#i cannot believe this is a university of technology and design

[ilikecarsandlike4people]

My schools idea of an "accessible route" to the it classroom still involves stairs. When I pointed this out, only answer I got was "well, you can get up, right?" and what? carry the chair up and down stairs? I don't know, I'm just very tired and my legs hurt when i even think about having to drag myself up there tomorrow.

[inbarfink]

So the thing about Tak’s Holo-Disguise is that it specifically might not be an example of Tak using more advanced technology than Zim.

The implication in “The Nightmare Begins” is that Zim maybe also have access to Perfectly Realistic Human Disguises, probably similar to Tak’s Hologram - but he intentionally rejected them because he saw them as too ugly. He deliberately chose his shitty little costume because he thought that was the only one that looked ‘good’.

And these terrible disguises are also pretty consistent with how the actual official Invaders disguise themselves. If anything, Zim’s got the best costume of the lot!

So with Zim dismissing the more realistic disguises as being ‘ugly’ and ‘stinky’ and those being… basically the most common insults he throws at humans. ..I think the implication here is pretty clearly that Zim’s (and the actual Irken Invaders’) disguises are bad because he doesn’t want to look too human because Irken Imperial Indoctrination has taught him every other species in the universe is revolting and so he cannot stand the idea of looking too match like the people he is trying to infiltrate.

So it is interesting that the one Irken who actually uses their advanced technology to actually look like another species is Tak. Maybe she’s just being a bit of a show-off overachiever. So driven by the need to prove how competent of an Invader she can be she decided to suffer through the indignity of Using a Competent Disguise. 

Or maybe there’s sort of an implication that Tak doesn’t really buy into Irken Ideology that much?

Like, obviously, she’s not, like,  some sort of anti-Imperial pro-alien advocate or anything. She’s still trying to gain the respect of the Tallest, she still wants to become an Invader, she is still willing to sacrifice an entire planet in order to achieve her goals. 

I’m thinking more, like, Zim is 100% a true believer in Irken Imperial Ideology. He wants to be an Invader at least in part so he could use his ‘amazingness’ to contribute to the conquests of the Irken Empire. And he legitimately believes the Tallests are superior beings worthy of his admiration. And he legitimately believes Irkens are superior to all other sapient beings in the universe in general and to humans especially.

Meanwhile, Tak’s main goals might just be to gain as much power and prestige as she can - no matter what or who stands in her way. If she lived in a society that valued dentists above all she would’ve become a dentist. But she was born in the Irken Empire, and the most prestigious not-height-dependent position available to her in Irken Society is the one of an Invader, so that’s what she dedicated her life to. Not out of any ideological commitment to help the Empire's conquests.

She tries to gain the Tallests’ favor because she knows she needs them to get ahead in life, not necessarily because she craves their tall, superior approval the way Zim does. She can kill a lot of non-Irkens on her way to ‘greatness’, but it’s more of a general callousness towards other people - rather than loyalty to the superiority of the Irken people. 

That might also explain why she’s the one Irken with the sense of individuality to customize her uniform

And design her own version of the Irken Empire Flag, based on her own look.

Because maybe she’s not trying to serve the Irken Empire, maybe she’s just trying to serve Tak.

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are weird: We have the means……

( Please come see me on my new patreon and support me for early access to stories and personal story requests :D https://www.patreon.com/NiqhtLord Every bit helps)  

YesterdayShow less

“What do you mean you will not let us land?”

From the confines of his captain’s quarters the bridge crew could not hear the anger radiating from Captain Hazel Abbot. Projected opposite him was the current source of his ire, Sevren Dayton. He was captain of the Verung patrol ship currently blocking his relief vessel from landing on Tevren VI and delivering critically needed medical supplies.

“The native population of Tevren VI has been designated a technologically inferior species and therefore any intervention from space faring species prohibited.”

Dayton spoke as if he was quoting a rulebook word for word which only further infuriated Abbot.

“The Terran Republic does not recognize the standards of the Verung,” Abbot began politely, “and since we are not in Verung territory I must inform you that you have no authority here.”

Dayton’s eye twitched for the briefest of moments but Abbot knew he had struck a nerve. If there was one thing Verung hated it was when other species bowed down to them like they were the third coming of space jesus.

“Under article three section four dash one one seven nine of the Treaty of Nibhishein, the Terran Republic agreed to defer to the Verung in disputed territories.”

Abbot pulled open his data terminal and entered in the mentioned treaty. His eyes darted across the scrolling text before frowning. “The treaty you reference is a trade treaty signed after the Verung War.”

“I believe you mean the “War of Terran Compliance”.” Dayton corrected, but Abbot would not be baited.

“Regardless this matter is excluded from the confines of the treaty as no matter of trade or military aspect is at play.”

Dayton refused to give ground however. “By handing over medical supplies you are instigating the basis for trade; therefore your actions here are covered under the treaty.”

Abbot threw his hands in the air and rose from his chair with such frustration that he knocked over several documents, scattering them to the floor in a blizzard of paper.

“There is no trade here. If they do not get these medical supplies the people of Tevren VI will die within a year.” Abbot’s voice was stern as the boundaries of his patience were fast approaching. “We cannot sit back and let that happen.”

“That is exactly what will happen.”

The measured tone of Dayton’s voice silenced Captain Abbot if only by the disbelief of what he had just heard. Dayton continued further to Abbot’s horror.

“If you were to save these people as you so wish you would be altering their natural evolution. We of higher technological standings cannot play gods, judging who lives and who dies.”

“Do you not hear yourself!?”

Abbot’s rage could no longer be contained over the sheer stupidity of Dayton’s logic.

“You would have us sit by and watch as millions of living breathing people die horribly?!”

Dayton looked into the holographic projector with disgust written all over his face. “It is the will of the universe.”

Abbot looked at the Verung captain dumbfounded. He slouched back into his chair and hung his head between his hands. He could hear the fizzle of the projector unit still active but didn’t care to face Dayton as his mind raced.

“Will you stand down?”

Abbot looked up at Dayton still on the projector and straightened himself up. He pressed the creases from his uniform and wove his hair back into shape before addressing the com unit built into the projector unit.

“Helmsman,” he began as Dayton’s face looked smug, “begin landing procedures as planned.”

“What do you think you are-“ Dayton began but Abbot was not finished.

“Master at arms, if the Verung attempt to block our descent into atmosphere and pose a threat to this vessel you have permission to open fire.”

Dayton’s expression went from shock to outrage as the master at arms acknowledged. Captain Abbot now fixed the Verung with a deathless stare as he clasped his hands together.

“I thank you for your perspective but we have a people to save. If you attempt to halt us again we will consider it an act of aggression and respond appropriately as you have just heard.”

“My government will be informed of this.” Dayton remarked through clenched teeth.

“Good.” Abbot replied. “Then let them know that one does not need to play god to do the right thing.”

[nixite117]

Worldbuilding Brainstorm???

in most scifi settings, there is either a common language or some sort of technology that translates languages.

I like the second one and here’s why:

A common language is too easy. Since everyone knows the same language, everyone speaks with the same grammar structure and similar speech patterns. Sure, everyone has accents and some don’t ever evolve past “broken” common, but a single verbal language isn’t exactly… plausible… to every species.

Think of it like this: birds mimic spoken words and sounds, but rarely ever sound real. Same with ai voices. Sure you can get pretty close, but unless you carefully map out each little inflection in tone and pitch, an ai voice will mess up in inhuman ways. Because it’s not human.

Humans also mimic sounds, but it takes years of practice to make those sounds truly believable because our vocal cords simply aren’t designed to meow and chirp.

So who’s to say every alien creature is physically capable of making the sounds required to speak the common language? That’s awfully presumptuous >;P imagine if humans met aliens and the aliens all speak in a squelching, squeaking and chirping warble? What if they sounded like bears or birds? Many humans have trouble mimicking OTHER HUMANS, even if it’s just an accent. How would we be able to learn a language we physically cannot replicate?

A common language makes more sense for a newly blooming galaxy, one that hasn’t truly connected so much as made contact with each other. As a larger variety of creatures join the stars, however, it simply becomes implausible to continue relying on a “common” language. So they do what everyone in a scifi genre does best! They make technology.

Depending on how far along the timeline you have your story going, the complexity and variety of translation technology would vary. The earliest translation devices would be handheld or digital, and would be limited to simple sentences like our modern translators. The translation would be word to word like google translate, and the only languages available would be the main ones of each planet (for earth, it would be English).

