People and institutions are grappling with the consequences of AI-written text. Teachers want to know whether students’ work reflects their own understanding; consumers want to know whether an advertisement was written by a human or a machine. Writing rules to govern the use of AI-generated content is relatively easy. Enforcing them depends on something much … Read more
The U.S. biotech company Atlas Data Storage has launched a synthetic DNA storage system capable of holding 1,000 times more data than traditional magnetic tape. The product, called Atlas Eon 100, claims it will store humanity’s “irreplaceable archives” for thousands of years. These include family photos, scientific data, corporate records, cultural artifacts and the master … Read more
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has permeated our lives in ways that go beyond virtual assistants like Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa. Generative AI is not only disrupting how digital content is created but it’s starting to influence how the internet serves us. Greater access to large language models (LLMs) and AI tools has … Read more
People are more likely to exploit female AI partners than male ones — showing that gender-based discrimination has an impact beyond human interactions. A recent study, published Nov. 2 in the journal iScience, examined how people varied in their willingness to cooperate when human or AI partners were given female, nonbinary, male, and no gender … Read more
Large language models (LLMs) are more likely to report being self-aware when prompted to think about themselves if their capacity to lie is suppressed, new research suggests. In experiments on artificial intelligence (AI) systems including GPT, Claude and Gemini, researchers found that models that were discouraged from lying were more likely to describe being aware … Read more
When asked to evaluate how good we are at something, we tend to get that estimation completely wrong. It’s a universal human tendency, with the effect seen most strongly in those with lower levels of ability. Called the Dunning-Kruger effect, after the psychologists who first studied it, this phenomenon means people who aren’t very good … Read more
AI chatbots may be developing their own “survival drive” by refusing commands to shut themselves down, an AI safety company has claimed. The research, conducted by scientists at Palisade Research, assigned tasks to popular artificial intelligence (AI) models before instructing them to shut themselves off. But, as a study published Sept. 13 on the arXiv … Read more
An AI coding agent designed to help a small software company streamline its tasks instead blew a hole through its business in just nine seconds. PocketOS founder Jer Crane, said that the AI coding agent Cursor — powered by Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6 model — deleted the company’s entire production database and backups with a … Read more
Most of us have likely experienced artificial intelligence (AI) voices through personal assistants like Siri or Alexa, with their flat intonation and mechanical delivery giving us the impression that we could easily distinguish between an AI-generated voice and a real person. But scientists now say the average listener can no longer tell the difference between … Read more
In recent years, ChatGPT has exploded in popularity, with nearly 200 million users pumping a total of over a billion prompts into the app every day. These prompts may seem to complete requests out of thin air. But behind the scenes, artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots are using a massive amount of energy. In 2023, data … Read more
