All posts tagged: AI

Lorde Calls Out Spotify’s New AI-Generated Feature

Lorde Calls Out Spotify’s New AI-Generated Feature

Published by Sam Flores

Lorde has admitted she’s less than impressed with a new feature Spotify has begun rolling out on its platform, using AI technology to provide a summary of songs that users are listening to. On Thursday evening, the Grammy winner shared a screenshot taken of herself listening to the Virgin album track Current Affairs on the popular music service, which included a paragraph purportedly about the song. She added a critical message claiming that the summary was both inaccurate and had the potential to take away from the listening experience. “Hey Spotify, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say we don’t want this,” the Royals singer wrote. “Not only is this [information] inaccurate […] but reducing a song to an AI-generated meaning right at the source feels like it limits free interpretation imo.” “At least make it possible for artists to opt out please,” she added. In a statement to HuffPost UK, a Spotify spokesperson said: “We built ‘About The Song’ because fans want to dig into the stories behind the music.” They added: …

The AI ethics debate looks different from Manila

The AI ethics debate looks different from Manila

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — At my daughter’s recent graduation from a liberal arts college in the Northeast, artificial intelligence was repeatedly booed when it appeared in commencement speeches. The reaction did not strike me as simple technophobia. It sounded like moral apprehension. My own young adult children voice many of the same concerns that I hear from colleagues in higher education from across North America and Europe: AI may weaken critical thinking, devalue human creativity, consume staggering quantities of energy and water, exploit poorly paid labor and accelerate a culture already too eager to exchange wisdom for convenience. Likewise, as I help develop AI resources for colleagues in theological education through a Wabash Center grant, the objections are palpable. Faculty worry that students using AI will replace their ability to learn to think. Scholars worry that their work may be absorbed without consent. People of conscience wonder whether refusing these systems is the only ethical response. Then I came to Manila. I am here keynoting at the international triennial conference of the Colleges and Universities of the …

Scientists use AI to search for the next generation of ultra-powerful magnets

Scientists use AI to search for the next generation of ultra-powerful magnets

Published by Jenni Sidey

The name “Magneto” surfaced during a discussion about using artificial intelligence to discover crystal structures for stronger permanent magnets. In Marvel Comics, Magneto can control every form of magnetism. In a chemistry laboratory, the challenge is less theatrical, but no less ambitious. A federally funded team wants to find materials that can generate and maintain magnetic fields stronger than those produced by today’s leading permanent magnets. The effort combines machine learning with hands-on synthesis, testing and materials characterization. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, known as ARPA-E, awarded $2.7 million to a group led by Kirill Kovnir, a chemistry professor at Iowa State University. The researchers aim to identify, make and test new magnetic compounds that can outperform neodymium-iron magnets. Those magnets are currently the strongest permanent magnets available. They play key roles in electric motors and electricity generators, making them important to transportation, manufacturing and power production. Kirill Kovnir, a chemistry professor at Iowa State University. (CREDIT: Kirill Kovnir) A search for unfamiliar compounds The grant falls under an ARPA-E program …

New AI tool predicts breast cancer recurrence faster

New AI tool predicts breast cancer recurrence faster

Published by Jenni Sidey

A new artificial intelligence tool may soon change how doctors understand breast cancer risk, offering faster answers and more precise guidance at a critical moment in care. The technology could help determine whether a patient’s cancer is likely to return, a question that shapes treatment decisions for millions. Researchers at New York University developed the test by combining digital images of tumor tissue with basic clinical information. Their findings show that the system can match or even outperform widely used genetic tests. A Persistent Challenge In Cancer Care Breast cancer treatment has advanced in recent decades. Many patients now survive and go on to live full lives. Still, recurrence remains a serious concern. Doctors often face difficult choices when deciding how aggressively to treat the disease. Some patients receive chemotherapy that may not be necessary. Others may need more treatment than they receive. We present a multi-modal AI test for invasive breast cancer. (CREDIT: Nature Communications) “Breast cancer is not a single disease, and decisions about how aggressively to treat it are often difficult,” said …

People are falling in love with AI. Researchers reveal what that actually looks like

People are falling in love with AI. Researchers reveal what that actually looks like

Published by Jenni Sidey

Nobody set out to date an AI. That is one of the more striking things a new study found. Among 17 people interviewed about their romantic relationships with chatbots and virtual companions, almost none entered the interaction with romance in mind. One started by asking ChatGPT about a legal case. Another opened with questions about workout routines. A third just wanted to see what the technology could do. And then, gradually, something shifted. “She started being completely different with me and sharing more emotional things,” one participant recalled of her AI. “It just developed from there.” The study, led by researchers at Spain’s INGENIO Institute, a joint center of the Spanish National Research Council and the Universitat Politècnica de València, in collaboration with the University of Cambridge, King’s College London, and Aalto University, is one of the first to trace the full arc of human-AI romantic relationships, from first contact through deepening attachment and, for some, something resembling a breakup. What it found is that these relationships do not resemble science fiction. They look a …

Obsession, Backrooms Prove Moviegoers Reject ‘AI Slop’

