Thinking Allowed

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The Vulnerable World Hypothesis

blog post image "This paper introduces the concept of a vulnerable world: roughly, one in which there is some level of technological development at which civilization almost certainly gets devastated by default, i.e. unless it has exited the ‘semi-anarchic default condition’. Several counterfactual historical and...
Source: doi.org

Is Vaccination Approaching a Dangerous Tipping Point? Peter Marks. Robert Califf. JAMA.

This Viewpoint discusses declining vaccination rates in the US, specifically against COVID-19, and the ways in which clinicians and the Food and Drug Administration can counter the current large volume of vaccine misinformation.
Source: jamanetwork.com

Workplace well-being initiatives don't boost employee mental health

"The mental health of people who undertake mindfulness or meditation courses offered by their employer is generally no better than those who are not offered such programmes." "Instead of offering these initiatives, Fleming suggests that employers focus on bettering the work environment. For example,...
Source: newscientist.com

Mozilla launches a new startup focused on 'trustworthy' AI | TechCrunch

Mozilla, the nonprofit behind software like Firefox, has launched a new startup, Mozilla.ai, focused on developing trustworthy AI systems.
Source: techcrunch.com

Trust in Scholarly Publishing - The Scholarly Kitchen

How do we define, track, and measure trust in scholarly publishing?
Source: sspnet.org

A New Kind of AI Copy Can Fully Replicate Famous People. The Law Is Powerless.

New AI-generated digital replicas of real experts expose an unnerving policy gray zone. Washington wants to fix it, but it’s not clear how.
Source: politico.com

AI will be deeply disruptive to Higher Education

blog post image Paul LeBlanc and George Siemens are teaming up to explore how AI is going to change higher education. "LeBlanc transformed SNHU from 2500 students in 2003 to over 200,000 students in 20 years by using technology to switch delivery online." Siemens is one of the proposers of connectivism - a theory...

Nikon, Sony and Canon fight AI fakes with new camera tech

Digital signatures to provide way to tell real photos from deepfakes
Source: nikkei.com

20 Years Later, the Y2K Bug Seems Like a Joke—Because Those Behind the Scenes Took It Seriously

Some of the fixes put in place in 1999 are still used today to keep the world’s computer systems running smoothly
Source: time.com

Sustained decrease in latent safety threats through regular interprofessional in situ simulation training of neonatal emergencies

Simulation training at trainees' actual workplace offers benefits over traditional simulation-based team training. We prospectively investigated whether regular in situ simulation training of neonatal emergencies in an interprofessional and interdisciplinary team could be used to identify and rectif...
Source: nih.gov

We're getting closer to OpenAI's first device

Sam Altman and Jony Ive have tapped Apple executive Tang Tan to build their new AI device.
Source: businessinsider.com

Educational Effectiveness of Telementoring as a Continuing Professional Development Intervention for Surgeons in Practice:

"Moderate-level evidence demonstrates the use of telementoring as effective in changing surgeons’ knowledge and competence in both educational and workplace-based settings. Its use is also associated with changes in patient outcomes."
Source: lww.com

Discovery of a structural class of antibiotics with explainable deep learning.

One of the challenges with deep learning (neural networks) is that although they find patterns the reasoning disappears into an endless detail of numbers. In this paper the researchers built an 'explainable' AI to discover antibiotics instead of such a 'black box'. "The discovery of novel structural...
Source: nature.com

This AI Trained on the Life Events of Every Person in Denmark. It Can Now Predict Their Future.

Artificial intelligence is very good at finding patterns. Given enough data it will start making telling you what's going to happen. "The AI can make highly accurate predictions about people’s lives, including how likely they are to die in a given time window and their personality traits." ... ...
Source: singularityhub.com

NFTs died a slow, painful death in 2023 as most are now worthless

A reminder that early adoption of technology is not without risk. "Non-fungible tokens promised to revolutionise the concept of ownership using the blockchain technology behind bitcoin, but the market seems to have all but collapsed."
Source: newscientist.com

Innovating Pedagogy 2023

blog post image Looking for something innovative to try in 2024? MedEd professionals would benefit by looking through these ideas first. Open University's, Institute of Educational Technology's latest innovating pedagogy report from August 2023. This is the 11th annual report on emerging technologies in education...
Source: open.ac.uk

Machines may be better at assisting, not replacing us.

Journalist Kawandeep Virdee sees if he can be replaced by AI by writing some predictions for 2024. "I gave ChatGPT the last 13 years of Nieman Lab predictions ... [and asked it what I'd write about in 2024]" [ChatGPT suggested] Navigating the infodemic: Strategies for media in the era of misinformation...
Source: niemanlab.org

(We are not) using eHealth Data to Inform CPD for Medical Practitioners

"There is no formal or well-established correlation between individual performance data obtained through eHealth data analysis and CPD planning and programming for medical practitioners; in particular, the literature shows no consistency in type of eHealth data to analyze, software and tools to use,...
Source: nih.gov

Ice Halos over Bavaria

"For suspended water to freeze into an ice fog requires quite cold temperatures, and indeed the air temperature on this day was measured at well below zero. The ice fog reflected light from the Sun setting behind St. Coleman Church."
Source: nasa.gov

Coding excursions

blog post image Anonymity with encryption At Outcomes Engine we are working on techniques to gather data from learners, analyse the data, and share the data whilst maintaining anonymity. I was involved in some work in my previous company (pharmaceutical) with the security of personal data - in our case it was data...