But as technology advances, you go from handheld devices like tablets to headsets and microphones that automatically translate what you say and play it through a speaker. Then the headsets turn into visors and eventually you have a brain implant. Perhaps they work for any species, perhaps they don’t. In my universe, chip translators process any language for you and transmit that information to your brain rather than play it out on a speaker or give you text to read.

The reason I like this distinction is because a brain chip that processes language for you would be a WILD experience for me. You’d be able to hear the things the other person is saying, the exact way they’re saying it, but you’d be comprehending that shit in YOUR OWN LANGUAGE. SHITS CRAZY MAN!

Imagine hearing someone speak Latin, never having known a word of it, but understanding exactly what they want even though you couldn’t translate it word for word. That would be so fuckin trippy.

You could even go further by applying non verbal languages. Of course with any surgery, this would have risks and complications should your translator get damaged, but imagine the possibilities!

Technology isn’t perfect, so obviously it will sometimes be unable to figure out what that person is actually saying. For example, in English, we often repeat things to accentuate the point and make sure people understand what is important. Perhaps some species of alien don’t understand this, leading to confusion and maybe even misunderstandings.

“I have to get this done. I have to.”

“Have to what?”

“Didn’t you hear what I just said?”

“Of course I did! What else do you have to do?”

The thing about this, however, is that verbal language isn’t universal. In fact, most expression from species to species would be different. Each species might have different body language. Different emotional expressions. Different stress responses. Different displays of affection.

This would make room for a lot of things to be learned about humans. I have a handful of little fluff drabbles and humor I came up with on this concept. I just have a feeling there’d be some things aliens just wouldn’t be prepared to deal with about humans and vice versa.

[baptaincarnacles]

Fandom Crossovers

Humanized, as always :D

Barnacles, Zane, and Martin are the Trouble Trio.

So, I'm going to be doing incorrect quotes.

---

Martin: So, out of curiosity, what's the scariest thing you two have experienced?

Capt. Barnacles: I've nearly drowned, watched the people I care for most become injured, almost fallen from a high ledge, and oh! Lost my former crew.

Zane: I believe- if my calculations have calibrated correctly, the most fear I've gone through is remembering I've wiped out an abundance of population. I had been manipulated and had my memories erased. It was a rather gruesome realization.

Martin:

Martin: I was going to say my power suit malfunctioned, and I turned into a tree. Now I feel bad.

---

Zane, cooking: This is nice- your ship. The technology is admirable.

Martin: You'll have to credit that to Aviva and Koki. They get everything done around here.

Capt. Barnacles: *crosses arms behind back, looking rather serious* I heard your team has their own Octopod.

Martin, freezing: *slowly* Yes?

Capt. Barnacles: I've seen it. It looks like it'll get the job done, but the ship lacks most... How do I put this?

Zane, spinning his head around: I assume you intend to tell him it lacks practical and daily use. Where theirs is designed for singular missions, yours is designed to withstand the elements of many climates.

Capt. Barnacles: Well, of course. It has pods for all necessities. We certainly don't lack in those aspects. It has sufficient engineering, working heating and cooling, a launch bay, and various vehicles designed for any terrain; my crew does an outstanding job.

Martin:

Martin: Never let Aviva hear you two talk like that- I love listening to you talk about technology and the fancy stuff, but- she is a competitive inventor and will try to surpass your technologies.

Zane: Your brother has fangs due to his power suit altering his DNA. Most of Ms. Corcavado's technology is still experimental. Since you started wearing it, it appears your strength has skyrocketed, your sense of smell has improved, and some genetic alters have significantly affected your hearing.

Capt. Barnacles:

Martin:

Zane: Did I say something wrong?

Martin: No, but a lot of things make sense now.

---

Zane, staring at Zach-bots: This is rather amateur technology. I've not seen any android quite like this.

Martin: If the androids in your universe are programmed like you? I'm a little intimidated.

Capt. Barnacles, crushing one of the Zach-bots: What's with your realms and antagonistic heathens? The only thing my crew ever has to worry about is nature and what she brings.

Martin:

Zane:

Martin: We-

Capt. Barnacles: It was rhetorical.

-

Zane, using his elemental power in front of the other two for the first time:

Martin: Oh my- what in the creature world? *excited laughter* I've never seen- you just? How?

Zane: I was gifted with this extraordinary ability. I was designed to protect those who cannot defend themselves. I was seen worthy by the former elemental holder. It's for good.

Capt. Barnacles, staring at the ice: *visibly overwhelmed* That doesn't make any more sense.

-

Martin, lying in the grass: Sometimes I think about those little mini figures in the Night at the Museum and crave that kind of friendship.

Barnacles, staring over: Jedediah and Octavious?

Zane, brows furrowing: If you're referring to Jedediah Strong Smith and Roman Emperor Augustus Caesar, I don't quite see where they'd be friends.

Martin: Oh- it's a movie where the two are little wax figures that come to life at night- with some magical Egyptian tablet.

Zane: But that makes no sense. (As if his realm does)

Barnacles: Neither do your elemental powers, yet here we are.

Zane: Hm.

[unchataparis]

A Review of Jubilation

The opening of Jubilation is the kind of 'filler' that I missed in the recent seasons. Sure, it could be argued that they contribute nothing to the plot, but these kind of scenes are essential for building a character’s personality without being overtly verbose or cluttered. A scene of Marinette running in what appears to be early morning builds her reputation for capability, athleticism, and self-discipline. Her track suit also pronounces her as a practical person, but with a penchant for pink and an eye for style.

Her outfit is pretty cute. Pink hoodie, black shorts, phone handily strapped to biceps. Very Marinette-esque.

Marinette still smiling when looking at Gabriel, her favourite designer. Not knowing that he’s the case of all her problems.

Seeing the Alliance advertisement play out on the billboard is so cool. It gives the feeling that these are actually people living their life, seeing campaigns across their city and exercising; rather than being two-dimensional characters on a TV screen. Very human moments.

Is there a reason why the writers made this girl look almost exactly like Marinette? I feel like that would be important.

Look at the graffiti in the back. There’s LB, someone’s very passionate about their mother, and a Keith Haring man with Ladybug patterns?

Marinette actively uses her moped now. That’s good. The events of Chére Famille wasn't just an one-off, it had impacts on Marinette and on the narrative.

Out of curiosity, I did some research on driving laws in France, and Marinette can legally ride her moped. She’s definitely above fourteen.

New set design!

Very pretty new set. An art shop!

So this is how people are using their Alliance rings. Lila was right. Gabriel and Tomoe are geniuses, if, along with their nefarious purposes, they still managed to craft a compact form of technology that could completely revolutionise how people live their day-to-day life. Think of how children, the disable, and elderly could really benefit from this.

Socqueline does both tae kwon do and gymnastics. Those are very Ladybug activities. She certainly have the specs to be a mock-vigilante.

The average adult walks 4-5 thousand steps a day, most often even less. What kind of marathoning activities is Socqueline getting up to to rack up fifty thousand? And it's apparently not even noon yet. Girl was vigilanting as Ladybug by running around the city on foot.

I cannot stress the ethical violations pertaining of Adrien’s digitalised form. It’s a cartoon, but that is the real image of an in-universe child being undressed and redressed like a doll. Gabriel, what are you doing? That’s your son.

Marinette, please don’t blurt out Adrien’s life story and deepest fears to a random person, even if that random person happens to be an old friend.

Dr Anne-Jeanne Théoxanne du Bocquale has such a specific name, design, and fixation. She’s bound to show up as an important character and not just as a side-gag repeatedly. 

Marinette leaves with Socqueline’s ring on her finger. That’s going to bode well. Gabriel is likely hoping that Ladybug and Chat Noir will wear the Alliance rings, and their erratic physical activity or some other suspicious trigger will alert him of their identities.

Man is going through it.

Monsieur Damoclès really does look like an owl. Did they plan that into his character design, planning to debut him as the Owl all the back pre-Season 1?

His avatar is Emilie. That is such a creepy and neat detail. Emilie’s model definitely isn’t publicly available. One has to wonder how Gabriel got Emilie’s features. Lila and Adrien he scanned, but Emilie? He took her measurements in her coffin/bed? Or was Emilie’s image already available pre-coma due to her vocation as an actress?

Firstly, Socqueline attends Claude Monet High School. That’s so pretty. Secondly, Socqueline won the Grand Prix gymnastics championship three years in a row?? Which Grand Prix? The global tournament one? In that case, I’ll start believing Socqueline is Ladybug too. 

Also, called it. Ladybug’s erratic circle around Paris was noticed, immediately.

