That is right now’s version of The Obtain, our weekday publication that gives a every day dose of what’s happening on this planet of know-how.
Google DeepMind has a brand new method to look inside an AI’s “thoughts”
We don’t know precisely how AI works, or why it really works so effectively. That’s an issue: It could lead on us to deploy an AI system in a extremely delicate discipline like medication with out understanding that it may have crucial flaws embedded in its workings.
A workforce at Google DeepMind that research one thing referred to as mechanistic interpretability has been engaged on new methods to allow us to peer beneath the hood. It not too long ago launched a instrument to assist researchers perceive what is going on when AI is producing an output.
It’s all a part of a push to get a greater understanding of precisely what is going on inside an AI mannequin. If we do, we’ll be capable to management its outputs extra successfully, main to higher AI programs sooner or later. Learn the total story.
—Scott J Mulligan
What’s on the desk at this yr’s UN local weather convention
Talks kicked off this week at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan. Working for a few weeks annually, the worldwide summit is the biggest annual assembly on local weather change.
The difficulty on the desk this time round: Nations must comply with set a brand new aim on how a lot cash ought to go to creating international locations to assist them finance the battle in opposition to local weather change. Complicating issues? A US president-elect whose method to local weather may be very completely different from that of the present administration (understatement of the century).
It is a massive second that might set the tone for what the subsequent few years of the worldwide local weather world appears to be like like. Right here’s what that you must learn about COP29 and the way Donald Trump’s election is coloring issues.
—Casey Crownhart
This story is from The Spark, our weekly publication providing you with the within observe on all issues power and local weather. Join to obtain it in your inbox each Wednesday.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the web to seek out you right now’s most enjoyable/vital/scary/fascinating tales about know-how.
1 The FBI is investigating crypto predictions-betting platform Polymarket
It’s investigating whether or not the agency allowed US merchants to guess on the election. (Bloomberg $)
+ Doing so would have been a violation of an settlement with the US authorities. (NYT $)
+ Polymarket claims to be a “absolutely clear prediction market.” (WSJ $)
2 OpenAI is looking for the US authorities to spend money on AI
With out monetary help, the US may lose essential floor to China, it warns. (WP $)
+ The agency floated the thought of constructing a colossal information middle. (The Info $)
3 AI-generated Elon Musk propaganda is rife on Fb
Professional-Musk inspiration porn is the content material of alternative for spammers. (404 Media)
+ Trump is surrounding himself with terminally on-line edgelords. (The Atlantic $)
4 The net proper has a misogynistic new rallying cry
‘Your physique, my alternative’ is being unfold by younger males looking for to impress. (New Yorker $)+ The upcoming presidency may usher in an age of gendered regression. (The Guardian)
5 China’s human manufacturing unit staff are beneath stress
Robots are creeping into each stage of the manufacturing course of. (FT $)
+ Three causes robots are about to develop into far more helpful. (MIT Expertise Assessment)
6 The way forward for chipmaking in America
Efforts to revitalize native services aren’t precisely going to plan. (Wired $)
+ What’s subsequent in chips. (MIT Expertise Assessment)
7 Blindbox stay streaming is thrilling buyers in China
You by no means know what you’re going to get. (NYT $)
8 What the glacial Earth could have seemed like
Round 700 million years in the past, all the planet was coated in ice. (Ars Technica)
+ Life-seeking, ice-melting robots may punch by way of Europa’s icy shell. (MIT Expertise Assessment)
9 Tips on how to defend the world’s largest single coral colony
The newly-discovered colony is the dimensions of two basketball courts. (Vox)
+ The race is on to avoid wasting coral reefs—by freezing them. (MIT Expertise Assessment)
10 These researchers have reinvented the wheel
This ‘morphing’ wheel can roll over obstacles as much as 1.3 occasions the peak of its radius. (Reuters)
Quote of the day
“Shawty crunk, so recent, so clear.”
—Mark Zuckerberg, Meta CEO-turned rapper, debuts a reworked model of 2002 rap hit Get Low in a tribute to his spouse, the Wall Road Journal stories.
The large story
Marseille’s battle in opposition to the surveillance state
The world over, video cameras have develop into an accepted function of city life. Many cities in China now have dense networks of them, and London and New Delhi aren’t far behind. Now France is enjoying catch-up.
Issues have been raised all through the nation. However the surveillance rollout has met particular resistance in Marseille, France’s second-biggest metropolis.
It’s unsurprising, maybe, that activists are preventing again in opposition to the cameras, highlighting the surveillance system’s overreach and underperformance. However are they succeeding? Learn the total story.
—Fleur Macdonald
We will nonetheless have good issues
A spot for consolation, enjoyable and distraction to brighten up your day. (Acquired any concepts? Drop me a line or tweet ’em at me.)
+ This yr’s gurning championship profitable mugshots don’t disappoint.
+ What does it imply to have private type, precisely?
+ Amsterdam’s unofficial police cat is totally lovely (and he lives on a ship!)
+ Save the worms—this author actually is. 
