Wednesday, May 1

Tag: building

They Could Transform How We Reach Underserved Areas – We’re Building A Vaccine Corps Of Medical And Nursing Students
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COVID-19

They Could Transform How We Reach Underserved Areas – We’re Building A Vaccine Corps Of Medical And Nursing Students

The U.S. faces one of the most consequential public health campaigns in history right now: to vaccinate the population against COVID-19 and, especially, to get shots into the arms of people who cannot easily navigate getting vaccinated on their own. Medical students’ backgrounds often reflect the diversity of local communities, which can allow them more access and trust for vaccination efforts. Bryan Goodchild/UMass Medical School, CC BY-ND Time is of the essence. As new, potentially more dangerous variants of this coronavirus spread to new regions, widespread vaccination is one of the most powerful and effective ways to slow, if not stop, the virus’s spread. Mobilizing large “vaccine corps” could help to meet this urgent need. We’re testing that concept right now at the University of M...
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People Who Attacked The US Capitol Building Are Being Track Down By Law Enforcement Using Technology
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IN OTHER NEWS

People Who Attacked The US Capitol Building Are Being Track Down By Law Enforcement Using Technology

After rioters flooded the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, there was an immediate call for those who overran officers on the scene and swarmed the House and Senate floors, as well as congressional members’ personal offices, to be identified, arrested and prosecuted. The coordinated law enforcement response to this incident is massive. As researchers who study criminal justice, we see that law enforcement agencies are accessing large amounts of information via technological sources to investigate the attack on the U.S. Capitol building. High-definition security cameras, facial recognition technology, location services acquired from cellphones and third-party apps, and accessing archival evidence on social media are all used to identify perpetrators of crimes and tie them to specific places...
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The Fundamental Building Blocks Of The Universe May Be Fragments Of Energy – Not Waves Or Particles
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TECHNOLOGY

The Fundamental Building Blocks Of The Universe May Be Fragments Of Energy – Not Waves Or Particles

Matter is what makes up the universe, but what makes up matter? This question has long been tricky for those who think about it – especially for the physicists. Reflecting recent trends in physics, my colleague Jeffrey Eischen and I have described an updated way to think about matter. We propose that matter is not made of particles or waves, as was long thought, but – more fundamentally – that matter is made of fragments of energy. In ancient times, five elements were thought to be the building blocks of reality. IkonStudio/iStock via Getty Images From five to one The ancient Greeks conceived of five building blocks of matter – from bottom to top: earth, water, air, fire and aether. Aether was the matter that filled the heavens and explained the rotation of the stars, as observed from the ...
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Is It Ok To Turn Off A Robot If It Has A Conscious? Building True AIs The Moral Implications
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AI, TECHNOLOGY

Is It Ok To Turn Off A Robot If It Has A Conscious? Building True AIs The Moral Implications

In the “Star Trek: The Next Generation” episode “The Measure of a Man,” Data, an android crew member of the Enterprise, is to be dismantled for research purposes unless Captain Picard can argue that Data deserves the same rights as a human being. Naturally the question arises: What is the basis upon which something has rights? What gives an entity moral standing? The philosopher Peter Singer argues that creatures that can feel pain or suffer have a claim to moral standing. He argues that nonhuman animals have moral standing, since they can feel pain and suffer. Limiting it to people would be a form of speciesism, something akin to racism and sexism. Without endorsing Singer’s line of reasoning, we might wonder if it can be extended further to an android robot like Data. It would require ...
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