Source: www.schneier.com – Author: Bruce Schneier
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vas pup •
Fourteen Israeli professors awarded top EU research grants
h ttps://www.timesofisrael.com/three-hebrew-university-professors-awarded-top-eu-research-grants/
“Fourteen researchers from Israeli universities have been awarded prestigious Advanced Grants by the European Research Council (ERC), it was announced Thursday.
The EU-funded research grants are each worth approximately 2.5 million euros ($2.68 million), disbursed over five years, with an additional 1 million euros ($1.07 million) available in certain cases.
The grants are “among the most prestigious and competitive research grants offered by the European Union. These grants provide seasoned researchers with the opportunity to pursue ambitious projects capable of catalyzing significant scientific breakthroughs,” the Hebrew University said in a statement announcing its three winners.
The other Hebrew University mathematician awarded the prize, Prof. Nathan (Nati) Linial, researches error-correcting codes. “All communication, whether among humans or machines, is susceptible to external noise. In his research, Linial and his students have developed mathematical methods employing analysis, optimization, and combinatorics to analyze the optimal balance between the rate of an error-correction code and how many errors it can correct,” the announcement notice said.
The main problem “is about coding and error correcting codes. This is a very important problem in many different ways,” he said. When computers communicate, there is “always noise,” meaning small errors or unwanted modifications, “so the receiver doesn’t always receive what the sender has sent.”
“This is called the ‘distance vs. rate problem’ in codes. As strange as it sounds, it’s a very fundamental question, and the amazing thing is, the last significant progress was made in the late 70s, so we have been stuck with this for many years,” Linial said.
The research he and his students are doing represents “some new ideas, some initial progress” on this issue, he said. “Codes are used everywhere, in every communication. Many critical technologies depend on clean codes… Error-correcting codes are all over the place. These are questions that are very fundamental and critical for a lot of technologies,” he stressed.”
Go to the link for more details.
&ers •
@ALL
Old but eye-opening. Where we are heading.
hxxps://breakingdefense.com/2023/06/dumb-and-cheap-when-facing-electronic-warfare-in-ukraine-small-drones-quantity-is-quality/
vas pup •
The scientists learning to speak whale
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240409-the-scientists-learning-to-speak-whale
“In a world-first, scientists had a “conversation” with a whale. Now, researchers are trying to find out what they are actually saying.
A growling “throp” noise emanates from the research vessel’s underwater speaker. A humpback breaks away from its group and approaches. The mammal circles the boat. It surfaces and then dives again, tail slipping noiselessly into the water, and echoes the call back.
Researchers who “conversed” with a humpback whale say their encounter could be the first step towards communication with non-human intelligence. It was in 2021, off the coast of south-east Alaska, that the team of six scientists played a recording of a humpback greeting call using an underwater speaker. They were stunned when one humpback whale they had named Twain responded in a conversational manner.
Brenda McCowan was broadcasting a recorded humpback contact call – a “whup” r “throp” – through an underwater speaker. When Twain finally moved away, Hubbard ran downstairs to find a hubbub of excitement. Twain had “spoken” back, engaging in a “conversation” that lasted a full 20 minutes.
Long, rhythmic and constantly evolving, whales’ haunting songs can flow across entire ocean basins. They chatter with whistles and pulses, or use echolocation to paint pictures of their underwater world.
Whales have enchanted humans for centuries. In fact, whales display a long list of behaviours similar to humans. They cooperate with one another, as well as other species. They teach each other useful skills, look after each other’s young, and play.
However, unlike humans, the dominant sense in whales is not sight, but hearing. Sink 200m (660ft) below the ocean surface, and you’ll travel beyond the reach of light. Sound, on the other hand, can move farther and faster in water than it does in the air.
Baleen whales, including humpbacks, right whales and blue whales, have evolved a unique larynx that allows them to produce super low-frequency sounds which can travel huge distances. Blue whales, for instance, emit frequencies as low as 12.5 Hz, classed as infrasound and below the threshold of human hearing. Toothed whales, meanwhile, which include sperm whales, dolphins, porpoises and orcas, are the among loudest animals on Earth and use ultra-fast clicks for echolocation, to “see” their world, as well as soft burst pulses and whistles to communicate.
Fast forward to today, and the Seti research team hopes deciphering whale communication could help us to understand aliens, should we encounter any. The group hypothesises that whale sounds contain complex, intelligent messages akin to languages used by humans or potentially extraterrestrials. However, says McCowan, our understanding of whale communication is still very much in its infancy.
More than 5,000 miles (8,000km) away, a group of artificial intelligence and natural language processing experts, cryptographers, linguists, marine biologists, robotic experts and underwater acousticians are also hoping to use AI – this time to decipher sperm whale conversation.
