A New Reality Materializing: Humans Can Be the New Supercomputer

Illustration: Colourbox Today, people of all backgrounds can contribute to solving serious scientific problems by playing computer games. A Danish research group has extended the limits of quantum physics calculations and simultaneously blurred the boundaries between man and mac. The Danish research team, CODER, has found out, that the human brain can beat the calculating powers of a computer, when it comes to solving quantum-problems. The saying of philosopher René Descartes of what makes humans unique is beginning to sound hollow. 'I think -- therefore soon I am obsolete' seems more appropriate. When a computer routinely beats us at chess and we can barely navigate without the help of a GPS, have we outlived our place in the world? Not quite. Welcome to the front line of research in cognitive skills, quantum computers and gaming. Today there is an on-going battle between man and machine. While genuine machine consciousness is still years into the future, we are beginning to see computers make choices that previously demanded a human's input. Recently, the world held its breath as Google's algorithm AlphaGo beat a professional player in the game Go--an achievement demonstrating the explosive speed of development in machine capabilities. A screenshot of one of the many games that are available. In this case the task is to...
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Nasa-Inspired 'Miracle Suit' helping to save new mothers from death

@ https://pixabay.com/under Creative Commons CC0 Washington: Inspired by Nasa research on inflated anti-gravity suit or G-suit, "miracle suits" are helping new mothers survive blood loss after birth in developing countries, including India. California-based Zoex Corporation was the first company to develop commercially available pressure garment suitable for treating shock and blood loss in new mothers. Since the pressure does not need to be as strong as in military and aviation cases, the company scrapped the old-style G-suits for a non-pneumatic version using simple elastic compression. In a recent study by Nasa Ames Research Centre and other researchers, the garments saved 13 out of 14 patients in Pakistan who were in shock from extreme blood loss. In another study in Egypt and Nigeria, the garment reduced both blood loss and mortality from postpartum hemorrhage by 50 percent. "In the field of maternal health, we generally don't see that kind of a reduction, and even more so when it's the result of a single, simple intervention," said Suellen Miller, founder of the Safe Motherhood Programme which aims to reduce pregnancy- and childbirth-related deaths and illnesses across the globe. By 2012, the World Health Organisation and the International Federation of Gynecologists and Obstetricians both decided to officially recommend...
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Football pitch-sized billboard to open in Times Square

Due to open later today, New York's Times Square is now home to one of the world's largest and most expensive digital billboards in the world. Measuring the length of a football pitch, and running the entire length of one city block, it is situated along the front of the Marriott Marquis Hotel, just outside the intersection of Seventh Avenue and Broadway. No exact measurements have been announced prior to the launch, but as a guide a football pitch in the U.S. is 110 metres long, it is said to be six to eight stories high. The site is one of the busiest in the U.S, with more than 300,000 pedestrians entering the area on a normal day. Another 115,000 drivers and passengers pass by it every day. The display feature almost 24 million LED pixels. To advertise on the screen will costs more than $2.5 million for four weeks, ranking it as one of the most expensive pieces of outdoor ad real estate on the market. A digital art exhibition by the Universal Everything studio collective will animate the screen from Tuesday night. Google will take over as the exclusive, debut advertiser a week later, on Tuesday 24 November, with a campaign that runs through the New Year. The screen is the biggest and the only one to cover an entire city block, from 5th Street to 46th Street on Broadway, in the Times Square area. Source: InAVat...
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