Latest news with #civilization
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
SpaceX adds 27 Starlink satellites to constellation after successful launch from California (video)
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. SpaceX's broadband internet constellation grew again today (May 31), with the launch of 27 satellites into Earth orbit. A Falcon 9 rocket carrying the additions to the Starlink network lifted off at 1:10 p.m. PDT (4:10 p.m. EDT or 2010 GMT) on Saturday from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Station in southern California. About 8 minutes later, the Falcon's first stage returned to Earth, landing vertically on the ocean-based droneship "Of Course I Still Love You." This was the 25th flight for this booster, including 14 previous Starlink launches, according to SpaceX's website for Saturday's mission. The 27 satellites were on course to be deployed at just under an hour after they left the ground. According to SpaceX's billionaire founder Elon Musk, the Starlink network is not only a needed solution for people outside the reach of other broadband options, but a key to the company's plans for the future. "Starlink internet is what is being used to pay for humanity going to Mars," Musk said during a recent update delivered to employees at SpaceX's Starship facility in Starbase, Texas. "I would like to thank everyone out there who has bought Starlink because you are helping to secure the future of civilization and helping make life interplanetary." Starlink is now the largest satellite constellation ever launched into Earth orbit. According to satellite tracker Jonathan McDowell, there are currently more than 7,600 active Starlink spacecraft out of the nearly 8,790 total units deployed to date.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Cavemen battled bedbugs, study finds
Cavemen suffered from bedbugs, according to a study. The small insects have been plaguing human sleep for at least 50,000 years, but populations boomed when humans left caves behind and started forming basic cities, around 13,000 years ago. A study on the genetics of bedbugs found the pest split into two lineages millennia ago, with one staying on bats and the other adapting to target sleeping people. Both groups saw a decrease in numbers during the last Ice Age around 20,000 years ago, the scientists found. Analysis of the genes of the two types of bedbugs revealed the bedbugs recovered at different rates depending on what animal they lived on. Bedbugs that lived in human beds fared better than those still living on bats, the scientists discovered. Data reveals the bedbug association with humans 'dates back potentially hundreds of thousands of years', and around 13,000 years ago there was a population boom for bedbugs. This is the same time their human hosts were starting to form primitive civilisations. It likely triggered the surge in bedbug numbers, the scientists conclude, because no boom was seen in bedbugs that lived on bats. 'Modern humans moved out of caves about 60,000 years ago,' said Dr Warren Booth, the study author from Virginia Tech. 'There were bedbugs living in the caves with these humans, and when they moved out they took a subset of the population with them, so there's less genetic diversity in that human-associated lineage.' The two bedbug types have not yet diverged enough to become different species but are still undergoing evolution as a result of bug spray and other measures, which target and kill bedbugs, it added. The study is published in the journal Biology Letters. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
7 days ago
- General
- Telegraph
Cavemen battled bedbugs, study finds
Cavemen suffered from bedbugs, according to a study. The small insects have been plaguing human sleep for at least 50,000 years, but populations boomed when humans left caves behind and started forming basic cities, around 13,000 years ago. A study on the genetics of bedbugs found the pest split into two lineages millennia ago, with one staying on bats and the other adapting to target sleeping people. Both groups saw a decrease in numbers during the last Ice Age around 20,000 years ago, the scientists found. Analysis of the genes of the two types of bedbugs revealed the bedbugs recovered at different rates depending on what animal they lived on. Bedbugs that lived in human beds fared better than those still living on bats, the scientists discovered. Data reveals the bedbug association with humans 'dates back potentially hundreds of thousands of years', and around 13,000 years ago there was a population boom for bedbugs. This is the same time their human hosts were starting to form primitive civilisations. It likely triggered the surge in bedbug numbers, the scientists conclude, because no boom was seen in bedbugs that lived on bats. 'Modern humans moved out of caves about 60,000 years ago,' said Dr Warren Booth, the study author from Virginia Tech. 'There were bedbugs living in the caves with these humans, and when they moved out they took a subset of the population with them, so there's less genetic diversity in that human-associated lineage.' The two bedbug types have not yet diverged enough to become different species but are still undergoing evolution as a result of bug spray and other measures, which target and kill bedbugs, it added. The study is published in the journal Biology Letters.