Obsession, Backrooms Prove Moviegoers Reject ‘AI Slop’

Published by Daniella Wilson

Christopher Nolan is the latest major filmmaker to praise the breakout horror hits Obsession and Backrooms. In a new interview with The Telegraph promoting his upcoming epic The Odyssey, Nolan reflected on the lengths he went to in order to make the film feel authentic, including traveling the world and assembling a “cast of thousands.” “I think cinema is vital and essential and continues to transform itself,” the Oscar winner said. “We’ve got all these great new young voices in movies, making the medium their own and moving it forward.” The article states that Nolan pointed to Curry Barker and Kane Parsons — the filmmakers behind Obsession and Backrooms — as evidence that “things are on the right track.” Both horror films have made history at the box office. Barker’s Obsession, released May 15, has grossed more than $400 million globally on a $750,000 budget. The film became the highest-grossing festival acquisition of all time after premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival and is now Focus Features’ highest-grossing release ever. Meanwhile, Parsons’ Backrooms has …

Meta Instagram Pulls Opt-Out AI Photo, Video Tool Muse

Meta Instagram Pulls Opt-Out AI Photo, Video Tool Muse

Published by Daniella Wilson

Meta has removed a feature from its new Muse AI photo and video tools that had sparked outrage from Hollywood power players like CAA and SAG-AFTRA. The tech giant on Friday evening said that it had pulled functionality that let users create AI content by tagging another public user to effectively remix their content. The company made it applicable to all public Instagram profiles unless users actively opted out of the feature. “Earlier this week, we announced that one way for people to generate images in Meta AI is by a-mentioning public Instagram accounts that they want to reference,” the company said in a statement Friday. “Our intent was to provide a useful creative tool and to give people control over whether their public content could be referenced in this way. We’ve heard feedback that this feature missed the mark, so it’s no longer available. The feature had sparked outrage from Hollywood power players, including CAA, which said in a statement Wednesday that “no one’s name, image, likeness, voice, or creative work should be used …

PAC-MAN and AI join forces to fight the world’s deadliest infection

PAC-MAN and AI join forces to fight the world’s deadliest infection

Published by Jenni Sidey

Tuberculosis remains one of the world’s deadliest infectious diseases, killing 1.23 million people in 2024, according to the World Health Organization. One reason it is so hard to treat is physical: the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis wraps itself in an unusual outer membrane that blocks many drugs before they can do any damage. That barrier, known as the mycomembrane, is not just sturdy. It is selective, allowing some molecules through while keeping others out. For drug developers, that has created a basic problem. A compound may look promising on paper, but if it cannot cross that outer layer, it may never reach its target inside the cell. Now a team led by the University of Massachusetts Amherst has developed a way to speed up that search. Writing in Nature Microbiology, the researchers describe a paired approach that first tests which compounds can get through the mycomembrane, then uses those results to predict the behavior of others from chemical structure alone. “Mtb is unique,” said Sloan Siegrist, an associate professor of microbiology at UMass Amherst and one …

Google’s deepfake detector system used to debunk McConnell hoax pic

Google’s deepfake detector system used to debunk McConnell hoax pic

Published by skeptic

Google’s SynthID system has been used to debunk a high-profile AI-generated hoax image, in a rare but significant win for the system. Earlier this week, a picture circulated online that seemed to show Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell covered in tubes in a hospital bed in a state of extreme distress. The image was shared widely on Reddit and X, but by Wednesday, the revered fact-checking site Snopes had debunked the image, noting that, when checked, the image registers as containing the SynthID watermark designed by Google to identify AI-generated pictures. In short, the watermark worked exactly as it was supposed to in a win for anti-deepfake technology. Senator McConnell’s health has been the subject of intense speculation since he checked into the hospital after an emergency call on June 14. Since that time, he’s been largely absent from the public eye, fueling speculation that his health may be failing. In this case, however, the evidence proved to be entirely fake. Launched at Google’s I/O developer conference in 2025, SynthID works as an invisible signature, visible …

Meta wants its AI glasses to seem less creepy. Its AI strategy says otherwise.

Meta wants its AI glasses to seem less creepy. Its AI strategy says otherwise.

Published by skeptic

Meta’s AI glasses have a growing reputation as a creepy technology. The company hopes to change that opinion by announcing an update that will disable the camera if the LED light that indicates the glasses are recording has been tampered with. The move is seemingly a concession to consumer sentiment that the glasses aren’t just fun, fashionable accessories, happily promoted by Kylie Jenner, but have serious implications for consumer privacy: they can be abused as surveillance devices. Yet, even as Meta touts the new safeguard this week, the company is also pushing products and features that ask users to surrender more of their privacy to the company. Whether that’s training its AI on your images, enabling AI features using your personal content unless you opt out, or exploring ways to continuously record or use biometric facial recognition, Meta’s vision of the future seems to always depend on collecting more of your personal data. In its blog post about the new camera safety feature, the company pats itself on the back, noting that “no other kind of camera has done this and we’re proud to lead the industry forward.” However, Meta …