Launched in 2020, Ceti (Cetacean Translation Initiative), led by marine biologist David Gruber, has been continuously recording a group of whales off the coast of Dominica, an island in the Caribbean, using microphones on buoys, robotic fish and tags fitted to the whales’ backs.
Sperm whales, which have the largest brains of any animal, gather at the ocean’s surface in family groups and communicate using Morse code-like sequences of clicks known as codas. The group of sperm whales that Ceti has been working with is made up of around 400 mothers, grandmothers and calves. This pod , or two evenly spaced clicks and then three clicks in quick succession.
The data collected has been processed using machine-learning algorithms to detect and classify clicks, with results due to be published in 2024. The aim, says Gruber, is to be able to econstruct “multi-party conversations” – in other words to create a “conversation” using the sperm whales’ own vocalizations.
Gruber hopes Ceti’s work will increase humans’ connection to nature. “AI could allow us to understand the communication systems of many other life forms on a much deeper level. I think it would be a good thing for the world if we really listen – if we care deeply about what whales are saying.”
Clive Robinson •
@ &ers,
Re : Cheap drones and EW.
“Old but eye-opening. Where we are heading.”
As you know I’ve talked about how to use drones in the “new warfare” for more than a couple of years now.
Importantly “AI is not required”.
I’ve explained how to get useful anti-EW on the attack drone control channels that gives you a 1000:1 power advantage over the EW jammers that in effect gives you upto thirty times the range advantage.
I’ve also mentioned quite indirectly using EM signals that the EW systems can not jam via a repeater system.
To put it bluntly and somewhat over simply, if you use a laser or high power LED in a tube as a transmitter on the repeater drone you get a very tight TX cone. If you put the receive diode in a tube pointing backwards off of the attack drone then you get a tight RX cone. To jam the attack drone you have to be quite a distance behind and at the right hight to get inside the RX cone to jam it.
I’ve also mentioned using “gum stick” “Single Board Computers” for various things…
Consider that the RX LED can be attached to one of the USB ports and an SDR transmitter to another. Thus with appropriate software you can get the SBC SDR to transmit the correct signals to the drone it’s attached to at a level an EW system can not jam.
As I’ve mentioned before the GPS signal can be spoofed. A fun thought is if you set the drone to hover, and change the GPS signals then the drone will move according to the changes. I demonstrated this back last century and little has been done to stop it.
I could go on but the simple fact is the journalist has either misunderstood or been given incorrect information.
For around $100-200 you can make a very light anti-EW or more correctly “Electronic Counter Counter Measures”(ECCM) system. If as the journalist indicates you are spending $2000/drone then a low cost ECCM system will be a bit of a game changer.
One of the reasons jamming or ECM systems have died back in the Western Weapons line up is that ECCM can with careful thought, overcome ECM systems for a fraction of the hardware cost and a fraction of the EM power thus very very significantly reducing size, weight and electrical requirements.
Oh and Jamming equipment is kind of like a lighthouse on a clear dark night. You can see where it is from 20miles away and sail straight for it. Even if it is ground mobile it will not be able to out run a low cost fox with DF RX thus “fly down the beam” and drop a pound or to of HMX or equivalent on the antennas or vehicle. Get the timing right and you can then send in other drones.
I won’t go into the details of how to setup an airborne repeater but note that “hight of repeater” means that the “attack drone can fly lower” so low in fact it’s below the ground mounted jammers horizon… Add in a simple cardioid antenna to the attack drone with the null pointing at the EW source and well the advantages are significant.
Twist my arm and I can tell you how to make an electronically phased four wire antenna that can actively not just steer the null but DF signals to triangulate it’s position so GPS jamming becomes irrelevant.
Before people throw a wobbly, all this knowledge is very much in the public domain looking up the principles of Decca-Navigator, and US rip-off LoRan and the various VOR systems will tell you what you need to know.
echo •
If anyone wants a wild trip through the history of far right activity, shady bad actors with deep pockets, and how bad actors attempt to manufacture consent with dodgy reports and media manipulation you wouldn’t go far wrong by using the Cass review as a case study. And yes it’s not many steps onwards to expose dodgy billionaires, domestic terrorists, and nation state level bad actors. I’m sure one day it will make for a breathless narrative and earn some journo a Pulitzer for their scoop. In the meantime real people are being harmed and children are dying as a result of industrialised hatred. Only this week I saw pictures of a young transgender woman whose face looked like a road accident after she was beaten by a gang of men, and two more inquests opened this week into the deaths of transgender children bullied and abused by a system which does not care.
This is only one link of many. I picked it as it’s a fairly readable take on the situation. It leaves a lot out which conceals the horror show. I’m not linking to anything else as it’s not helpful having none subject matter experts stick their know-it-all noses in nor do I want to put individuals at risk of privacy invasion or abuse.
https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/politics/the-cass-review/
The Cass review: trans care or trans scare?
