Having conquered Go and protein folding, the company turns to a really hard problem

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE has reached deep into our lives, though you might be hard pressed to point to obvious examples of it. Among countless other behind-the-scenes chores, neural networks power our virtual assistants, make online shopping recommendations, recognize people in our snapshots, scrutinize our banking transactions for evidence of fraud, transcribe our voice messages, and weed out hateful social-media postings. What these applications have in common is that they involve learning and operating in a constrained, predictable environment.

Read more at IEEE Spectrum magazine.

There’s been much debate about lateral flow tests – their accuracy depends on context and the theories of a 18th-century cleric

A rise in the Covid-19 infection rate actually means that lockdown is working

Read more in UnHerd.

Hindsight makes it easy to blame the Government for listening to the wrong people, not the right ones

Read more in UnHerd.

There’s nothing like a bunch of paintbrush-toting nerds telling each other that they’re doing nice work

Read more in UnHerd.

Rows involving Richard Dawkins and Andrew Sabisky reveal how difficult it is to ‘decouple’ controversial concepts in our heads

Read more in UnHerd.

A promising field of research on social behaviour struggled after investigators couldn’t repeat key findings. Now researchers are trying to establish what’s worth saving.

Read more in Nature.

In a few decades, two warring toothbrush giants have carved out a market worth billions, with the help of a little science and some clever marketing. But where does it go next?

Read more in Wired.

The country’s only shot at a nuclear missile is inspiring a new shot at a future in space.

Read more at Smithsonian Air & Space magazine.

Dominic Cummings and I share some interests, to my slight chagrin. Both he and I are big fans of the nerdy, abstruse bit of the internet filled with people who are sometimes called “Rationalists”. Read more on Unherd.