Lifeboat Foundation

With skull parts that click together like puzzle pieces and a large central tooth, the real-life sandworm is stranger than fiction.

Amphisbaenians are strange creatures. Like worms with vertebrae, scales, a large central tooth, and sometimes small forearms, these reptiles live underground, burrowing tunnels and preying on just about anything they encounter, not unlike a miniature version of the monstrous sandworms from “Dune.”

Even though they’re found around much of the world, little is known about how amphisbaenians behave in the wild because they cannot be observed while in their natural habitat under sand and soil. But thanks to two papers published in the March issue of The Anatomical Record, new light is being shed on these animals and their specialized anatomy.

Apple announces MM1

Methods, Analysis & Insights from Multimodal LLM Pre-training.

In this work, we discuss building performant Multimodal Large Language Models (MLLMs).

Continue reading “MM1: Methods, Analysis & Insights from Multimodal LLM Pre-training” »

The Los Angeles Police Department is warning residents that burglars are using WiFi jammers to easily disarm “connected” surveillance cameras and alarms that are available for cheap on marketplaces like Amazon.

As LA-based news station KTLA5 reports, tech-savvy burglars have been using WiFi jammers, which are small devices that can confuse and overload wireless devices with traffic, to enter homes without setting off alarms — a worrying demonstration of just how easily affordable home security devices from the likes of Ring and Eufy can be disarmed.

As Tom’s Hardware reported last month, instances of WiFi jammers being used by criminals go back several years. Jammers are not only easily available to purchase online, they’re also pretty cheap and can go for as little as $40.

“There is evidence that the youth of today blame the generations before them for the challenges that they and the planet face today,” said Mike Pickett, director of London-based Cazenove Capital, in the report.

The property broker added that housing will continue to be a focus of spending for the next generation, as those born between 1981 and 1996 may have struggled to get on the housing ladder thus far. Even at the highest end of the income ladder, growing a property portfolio is a key concern among those born between 1981 and 1996.

The study shows 23% of female ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNWI, valued at $30 million or above) are considering buying a home in 2024, with 21% of male UHNWI expecting to make a similar purchase this year. Wealthy Gen Zers feel the same, with 20% of those born from the mid-1990s to the early 2000s planning an acquisition.

Covariant this week announced the launch of RFM-1 (Robotics Foundation Model 1). Peter Chen, the co-founder and CEO of the UC Berkeley artificial intelligence spinout tells TechCrunch the platform, “is basically a large language model (LLM), but for robot language.”

RFM-1 is the result of, among other things, a massive trove of data collected from the deployment of Covariant’s Brain AI platform. With customer consent, the startup has been building the robot equivalent of an LLM database.

“The vision of RFM-1 is to power the billions of robots to come,” Chen says. “We at Covariant have already deployed lots of robots at warehouses with success. But that is not the limit of where we want to get to. We really want to power robots in manufacturing, food processing, recycling, agriculture, the service industry and even into people’s homes.”

The Wave House took a mere 140 hours to be printed.

Imagine a dress that doesn’t just fit you perfectly – it morphs along with your style, body, and the shifting trends of the season. It sounds futuristic, but this ‘smart’ garment exists thanks to a collaboration between textile innovators at MIT and a forward-thinking fashion house. It makes sustainable fashion more innovative.

Traditionally, bespoke tailoring—making clothes to a customer’s measurements—was the only way to ensure a perfect fit for one’s body. However, this option was too expensive for most people. A new invention of active fibers and innovative knitting processes is making custom clothing more accessible and eco-friendly.

This is a sci-fi documentary, looking at what it takes to build an underground city on Mars. The choice to go underground is for protection, from the growing storm radiation that rains down on the surface every day. And to further advance the Mars colonization efforts.

Where will the materials to build the city come from? How will the crater be covered to protect the inhabitants? And what will it feel like to live in this city, that is in a hole in the ground?

Continue reading “The Dream of Building an Underground City on Mars (Sci-Fi Documentary)” »

Why do I find this so alarming?

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI is looking to fuse its artificial intelligence systems into the bodies of humanoid robots as part of a new deal with robotics startup Figure.

Sunnyvale, California-based Figure announced the partnership Thursday along with $675 million in venture capital funding from a group that includes Amazon founder Jeff Bezos as well as Microsoft, chipmaker Nvidia and the startup-funding divisions of Intel and OpenAI.

Continue reading “Humanoid robot-maker Figure partners with OpenAI and gets backing from Jeff Bezos” »