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Archive for the ‘Elon Musk’ category: Page 274

Jan 10, 2016

Elon Musk: You’ll be able to summon your Tesla from anywhere in 2018

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, habitats, robotics/AI, sustainability, transportation

Yesterday, Tesla Motors released software update 7.1 for the Model S and Model X, an update that allows the electric cars to park themselves while you stand by and watch in awe. Today, CEO Elon Musk made a bold prediction: In 2018, this feature will work anywhere that cars can drive.

Called Summon, the functionality is part of Tesla’s Autopilot self-driving technology. Autopilot was introduced with version 7.0 of Tesla’s software in October 2015, and lets drivers take their hands off the wheel in certain conditions.

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Jan 7, 2016

New Video Shows Hyperloop Tubes Sitting in the Nevada Desert

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, transportation

Elon Musk’s vision of the Hyperloop — a lightning-fast transportation system that would shuttle passengers at speeds nearing 700-mph using low pressure tubes and air compressors — is slowly coming to fruition in the Nevada desert.

In fact, the first ever Hyperloop tubes are neatly lined up in a ditch, waiting to be assembled and then later tested by Hyperloop Technologies at a site in North Las Vegas.

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Dec 29, 2015

Speculation mounts over Elon Musk’s Mars plan

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space travel

Some of SpaceX’s most ardent fans are guessing at the shape of the biggest thing to come: the Mars Colonial Transporter.

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Dec 25, 2015

Think-tank dismisses leading AI researchers as luddites

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI, transportation

‘In a surprisingly polemic report, ITIF think-tank president Robert Atkinson misinterprets this growing altruistic focus of AI researchers as innovation-stifling “Luddite-induced paranoia.”’

The report released by the ITIF think tank suffers from many problems. It accuses Elon Musk in risking research in the “cars that Google and TESLA are testing”, missing entirely the irony. IMHO, the nomination is not the product of research in what Nick Bostrom, Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates, & Elon Musk actually say.


Each year, the ITIF produces a list of 10 groups they think are holding back technological progress with their annual Luddite award. This year, they included researchers who support AI safety research and autonomous weapons bans, and they called out Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Stephen Hawking by name. The ITIF doesn’t seem to see the irony of calling Elon Musk a luddite despite just landing a rocket, launching auto-piloted electric cars and investing in a $1Bn AI-startup. Read the response written by Stuart Russell and Max Tegmark:

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Dec 21, 2015

Elon Musk Says Tesla Vehicles Will Drive Themselves in Two Years

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI, space travel, sustainability, transportation

Musk opens up about autonomous vehicles, self-driving car rules, and the competition.

In Elon Musk’s world, “easy” is used to describe problems many might consider impossible—or at least very difficult to solve. Producing a fully autonomous vehicle that can operate in any condition and on any road, for example, is easy-ish. And Tesla Motors TSLA 0.91%, the all-electric automaker that Musk heads, is two years away from achieving it.

“I think we have all the pieces, and it’s just about refining those pieces, putting them in place, and making sure they work across a huge number of environments—and then we’re done,” Musk told Fortune with assuredness during his commute to SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif., where he is also CEO. “It’s a much easier problem than people think it is. But it’s not like George Hotz, a one-guy-and-three-months problem. You know, it’s more like, thousands of people for two years.”

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Dec 21, 2015

Inside OpenAI: Will Transparency Protect Us From Artificial Intelligence Run Amok?

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, ethics, finance, robotics/AI

Last Friday at the Neural Information and Processing Systems conference in Montreal, Canada, a team of artificial intelligence luminaries announced OpenAI, a non-profit company set to change the world of machine learning.

Backed by Tesla and Space X’s Elon Musk and Y Combinator’s Sam Altman, OpenAI has a hefty budget and even heftier goals. With a billion dollars in initial funding, OpenAI eschews the need for financial gains, allowing it to place itself on sky-high moral grounds.

artificial-general-intelligenceBy not having to answer to industry or academia, OpenAI hopes to focus not just on developing digital intelligence, but also guide research along an ethical route that, according to their inaugural blog post, “benefits humanity as a whole.”

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Dec 17, 2015

SpaceX is launching its most powerful rocket for the first time this weekend

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space travel

These upgrades certainly get Elon Musk’s seal of approval.

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Dec 16, 2015

Pentagon Seeks $12 -$15 Billion for AI Weapons Research

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, military, neuroscience, robotics/AI

The news this month is full of stories about money pouring into AI research. First we got the news about the $15 million granted to the new Leverhulme Center for the Future of Intelligence. Then Elon Musk and friends dropped the news about launching OpenAI to the tune of $1 billion, promising that this would be a not-for-profit company committed to safe AI and improving the world. But that all pales in comparison to the $12-$15 billion that the Pentagon is requesting for the development of AI weapons.

According to Reuters, “The Pentagon’s fiscal 2017 budget request will include $12 billion to $15 billion to fund war gaming, experimentation and the demonstration of new technologies aimed at ensuring a continued military edge over China and Russia.” The military is looking to develop more advanced weapons technologies that will include autonomous weapons and deep learning machines.

While the research itself would be strictly classified, the military wants to ensure that countries like China and Russia know this advanced weapons research is taking place.

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Dec 14, 2015

Musk, others commit $1 billion to non-profit AI research company to ‘benefit humanity’

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, finance, neuroscience, robotics/AI

(credit: OpenAI)

Elon Musk and associates announced OpenAI, a non-profit AI research company, on Friday (Dec. 11), committing $1 billion toward their goal to “advance digital intelligence in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity as a whole, unconstrained by a need to generate financial return.”

The funding comes from a group of tech leaders including Musk, Reid Hoffman, Peter Thiel, and Amazon Web Services, but the venture expects to only spend “a tiny fraction of this in the next few years.”

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Dec 11, 2015

Artificial-Intelligence Research Center Is Founded

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI

Its long-range goal will be to create an “artificial general intelligence,” a machine capable of performing any intellectual task that a human being can, according to Mr. Musk. He also stressed that the focus was on building technologies that augment rather than replace humans.


The investors — including Elon Musk, Peter Thiel and Reid Hoffman — said they planned to commit $1 billion to the project long term, but would initially spend only a small fraction of that amount in the first few years of the project. But, Mr. Musk said, “Everyone who is listed as a contributor has made a substantial commitment and this should be viewed as at least a billion-dollar project.”

The organization, to be named OpenAI, will be established as a nonprofit, and will be based in San Francisco.

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