It’s September and that means we’re on the cusp of seasonal change. So as you take time to reflect on the changes happening in the physical world, here’s a list of excellent articles around the web that will get you thinking about the changes happening in the tech world. Enjoy!
Is There a Creativity Deficit in Science? | Ars Technica
“Dr. Elias Zerhouni, director of the NIH from 2002 to 2007, admitted he was shocked by the trend away from younger researchers. ‘I couldn’t believe the data,’ he said during a Baker Institute event in 2008. Zerhouni went so far as to say it’s ‘probably the greatest long-term policy issue that will threaten America’s future competitiveness.'”
Will Superintelligent AIs Be Our Doom? | IEEE Spectrum
“We may call the phenomenon the treacherous turn. While weak, an AI behaves cooperatively (increasingly so, as it gets smarter). When the AI gets sufficiently strong—without warning or provocation—it strikes, and begins directly to optimize the world according to the criteria implied by its values.”
In E-Sports, Video Gamers Draw Real Crowds and Big Money | The New York Times
“More than 70 million people worldwide watch e-sports over the Internet or on TVs, according to estimates by SuperData Research. South Korea even has a TV channel devoted largely to e-sports. A championship tournament last October for League of Legends, an arena battle game, streamed around the world, attracting 8.5 million simultaneous online viewers at its peak — the same as the peak viewership for the deciding game of professional hockey’s Stanley Cup finals in June.”
The Food Gap Is Widening | The Atlantic
“Hu later called the growing gap between the rich and poor ‘disturbing.’ That gulf is really the critical takeaway of this study. There can be no tenable ‘overall improvement’ when there is growing disparity around a point so critical to preventive medicine, or when there is deterioration among any such sizable marginalized population.”
The Future of Robot Labor Is the Future of Capitalism | Motherboard
“Capitalism is very much alive and well, despite automation’s steady march towards ascendancy over the centuries. The reason is this: automation doesn’t disrupt capitalism. It’s an integral part of the system.”
The Rise and Fall and Rise of Virtual Reality | The Verge
This is a collection of pieces that are totally worth your time to read through on a lazy afternoon (especially on a tablet).
[Photo credit: Harold Hoyer/Flickr]
