Links for 2024-07-25

AI:

1. Mistral: “Today, we release Mistral Large 2, the new version of our largest model. Mistral Large 2 is a 123B-parameter model with a 128k context window. On many benchmarks (notably in code generation and math), it is superior or on par with Llama 3.1 405B. Like Mistral NeMo, it was trained on a very large amount of source code and multilingual data.” https://mistral.ai/news/mistral-large-2407/ (Try it here:

   https://chat.mistral.ai/chat)

2. Meta: “Introducing Llama 3.1: Our most capable models to date” https://ai.meta.com/blog/meta-llama-3-1/ (Try it here: https://huggingface.co/chat/)

3. Mark Zuckerberg: “Open Source AI Is the Path Forward” https://about.fb.com/news/2024/07/open-source-ai-is-the-path-forward/

4. OpenAI: “We’ve developed Rule-Based Rewards (RBRs) to align AI behavior safely without needing extensive human data collection, making our systems safer and more reliable for everyday use.” https://openai.com/index/improving-model-safety-behavior-with-rule-based-rewards/

5. “A little over a year ago, when @ShunyuYao12 tweeted about our tree-of-thoughts (ToT) paper...there were concerns around it being too expensive given the use of tens to hundreds of LLM calls for solving each problem. The recent releases of gpt-4o mini, llama 3.1 8B, etc. have shown that costs will reduce quickly every year for similar performance and this totally changes the game (e.g. 4o mini is 30x cheaper than 4o or 100x cheaper than gpt-4).” https://x.com/karthik_r_n/status/1815843993168797876

6. “The 🤗 Infinite Dataset Hub ♾ It's a 100% synthetic Dataset Hub, you can search any kind of dataset and always get results.” https://huggingface.co/spaces/infinite-dataset-hub/infinite-dataset-hub

7. System-1.x: Learning to Balance Fast and Slow Planning with Language Models https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.14414

8. Study suggests that models may have more nuanced and generalizable understandings of truth and falsity than previously thought. Authors find a two-dimensional subspace within an LLM's representations: a general truth direction and a polarity-sensitive one. https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.12831

9. Targeted Latent Adversarial Training Improves Robustness to Persistent Harmful Behaviors in LLMs https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.15549

10. Cross Anything: General Quadruped Robot Navigation through Complex Terrains https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.16412

11. MovieDreamer: Hierarchical Generation for Coherent Long Visual Sequence https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.16655

12. Generating all tokens at once with flow matching https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.15595

13. Google has launched its Project Oscar, an open-source platform that enables development teams to create AI agents that monitor issues, manage bugs, and handle various aspects of the software lifecycle—all through natural language interactions. https://venturebeat.com/ai/google-brings-ai-agent-platform-project-oscar-open-source/

14. Senate Democrats demand OpenAI detail efforts to make its AI safe https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/07/23/openai-senate-democrats-ai-safe/ [no paywall: https://archive.is/GojAO]

https://x.com/zswitten/status/1815828667391738361

Neuroscience:

1. “The brain may have evolved a modular architecture for daily tasks, with circuits featuring functionally specialized modules that match the task structure. We hypothesize that this architecture enables better learning and generalization than architectures with less specialized modules…Our results shed light on the possible rationale for the brain’s modularity and suggest that artificial systems can use this insight from neuroscience to improve learning and generalization in natural tasks.” [PDF] https://www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1126/sciadv.adk1256

2. “If you want to unlock unlimited intelligence you need to increase density of microtubules in the PFC” https://x.com/SterlingCooley/status/1757802109293261245

3. Rice neuroscientists to build state-of-the-art neural recording system https://news.rice.edu/news/2024/rice-neuroscientists-build-state-art-neural-recording-system

Drones:

1. Beijing scientists have developed the world’s smallest and lightest solar-powered drone, weighing just 4.21g with a 200mm wingspan. It can fly non-stop during daylight thanks to its electrostatic motor, which is 200-300% more efficient than traditional electromagnetic motors. https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/new-chinese-drone-can-fly-as-long-as-the-sun-shines-solar-powered-device-with-200mm-wingspan-weighs-record-breaking-421g

