jony Ive Confirms Involvement in AI Hardware Project With OpenAI https://www.macrumors.com/2024/09/23/jony-ive-working-on-new-device-openai/
It's fascinating to think that decades ago, visionaries like Vernor Vinge, Ray Kurzweil, and DeepMind co-founder Shane Legg predicted AGI could emerge by the late 2020s. At the time, many dismissed it as highly improbable. Yet now, as we approach that era, the possibility feels increasingly plausible.
In a few months, it will be interesting to see if OpenAI's o1 causes a decrease in traffic to Mathematics Stack Exchange and possibly even MathOverflow.
Biology:
Making Eggs Without Ovaries https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/BhPQTrTRiLLWcbQiH/making-eggs-without-ovaries
“You can now get cells to automatically record their history in their own DNA!” https://mathstodon.xyz/@johncarlosbaez/113182781819735808
Free online book in human genetics https://web.stanford.edu/group/pritchardlab/HGbook.html
Octopuses seen hunting together with fish in rare video — and punching fish that don't cooperate https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/octopuses-hunt-with-fish-punch-video-rcna171705
Genetics:
Why no news coverage yet of David Reich's epochal paper? https://www.stevesailer.net/p/why-no-news-coverage-yet-of-david
“So even if there’s been natural selection on cognitive performance within Eurasians, as Reich et al. found, one isn’t entitled to conclude that differences among populations (or “races”, a word I avoid because of its historical misuse) must therefore also reflect genetic results of natural selection.” https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024/09/23/sullivan-on-the-ideological-erosion-of-science-and-the-genetics-of-race-differences/
The Eugenic Origins of Modernity https://www.josephbronski.com/p/the-eugenic-origins-of-modernity
Neuroscience:
“Averaging is a convenient fiction of neuroscience. But neurons don’t take averages. This ubiquitous practice hides from us how the brain really works.” https://www.thetransmitter.org/neural-coding/averaging-is-a-convenient-fiction-of-neuroscience/
Signal switching may enhance processing power of the brain https://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613(24)00103-7
Astronomy:
"abundance of methane & CO2, & shortage of ammonia, support the hypothesis [of] water ocean underneath a hydrogen-rich atmosphere in K2-18b. … a possible detection of a molecule called dimethyl sulfide. On Earth, this is only produced by life." https://www.nasa.gov/universe/exoplanets/webb-discovers-methane-carbon-dioxide-in-atmosphere-of-k2-18-b/
Astronomers have discovered the largest black hole jets ever observed, named Porphyrion, stretching an astonishing 23 million light-years—equivalent to lining up 140 Milky Way galaxies. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-astronomers-biggest-black-hole-jets.html
Politics:
Prisons are good because they remove bad people from society and protects the rest from their misbehavior. https://inquisitivebird.xyz/p/the-case-for-prisons
The “Haitians eating pets” story was completely and utterly fake https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/the-dark-vision-of-america
Ukraine:
Ukraine destroyed two other large Russian ammunition depots. Spectacular explosions ensued.
The special military operation continues as planned. Projectiles are flying from the Tikhoretsk ammunition depot to nearby settlements. A Grad missile was found 7,5km from the ammunition depot.
Maxar collected a trove of new high-resolution satellite imagery showing the damage to Russian ammunition depots in western southern Russia.
P.S. This is how the destruction of the Russian ammunition depot looked from the city of Toropets. The blast wave spread up to 320 km. It was destroyed together with a fully loaded train.
More:
A Russian woman is shocked after she saw a video of what her fellow Russians do to Ukrainians in Russian captivity. https://x.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1837806758992973897
Russian assault forces were eliminated near Pokrovsk during a recent attack against Ukrainian positions. Drone operators from the 68th Separate Jaeger Brigade captured footage of bodies of Russian soldiers and destroyed equipment along a road. https://x.com/NOELreports/status/1838173842746839173
Special forces of the Ukrainian Main Directorate of Intelligence (GUR) destroyed Russian militants occupying the factory district of Vovchansk. https://x.com/Tendar/status/1838578836948082886
“We see many cauldrons are forming.” Russian forces are overpowering Ukrainian troops and employing new tactics, as they pound their way toward key cities of Pokrovsk, Vuhledar & Kurakhove. https://www.ft.com/content/b4baf76b-294d-496e-8e51-7ed1b8b0e6ca [no paywall: https://archive.is/Tr7jq]
“During September, Russians have made significant gains in the Vuhledar area. The situation on a previously stable front has quickly deteriorated, and the Russians are less than five kilometers from the main supply road.” https://x.com/emilkastehelmi/status/1838304397043925164
“Let’s take a hard look at the potential consequences if Ukraine freezes the conflict without securing firm guarantees.” https://x.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1838092673132949836
“As it turns out, Russia has more decisive allies than we do,” said Roman Kostenko, the secretary of the defense and intelligence committee in Ukraine’s parliament. “It’s shameful for the West.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/24/ukraine-weapons-limits-biden-permission-atacms/ [no paywall: https://archive.is/z83xC]
The most amazing thing about 3 miles island is that there was a movie made about a nuclear meltdown that came out just before it happened. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Syndrome It was published on March 16, and the real incident happened on March 26!