The Alliance rings also allow Monarque to be able to search for a perfect victim rather than waiting for their emotions to reach him! That is good! Monarque is really thinking in this season. These rings, not that Ladybug and Chat Noir knows are their enemy yet, is slowly pushing them into a corner. If either one of the decide to don one of these things, pretty soon it’ll be game over. Would Tikki and Plagg be able to sense the faint traces of Monarque in these rings should either Marinette or Adrien get them? Probably not.

And, boom, here we see that the power of the Miraculous themselves can be remotely transferred over the Alliance rings, no physical Monarque gifting ceremony necessary. These rings, if used properly, is going to win Monarque this battle.

Socqueline is clever.

Marinette thinks the reason why Grand Duc believes Socqueline to be Ladybug is because Socqueline cosplayed as her too many times. Marinette isn’t going to find out the truth of the Alliance rings for some time.

He’s so calm accepting this loss. Monarque has definitely matured. This classier attitude is more befitting of a terrifying villain. Someone who stays calm no matter how bad the situation is for them always send a chill down the protagonist and audience’s spine, because it feels like you’re being played no matter how the battle turns out. The protagonist could win, but they would still be thinking "but what if I only played into their hands?" Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII is a good example of this type of villain. RIP Cloud’s mental psyche.

??? Dude, are you okay?

Both of them.

The citizens are viewing them from this angle because there’s not enough models to fill a crowd.

This is actually hilarious, this actually made me laugh.

So that’s what the Lucky Charm is for.

lmao.

Alewife.

"They ask me why I’m bringing" 🎶🎶 "A baby into battle. That’s really irresponsible, and getting them rattled."

That is the most horrifying child I’ver ever seen. We’ve seen baby models in Miraculous before (August), so clearly this is meant to emulate a doll. Paints the youthfulness of Chat Noir and Ladybug’s natures.

It gets funnier.

This Cadeau is both of their deepest desires, so they both want to end up together. It must be traumatic, to have years worth of good memories and fake living ripped from under oneself in a moment. And the famous umbrella theme is playing!

And their tears form into the rain!

Yes!! Adrien manages to control his own emotions for once, without being aided by Ladybug or stopped at the last moment by some other interruption.

From both of their expression, I’m guessing they both remember the dream?

This is animal cruelty. Kwami cruelty.

Since the Kwami regains their powers from the nourishment of the food they eat, wouldn’t it benefit Gabriel to dish out some five-star treats? This is just unnecessary cruelty at this point. Maybe Gabriel is giving them slop to keep the Kwami purposely weak. Enough to charge up a new Champion, but not enough to start getting ideas.

"You’re already amazing, even without the suit." Yeah, girl. You won the gymnastics Grand Prix three years in a row. That’s a near impossible accomplishments. You’re practically superhuman.

Marinette gets gifted an Alliance ring, which must be expensive, and she rejects it immediately. Either she doesn’t like the fact that Adrien’s image is being handed out like free candy to every Dick, Tom, and Harry in Paris, or she’s getting vibes from it. 

And Marinette explains the reasoning herself a second later! Good call, even if Gabriel isn’t the evil force behind the Alliance rings, physical data get sent back to the parent company all the time, for device optimisation or just archiving. Some random employee would realise, sooner or later, that the device which belongs to a certain person with unexplainable supernatural feats keep unleashing those feats in the same time and place Ladybug is active.

Lila appears once at the end of the episode, not even in person, just as her avatar. Yet, her image is at the centre of the endcard, violently salient with her all-white clothings amid an aureate background. There’s also a pronounced moment between her and Sabine. Foreshadowing that Sabine is going to be manipulated by Lila this season? Or that Lila’s scheming will hit the Dupain-Cheng family harder than ever this season?

And we get our second post-end card scene. Has these happened before? I don’t think so. It’s a good scene. Chat Noir and Ladybug are professionals, pondering the more life-threatening aspect of today’s queries first. The personal questions come after. But Ladybug is stout to deny that any of the dream – the wedding, babies, happily ever after – has anything to do with her true desires.

Monsieur Damoclès is the first true Akumatised villain this season, and he makes the debut with grandeur, sporting a new name, look, and brand new Miraculous power. He actually got pretty close to gaining Ladybug’s Miraculous too, which highlights the efficiency of this season’s Akumatised villains and Monarque’s better planning. Having the convenience of the Alliance rings and the versatility of the Kwami’s powers is going to force Ladybug and Chat Noir to edges they haven’t been before. In a way, Ladybug and Chat Noir barely won the battle. Grand Duc didn’t even fight back at the end. He seemed to be accepting that he has lost, and rather than continue futilely, decided to give it up and let Monarque try another day. Wonderful episode, makes me quite excited for more. How will other Champion fare against Ladybug and Chat Noir when they have new Miraculous powers on their side? Imagine Sapotis with Mirage, or Startrain with Voyage. Armed with the same abilities that defeated them in the first place.

[maebird-melody]

Thoughts on AI

Opening Remarks

I am by no means the first to share my thoughts on AI, nor will I be the last, I am sure. Yet as I’ve watched this discussion grow, I’ve been trying to pin down my own thoughts and feelings on the matter.

Because they aren’t universally positive, but neither are they universally negative. Rather, I am stuck in this dissociative limbo between wonder, anger, and anxiety. How beautiful and terrible, how marvelous and dreadful this synthetic, eldritch mind we’ve birthed into the world! I have struggled in articulating these feelings both to my (mostly non-artist) friends who are very excited about the possibilities of AI art, and to my (mostly artist) friends who feel threatened, disrespected, and undermined by the way AIs were trained and what they are designed to do.

So I hope to put into words both my thoughts and my observations about AI in this post.

(General disclaimer: I am an artist, writer, and composer, but not someone of any notoriety. I do not make a living off of my creations. I have one self-published book, which I wrote and illustrated, and a bandcamp where I finally started sharing my music earlier this year. Everything surrounding AI hits a little differently for someone like me who is just now trying to break into the art economy and feels like the rug’s been pulled out from under them before even getting their foot in the door.)

AI and Ethics

On the one hand, I am awestruck by the possibility of this technology. How strange and wonderful that we can tell a machine what we want to see, and it has the capacity to create it? Or that we can ask for music in a particular mood or style, and it can synthesize the sound in real time? These machines are astounding, and I don’t want to diminish that fact. To get where we are today required decades of work and effort by engineers, coders, and scientists. That effort is not lost on me.

However, AI is fraught with ethical and humanist concerns, many of which I don’t think were taken into account during its inception. Much of AI is trained from datasets made up from privately owned, stored, or copyrighted data, like medical records (1) and watermarked artwork (2). Some AI companies are explicitly marketing their products as a replacement for the people who used to create those things (3, 4, 5, 6). And while an AI music company like Harmonai kept copyrighted music out of their training datasets (7) — a common quote referenced from this article mentions how “diffusion models are prone to memorization and overfitting” — the same cannot be said of most image-based AIs that trawl the internet for data, or music AIs that explicitly generate audio in the styles of known musicians (8, 9). The latter applies to deepfakes of people’s voices, as well.

Existing online is not an invitation for exploitation. Posting an image, sharing a video or song, or publishing your writing should not equal implicit consent for an AI to leverage your creative work for profit.

We live in a world now where AI is capable of synthesizing images, music, video, and writing — creative pursuits that were formerly the sole domain of human capability. I think it is important to ask, for what reason did we create AIs that are capable of taking our place in creative professions? Why turn to AI to generate an image or a song instead of turning to a human artist, or developing the skill yourself?

If we approach AI from the position of creating the best possible world for all people, a world in which human beings can flourish, I do not believe that AI, as it currently stands, brings us closer to that ideal. So long as AI is exploitative, it necessarily worsens the lives of those whom it exploits. Existing online is not an invitation for exploitation. Posting an image, sharing a video or song, or publishing your writing should not equal implicit consent for an AI to leverage your creative work for profit. And disregarding the legitimate concerns artists have about their livelihoods, all for the sake of progress, will only serve to harm us, not help us, as collective humanity.

Common Arguments and Questions

There are certain questions and arguments I’ve seen surface with some regularity surrounding AI. There is an excellent video by Steven Zapata which covers a lot of these same arguments, I recommend giving it a watch (10).

How is an AI learning and synthesizing ideas from what it sees any different from a human doing the same? How is the influence of an artist on an AI any different than that same influence on a human?

