Dubious Augury

Martian Levittown

I have major doubts whether the following popular forecasts will come to pass ... at least in our lifetimes ...

-  Go-everywhere self-driving vehicles

- Serious global warming caused by increases in carbon dioxide

- Electric vehicles/airplanes totally replacing internal-combustion ones

- Widespread G-5 communications

- Colonization of Mars

- Artificial intelligence/robots controlling humans

- Nuclear-powered missiles

- Vegetarian “meat” replacing real meat

- Total elimination of nuclear and hydrocarbon-based power plants

- Nuclear fusion power generation

- Quantum computers

- Plastic products disappearing altogether

Headlines

Largest earthquake in decades shakes Southern California

Trump tweet raises concerns that the US may raise tariffs on Europe

Rouhani says Iran will enrich uranium to ‘any amount we want’ ...

Warren: Trump’s July 4th event ‘a campaign event’ that taxpayers shouldn’t pay for

Artificial intelligence more transformative than the Internet

Fire destroys Jim Beam warehouse with 45,000 bourbon barrels

Gibraltar detains supertanker with Iranian oil ...

Kamala top choice of Hispanic Dems after criticizing Obama on deportations

Producer-in-chief puts on a 4th of July show — with a military emphasis

Kamala Harris says busing should be considered, not mandated

Russian sub that caught fire linked to underwater drone program ...

Pew: Only 1-in-3 Democrats say knowing pledge of allegiance is important

Headlines

Booker proposes “Office of Reproductive Freedom”

China would see blue skies ahead if it accepted US demands: Fed’s Bullard says

Wall stall: Less than two miles built!

Joe Biden: China is going to win 5G and A.I. if Trump is still president

Republican Keller wins Pennsylvania special election

America businesses in China: Tariffs are hurting us

Nevada passes National Popular vote bill in bid to upend Electoral College ...

Obama admin cut Situation Room’s feed during Russia probe meetings

Small-dollar Bernie sidles up to big money

US trade chief is expected to discuss China with officials from Japan and EU this week

NBA ratings plunge 48% ...

Ilhan Omar: ‘Ignorance is really pervasive in many parts of this country’

Neural Networks

Your humble poster here once headed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) software project. One of my best programmers quit because of his frustration over complex nested conditionals (neural networks). The ultimate success of AI will depend on the ability to identify nodes in such networks as well as being able to deal with the almost infinite levels of conditional complexities.

It seems to this author that one of Trump’s great strengths as a policy maker is his ability to include in our country’s decision-making process an uncanny knack to identify previously ignored nodes in our neural network — unfair trade alliances, over regulation, Russian pipeline into Germany, NATO slackers, open borders, steel and aluminum being strategic US native industries, etc.

The jury is somewhat out on Trump’s ability to navigate these new expanded decision trees ... but he is still way, way ahead of our last four presidents.

Back to the subject at hand. Yes, quantum computers may someday be able to handle the huge number of complex conditionals involved in true AI. But, if a butterfly flapping it wings in Japan can cause a tornado in Alabama, I still have some doubts about the logistics of the data amassing project needed to account for all possible inputs into such an ultimate AI breakthrough.

How about it Elon?

New New World Order

Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency under the banner that championed Nationalism over Globalism. This theme is now spreading around the world .. to the chagrin of the Davos billionaire elites. However, Trump's message carries much more ideology than just the supremacy of nation states over (an unelected) world government. Here are a number of the battles that also define Trump's message ... you decide what side Trump favors:

Open Borders vs. Sovereignty

Global Warming vs.Self-modulating Climate

Capitalism vs. Socialism

Economic growth vs. Stagnation ("New Normal")

Diversity vs. Homogeneity (a tough one)

Populism vs. Authoritarianism

AI vs. Human Cognition  (another toughie)

Freedom vs. Enslavement

Privacy vs. Personal data capture (evolving)

Free trade vs. Fair trade

Headlines

Trump calls for Russia to be brought back into the G-7

Celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain has died at 61 in a suicide, CNN says

Krauthammer: Weeks to live ...

