@jjaron

News editor for New Scientist

 London
Joined January 2009
  • Tweets36.6K
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  • Followers7.1K
1.6KMedia
My latest AI Explained column looks at the idea that self-replicating AIs are going to take over your smart oven. They aren't! newscientist.com/article/259…

Self-replicating AIs are a great digital horror story – here’s the reality | New Scientist

Anthropic announced that an AI could self-replicate inside smart devices within months, stoking fear around the internet. Columnist Jacob Aron explains the technical limitations that make this spook...

newscientist.com
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Pleased to announce that I am launching AI Explained, a weekly column on how to understand AI. The first edition today is all about OpenAI's maths dump newscientist.com/article/259…

OpenAI has dumped 722 maths papers – now it must clean up the mess | New Scientist

OpenAI is using mathematics as a test site for its most capable AI models, and that means it has a responsibility to deal with the fallout, rather than just leaving it to mathematicians, says Jacob...

newscientist.com
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Jacob Aron retweeted
Scott Manley
@DJSnM4 Mar 2025
We've never seen anything like this recording of a landing on another world. @fireflyspace
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In a monthly reporting call on global climate, researchers from the US government’s climate and weather agency avoided linking recent record temperatures with climate change newscientist.com/article/246…

NOAA scientists refuse to link warming weather to climate change | New Scientist

In a monthly reporting call on global climate, researchers from the US government’s climate and weather agency avoided mentioning rising levels of greenhouse gases

newscientist.com
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Image by Michael Carroll in 2013. We did NOT see the little one coming; it hit Earth above Chelyabinsk in 2013, injuring >1400 people. Asteroid 2024 YR4 is bigger than the little one & perhaps as large as the football field! JWST 🔭 data next month will help pin down the size.
Image by Michael Carroll illustrating the sizes of some asteroids in 2013. The asteroids are shown in comparison to a US football field. We had seen the big one "2012 DA14" coming, and it just buzzed Earth. But the littler one we did NOT see coming, and it hit Earth above Chelyabinsk, creating a shockwave the blew out windows and injuring more than 1400 people. The asteroid we are monitoring now - 2024 YR4 - is bigger than the little guy, but maybe as large as the whole football field! Our JWST measurements next month will help pin down the size of 2024 YR4. Source: https://carrollspaceart.com/gallery/comparisons/

ALT Image by Michael Carroll illustrating the sizes of some asteroids in 2013. The asteroids are shown in comparison to a US football field. We had seen the big one "2012 DA14" coming, and it just buzzed Earth. But the littler one we did NOT see coming, and it hit Earth above Chelyabinsk, creating a shockwave the blew out windows and injuring more than 1400 people. The asteroid we are monitoring now - 2024 YR4 - is bigger than the little guy, but maybe as large as the whole football field! Our JWST measurements next month will help pin down the size of 2024 YR4. Source: https://carrollspaceart.com/gallery/comparisons/

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The making shit up machine will make up as much shit as you want, and it only costs $200 a month!
Daniel Litt
@littmath18 Feb 2025
Had a sort of a funny experience with OpenAI’s Deep Research tool, which I wanted to share since I think it reveals some of the tool’s strengths and weaknesses.
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And this is why I am yet to find a use for LLMs
Find me on bsky @colin-fraser.net@colin_fraser5 Feb 2025
Replying to @colin_fraser
anyway I guess as long as whatever thing you're doing has the property that it can withstand a factual error rate of ≥85%, this thing is safe to use
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This ain't gonna happen
Marcia Smith@SpcPlcyOnline20 Jan 2025
"We will pursue our manifest detinty into the stars, launching American astronauts to plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars." President Trump in his inaugural address just now.
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Hahaha what?!
The Verge
@verge19 Jan 2025
Marvel Snap is banned, just like TikTok theverge.com/2025/1/19/24347…

Marvel Snap is banned, just like TikTok

Dusted.

theverge.com
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"plan" is doing a lot of work here
George Mann@sgfmann18 Jan 2025
The Guardian: Tory plan to build 40 new NHS hospitals in tatters #TomorrowsPapersToday
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I wrote about how strange and wonderful it was that the incredible Twin Peaks briefly dragged David Lynch into the mainstream, and how hard he fought — especially with Twin Peaks: The Return — to do what interested him, and not a potential mass audience: rollingstone.com/tv-movies/t…

‘Twin Peaks’ Was the Most Bizarre Show on TV — and David Lynch’s Biggest Success

David Lynch's show Twin Peaks was a surprise cultural and ratings phenomenon when it aired in 1990. It changed television forever

rollingstone.com
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It seems insane that this form exists? 972 hours! Is anyone reading it?
Bearly AI
@bearlyai16 Jan 2025
Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon says that AI can draft 95% of an S1 IPO prospectus “in minutes” (a job that used to require a 6-person team multiple weeks). “The last 5% now matters because the rest is now a commodity,” per Solomon.
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Did it though? Or did a noisy statistic continue to oscillate around zero?
BBC Breaking News
@BBCBreaking16 Jan 2025
UK economy grew for the first time in three months, expanding by 0.1% in November, official figures show bbc.in/3E9Tbsg
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My leader this week is a cheerful one: it is time to accept that we have broken the climate, and for us to look at what comes next newscientist.com/article/mg2…

Are we entering a dangerous new phase of climate change? | New Scientist

A series of events, from the California wildfires to evidence we passed 1.5 degrees last year, suggests wild weather will become even more common

newscientist.com
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Congestion pricing coverage is peak economics Every person is like, "I didn't used to bear the external costs of my behavior. But now that I do, I am adjusting along an infinite variety of least-cost adaptive margins that no central planner could have foreseen or designed"
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If this doesn't explain how he became an expert in Parisian sewers then there is no reason for it to exist
The A.V. Club
@TheAVClub14 Jan 2025
Les Misérables' Jean Valjean is basically a superhero already and now he’s getting the requisite origin story to boot. avclub.com/jean-valjean-film…

Look down, there's a Jean Valjean prequel film coming

Look down, there's a Jean Valjean prequel film coming

avclub.com
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If ChatGPT had a way to reliably ingest RSS, this could potentially be useful...but as far as I'm aware, it doesn't
OpenAI
@OpenAI14 Jan 2025
Today we’re rolling out a beta version of tasks—a new way to ask ChatGPT to do things for you at a future time. Whether it's one-time reminders or recurring actions, tell ChatGPT what you need and when, and it will automatically take care of it.
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The government’s new AI plan marks a big shift in direction. Sunak saw the importance of AI but he tried to position the UK as the world’s AI safety leaders, emphasising the risks and in an eye-catching but negative way.
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70% accuracy is very bad, but if your existing processes are starting below that level, yeesh
john williams@wi_john13 Jan 2025
“Tests carried out by the department showed that the tool had an accuracy of about 70 per cent, which was described as “performing as good or better than existing processes” thetimes.com/article/19801ac…
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Not this again. I look forward to the intelligence agencies pointing out which of the laws of physics we're going to ignore in order to make such a weapon possible.
Yoni Appelbaum
@YAppelbaum10 Jan 2025
News from @shaneharris: Two intel agencies have shifted their position on the odds a mystery weapon caused Havana Syndrome—previously ruled out—to a "roughly even chance," based on new intelligence: theatlantic.com/internationa…

The Consensus on Havana Syndrome Is Cracking

After long denying the possibility, some intelligence agencies are no longer willing to rule out a mystery weapon.

theatlantic.com
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