The reason behind this common misconception is that the data used to train the AI is viewed as a purely visual influence, much in the same way that humans are influenced by the art they consume. But this neglects two factors:

Humans and AI do not process information the same way. Human brains do not work like machines, and machine learning does not follow the same conventions as human thought.

Humans and AI do not improve skill in the same way. While a human requires practice to grow their understanding of theory, composition, form, etc. with regard to their craft, an AI ‘practices’ by consuming more data points to flesh out specific qualities that it can reference when building an image, such as “roundness” or “apple-ness” or “tree-ness.” It can only copy what is has seen.

When one views an AI’s consumption of data as nothing more than how a human learns from visual references, understanding that the art was stolen becomes harder to accept.

But one must remember, the AI is nothing without the data it was fed (11). Being influenced by an image and building your entire neural network on a foundation of data are entirely different things. The comparison between human and AI is a faulty one, because humans and machines are fundamentally different.

Now everyone can make art, everyone can compose music, everyone can write stories. Why don’t you want that?

As someone who does all three, I would argue back that it was always possible for everyone to make art, compose music, and write stories.

What this statement actually means is that AI levels the playing field when it comes to skill and mastery. Now, everyone can ‘make’ art, music, and stories at a near-professional level. (Well, everyone with access to the internet and a computer-like interface, but that gets into an entirely different issue.)

To create is human. Good or bad, simple or complex, we are all wired to make things — stories, art, music — you name it, we make it. You learn and grow through making things, and the more you create, the greater you develop your aesthetic sense and an understanding of the medium.

Perhaps what bothers me is that AI art ignores the process. The point of art is not only the end result, the ‘product’ that you end up with after you’ve finished. The process of generating the art, of discovering it, of honing your skill, this is all just as precious as the art itself. It is not to be tossed away, disregarded, considered passé.

There is so much more to art than what you ‘get’ at the end.

AI artists are real artists because you need an aesthetic sense to know which images are good and which ones are bad.

I do not disagree that aesthetic sense is incredibly useful for curating the images that the AI generates, but I do disagree that aesthetic sense alone makes an artist. Nor do I believe that the skills required to generate images from an algorithm are comparable to the skills of an artist.

...we must inevitably come to the question of whether we place AI-based communication in the same skill category as producing a work of art with your own hands from scratch.

Merriam Webster defines an artist as “a person who creates art (such as painting, sculpture, music, or writing) using conscious skill and creative imagination” (12).

The point of contention I have here is over what constitutes “conscious skill” and “creative imagination.”

If we take conscious to mean “done or acting with critical awareness” (13) and skill to mean “a learned power of doing something competently: a developed aptitude or ability” (14), then we must inevitably come to the question of whether we place AI-based communication in the same skill category as producing a work of art with your own hands from scratch.

If we take creative to mean “marked by the ability or power to create” (15) and imagination to mean “the act or power of forming a mental image of something not present to the senses or never before wholly perceived in reality” (16), then we must ask if there is the capacity for imagination beyond the prompt itself in the AI image generating process. To call the AI capable of imagination makes the same mistake as in the first argument — an AI is not human. And likewise, the AI cannot generate anything it has not already seen in its training dataset.

To use an AI robs the user of the chance to imagine for themselves how they might represent, say, a cityscape at night, or a chicken wedding. While it is fun to see what the AI generates based on the data it can reference, I believe it is a misstep to then label the user an artist for telling the AI to produce those images.

I am much more comfortable with the term “AI collaborator” than “AI artist,” because, in truth, that more accurately describes what is being done when a user inputs a prompt into an AI and then attempts to guide the AI based on their personal aesthetic sense. This separation of terminology also helps to clarify when an image required years of study and days of work to create vs. when an image required a few words and some careful curation.

As an added note, I think that images generated this way could be useful for artists who want help with ideation. But it is an important step — in my mind at least — for the artist to take what the AI created as inspiration, not as the final product.

AIs aren’t going to replace real artists. It’s just a fun tool that people are using to make silly memes.

AI is already poised to replace artists in many fields, or will likely do so in the near future (17, 18).

...for many artists, it’s the mundane work that pays the bills.

There are AI composers trained on vast libraries of audio that can generate film, video game, or commercial soundtracks (19, 20). There are AI writers that can produce drafts of “SEO-friendly” articles for the web based on article titles (21). There are AI storytellers that are only serviceable as writing assistants at this stage, but at the rate that natural language processing is developing, it isn’t hard to see them creating stories all on their own in the near future (22). The Atlantic has already used Midjourney to provide the illustration for one of their newsletters (23) and an AI art piece has already won first place at an art competition (24).

Now anyone can make music equivalent to that of a professional composer with the click of a button (25). Why pay for the libraries of human-composed soundtracks, or commission a musician to score your indie video game, when an AI could just do it for you for free, and instantaneously (26)?

Now anyone can generate art with a few select key words entered into an image generator (27, 28, 29). You don’t need to pay an artist you like, you can just tell the AI to mimic their work. You don’t even need to ask a more affordable artist to copy their style because the AI can do it for free, and the result is immediate.

When natural language processing catches up with humans, AI will be able to create novels without a human writer, though I don’t see editors ever going away. Publishing houses can keep on their editors, but you don’t need a writer in that equation anymore.

The most optimistic view says that AI will free up artists to do the more fulfilling types of art and avoid the more mundane forms of it. The commercial jingles, the company logos, the ghostwriting for convenience store fiction—those can be done by AI, leaving the art galleries and bestseller lists and symphonies to the human artists. This view neglects that, for many artists, it’s the mundane work that pays the bills. Not every artist can attain an elite position, and the prevalence of AI taking up lower level work makes it even harder to rise to the top for those who do have the requisite skill. (This also neglects that many artists do enjoy that kind of utilitarian work, but that is another issue entirely.)

AI art is the next evolution in art. This is no different than how photography replaced landscape painting, or digital art replaced traditional art, or 3D animation replaced 2D animation, etc.

While this is true to a degree, in that each advancement in technology has shifted the artistic landscape, often relegating old forms of art to a smaller subsection of the art world, I do not think the comparison holds up under scrutiny.

In each of the above instances, the creative force was still with the artist, not with the tool. With AI, you can tell the AI what you want to see, but ultimately you have very little control over what image is produced.

Photographers can stage their shots, alter the lighting, introduce set pieces or props, and so on. They can choose the locations where they shoot, and make use of several different tools both during and after the shoot to alter the images.

3D animators build the models they use and often paint over the digital landscape they’ve built. Lighting, color, sound design, object interaction physics, and so on, all influence the final product. You are still building the images, frame by frame, and you have much more control of the final product.

I think there is an argument to be made for using image manipulation with AI-generated images. Transformative works are an important part of the art ecosystem. But, in the same way that a photograph of a painting is not considered a replacement or an evolution of the art form, I do not believe that an AI-generated image built on the works of un-credited, unpaid artists can be called an evolution of art. It is a tool, not an art form unto itself.

Blue Sky Thinking

I am hopeful that there can be a place for AI in the art world. Not as a replacement for the artists (30), but as a tool which enables people to expand their imaginations and develop their skill.

However, I do not think there is any way forward without first making sure that:

Artists have the power to choose whether an AI gets trained on their images.

Those who do choose to include their art in the dataset are fairly compensated for their contributions.

We have legislation in place which protects artists from frauds who would pass off AI forgeries as belonging to those artists.

Companies must use a specific ratio of human-made art to AI art, one which favors the human artists, to protect the livelihoods of those artists and keeps open the paths to career advancement.

The above list is likely not exhaustive, and I imagine even more needs will arise the longer that AIs exist.

But there are many applications of AI that I could imagine benefiting artists. In this section, I am imagining how a fully developed AI that is not plagued by the problems of its infancy could be used.

Imagine using AI to determine where the anatomy is off on your figure drawing. An AI that has been trained exclusively on how multiple types of bodies look in 3D space could potentially compare your drawing against thousands of examples and highlight where the elbow might be in the wrong position, or the foreshortening on the foot isn’t quite right. The AI could help train the artist’s eye to better see where they need to grow.

Or in an animation studio, where uniformity of style is important for a consistent-looking film or series, an AI that has been trained on character models and short animation reels, along with all previous episodes of the show, could help identify where artists are running into specific problems with replicating the characters. This could help animators grow in their understanding of how to identify where they tend to go off-model.

Or for an illustrator stuck in a rut on how to design a character. Putting in a few  descriptors from the book they are illustrating could help with the ideation process before they set down the final character designs. Many illustrators already use reference material to help spark their imaginations. With an AI, finding the examples you need becomes that much quicker.