The Guardian
26-05-2025
- Automotive
- The Guardian
My petty gripe: I graciously let your car in, now where's my bloody thank you wave?
I'm the best driver I know, whatever my driving record might say. I don't hog the right lane. I never tailgate. And I usually let people in ahead of me if they need to change lanes or enter traffic. So why does it infuriate me so much when they don't give a little thank you wave? I don't expect a medal. Nowhere else do I expect thanks for common courtesy. But not seeing that little wave on the road makes me see red. I may not scream, but I will swear, fulminate about selfish, thoughtless, ungracious idiots and rail against the end of civil society. It's not like I'd follow the offender to demand thanks. I'm already likely running late for wherever I have to be, and whoever thanked an angry person demanding gratitude? More likely the opposite. But still, is it really that hard to flick your hand up in thanks? I know it's ridiculously trivial. So many religions remind us that the best charity doesn't seek acknowledgment. The great rabbi Maimonedes ranked different kinds of giving, with giving when neither person knows the other's identity up the top. As Saint Augustine wisely counselled, resentment is a cup of poison you drink while waiting for the other person to die. That person speeding away is already oblivious. My anger is pointless. I know I don't have to let anyone in. Perhaps driving more selfishly would save me the grief of being so enraged, especially as it's only a little thing. Or perhaps that's why it's such a big deal, because it is such a little thing. That's why I'm always scrupulous to put my hand out the window in thanks, just in case the kind person who let me in didn't see it through the tinting. Only takes a second but makes a big difference. Try it – if not for me, then at least for the three other considerate drivers out there.
Forbes
23-05-2025
- Forbes
AI Could Reshape Humanity And We Have No Plan For It
Explore how artificial intelligence could shape the future of humanity, from transforming global ... More industries to posing existential risks. As someone who spends most of my waking hours exploring how emerging technologies transform business and society, I occasionally encounter perspectives that fundamentally shift how I view our technological future. My recent conversation with Richard Susskind, leading AI expert and author of "How to Think About AI: A Guide for the Perplexed," provided exactly that kind of paradigm-shifting insight. His latest book offers a comprehensive framework for understanding AI's potential and pitfalls, going well beyond the superficial analyses that dominate today's conversation. When I asked Susskind to unpack his view that AI represents "the defining challenge of our age," he explained that we must simultaneously embrace two seemingly contradictory mindsets. "On the one hand, this technology offers remarkable, perhaps even unprecedented promise for humans and civilization. On the other hand, in bad hands or misused, it could pose some very elemental threats to us," Susskind told me. This duality requires us to move beyond polarized thinking about AI as either salvation or destruction. What makes Susskind's analysis particularly valuable is his ability to distinguish between different ways of thinking about AI. He separates "process thinkers" focused on how AI works from "outcome thinkers" concerned with what AI achieves. "When people say machines can't be creative or they can't exercise judgment, I think that's process thinking," Susskind explained. "What they're thinking about is that machines cannot think, cannot reason, cannot empathize, cannot create in the way that humans do." But the real story, according to Susskind, lies elsewhere: "Machines that most AI people are working on are not seeking to replicate the way humans work. They're seeking to provide outcomes that match or even are better than those of human beings, but using their own distinctive capabilities." Perhaps the most thought-provoking aspect of our conversation centered on how our existing language and conceptual frameworks fail to capture what AI is becoming. Susskind compared our current situation to the pre-industrial era, when concepts like "capitalism" and "factory" didn't yet exist. "I don't think it is accurate to say that a machine is creative because I think creativity is a distinctively human process," Susskind said. "But do machines create novel output? Can they configure ideas or concepts or drawings or words in ways that have never been done before? Yes, they certainly can." This gap in our vocabulary extends to how we relate to AI systems. "I find myself saying please and thank you to these machines. When I use them, I find myself wanting to apologize for wasting its time," Susskind admitted. While this behavior might seem strange, it points to the emergence of relationships with machines "for which we have no words today." One of Susskind's most important insights is that simply grafting AI onto existing institutions like courts, hospitals, or schools won't deliver transformative benefits. He distinguishes between three approaches to technology: automation, innovation, and elimination. "Automating is when we computerize, we systematize, we