2. Bug brains could help drone swarms find their way home https://www.popsci.com/technology/drones-ants-memory/

3. Ukraine rushes to create AI-enabled war drones https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/ukraine-rushes-create-ai-enabled-war-drones-2024-07-18/

4. “Unmanned strikes get the attention in reports and social media, but Ukrainian forces are increasingly using drones to sow mines and haul supplies.” https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2024/07/us-risks-learning-wrong-lessons-about-ukraines-drones-expert-says/398242/

5. Vadym Sukharevsky, the man in charge of Ukraine’s drones — “Colonel Sukharevsky says drones will not overturn the fundamental principles of warfare. The primary role of artillery or infantry are undiminished…” https://www.economist.com/europe/2024/07/22/vadym-sukharevsky-the-man-in-charge-of-ukraines-drones [no paywall: https://archive.is/Zqv2F]

6. “Ukraine is transitioning to the “correct side of the cost curve” in its ongoing battle to deal with Russia’s one-way attack uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS), the most senior U.S. Air Force general in Europe says.” https://aviationweek.com/shownews/gascc-riat/ukraine-achieving-low-cost-kills-against-russias-attack-drones

7. Ukraine’s “Sky Fortress” system of cheap acoustic sensors “was so effective that the engineers behind the system were invited to demo it at Ramstein Air Base in Germany https://www.defenseone.com/defense-systems/2024/07/ukraines-cheap-sensors-are-helping-troops-fight-waves-russian-drones/398204/

8. “Video of the Ukrainian Wild Hornets' Queen Hornet FPV, which they say is the largest Ukrainian FPV. It can carry a 6 kg payload up to 17 km and 65% of its components are Ukrainian. It can be used in a variety of mission sets, including bomber, kamikaze, remote mining, resupply, as a retransmitter, or to carry kamikaze FPVs.” https://x.com/RALee85/status/1815464134659465277

9. Interception of the Russian Zаla reconnaissance UAV on the Kreminna front. https://x.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1815662394758091219

10. Video of Zala UAVs being rammed by Ukrainian SSO FPVs with a stick. https://x.com/RALee85/status/1816170163902779447

Science and Technology:

1. "We estimate that the decline in Nuclear power Plants caused by Chernobyl led to the loss of approximately 141 million expected life years in the U.S., 33 in the U.K. and 318 million globally" [PDF] https://conference.nber.org/conf_papers/f205791.pdf

2. HKUST Engineering Researchers Discover a “Secret” Hidden Structure that Paves New Way of Making More Efficient and Stable Perovskite Solar Cells https://seng.hkust.edu.hk/news/20240719/hkust-engineering-researchers-discover-secret-hidden-structure-paves-new-way-making-more-efficient-and-stable-perovskite-solar-cells

3. “Something is pumping out large amounts of oxygen at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, at depths where a total lack of sunlight makes photosynthesis impossible.” https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-02393-7

4. Near-collapse of the geomagnetic field may have contributed to atmospheric oxygenation and animal radiation in the Ediacaran Period https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01360-4

5. Neanderthals built 2 oval structures from purposely broken stalagmites deep in Bruniquel Cave France, about 176,000 years ago. The reasons are still unknown... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZcZK46xhkc

Psychology:

1. Hunter-gatherer societies are highly expert in group deliberation and decision-making which respects both difference and unity https://aeon.co/essays/what-the-ju-hoansi-can-tell-us-about-group-decision-making

2. Are teenage depression rates an artifact of Obamacare-related changes to hospitals’ depression reporting practices? https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/01/opinion/smartphones-social-media-mental-health-teens.html [no paywall: https://archive.is/T2E6R]

Economics:

1. Basic income study: Big RCT finds a significant disemployment effect. Even just $1000 per month causes some people to stop working, or to work less. https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2024/07/the-employment-effects-of-a-guaranteed-income.html