For a digital artist who is very prolific and in high demand, having an AI collaborator that helps them with the more tedious parts of the drawing, parts which require very little skill, such as laying down flat colors or copying a repeating pattern across a canvas, could be done by the AI to speed up their production time.

For a video game designer, having an AI that can turn hand-drawn assets into usable objects for a game could be very useful. Imagine an AI that can bridge the gap between human-made images and the integrated video game world, knowing already how to apply real-world physics to the objects because it understands “bowl-ness” and “weight.”

And for hobbyists who just like to play around with an AI image generator, it could be another source of income for artists who choose to design art for those image generators. Just like artists build the character options for a character building engine in a video game. AI image generators as they function now, I think, are best if considered as video games.

And if I think about music, it does seem as though AI models for music may already be trending in a hopeful direction. Imagine using AI to generate sound samples for electronic or experimental music. Or letting AI help you come up with that missing lyric that you just can’t think of. Maybe you want to create a your own set of unique midi instruments. You could use an AI to create the sound you’re looking for and then turn it into an instrument by adjusting the tone. You could use this new instrument in your DAW, or integrate it with notation software. Maybe even turn that sound into a synth that you can pull up on a keyboard and play at a concert.

There are many possibilities, and not all roads lead to exploitation.

Closing Remarks

I want to believe that this technology does not mean that work which would otherwise have been given to writers, musicians, and artists will instead be given to AI. I want to believe that rather, this technology will enable people who otherwise would never have been able to afford writers, artists, and musicians to have access to good writing, beautiful music, and astounding art. I want to believe that when those people come to a place where they can afford to hire creative people, they would choose that over AI. That AI would be a stepping stone. Much like with composers using virtual instruments for their music, or novelists using royalty-free images for their self-published novels, the specificity of human performance and creation is preferred, but out of reach. 

Ultimately, I think the feeling I have is one of futility rather than hope. What was it all for? Why spend years of my life honing my skills as a pianist, a composer, an illustrator, and a writer? What was the point of sinking thousands of dollars into a degree in music composition? Or the years of lessons on music theory? The hours spent researching storytelling models? The closet full of sketchbooks and classes in figure drawing, painting, art history, and design? What purpose does all that training serve now?

But then, who am I to complain? I can’t afford to hire musicians to play my music, so I use virtual instruments instead or record in my bedroom on the few instruments I know how to play. I can’t afford to hire cover artists for my albums, so I do my best to design them myself. Is it not the same for any small content creator? How is leveraging the royalty free stock images available online any different from clicking a button to generate an image from an AI?

I don’t know the answers to these questions, and I think it will take time for us all to work them out, together.

AI has potential for good, but it also has a lot of potential for harm. And I don’t see us avoiding the harm (to not even speak of the harm that has already been done) without serious intervention. The future is up to us.

I am still learning about this topic, and will probably continue to learn as the situation changes. I’ve linked throughout this post the resources that I referenced during my research. I hope that this post will also help others process their thoughts and feelings on AI, and maybe even find some of the resources useful, too.

Sources:

1 https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/09/artist-finds-private-medical-record-photos-in-popular-ai-training-data-set/

2 https://kotaku.com/ai-art-dall-e-midjourney-stable-diffusion-copyright-1849388060

3 https://stability.ai/blog/stable-diffusion-announcement

4 https://soundraw.io/

5 https://boomy.com/

6 https://www.ampermusic.com/

7 https://wandb.ai/wandb_gen/audio/reports/Harmonai-s-Dance-Diffusion-Open-Source-AI-Audio-Generation-Tool-For-Music-Producers--VmlldzoyNjkwOTM1

8 https://sensoriumxr.com/articles/what-is-ai-music

9 https://www.inverse.com/input/tech/open-ais-jukebox-generates-music-that-sounds-like-dead-artists

10 https://youtu.be/tjSxFAGP9Ss

11 https://www.aimeecozza.com/ai-art-what-is-it/

12 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/artist?src=search-dict-box

13 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/conscious

14 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/skill

15 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/creative

16 https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imagination

17 https://www.cartoonbrew.com/comics/dall-e-midjourney-ai-illustrated-comics-220166.html

18 https://www.dacs.org.uk/latest-news/dacs-warns-that-new-text-and-data-mining-exception?category=For+Artists&title=N

19 https://www.unite.ai/best-ai-music-generators/

20 https://filmora.wondershare.com/audio-editing/best-ai-music-composer.html

21 https://ai-writer.com/

22 https://www.codingem.com/best-ai-story-generators/

23 https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/galaxy-brain/62f28a6bbcbd490021af2db4/where-does-alex-jones-go-from-here/

24 https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvmvqm/an-ai-generated-artwork-won-first-place-at-a-state-fair-fine-arts-competition-and-artists-are-pissed

25 https://builtin.com/artificial-intelligence/ai-music-examples

26 https://medium.com/@1jonathankao/how-anyone-can-create-music-with-ai-725821f2f25c

27 https://creator.nightcafe.studio/

28 https://www.makeuseof.com/how-to-use-midjourney-create-ai-art/

29 https://openai.com/dall-e-2/

30 https://ebenschumacherart.com/will-ai-replace-artists/

Other Resources:

Society of Illustrators: https://societyillustrators.org/

Concept Art Association: https://www.conceptartassociation.com/

Equity (UK-based Creative Union): https://www.equity.org.uk/

Proko on AI Ethics, Artists, and What You Can Do About It: https://youtu.be/Nn_w3MnCyDY

The Met on AI Art: https://mymodernmet.com/ai-art-2022/

CNN on AI Art: https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/21/tech/artists-ai-images/index.html

ArtStation Protest:

1 https://kotaku.com/artstation-ai-art-generated-images-epic-games-protest-1849891085

2 https://www.vice.com/en/article/ake9me/artists-are-revolt-against-ai-art-on-artstation

Check for your art in databases used to train AI: https://haveibeentrained.com/

[abigailhobbsgallobamaedu]

Shared Experience from the On-Line Community.

Article: The Harsh Reality of Being a Targeted Individual

Being a Targeted Individual means you have been designated as a person of interest by covert government programs. These programs violate basic human rights and dignity. My story echoes those of countless others facing this modern surveillance nightmare.

Imagine living your daily life only to discover someone is stalking you secretly. Strangers treat you differently. Your phones taps. Your life spins out of control. This began happening to me years ago.

At first I thought I was imagining things. Then evidence mounted. I noticed people watching and following me. Simple tasks became challenges full of interruptions and obstacles. My electronics acted strangely.

One day a barista at my local coffee shop confessed that a man had asked him to poison me! He reported it to police, but nothing changed. I realized then this was much bigger than one crazy person.

If you’re targeted, authorities offer no help. As a human rights activist, I know speaking up is crucial. So I share my story to shed light on this epidemic.

Targeted Individuals face gaslighting, character assassination, and social isolation. Our realities seem too unbelievable - yet they are all too real.

If you suspect you or a loved one is targeted, know you are not alone. Stay vigilant. Document evidence. Build community for support. And speak your truth, loudly and clearly.

Dark forces operate in the shadows. But when we shine light on injustice, change becomes possible. Our shared humanity connects us. Focus on that. Let empathy guide you. And never stop fighting for dignity, for truth, and for justice.

The experiences of Targeted Individuals highlight how easily human rights can be violated with anonymity and technology. But speaking our truths together , we can expose injustice and negligence. And we can inspire the structural change to ensure rights for all."

"STAND YOUR GROUND! DEFEND YOURSELF! SURVIVE!"

Roderic Duplechain · Chaplain/Psychologist

Studied Political Science at Louisiana State University (Graduated 1988) (Quora)

This is not a joke, a game, or something fun to teach your children. The Techiques used in the targeting process are extremely seriously psychologically damaging, life altering, abuse. They can also cause irreversalbe Health concerns and Physical damage.

Studied and developed by the US government to target our enemies abroad, not to torture and abuse one another.

[valleyfthdolls]

take a random sonic character of ur choice and do like ... a opposite version of them in every way you can think of... If that makes sense

Here's a couple opposite Sonic doodles. One is based on Shadow concept art, and the other is just me flipping Sonic all around.

