Wednesday, January 15

Tag: longreads

They Experimented on Themselves in Secret. What They Discovered Helped Win a War
16Apr By adminNo Comments
Technology

They Experimented on Themselves in Secret. What They Discovered Helped Win a War

The Allied soldiers who weren’t killed limped back from the defeat. It was clear now, they needed to be able to creep up to the beaches days before a raid to get up-to-date information. They needed to know where the Nazis had tunneled into the land, placed explosives, or built machine gun nests. None of their ships or boats could get close enough to the shore without being detected, so the Allies needed miniature submarines—and divers. And they needed science to make those things happen.By this point, Haldane, Spurway, and the other scientists had already given themselves eight seizures and broken several vertebrae for the cause. That’s because, shortly before the disaster at Dieppe, but not in time to stop it, Haldane and his crew had been asked by the Admiralty to pivot and focus on a n...
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WIRED’s 11 Noteworthy Long-form Stories of 2023
27Dec By adminNo Comments
Technology

WIRED’s 11 Noteworthy Long-form Stories of 2023

Personally, I think you should spend your holiday season reading all of WIRED’s standout features. Start here, work backward. Have fun!But fine, if you insist on spending some of that time with family or friends, we’ve also come up with 11 picks for more focused perusal. Not necessarily the best or most popular stories—as editors, we can’t choose favorites among all our precious children—but a collection that captures the wild range of life and weirdness on this planet in 2023. There’s AI, of course, and TikTok. Hardware and software. Stories that take you inside the biggest hacks of recent history, and personal quests to confirm family lore. Stories are important. We have to believe that, or we wouldn’t be here. And we’ll be here again next year, with even more stories to share. ...
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How Not to Be Stupid About AI, With Yann LeCun
22Dec By adminNo Comments
Technology

How Not to Be Stupid About AI, With Yann LeCun

Once we get computers to match human-level intelligence, they won’t stop there. With deep knowledge, machine-level mathematical abilities, and better algorithms, they’ll create superintelligence, right?Yeah, there's no question that machines will eventually be smarter than humans. We don't know how long it's going to take—it could be years, it could be centuries.At that point, do we have to batten down the hatches?No, no. We’ll all have AI assistants, and it will be like working with a staff of super smart people. They just won't be people. Humans feel threatened by this, but I think we should feel excited. The thing that excites me the most is working with people who are smarter than me, because it amplifies your own abilities.But if computers get superintelligent, why would they need us...
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The Real Reason Steph Curry Is So Damn Good
27Jul By adminNo Comments
Technology

The Real Reason Steph Curry Is So Damn Good

In looking over the footage for the doc, was there anything that surprised you?Curry: I guess the one thing that surprised me was how bad my first college game was. Because I tell the story—I've told the story all the time. Like you saw, you can hear, “He had 13 turnovers in this game.” And Coach had to make a decision, do I keep playing him or bench him? He could have made or broken my college career at that moment. But it was worse than I remember.How do you go about forgiving yourself for a bad performance or a bad mistake?Curry: It's easier to move on to the next thing as long as you're not cheating the process. In terms of learning the lessons you need to learn, you need to be honest with yourself, vulnerable with yourself. I know human nature is powerful, the mind is a powerful thin...
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