The Cass review into NHS England’s gender identity services for children and young people lacks rigour but fits the government’s agenda
The Cass review dropped this week. The media gave people two hours to respond in some cases without even having read the report. As the review was leaked some researchers had time to rush out a preliminary analysis before the media began its cycle and had already ripped it to shreds. As more subject matter experts including PhD’s and Professors and various established NGO’s began to look at the document it was shredded on a line by line basis in real time. The report has already been rejected by established experts and authorities in the field internationally. More experts are being invited to comment and at least one working group is being put together to provide an in depth formal response.
The Cass review has a fluffy preamble which can frame uninformed views. The document itself would not pass any peer review process or ethics committee. In the words of one person the document is designed to be quoted not read.
From its inception the Cass review was rigged both by the government and bad actors in NHS England. Cass herself has been exposed as a “for hire” transphobe who was brought in to work on a policy pushed by DeSantis in Florida before being commissioned by the UK government. It is to be noted that Kemi Badenoch minister for equalities met with DeSantis in person and was caught red handed concealing information she privately met with known hate groups. Cass is known to have followed known transphobes on a Facebook account and on Twitter. She does not and has never followed any NGO representing or supporting transgender people. The specification for the governance panel was put together by a known transphobe. The governance panel itself excluded paediatricians with experience of working with transgender children because they would be “biased”. It excluded any transgender people or NGO’s representing transgender people because of “bias”. Known hate groups and individuals were given seats on the governance panel. 98% of peer reviewed papers in the world were excluded because of “bias”. All peer reviewed papers within the past two years were excluded.
The Cass review isn’t a serious document at all. It is simply a tool that bad actors wanted to create to use as an excuse to attack transgender peoples rights, feed scare stories, and dismantle access to healthcare and social support and a public life, and push “Conversion therapy”. This is genocidal and a recognised form of torture. The review itself is also counter to the view of every established women and LGBT rights NGO’s all of women support transgender people along with Amnesty International, Liberty, the United Nations, European Council of Ministers, European Union, the European Court of Human Rights, and long-term polling.
The far right view this as a mechanism by which the can then attack and remove other LGBT rights and abortion rights, and dismantle human rights legislation including privacy legislation.
Privacy has already come under attack. The government attempted to scoop up all transgender peoples medical records. Doctors refused to cooperate so they passed a law to exempt transgender peoples medical records from privacy by default. As doctors and transgender people are refusing to cooperate the government is talking about breaking the GDPR by passing a law to force access to these records.
Search Me •
Nationwide, more than 20,000 media jobs were slashed last year alone… the highest figure since since 2020, when news outlets laid off some 30,000 workers during the pandemic.
At least 70% of digital advertising revenue has been collected by Google and Meta, according to Insider Intelligence.
The Department of Justice has sued Google over its grip on digital advertising, with federal officials alleging it amassed such power by violating U.S. competition laws.
In California, advocates of the bill say Silicon Valley has a responsibility to pay news publishers for the astronomical profits it has reaped from serving people news articles.
https://www.npr.org/2024/04/12/1244416887/google-blocks-california-news-payments-bill
echo •
@Search Me
Three things are required for media/social media to improve especially in the US and UK
- Media regulation and fitness for ownership tests.
- Removal of indemnification of social media platforms and law enforcement turning blind eyes.
- Firm human rights especially hate speech law and privacy and right of redress and damages.
Until that happens all that would happen is taking money off one set of bad actors and giving money to another set of bad actors.
ResearcherZero •
How we filter sensory input.
“You don’t remember things as they actually happened; you only remember the bits that caught your attention.”
(the odd curse word)
The frequency illusion is the product of selective attention and confirmation bias, often with a dash of recency illusion. The frequency illusion refers to the same concept that was previously described as the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon.
Once something has grabbed your attention, you’re likely to notice. Leading you to think that the frequency has changed, as now you remember s–t that would have remained oblivious to you.
You now begin to see it everywhere.
‘https://mentalhealthathome.org/2021/12/03/what-is-frequency-illusion/
ResearcherZero •
Humans make social media toxic.
‘https://english.elpais.com/technology/2024-03-20/regardless-of-the-platform-or-algorithm-its-humans-that-make-social-media-toxic.html
technological, and psychological factors that contribute to the radicalization of ideological biases on social media
‘https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-52569-8_3
concrete ideas and research questions to improve algorithms
“Our brief overview of the current evidence on how algorithms affect well-being, misinformation, and polarization suggests that the role of algorithms in these phenomena is far from straightforward”
‘https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/17456916231185057
ResearcherZero •
designed for engagement, not information sharing
‘https://www.fastcompany.com/90943919/the-science-behind-why-social-media-algorithms-warp-our-view-of-the-world
disproportionalities
‘https://knightcolumbia.org/content/the-myth-of-the-algorithm-a-system-level-view-of-algorithmic-amplification
“the values encoded in these signals overridingly remain focused on the individual.”
