Leanna Garfield writing in BI this week outlines how the the New Zealand-based robotics company, Scott Technology Limited is developing fully-automated meat processing bots, which can extract different cuts from lamb, pig, and beef carcasses. Many meatpacking companies believe using this type of technology (rather than human workers) will make processing more efficient. Garfield points out: The world’s largest meat production company, JBS, is already investing in it. As NPR reported, the Brazil-based corporation bought a controlling…
Category Archives Computers
On July 27, 2016, Michigan-based Vayu, Inc., in collaboration with the Stony Brook University Global Health Institute completed the first ever series of long-range, fully autonomous drone delivery flights with blood and stool samples, setting records in the process. The samples were flown from villages in rural Madagascar to Stony Brook University's Centre ValBio, a central testing facility located adjacent…
Those of us over thirty years of age, may have lived the majority of our lives without the World Wide Web, yet I imagine it is increasingly more difficult to remember what that was like. Perhaps more significantly, those under thirty have only lived with the World Wide Web. 25 years ago, the first website was launched. A simple announcement in a…
Stephen Hawking: There's a story that scientists built an intelligent computer. The first question they asked it was: "Is there a God?" The computer replies: "There is now." And a bolt of lightning struck the plug so it couldn't be turned off. Nick Bostrom: Most of the world is completely oblivious to the most major things that are going to happen…
The team at BD is at it again. SpotMini is a new smaller version of the Spot robot. SpotMini is all-electric (no hydraulics) and runs for about 90 minutes on a charge, depending on what it is doing. SpotMini is one of the quietest robots Boston Dynamics have ever built.
Terrapattern finds places that look the same using machine learning. Terrapattern is a prototype for helping people quickly scan extremely large geographical areas for specific visual features. We are particularly keen to help people identify, characterize and track indicators which have not been detected or measured previously, and which have sociological, humanitarian, scientific, or cultural significance. Terrapattern provides an open-ended…
Think about this for a moment. Fractal-based mind-map that can contain and visualise all human knowledge. The OneZoom software uses fractals to condense the entire tree of life into a single, zoomable page. OneZoom® is so named because all the information is on a single page: all you have to do is zoom to reveal details. Not a bad start...…
Part of the problem or part of the solution? Things really have improved. Perfect? Not by a long-shot. Could you imagine the largest manufacturer in the world, even a decade ago, investing capital and recurrent resources in this level of innovation to recycle the products they produce? http://www.apple.com/recycling/ The cynical amongst us [I count myself as one] have always looked…
Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.