2. Does Income Affect Health? Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial of a Guaranteed Income — “There was no effect of the transfer on physical health, measured via self-reports, clinical outcomes derived from blood draws, and admin records of mortality.” https://public.websites.umich.edu/~mille/ORUS_Health.pdf

Math:

1. A simple model of math skill https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/EF8tvShQJ5cbdZzTb/a-simple-model-of-math-skill

2. Free book: Linear Algebra for Data Science https://kyunghyuncho.me/linear-algebra-for-data-science/

China:

1. “Chinese officials are adamant that they want to shift away from resource-intensive industries. Logic dictates…appetite for commodities should be shrinking…instead China appears to be stockpiling materials at a rapid pace…when commodities are expensive” https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2024/07/23/why-is-xi-jinping-building-secret-commodity-stockpiles [no paywall: https://archive.is/XiIMu]

2. China Is Getting Secretive About Its Supercomputers https://www.wsj.com/tech/china-supercomputers-0200642f [no paywall: https://archive.is/v9tC8]

Ukraine:

1. Detailed footage of a Ukrainian Lyutiy drone hitting an oil refinery in Tuapse this morning. https://x.com/NOELreports/status/1815291888225714340

2. 72nd Brigade shows fields of destroyed Russian equipment, many of which are T-62 tanks, on the Vuhledar-Novomykhailivka area of the front. https://x.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1815875855190503734

3. “The 79th Air Assault Brigade repelled one of the largest Russian assaults from multiple directions. The attack involved 11 tanks, 45 BMP/BTR, a BMP-T "Terminator," 12 motorcycles, and around 200 personnel.” https://x.com/NOELreports/status/1816192684425634166

4. [RU] "3 minutes in the life of a storm trooper" https://x.com/DefMon3/status/1816197201875308961

5. Czech FM announced that through a Czech-led initiative involving 18 countries, with 15 contributing, 100,000 artillery shells will be delivered to Ukraine in July-August, with plans for 500,000 shells by year-end. https://euromaidanpress.com/2024/07/22/czech-initiative-to-deliver-100000-artillery-shells-to-ukraine-by-summer-end/

6. Russia's War Machine Is Peaking. Next Year, It Runs Out of Steam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8wB_5LR6d4

7. “Syrskyi contrasted his battlefield tactics with those used by Russian commanders, who are known for sacrificing huge numbers of infantry troops to gain “100 to 200 metres”. “It’s very important for us to save the lives of our soldiers. We don’t defend ruins to the death,” Syrskyi said.” https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/24/i-know-we-will-win-and-how-ukraines-top-general-on-turning-the-tables-against-russia

8. Eye of the storm: A day in the life of Ukrainian infantry on the zero line near Toretsk https://kyivindependent.com/eye-of-the-storm-a-day-in-the-life-of-ukrainian-infantry-on-the-zero-line-near-toretsk/

9. “Ukrainians struggled to defend against enemy forces trying to encircle them near Progress. South of Lozuvatske, the enemy has created a bottleneck, threatening positions west of height 236.9, using tactics to advance towards Ivanovka. The situation became critical after a chaotic retreat by another infantry brigade over the weekend. Reinforcements from the 47th Brigade were unable to hold back the numerically superior enemy.” https://x.com/wartranslated/status/1816010039725113620

10. “The ferry "Slavyanin" used by the Russians in the port of "Kavkaz" has been significantly damaged by Ukrainian Defense Forces. This ferry was used for transporting railway wagons, vehicles, and containers for military purposes. It is the third and last railway ferry Russia had in the region.” https://x.com/NOELreports/status/1815796803771466021

11. Video of a likely HIMARS strike on a Russian Buk. https://x.com/RALee85/status/1815841269404557815

12. Shark reconnaissance drone and HIMARS MLRS destroy Russian Pantsir-S1 air defence system. Somewhere 30km south from Donetsk. https://x.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1816122337919369454