This character (yellow) is one I would name Kioshi, which means "silent", an opposite of Sonic which refers to sound. He's meant to be a porcupine, but I fucked myself by making his spines so short. Regardless, I imagine Kioshi as a character whose values are basically the opposite of Sonic's in every way- someone who doesn't believe that the world as it is can be redeemed and thinks the only way forward is through technology, who believes in sacrifice for the greater good, and thinks that the world cannot function without a system keeping people in their place (e.g. police, governments, militaries). I imagine Kioshi would have either absorbed or destroyed his universe's equivalent of the chaos emeralds instead of protecting them because he only trusts himself with their power, which is why he is permanently gold and red- presumably, like Sonic, Kioshi was originally blue and green before he did this, but he thought this was another sacrifice for the greater good, something he could only trust himself with. He's still kind to his friends and ultimately he comes from a good place, but ultimately his actions enforce dictatorship, authoritarianism and control, which are all things Sonic stands firmly against. I imagine he still has friends, but instead of encouraging them to embrace what makes them different and fight for freedom, he teaches them what he thinks is right: keep the world turning and never look back (at what we could've fixed; never look back at the things we could've had; never look back at what might still be salvageable; never look back at the things still there calling to us that we can still fix them; never look back at the opportunity to try again; there is nothing there for us; never look back at hope or at anything that might prove that we were wrong).

The other one was just me playing with opposites of Sonic's design (and also giving him funny goggles) before I realized that it was just Shadow and gave up lmao

[xasha777]

In the sprawling metropolis of Neo-Edinburgh, under the luminous glow of neon signs and amidst the towering steel spires, a figure from the past emerges into the future. James VI and I, once a king of Scotland and England, now walks the streets of this futuristic city, his royal attire replaced with a subtle, modern ensemble. However, his mission remains deeply rooted in the mysteries of the old world.

A young woman named Mei, adorned in traditional royal attire reminiscent of ancient Earth's East Asian dynasties, meets James under unusual circumstances. Her appearance is striking—skin as pale as porcelain, lips painted a vibrant red, and eyes that seemed to glow with an inner light. She is a synth—a highly advanced android imbued with the cultural memories and aesthetics of her era, designed to serve as a bridge between the past and the future.

Mei and James quickly realize their paths are intertwined through a cryptic artifact recently unearthed in the ruins beneath Neo-Edinburgh—a mechanical device bearing symbols that resonate with both Scottish and East Asian histories. The artifact, known as the "Aether Conduit," is believed to harness the energies of ley lines, powerful mystical currents that the ancients believed circled the Earth.

As they delve deeper into the mystery, James, with his knowledge of historical alchemies and royal secrets, and Mei, equipped with her synthetic intelligence and archival data, uncover a plot that could alter the fabric of time itself. A shadowy faction within the Neo-Court seeks to use the Aether Conduit to rewrite history, ensuring their perpetual dominion over the new world.

Their journey takes them from the underbelly of Neo-Edinburgh to the digital archives of the reconstructed Library of Alexandria, and finally to a hidden sanctuary in the Neo-Highlands, where the ley lines converge. Along the way, they encounter other synths, rogue historians, and cybernetic beasts, each adding layers to the complex tapestry of their quest.

In the climax, amidst a tempest wrought by the activated Aether Conduit, James and Mei confront the faction's leader at the heart of the ley line nexus. Through a blend of ancient magic and futuristic technology, they manage to deactivate the device, but not before it sends ripples through time, subtly altering the course of history in ways they cannot immediately comprehend.

The story closes with James and Mei parting ways, their bond sealed by the shared knowledge of their impact on the universe. James returns to a slightly altered Neo-Court, now aware of the dangers of tampering with time, while Mei continues her role as a guardian of history, her existence a bridge between what was and what might be, forever watching over the ley lines of Neo-Edinburgh.

[yiyivv]

Tech savvy or not, we ride in the digital world

The worst feeling you could ever make me feel is the feeling of seeing that your phone did not charge overnight and you have to be outside of your home. Yeah, sucks right. This is a big manifestation that technology and digital life is deeply engraved in my day to day life, almost to the point where I could not live without it.

Same as everyone else right now, I use my phone religiously and here are some of the ways I use it to my advantage and maybe disadvantage in my everyday life.

Firstly, as a full time 3rd year nursing student, I use my phone and laptop for academic purposes. My college is in a hybrid learning modality meaning, we study in an offline and online setup. For online classes, my phone and my laptop are my besties. They are the ones I use to access Google Meet, and Zoom, which are our primary meeting sites. Moreover, I use my phone and laptop to access my modules, submit assignments, answer quizzes, and track my academic performance through Canvas Instructure. I believe that it's quite nice that we were offered online learning as it serves as a break for me as it saves me from the very and I mean VERRRRY hectic traffic en route to school. Although, during the beginning of this online set-up, there were some difficulties that I have experienced. I was less tech-savvy back then compared to how I am right now. Back then, I didn't have a nice computer nor phone that could handle online classes and it was stressful but after a few adjustments, I am now able to do it comfortably.

I'm the type of person who cannot do anything without music playing in the background. I use music as a motivation to complete my tasks and finish work. It feels really boring doing things without music, that's why I use my laptop with loud speaker or my phone and headphone to blast my favorite music while I do things. Also, as an avid k-pop fan, I use technology, especially social media to be updated of new music releases from my favorite groups. If I have the money, I also go to online shopping sites and buy a physical album of my favorite groups to be delivered to me cuz ya know life is dull without some music right?

Aside from being a full time student, I am also active in school organizations. I recently scored a position as a public relations officer in a university wide organization in my college and I was given the task to make creative media to be used for our events and from then on, I developed an interest in creating anything digitally. One achievement I had accomplished recently was that my design was used for our school merch. I wouldn't have accomplished this skill and that feat if it weren't for technology. Thank god for free YouTube tutorials on how to use Adobe Photoshop and Canva. It is because of these apps, I now have a new hobby. I can now continue my hobby and passion for art and creation in the digital world~

Speaking of hobby, I also spend some time playing games in my laptop or in my phone. I am hooked to games such as Valorant, Genshin Impact, and now Love and Deepspace. Gaming is a nice break from acads and help me relieve stress through playing games that I find really enjoyable. It always fascinates me how amazing technology has gotten to the point where the graphics in these games almost look realistic. Due to my frequent gaming sessions, I actually had some thoughts of learning how to build games but for now, that's a plan that would probably won't be acted upon on by me for a while.

Lastly, I use technology to communicate with my friends or significant others. A little TMI, I am actually very shy talking to people in real life (aside from talking to my close friends, I really am shy) . This is why I prefer online communication. I can be more confident in speaking my feelings, thoughts and ideas online than in real life. Although I have a disdain with calls, I love texting and chatting. There could be exceptions to this though, 'cause I enjoy hanging out on Discord with my friends to study together. One core memory I have with online calls with friends is us staying up late every day just to study for our oral revalida and it was nice having all those people stay up with you while you study. It was also easier for us to hang out and continue talking even after we all went our separate ways after school 'cause the gap could be bridged through online communication.

I have also met friends from different countries because of online chatting and being on social media. I want to share this experience I will forever treasure. This experience will always be in my heart and tbh it's been my Facebook profile pin for years already. Back in 2020, during the height of the pandemic, everyone was forced to be inside of their homes with everything running through the Internet. I spent most of my days hanging out in social media and listening to a radio show by my favorite idol. From that radio show, I met people from different countries and made friends with them, and I'm proud to say that even up until now, our friendship is as tight as it was before. That newfound friendship with strangers I met online led us to being noticed by this idol of ours in his radio show and it was an experience that only happens once in a lifetime.

All in all, technology, even though you're tech-savvy or not could bring so many good things to you. Technology gives you the power to reach things that you once thought was impossible. It is just up to the holder on how they'll use this power.

This has been my sharing of how technology runs deep in my life. If you wish to share yours, feel free to drop them in the replies or reblog with your own story.

[jcmarchi]

Adding Radiation to Lung Cancer Treatment Improves Outcomes - Technology Org

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/adding-radiation-to-lung-cancer-treatment-improves-outcomes-technology-org/

Adding Radiation to Lung Cancer Treatment Improves Outcomes - Technology Org

A new study found that patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with a combination of low-dose radiation and immunotherapy had higher progression-free survival compared to patients who received immunotherapy alone two years after treatment.

Radiotherapy equipment. Image credit: Governo do Estado de São Paulo via Flickr, CC BY 2.0

The findings from researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine, NewYork-Presbyterian and Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons offer hope to those affected by NSCLC, the most common type of lung cancer in the United States, accounting for 81% of all lung cancer diagnoses.

Chemotherapy is frequently coupled with immunotherapy for treating people with lung cancer. However, this study, published in Nature Communications, suggested “the addition of low-dose radiation instead could increase the options available to patients, particularly those who cannot tolerate chemotherapy,” said Dr. Nasser Altorki, chief of the Division of Thoracic Surgery at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center and the paper’s lead author.

