Some ran. Some stood and fought. But no-one forgot their first meeting with a tank. A weapon without precedent, which went on to dominate the battlefields of the 20th Century.
And it was designed by two men, in little more than two months, working out of a small hotel room in Lincoln.
via BBC News – World War One: The tank’s secret Lincoln origins.
Computers will be cleverer than humans by 2029, according to Ray Kurzweil, Google’s director of engineering.
The entrepreneur and futurologist has predicted that in 15 years’ time computers will be more intelligent than we are and will be able to understand what we say, learn from experience, make jokes, tell stories and even flirt.
via 2029: the year when robots will have the power to outsmart their makers | Technology | The Observer.
Australian scientists should set a goal of developing the world’s first bionic brain, a report into the future of brain research recommends.
The report, Inspiring smarter brain research in Australia, calls for an investment of $250m over 10 years into interdisciplinary projects to understand the human brain.
Some jurisdictions have taken the step of banning cycling without a helmet. In Australia for example, it is now illegal even for children to ride around without a helmet. And in Australia, cycling-related deaths have fallen. But what’s intriguing is that cycling overall has also fallen, at a faster rate than cycling-related fatalities. In other words, the rate of cyclist death has increased. More worryingly, the rate of head injuries – which one might naively expect to be more directly affected by helmet use – has not fallen as a result of legislation, again implying that the rate has gone up. (See the links here.) Put another way, if you cycle in Australia, where cycle helmets are mandatory, you’re more likely to get a head injury now than before the law was changed.
Large-scale human engineering of the Earth’s climate to prevent catastrophic global warming would not only be ineffective but would have severe unintended side effects and could not be safely stopped, a comparison of five proposed methods has concluded.
This is the other end of the technology spectrum from that ghost ship full of rats that was all over the internet recently. There has to be story potential in stowaways or pirates upping their game to keep up.
Rolls-Royce envisions crewless drone freight ships | Digital Trends.