Evolution journal editors resign en masse
Over the holiday weekend, all but one member of the editorial board of Elsevier's Journal of Human Evolution (JHE) resigned "with heartfelt sadness and great regret," according to Retraction Watch, which helpfully provided an online PDF of the editors' full statement. It's the 20th mass resignation from a science journal since 2023. The editorial staff has been cut by more than 50% for some roles, and in 2023 Elsevier began using AI during production without informing the board. The AI regularly reformats submitted manuscripts to change meaning.The Surreal Identity Crisis of “I’m Not a Robot”
‘Sorry I’m still processing this’: Elon Musk allegedly has a burner account and the internet is losing it
Musk’s supposed account goes by the name Adrian Dittman. On said account, the moderator joins X spaces to talk about a number of things, including praising Elon Musk. The account also uses a cheap sounding voice changer to disguise the voice of who is speaking.‘Flagrant and serious violations’: Senator accused of illegally using campaign funds to splurge on pricey trips to Europe and ‘California wine country’
Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema has been accused of using campaign funds to splurge on travel expenses for trips to Europe, Japan, Aspen and “California wine country.” The Democrat-turned-independent “illegally” used the money to pay for chartered domestic and international flights, hotels, personal meals and catering — which “appear unrelated to any campaign or official business,” according to a government watchdog group.U.S. Homelessness Spiked by Jaw-Dropping Amount in 2024
Homelessness in the United States is soaring, increasing 18.1 percent in 2024 after a 12 percent increase the year prior. Natural disasters, inadequate options for migrants, and a devastating lack of affordable housing are the primary catalysts.OpenAI's o3 isn't AGI yet but it just did something no other AI has done
The test, in this case, is called the "Abstraction and Reasoning Corpus for Artificial General Intelligence," or ARC-AGI. It is a collection of "challenges for intelligent systems," a new benchmark. The ARC-AGI is billed as "the only benchmark specifically designed to measure adaptability to novelty." That means that it is meant to test the acquisition of new skills, not just the use of memorized knowledge. The score of 76% is the first time AI has beaten a human's score on the exam, as exemplified by the answers of human Mechanical Turk workers who took the test and who, on average, scored just above 75% correct.The questions are not text-based but instead consist of pictures. A grid of pixels with colored shapes is first shown, followed by a second version that has been changed in some way. The question is: What is the rule that changes the initial picture into the second picture? It's fun, rather like playing Sudoku or Tetris.
Hertz continues EV purge, asks renters if they want to buy instead of return
Get a used Chevy Bolt for a bit over $18,000 or a 2023 Tesla Model 3 for a bit less.