streamline, we optimize what we already do today," Susskind explained. "Innovation [is] using technology to allow us to do things that previously weren't possible. And elimination [is] elimination of the tasks for which the human service used to exist." This distinction is crucial because most organizations are stuck in automation thinking. "I think the mindset is still very much about AI as a tool to improve what they currently do," Susskind observed. This approach misses the bigger opportunity. To illustrate, Susskind shared a story about addressing 2,000 neurosurgeons: "I started off by saying patients don't want neurosurgeons [gasp in audience]. I said, patients want health. And I said, for a particular type of health problem, you are the best answer we have today. And thank goodness for you." But the future might look very different. "What AI will provide us with is preventative medicine," Susskind continued. Instead of simply automating surgery or medical diagnoses, AI could fundamentally transform how we approach healthcare altogether. "Increasingly, AI systems, in all walks of life, will be able to provide early warnings of difficulty," he explained. Susskind envisions nano-scale monitoring systems that could detect health problems before they manifest as symptoms, eliminating the need for many medical interventions entirely. "Everyone wants a fence at the top of the cliff rather than an ambulance at the bottom," he noted, highlighting how AI might eliminate problems rather than just automate solutions. Despite his generally optimistic outlook, Susskind doesn't minimize AI's risks. He categorizes them into a "mountain range of threats," including existential risks (threats to humanity's survival), catastrophic risks (massive but non-extinction level harms), socioeconomic risks (like technological unemployment), and what he calls the risk of "failing to use these technologies." On technological unemployment, Susskind raises profound questions: "If machines can indeed perform all tasks that humans can perform, what will we do in life, but economically, how will people earn a living? How will people have any income security?" Even more concerning is the concentration of AI power: "Currently, the data, the processing, the chips, the capability is in the hands of a very small number of non-state-based organizations," Susskind noted. "This is a fundamental risk and a fundamental question of political philosophy. How is it that we can or should redistribute the wealth created by these AI systems in circumstances where the wealth is created and simultaneously the old wealth creators are no longer needed?" The challenges AI presents require expertise far beyond technical knowledge. "We need to call up an army of our very best, our best economists, our best sociologists, our best lawyers, our best business people, our best policy makers," Susskind urged. "This is our Apollo mission. It's of that scale." While acknowledging the brilliance of many technologists, Susskind believes they shouldn't dominate these conversations alone: "First of all, we need diversity of thinking. But secondly, technologists may be wonderful in technology, but their experience of ethical reasoning, their experience of lawmaking and regulation formulation, their experience of policymaking is likely to be minimal." Perhaps most sobering is Susskind's assessment of how quickly AI will advance. "In the early days of AI, say in the fifties, sixties and seventies, we had breakthroughs every five to 10 years. We're now seeing breakthroughs, not necessarily technological breakthroughs, but breakthroughs in usage, and ideas, probably every six to 12 months." He points to an astonishing trajectory: "We know that the computing resource, compute people call it, available to train AI systems, is doubling every six months. That means we'll see 20 doublings in the next decade. That will be two to the power of 20, a 1-billion-fold increase in the power available to train these systems." Susskind believes we should plan for artificial general intelligence arriving between 2030 and 2035. While he's not certain it will arrive in that timeframe, he believes the possibility is significant enough to warrant serious preparation. In the most thought-provoking moment of our conversation, Susskind shared what he calls the "AI evolution hypothesis" from cosmologists like Lord Martin Rees: "The universe is 13.8 billion years old. Humanity's been around for a couple of hundred thousand years. In cosmic terms, we're simply a blink of the eye. It may well be that the only contribution that humanity makes to the cosmos is to create this much greater intelligence that will in due course pervade the universe and replace us." While many will dismiss this as science fiction, it highlights the profound transformation AI might represent, a shift potentially greater than the move from oral to written communication or the invention of the printing press. As we navigate this uncharted territory, Susskind's balanced approach, acknowledging both immense promise and peril, provides a valuable guide. The question isn't whether AI will transform our world, but how thoughtfully we'll manage that transformation. The answer may determine not just our future prosperity, but our very existence.