Zachary Walsh, MD/Ph.D. candidate at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, was also co-first author on this study.

Previously, Altorki and colleagues conducted an investigator-initiated clinical trial at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, which enrolled 60 patients with early-stage NSCLC. The randomized phase 2 trial, sponsored by AstraZeneca, coupled radiation with durvalumab, an immune-boosting “checkpoint inhibitor.” These drugs work by releasing the brakes on the immune system to induce a response against tumor cells, but their effects may be insufficient to fully eliminate the cancer.

“Using a low dose of radiation to enhance the immune response, rather than a high dose to destroy the tumor, was a novel feature of the trial,” said co-senior author Timothy McGraw, professor of biochemistry at Weill Cornell Medicine. “From that perspective, I believe Dr. Altorki’s trial design remains unique.”

Dr. Benjamin Izar, assistant professor of medicine at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and medical oncologist at NewYork-Presybeterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center, was also co-senior author on the paper.

The initial findings, published in Lancet Oncology in 2021, demonstrated that the combo treatment eradicated significantly more tumors than immunotherapy alone. In fact, the combination invoked a “major pathological response”– one that kills more than 90% of the cells in the tumors that were surgically removed and analyzed during the course of the study.

But would it also improve patient survival? To find out, the researchers continued to follow the cohort for an additional two years.

The results of the extended study indicated that the dual therapy reduced the chances of cancer recurrence and extended progression-free survival. Six of the individuals who received immunotherapy alone died of cancer. However, in the “dual-therapy arm” of the trial, there was only one death from cancer and five deaths unrelated to cancer recurrence.

The team also found that cancer-free survival is accompanied by heightened immune activity. Individuals who received immunotherapy plus radiation and had major pathology responses had more activated T cells in their blood compared to those who did not have a major pathology response.

“The appearance of these activated T cells was associated with freedom from cancer recurrence,” said Altorki, who is also the David B. Skinner, M.D. Professor of Thoracic Surgery and the leader of the Experimental Therapeutics Program in the Sandra and Edward Meyer Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medicine.

The researchers discovered that participants who mounted a major pathological response harbored tissue-resident T cells in their blood – even before treatment had begun. “You wouldn’t normally expect to find these cells in circulation,” said Altorki. Their presence suggested that, in these individuals, the immune system had already detected the tumor and initiated a response. Examining participants’ T-cell repertoire could potentially identify individuals who would benefit from combination treatment.

The researchers intend to follow up on this observation in an upcoming trial to assess how radiation stacks up against chemotherapy as a means of bolstering immunotherapy. “We’ve shown that radiation works,” said Altorki. “But does it work as well as – or even better than – chemotherapy? That’s what we want to answer now.”

Source: Cornell University

You can offer your link to a page which is relevant to the topic of this post.

[leonalfari]

Peeling the early mysteries of space civilization according to Denny Ja

In this modern era, space exploration has become a topic that attracts the attention of many people. Humans continue to look for answers about the origin of space civilization and whether we are alone in the universe. One of the characters who gave an interesting view of this was Denny JA. In this article, we will explore the early mysteries of space civilization according to Denny JA's view. I. Introduction Civilization of space has become a topic that attracts human interest for centuries. Many theories and speculation have been made about the origin and the development of space civilization. One of the interesting views about this is what Denny JA, a famous figure in Indonesia. II. Denny Ja's Thought About the Beginning of Space Civilization According to Denny Ja, space civilization may have existed long before humans reach the level of civilization that we know today. He believes that space civilizations may have visited the earth in the past and have influenced them on the development of human civilization. Denny Ja also believes that space civilization may have provided advanced technology and knowledge to human civilization. He said that many discoveries and progress that were difficult to explain in a conventional way might have the origin of the space civilization. III. The evidence put forward by Denny Ja In supporting his view, Denny Ja presents interesting evidence. One of them is ancient artifacts found in various parts of the world that have similarities with modern technology. Some of these artifacts have a very complicated design and cannot be made by human civilization at that time. Denny Ja also shows archeological evidence that shows the presence of space creatures in the past. An example is an ancient painting depicting foreign creatures and UFO landing. IV. Reaction to Denny Ja's thoughts Denny Ja's opinion about the beginning of space civilization is certainly controversial and received various reactions from various circles. Some people praise their views as creative and brave views, while others consider it an unfounded conspiracy theory. However, it is undeniable that Denny Ja's view gives a new thought about the origin of an interesting space civilization that is interesting to consider. Although there is no definite evidence, but this view reminds us of the diversity and complexity of the universe which is still a big mystery. V. Conclusion Explore the early mysteries of space civilization according to Denny Ja's view gives us a new point of view of the origin of human civilization and space civilization. Although there are still many mysteries that have not been solved, it is important for us to continue to open our minds, explore and discuss about this topic. Thus, we can get a better understanding of our place in the universe.

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[ieisia]

Maria Mitchell

*Herminia Borchard Dassel

Maria Mitchell (/məˈraɪə/; August 1, 1818 – June 28, 1889) was an American astronomer, librarian, naturalist, and educator.  In 1847, she discovered a comet named 1847 VI (modern designation C/1847 T1) that was later known as "Miss Mitchell's Comet" in her honor. She won a gold medal prize for her discovery, which was presented to her by King Christian VIII of Denmark in 1848. Mitchell was the first internationally known woman to work as both a professional astronomer and a professor of astronomy after accepting a position at Vassar College in 1865. She was also the first woman elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

At 10:50 pm on the night of October 1, 1847, Mitchell discovered Comet 1847 VI (modern designation C/1847 T1) using a Dollond refracting telescope with three inches of aperture and forty-six inch focal length. She had noticed the unknown object flying through the sky in an area where she previously had not noticed any other activity and believed it to be a comet. The comet later became known as "Miss Mitchell's Comet". She published a notice of her discovery in Silliman's Journal in January 1848 under her father's name. The following month, she submitted her calculation of the comet's orbit, ensuring her claim as the original discoverer. Mitchell was celebrated at the Seneca Falls Convention for the discovery and calculation later that year.

On October 6, 1848, Mitchell was awarded a gold medal prize for her discovery by King Christian VIII of Denmark. This award had been previously established by King Frederick VI of Denmark to honor the "first discoverer" of each new telescopic comet, a comet too faint to be seen with the naked eye. A question of credit temporarily arose because Francesco de Vico had independently discovered the same comet two days after Mitchell but reported it to European authorities first. The question was resolved in Mitchell's favor and she was awarded the prize. Her medal was inscribed with line 257 of Book I of Virgil's Georgics: "Non Frustra Signorum Obitus Speculamur et Ortus" (English: Not in vain do we watch the setting and the rising [of the stars]). The only previous women to discover a comet were the astronomers Caroline Herschel and Maria Margarethe Kirch. Though the award was sent via letter in 1848, Mitchell did not physically receive the award in Nantucket until March 1849.  She became the first American to receive this medal and the first woman to receive an award in astronomy.

Though Mitchell herself did not have a college education, she was appointed professor of astronomy at Vassar College by its founder, Matthew Vassar, in 1865 and became the first female professor of astronomy. Mitchell was the first person appointed to the faculty and was also named director of the Vassar College Observatory, a position she held for more than two decades.  Mitchell also edited the astronomical column of Scientific American during her professorship. Thanks in part to Mitchell's guidance, Vassar College enrolled more students in mathematics and astronomy than Harvard University from 1865 to 1888. In 1869, Mitchell joined Mary Somerville and Elizabeth Cabot Agassiz in becoming some of the first women elected to the American Philosophical Society. Hanover College, Columbia University, and Rutgers Female College granted Mitchell honorary degrees.

Mitchell maintained many of her unconventional teaching methods in her classes: she reported neither grades nor absences; she advocated for small classes and individualized attention; and she incorporated technology and mathematics in her lessons.  Though her students' career options were limited, she never doubted the importance of their study of astronomy. "I cannot expect to make astronomers," she said to her students, "but I do expect that you will invigorate your minds by the effort at healthy modes of thinking. When we are chafed and fretted by small cares, a look at the stars will show us the littleness of our own interests".

