a Promethean skunkworks

以前DeepMind公司只是一家很神秘的Skunkworks, 現在終於在全世界大放異彩。 他們的人工智慧 (DQN, deep Q-network)在兩年前就能夠用同樣的人工智慧玩Atari 的49種不同電腦遊戲， 超過一半的電腦遊戲能達到職業玩家的75%水準。 也就是不管是什麼遊戲，不管怎麼玩，只要告訴人工智慧，遊戲的pixels 和分數越高越好的原則，人工智慧就開始自動學習。 DQN號稱用人腦的海馬工作方式，在休息的時候(譬如睡眠)就會將前一陣子的學習經驗不斷的在複習。 也就是 DQN能夠不管是什麼工作, 從零開始，就不斷的將一絲一點的學習經驗累積，而達到職業水準。 這樣子演進下去，如果能成功的話，將非常可怕。 想像在以後的世界，將人工智慧放進任何一個工作，只要提示簡單的東西(譬如分數越高越好), 一段期間後, 人工智慧就能幾乎達到職業的水準. 假如這不是誇大的言詞, 那對人類是福是禍?

harm set, harm get

Harm set and harm get. 1 in 5 jobs in Oklahoma come from energy industry sector. In 2007, Oklahoma only had 1 mag-3 earthquake and 907 mag-3 or above in 2015. The culprit: 3 billion barrels of wastewater coming with shale oil were injected back to the earth which reactivated the fault line that had been slumbering for 300 million years. No free lunch for the oil boom.   
http://time.com/4253764/in-2007-oklahoma-had-one-earthquake-last-year-there-were-more-than-900-what-happened-greed-politics-and-the-biggest-oil-boom-in-decades/

AI, a deus ex machina

Deepmind 已經連續三次打敗韓國圍棋高手李世石乙，Deepmind 的創始人，Demis Hassabis, 談論到人工智慧在5年後的可能應用的項目，他最在乎的是智慧手機的App, 假如能夠將 pre-programmed 的App 轉變成 adaptive self-play App, 那智慧手機可真的是變成了超級智慧手機了. 還有智慧機器人，像鴻海製造的 Pepper 機器人只能做固定的工作。 假如幾年後加上人工智慧， 那家庭主婦的負擔可以減輕很多，因為她們可以叫機器人自己學習怎麼煮飯，做菜，掃地 以及任何清潔工作。 當然 Deepmind 也可以和IBM 的Watson Health來競爭, 看誰能夠更聰明地用人工智慧，來幫醫生診斷病人的病情。 甚至 Hassabis 還夢想說, 也許Deepmind的人工智慧可以幫助 CERN ( 歐洲核子研究中心) 在龐大的資料庫裡面， 搜尋任何人類找不到的新粒子。不過當然這只是期望的遠景。下一步 有人認為 Deepmind 必須要能打敗非常複雜的 video game Starcraft 的高手，因為這需要隨時準確地猜測對方隱藏的策略， 絕對比圍棋更能考驗人工智慧的"智慧"   
http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/10/11192774/demis-hassabis-interview-alphago-google-deepmind-ai

a neutron bomb in pharmaceutical industry

Any silver bullet to boost stock price from $13 to $263 in seven years?   The recipe to create this flashy record for Valeant Pharmaceuticals is savage, i.e., hostile takeover of the other companies followed by dismissing majority of the employees, slashing R&D funding down to almost zero and raising the drug price of the acquired company substantially.   Valeant, now under investigation by SEC due to its alleged accounting fraud, has a blatant hostile acquisition record:  acquired Medicis Pharmaceuticals and dismissed 95% of Medicis’s 790 full-time employees;  acquired Bausch & Lomb and slashed 27% of its 4,100 employees;  acquired Salix and 43% of Salix’s  977 full-time employees were let go.   http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-03/valeant-s-boss-is-back-can-the-ceo-save-the-day-again

A new promise for Alzheimer's?

More than 200 Alzheimer's drugs have failed. Will this one, LM11A-31, show any promise?   http://time.com/4217067/alzheimers-from-a-new-angle/

Taking a class and get a reward for college scholarship

Prospective accrued scholarship for high school students when taking selected classes in the high school may be an alternative approach to spur low-income high-school students to persist all the way to college.  http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/21/technology/got-an-a-in-algebra-thats-worth-120.html?_r=0

Deus Ex Machina to save lives

If replacing just 10% of U.S. vehicle fleet by driverless cars, 1,100 lives will be saved each year (if 90%, 21,700 lives each year in the U.S. will be saved). Probably the trend to autonomous cars in the near future is inexorable.     http://time.com/4236980/against-human-driving/