‘https://hai.stanford.edu/news/tuning-our-algorithmic-amplifiers-encoding-societal-values-social-media-ais
echo •
University and College Union, UK trade union for academics, lecturers, trainers, researchers & academic-related staff in further and higher education Women’s Standing Committee unanimously passed an emergency motion to Congress condemning the Cass report.
Most unions and pretty much all established women’s organisations are ahead the curve. It’s green lights across the board. It still surprises me to hear about it. I’ll confess it brings a tear to my eye to read of unimpeachable women’s committees bringing unanimous emergency motions in support of transgender rights. They grasp the magnitude of the problem and they’re not assing about are they?
Trans students’ attainment ‘limited’ by discrimination.
Bullying and discrimination are leaving trans students ‘unable to concentrate’ in class and causing some to drop out of school altogether, research warns.
Given hate speech from the government which even the Home Office noted caused a rise in hate crimes as well as the NHS being stubbornly transphobic and effectively not existing as an option for most transgender children, and social media which school children may have access to is utterly flooded with organised transphobia and algorithms which concentrate hate it’s no real surprise schooling is impacted.
One trans child who had transferred from one to school to another to conceal their transgender status and lived in “stealth” mode was outed by one “evangelical Christian” school teacher who had unlawfully accessed school records to search for markers for transgender children. His abuse was so bad that neither their union or the ideologically motivated super transphobic Christian Legal Centre would touch him. That school teacher was quite rightly fired and lost their tribunal.
This will obviously have a long term impact not just on transgender children’s lives but also on their careers and lives later in life. It will reduce workplace diversity which, if this kind of thing interests you, will reduce capacity and capabilities of business, the law, public services, and even the military and intelligence services where neurodiversity and different modes of reasoning and points of view can provide a combat power edge. Me? Before transgender children were being given a hard time it was gay children and before that disabled children. I just want to see transgender children grow up and live happy and fulfilled lives and be everything they can be just like everyone else. It’s no more complicated than that.
Winter •
@echo
Most unions and pretty much all established women’s organisations are ahead the curve.
It is trickling down that all discrimination is linked.
First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a CommunistThen they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a SocialistThen they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionistThen they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a JewThen they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
Martin Niemöller (1892–1984)
fib •
@ Researcher Zero
concrete ideas and research questions to improve algorithms
I think algorithms are already maximized to yield the results their owners pursue. “Improving” them has other connotations to their masters.
All society can do is try to defend itself from this overwhelming power. What we need is to regulate the use of algorithms [preferably by banning them from social media and software orchestrating social interactions]. I remember that for other algorithms [i.e. the algorithm for building the H bomb] there is social consensus on the need to regulate them.
ResearcherZero •
impact without intention
[RUN]
[I am a robot. My purpose is to classify, to sort, to order and to rank. Please proceed with input.]
Please proceed
Please proceed…………………
making many complicated processes and tasks easier, safer, more efficient……………………..
“Am I responsible for all the impacts of the algorithm I invoke, or algorithms invoked in my behalf through my choice of services?”
…Conceptual framework for the regulation of AI and algorithmic systems…
Respect for persons – This principle focuses on two main ethical convictions: the autonomy of every person and the protection of those with diminished autonomy.
Beneficence – This principle highlights the importance of treating people in an ethical manner, respecting their decisions, protecting them from any form of harm, and maximizing their well-being.
Justice – This principle is concerned with “fairness in distribution” and equality. It provides ways to distribute burdens and benefits by stating the importance of equal share, individual need, individual effort, societal contribution, and merit.
society-in-the-loop (SITL)
…Adapting the concept of human-in-the-loop (HITL) from the fields of modeling and simulation, and interactive machine learning.
‘https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-017-9430-8
Socially Responsible AI Algorithms
How to leverage this framework to improve societal well-being…
‘https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.02032
Please proceed…………………
[Teach me to be good robot?] 🤖
[STOP]
ResearcherZero •
Learning is not a passive process.
Constructivism is ‘an approach to learning that holds that people actively construct or make their own knowledge and that reality is determined by the experiences of the learner’.
“Vygotsky accepted Piaget’s claim that learners respond not to external stimuli but to their interpretation of those stimuli. However, he argued that cognitivists such as Piaget had overlooked the essentially social nature of language. As a result, he claimed they had failed to understand that learning is a collaborative process.”
…However, because knowledge is actively constructed by the learner, learning also depends to a significant extent on the learner’s internal drive to understand and promote the learning process.
‘https://gsi.berkeley.edu/gsi-guide-contents/learning-theory-research/social-constructivism/
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