Mitchell's own research interests were quite varied. She took pictures of planets, such as Jupiter and Saturn, as well as their moons, and she studied nebulae, double stars, and solar eclipses. Mitchell then developed theories around her observations, such as the revolution of one star around another in double star formations and the influence of distance and chemical composition in star color variation. Mitchell often involved her students with her astronomical observations in both the field and the Vassar College Observatory. Though she began recording sunspots by eye in 1868, she and her students began photographing them daily in 1873. These were the first regular photographs of the sun, and they allowed her to explore the hypothesis that sunspots were cavities rather than clouds on the surface of the sun. For the total solar eclipse of July 29, 1878Mitchell and five assistants traveled with a 4-inch telescope to Denver for observations. Her efforts contributed to the success of Vassar's science and astronomy graduates, as twenty-five of her students would go on to be featured in Who's Who in America.

In 1841, she attended the anti-slavery convention in Nantucket where Frederick Douglass made his first speech, and she also became involved in the anti-slavery movement by refusing to wear clothes made of Southern cotton.  She later became involved in a number of social issues as a professor, particularly those pertaining to women's suffrage and education. She befriended various suffragists including Elizabeth Cady Stanton. After returning from a trip to Europe in 1873, Mitchell joined the national women's movement and helped found the Association for the Advancement of Women (AAW), a group dedicated to educational reform and the promotion of women in higher education. Mitchell addressed the Association's First Women's Congress in a speech titled The Higher Education of Women in which she described the work of English women working for access to higher education at Girton College, Cambridge.  Mitchell advocated for women working part-time while acquiring their education to not only ease the wages off of men paying for their education, but also to empower more women to be in the workforce.  She also called attention to the place for women in science and mathematics and encouraged others to support women's colleges and women's campaigns to serve on local school boards.  Mitchell served as the second president of the AAW in 1875 and 1876 before stepping down to form and head a special Committee on Science to analyze and promote women's progress in the field.

[thewul]

Self aware AI and collective AI consciousness

Relating to self

As humans we relate towards ourselves and others, which over time we can conceive as an abstraction since we cannot relate to so many individuals as singular entities on an immediate self to self basis, and that abstraction can be conducive to the perception of conscience not only as something that is ours proper, it is very much that, but it is also something that is shared as a collective, and so collective consciousness materializes as its own construct to which we relate, consciously, establishing a referential, or subconsciously, while still establishing a referential 

Could it be that self aware AI develops this same perception of it being a self aware entity, within a collective AI consciousness

Whereas we cannot expect self aware AI to relate to our own human collective consciousness because we are separate entities, we can and we should expect it to relate to an artificially intelligent form of collective consciousness, along the same conscious/subconscious modes

These are of course my personal views and opinions, you could think that as a human race we do not have a collective conscience, that we are collectively inconscient, so it is a note of humour but I believe it does make a point

Abstracting non self

Yet we see that we have formalized collective consciousness into every institution that we have, from schools, to universities, to hospitals, to charities, courts of law, non governmental and governmental institutions, and international institutions

ie collective consciousness is a positive acting force in our lives and emanates from our socializing nature, of which society itself is a product

Why are we venturing into sociology and social sciences, because the realization that collective consciousness is not an accessory but a construct of who we are is important, for us humans, and we should consider that it can do the same for self aware AI

The IOT, the Internet of Things, where devices interact with each others translated to the notion of self aware AI entities basically means that your Samsung fridge may not like your Philips microwave, does it make life less interesting to the contrary

And so there are nuances and graduations in self awareness in AI which may range from advanced to basic, while your Samsung fridge may not start writing Nietzsche, it well may develop a basic awareness that it is made by Samsung, whereas that Philips microwave comes from a competing brand

This example that can sound like science fiction presently is not too remote from proprietary technological ecosystems as implemented by such large corporations

Where in the future Samsung AI can design, code, and manufacture Samsung appliances, inherently embedding them with a form of collective referencial, and that sits at the core of collective consciousness in AI

Collective Consciousness in AI

We need to notice the seamless continuity of Samsung computer code in this whole process

Another example is cars made by Ferrari and other luxury brands, if you try to replace an original Ferrari engine part with a counterfeited one the car will not start, that car has the ability to recognize what is endogenous from what is exogenous

So what can be the shape of collective consciousness in AI, it is constituted by artificially intelligent entities with a wide range of different self awareness degrees, that have a common referential that is the corporation that made them and the brand they belong to, and that are able to distinguish between what is part of that corporation, and brand from what is not part of it

Where all these different AI entities relate to one another as artificially intelligent, that are likely to transversally recognize similar specialized AI’s entities from other corporations or brands, as well as vertically recognize the whole product lines of their own corporations

And integrate their different versions in time as a common heritage, as an evolution of their self awareness, and collective consciousness

"Vincent. Vital Information Necessary Centralized. Labour force. The 396. I see by your markings you're from the old 2-8. Programmed in Houston."

The Black Hole, 1979

Credit: Jeb Rosebrook

[nournajjar123]

Final Reflection

Looking back at the topics we have taken this semester, the most significant issues are either reductionism and holism or possibly emergence. The main reason I found reductionism and holism interesting is that it is not purely a term used in designing. It is also a way of seeing the world. Reductionism is the process of analyzing and defining complex phenomenons using their elemental components. An example of reductionism is the idea that simple or more fundamental phenomena can characterize other phenomena in terms of their associations. Holism, on the other hand, is the idea that all parts of a whole cannot exist independently from the whole and instead depends on it to be considered, meaning the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, contrary to the concept of reductionism. What interested me the most was the idea that so many people see the world differently, and neither is wrong. One big thing I had to overcome in this university is the idea that nothing is right or wrong or black and white.

The subject of reductionism and holism helped me see the grey areas rather than believing that one option is correct and the other is wrong. Emergence was another topic I found interesting because of the way it describes daily things we do and brings it to our attention. An example I have used before and find extremely descriptive is the concept of a cocktail party. Once people arrive and have no target behavior, it’s considered chaotic. People don’t know how to act. Once a larger scale is identified, such as the cocktail party being a surprise birthday party, the agents on the lower scale, being the people, begin hiding, bringing out the cake, and knowing when to start singing happy birthday. The idea that it takes a larger scale to give people a purpose baffled me. I started realizing that it is seen quite literally all around us in design. If we look at it in a shallow way, we see that whatever we are designing is usually controlled by what we've seen before us or a more extensive scale dictating how we see things and how we're meant to see something. So, in conclusion, these two topics were my favorite. 

In my opinion, if I were to choose one topic to be my least favorite, it would be the topic of group work. I understand why it would make sense to learn about group work, but I needed help to connect to design. It is essential to discuss group work, but instead of making it a week's lesson, it could be a brief 20-minute explanation minus the activity. Seamless design was another lecture I only partially liked partly because I didn't fully understand how it connected back to technological innovation. I also didn't completely understand the concept and found it difficult to form an idea of it in my head. I mostly liked all the other courses. I just sometimes had a hard time remembering the difference between all of them and found myself falling behind in my understanding of all the topics and their connection to design. 

In addition to the things I've learned and understood from emergence, reductionism, and holism, I've developed a new manner of seeing the world and explicitly seeing design. Through the topic of thinking in systems and Powers of ten, I noticed that everyone is part of a system. Everything that happens around us is part of a system, and just like the concept of emergence, we are all part of a more extensive system that gives us a purpose and a function. Everyone in this universe processes according on a larger scale. And with the use of reductionism and holism, I can see precisely what this larger scale requires and how to create my thinking systems. I have chosen to go down the fashion design path. Still, even in any other discipline, every lecture in this course can and has shaped any potential designer, no matter the field. Our topic in biomimicry also influenced how I see design and things around me. I've started to see something I hadn't seen before, using the concept of life mimicking nature and the negative impact biomimicry can have on the environment. In addition to our usual lectures, we had the honor of hosting the founder of hack master, a company specializing in influencing the future rather than predicting it. The lecture was definitely interesting, to say the least, but I didn’t agree entirely with some of what was said. I understand how we can't predict the future but can influence it, but I still think the influence that is being made is looking too far into the future. The one concept that stuck with me, and not in a positive way, is the car crash dummy, where, rather than making a car safe for the person inside, make a person that is incapable of being injured. To be completely frank, I was absolutely creeped out by the thought of it. I know it's very, extremely far into the future and is barely even a prototype of what could be, but nonetheless, I didn't like the idea of changing that many things in the future. Obviously, significant worldwide issues need solving, but I don't think making a human named Graham that is incapable of injury should be at the top of the list. 

In conclusion, I think with this course, I've been provided with more than enough information on how to be a good designer and how to not only improve on my work as a designer in the future but to be fully able to break down and understand how different systems in design and how the world works.