Lifeboat Foundation

A team of OpenAI robots beat amateur human players at Dota 2.

Kroger Co. is about to test whether it can steer supermarket customers away from crowded grocery aisles with a fleet of diminutive driverless cars designed to lower delivery costs.

The test program announced Thursday could make Kroger the first U.S. grocer to make deliveries with robotic cars that won’t have a human riding along to take control in case something goes wrong.

Cincinnati-based Kroger is teaming up with Nuro, a Silicon Valley startup founded two years ago by two engineers who worked on self-driving cars at Google. That Google project is now known as Waymo, which plans to introduce a ride-hailing service that is supposed to begin picking up passengers in fully autonomous cars by the end of this year.

Continue reading “Kroger to test grocery deliveries with driverless cars” »

The deadlines set for “singularity” are also seen by some as an attempt to scare and coerce governments into implementing the movement’s social and technological “agenda”. However, when the names of major tech corporations of the world like Google, Nokia and Tesla are associated with the transhumanist ideology, it is difficult to dismiss the premise and prospects of this new revolutionary socio-technological movement.

For several centuries, political movements have emanated from nationalist or religious convictions, socio-political and economic theories or even environmental concerns. However, issues of science and technology have rarely driven mainstream socio-political discourse as scientists have hardly ever indulged in propounding societal constructs for the future.

However, a technology-oriented intellectual movement may soon become the focus of political debate as 21st century science stands at the brink of reshaping human identity itself.

Continue reading “Transhumanism: Politics of hybridizing humans with robots” »

Ever wish you could visit other planets in our solar system without launching on a deep-space mission? Now you can embark on an interplanetary adventure right from the palm of your hand, thanks to gorgeous, 3D-printed planet models and an augmented-reality (AR) app.

Brought to you by AstroReality, the same company that created the “Lunar” AR moon model and its new Earth counterpart, this set includes miniature models of all eight planets and one model of the dwarf planet Pluto. Each model is 1.2 inches (3 centimeters) in diameter and color-printed with a resolution of 0.1 millimeter per pixel.

Continue reading “Explore the Solar System in Augmented Reality with Mini Planet Models” »

Chemical innovation plays a key role in developing cutting-edge technologies for the military. Research chemists design and synthesize new molecules that could enable a slew of next-generation military products, such as novel propellants for spacecraft engines; new pharmaceuticals and medicines for troops in the field; lighter and longer-lasting batteries and fuel cells; advanced adhesives, coatings and paints; and less expensive explosives that are safer to handle. The problem, however, is that existing molecule design and production methods rely primarily on experts’ intuition in a laborious, trial-and-error research process.

DARPA’s Make-It program, currently in year three of a four-year effort, is developing software tools based on machine learning and expert-encoded rules to recommend synthetic routes (i.e., the “recipe” to make a particular molecule) optimized for factors such as cost, time, safety, or waste reduction. The program seeks to free chemists so that they may focus their energy on chemical innovation, rather than testing various molecular synthesis pathways. The program also is developing automated devices that uniformly and reproducibly create the desired chemical based on the software-generated recipe – this one-device, many-molecules concept is a departure from the traditional dedicated reactors in chemical production. Make-It research teams have recently demonstrated significant progress toward fully automated rapid molecule production, which could speed the pace of chemical discovery for a range of defense products and applications.

“A seasoned research chemist may spend dozens of hours designing synthetic routes to a new molecule and months implementing and optimizing the synthesis in a lab,” said Anne Fischer, program manager in DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office. “Make-It is not only freeing chemists to expend brain power in other areas such as molecular discovery and innovation, it is opening chemical synthesis and discovery to a much broader community of scientific researchers who will benefit from faster development of new molecules.”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=phaonMhOC8Q

Within 4–5 years Made In Space believes their Archinaut space manufacturing robot and manufacturing mini factory will be making large structures like trusses and reflectors in space.

The Archinaut has an industrial-sized 3D printer, cartridges full of plastics and alloys, and robotic arms programmed to assemble the big items extruded by the printer without any human supervision. All Archinaut parts are able to survive in microgravity and harsh conditions like lunar dust storms and extreme temperatures.

Continue reading “Made in Space targets 2023 for building large structures in space and later future asteroid mining” »

Self-driving cars have gone from DARPA project to roaming our streets much faster than anyone predicted, but if you bring the topic up with a grouchy truck nuts-owning uncle, the response is probably going to be “Yeah, but when can I buy one?”

Volvo is making a more concrete (and realistic!) pledge than most of its competitors: to have a Level 4 autonomous car in showrooms, buyable and usable, by 2021. Level 4 doesn’t mean full autonomy, but what it does mean is that you can have the bulk of your commute completely automated.

Don’t Miss : Get the wireless charger that should’ve come with your phone for $13.

Continue reading “Volvo is making a true ‘Autopilot’ that’ll let you eat, sleep, or watch movies – coming in 3 years” »

China has built a flock of robotic Doves, but do they come in peace?

Hi-tech drones that look and move like real birds have already flown over restive Xinjiang region.

A look at the AI robots that want your job.

https://bloom.bg/2IL4g1J