Trump floats idea of end to federal marajuana ban

Trump: First lady 'great' but cannot fly again for a month

Scientists at a company part owned by Bill Gates gave found a cheap way of converting CO2 into gasoline

Chinese hackers stole sensitive Navy underseas warfare plans ...

Google says will refuse to use A.I.  to help U.S. military

Trump says he's considering pardoning Muhammad Ali

Trump says EPA chief Scott Pruitt not blameless: 'We'll see what happens'

Australia to expel up to 60 imams, close 7 mosques

Tijuana 2018: Six murders per day

Headlines

'Bannonwas shot on the South Lawn and then run over by a tank'

Manufacturing accelerates to cap best year since '04 ...

North Korea appears to have bombed itself in botched missile test: Report

... Trump furious: Bannon not only lost his job, he lost his mind'

Bannon endorsement s now a sudden handicap for GOP candidates

Fire at Clinton Chappaqua home ...

Tesla falls far short of Model 3 deliveries, pushes back production targets

Trump dissolves Voter Fraud Commission despite 'substantial evidence'

Conservative media stands by Trump over Bannon

Manafort sues Mueller, Rosenstein, DOJ ... 'unlawfully exceeded authority' ...

China is developing giant $2.1 billion park, dedicated to developing AI

Witness: Mueller Grand Jury like something out of a Black Lives Matter rally

The DMV Solution?

Oracles are in a quandary about the projected effect of automation on future employment levels. One dire prediction concludes that 50% of all current jobs will disappear. It has become an accepted theme that robots and AI are going to create massive unemployment around the world resulting in social dislocations and disruption. One obvious answer is what I will call the DMV solution. When you go to the Department of Motor Vehicles for a driver's license, you wait in one line to get a form, then in another to  submit it, then in another possibly for a photograph, then in another to take an eye test, then in another possibly to take a written test, and finally go to someone else to take a road test.

This means that it takes six (or more) DMV employees to serve just one function, getting your license ... and there are many other functions of this agency ... a formula for full employment at the DMV. Yes, the DMV is a government agency and government agencies are notorious for make-work jobs for the relatives of politicians. And as distasteful as this process is, it is a fact of life.

I suspect that, if robots and AI are going to deplete the number of current productive jobs, that the world will eventually move toward a DMV-like world. All kinds of new service jobs will pop up.... like today's personal trainers and dog walkers ... that will help compensate for the jobs lost to automation. I don't think we will turn off our A/Cs and have Nubian boys fanning us, but there will be lots of new job categories created to fill the voids. But, of course, the really good jobs will be the robot builders and repairers.

Headlines

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites.

Trump signs sweeping order that could gut Obamacare

White House orders 'immediate regulatory freeze'

Churchill bust returns to Trump's gilded Oval Office

Gracious in victory -- Hillary gets standing ovation at Trump's behest

15 Steelers sick with stomach flu days before championship ...

Wash Post admits: Obama spent billions to fix schools, failed

Nancy Sinatra slams [CNN] network: 'Why do you lie?'

Man says 18.9 inch penis a disability, forcing to live off food banks ...

Trump offers father down on his luck $10,000 check at inaugural event

Axelrod: [Trump] Speech 'full-throated populist manifesto' 'lit this town on fire'

AI now smarter than average American ...

Sad Michael Moore: Trump 'will not last the four years'

AI

AI (Artificial Intelligence) is moving forward in leaps and bounds. There is a new product called Hound, a natural-language search engine for the Android smart phone, that can do remarkable things (if real). Watch a demonstration of its versatility in this YouTube Video. This product, developed by SoundHound Inc. (see: Corporate Website), is just bursting onto the market and is receiving considerable buzz. I first saw this demonstration on the reddit website and was quite impressed. A company I founded back in the 1990's, Occam Research Corp., developed a similar product (MUSE) ... but without the voice recognition and voice response. Although the above demonstration shows remarkable eclat, it does contain a few suspicious capabilities that deserve further investigation.

But, if real, this demonstration is a glimpse of what the future holds for AI ... a brave new world.