That is at this time’s version of The Obtain, our weekday publication that gives a day by day dose of what’s occurring on the earth of expertise.
Google DeepMind has a brand new solution to look inside an AI’s “thoughts”
We don’t know precisely how AI works, or why it really works so properly. That’s an issue: It could lead on us to deploy an AI system in a extremely delicate area like drugs with out understanding that it may have essential flaws embedded in its workings.
A crew at Google DeepMind that research one thing known as mechanistic interpretability has been engaged on new methods to allow us to peer underneath the hood. It lately launched a software to assist researchers perceive what is occurring when AI is producing an output.
It’s all a part of a push to get a greater understanding of precisely what is occurring inside an AI mannequin. If we do, we’ll be capable of management its outputs extra successfully, main to raised AI programs sooner or later. Learn the total story.
—Scott J Mulligan
What’s on the desk at this yr’s UN local weather convention
Talks kicked off this week at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan. Operating for a few weeks every year, the worldwide summit is the most important annual assembly on local weather change.
The problem on the desk this time round: International locations have to comply with set a brand new aim on how a lot cash ought to go to creating international locations to assist them finance the combat in opposition to local weather change. Complicating issues? A US president-elect whose method to local weather could be very totally different from that of the present administration (understatement of the century).
This can be a large second that would set the tone for what the subsequent few years of the worldwide local weather world appears like. Right here’s what you have to find out about COP29 and the way Donald Trump’s election is coloring issues.
—Casey Crownhart
This story is from The Spark, our weekly publication supplying you with the within observe on all issues power and local weather. Enroll to obtain it in your inbox each Wednesday.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the web to seek out you at this time’s most enjoyable/necessary/scary/fascinating tales about expertise.
1 The FBI is investigating crypto predictions-betting platform Polymarket
It’s investigating whether or not the agency allowed US merchants to wager on the election. (Bloomberg $)
+ Doing so would have been a violation of an settlement with the US authorities. (NYT $)
+ Polymarket claims to be a “totally clear prediction market.” (WSJ $)
2 OpenAI is asking for the US authorities to spend money on AI
With out monetary assist, the US may lose essential floor to China, it warns. (WP $)
+ The agency floated the concept of constructing a colossal information heart. (The Data $)
3 AI-generated Elon Musk propaganda is rife on Fb
Professional-Musk inspiration porn is the content material of alternative for spammers. (404 Media)
+ Trump is surrounding himself with terminally on-line edgelords. (The Atlantic $)
4 The web proper has a misogynistic new rallying cry
‘Your physique, my alternative’ is being unfold by younger males in search of to impress. (New Yorker $)+ The upcoming presidency may usher in an age of gendered regression. (The Guardian)
5 China’s human manufacturing facility employees are underneath strain
Robots are creeping into each degree of the manufacturing course of. (FT $)
+ Three causes robots are about to develop into far more helpful. (MIT Know-how Assessment)
6 The way forward for chipmaking in America
Efforts to revitalize native services aren’t precisely going to plan. (Wired $)
+ What’s subsequent in chips. (MIT Know-how Assessment)
7 Blindbox reside streaming is thrilling customers in China
You by no means know what you’re going to get. (NYT $)
8 What the glacial Earth could have seemed like
Round 700 million years in the past, the complete planet was lined in ice. (Ars Technica)
+ Life-seeking, ice-melting robots may punch by Europa’s icy shell. (MIT Know-how Assessment)
9 The best way to shield the world’s largest single coral colony
The newly-discovered colony is the dimensions of two basketball courts. (Vox)
+ The race is on to avoid wasting coral reefs—by freezing them. (MIT Know-how Assessment)
10 These researchers have reinvented the wheel
This ‘morphing’ wheel can roll over obstacles as much as 1.3 instances the peak of its radius. (Reuters)
Quote of the day
“Shawty crunk, so recent, so clear.”
—Mark Zuckerberg, Meta CEO-turned rapper, debuts a reworked model of 2002 rap hit Get Low in a tribute to his spouse, the Wall Road Journal stories.
The massive story
Marseille’s battle in opposition to the surveillance state
Internationally, video cameras have develop into an accepted characteristic of city life. Many cities in China now have dense networks of them, and London and New Delhi aren’t far behind. Now France is enjoying catch-up.
Issues have been raised all through the nation. However the surveillance rollout has met particular resistance in Marseille, France’s second-biggest metropolis.
It’s unsurprising, maybe, that activists are combating again in opposition to the cameras, highlighting the surveillance system’s overreach and underperformance. However are they succeeding? Learn the total story.
—Fleur Macdonald
We are able to nonetheless have good issues
A spot for consolation, enjoyable and distraction to brighten up your day. (Received any concepts? Drop me a line or tweet ’em at me.)
+ This yr’s gurning championship profitable mugshots don’t disappoint.
+ What does it imply to have private fashion, precisely?
+ Amsterdam’s unofficial police cat is completely lovely (and he lives on a ship!)
+ Save the worms—this author actually is. 
