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Artificial Intelligence (AI) is an emerging field of computer programming that is already changing the way we interact online and in real life, but the term ‘intelligence’ has been poorly defined. Rather than focusing on smarts, researchers should be looking at the implications and viability of artificial consciousness as that’s the real driver behind intelligent decisions.

Consciousness rather than intelligence should be the true measure of AI. At the moment, despite all our efforts, there’s none.

Significant advances have been made in the field of AI over the past decade, in particular with machine learning, but artificial intelligence itself remains elusive. Instead, what we have is artificial serfs—computers with the ability to trawl through billions of interactions and arrive at conclusions, exposing trends and providing recommendations, but they’re blind to any real intelligence. What’s needed is artificial awareness.

Voters in Denver, a city at the forefront of the widening national debate over legalizing marijuana, have become the first in the nation to effectively decriminalize another recreational drug: hallucinogenic mushrooms.

The local ballot measure did not quite legalize the mushrooms that contain psilocybin, a naturally occurring psychedelic compound. State and federal regulations would have to change to accomplish that.

But the measure made the possession, use or cultivation of the mushrooms by people aged 21 or older the lowest-priority crime for law enforcement in the city of Denver and Denver County. Arrests and prosecutions, already fairly rare, would all but disappear.

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Power suits, robotaxis, Leonardo da Vinci mania—just a few of the things to look out for in 2019. But what else will make our top ten stories for the year ahead?

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What will be the biggest stories of the year ahead?

00:35 — 10 — Powered Clothing.
In 2019 power dressing will take on a whole new meaning when this strange-looking clothing hits the market. Not so much high fashion as high tech, it’s a suit with built-in power that will literally get people moving. Part of the wearable robotics revolution, the suit is made up of battery-powered muscle packs which contract just like a human muscle to boost the wearer’s strength. With the global population of over 60s expected to more than double by 2050, and retirement age increasing, there’s no shortage of potential markets. But don’t expect the suits to ease the burden on aching limbs and overstretched health services anytime soon — as these suits don’t come cheap. According to the manufacturer they’ll retail for around the cost of a bespoke tailored suit.

02:13 — 9 — The year of cheap flights.
2019 will be the year low-cost long-haul travel takes off. You’ll be able to buy a ten thousand mile flight from London to Sydney for around $350 and this is why. The world will boast two new state-of-the-art mega hub airports and competition between them will drive down the cost of flying. Daxing Airport outside Beijing is due to open in 2019 and will feed growing demand for air travel in China. Beijing already has one of the world’s biggest airports and for China this new mega hub will send an important message to the world. Rivaling Daxing as a national symbol of global prestige will be a new mega hub airport in Istanbul. Opened in 2018 it covers a staggering 26 square miles — an area larger than the island of Manhattan. And in 2019 consumers will again be the beneficiaries of a state sponsored economic push. But the low fares offered by competition between these hubs could be short-lived.

04:06 — 8 Stonewall riots at 50.

Answer: Quite possibly because Facebook’s already forced you to log out and back into your account today.

The news: Facebook said hackers exploited a software flaw to access the records of almost 50 million customers. The firm said it had fixed the vulnerability and reported the breach to law enforcement.

The hack: The company said that the hackers had exploited a coding glitch that affected the service’s “View As” feature, which lets people see what their own profile looks like when someone else takes a look at it online. This allowed them to get hold of digital “tokens,” which are software keys that let people access their account without having to log back in every time.

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While facial recognition performs well in controlled environments (like photos taken at borders), they struggle to identify faces in the wild. According to data released under the UK’s Freedom of Information laws, the Metropolitan’s AFR system has a 98 percent false positive rate — meaning that 98 percent of the “matches” it makes are of innocent people.


The head of London’s Metropolitan Police force has defended the organization’s ongoing trials of automated facial recognition systems, despite legal challenges and criticisms that the technology is “almost entirely inaccurate.”

According to a report from The Register, UK Metropolitan Police commissioner Cressida Dick said on Wednesday that she did not expect the technology to lead to “lots of arrests,” but argued that the public “expect[s]” law enforcement to test such cutting-edge systems.

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