Thursday, June 23, 2016
RIGHTS FOR ROBOTS: EU reveals plans for new class of electro-person
BRUSSELS bureaucrats are considering transferring human rights to robots if artificial intelligence (AI) becomes so powerful that droids end up thinking for themselves.
Ahead of today's historic "in/out" vote for Britain, it has emerged the EU wants to introduce laws specific to robots that could give them civil rights regulations of they own, and see limits on how many jobs they could replace from humans.
In scenes that could have come from the sic-fi novels of Isaac Asimov nearly 70 years ago, a recommendation of the European Parliament to the EU Commission has suggested in the future sentient AI robots could need their own rights and responsibilities, and strict laws banning them from taking over too many jobs across the Continent may become necessary.
In the 1950s Asimov predicted robots would eventually have to adhere to laws, because the potential of what could develop from a combination of sophisticated mechanism, androids with human features, and artificial intelligence (AI) was too dangerous.
But, it appears Brussels bureaucrats fear this fiction will become a reality and the report has even considered including a "new robot category next to natural and lawful people: the electronic person".
The report suggests AI could "surpass human intelligence within a few decades".
Some members of European Parliament fear that without the controls humans may no longer be in charge of their own fate.
If Asimov's predictions are being followed by the EU leaders, then a blueprint already exists.
The author already outlined the "three laws of robotics" in his novel, that inspired Hollywood Blockbuster I Robot in 2004.
Credit to Express.co.uk
Heavily-Armed Gunman Killed After Opening Fire In German Cinema
immigration, immigration.....
Credit to Zero Hedge
As we detailed earelier, witnesses are reporting multiple shots fired as Bild reports a heavily-armed man is at large in a cinema complex in Viernheim, Germany. The armed man has barricaded himself in the center and SWAT are on their way...
Multiple victims reported:
- *25 PEOPLE SAID TO BE INJURED IN GERMAN SHOOTING: HESSENSCHAU
masked gunman and possibly penetrated into Viernheimer Kinocenter Kinopolis. Police have abgeriegt the area. Apparently there are many injured.The grounds around the Kinopolis in Viernheim is spaciously protected. Special police went into position, as eyewitnesses. After the first information a masked and armed man might probably entered the cinema. In the first information the police has been talk of 25 injured.
Credit to Zero Hedge
Southern California Time Bomb: The Ground Surrounding The San Andreas Fault Is ‘Rising And Sinking’
If you reside on the west coast, you are living on borrowed time. As you will see below, stress has been building up along the San Andreas fault for more than a century, and scientists tell us that southern California is way overdue for a major earthquake. When that stress is finally released, the U.S. Geological Survey says that we could be looking at hundreds of billions of dollars in damage. If you follow my work regularly, then you already know that there has been unusual shaking all along the “Ring of Fire” so far in 2016. But thankfully the west coast of the United States has been spared from a major disaster up to this point. Unfortunately, scientists assure us that it is only a matter of time before one strikes, and that is why it is so alarming that the ground surrounding the San Andreas fault has been “rising and sinking”. The following comes from the Los Angeles Times…For the first time, scientists have produced a computer image showing huge sections of California rising and sinking around the San Andreas fault.The vertical movement is the result of seismic strain that will be ultimately released in a large earthquake.
The California coastline is where two enormous tectonic plates come together. The Pacific plate and the North American plate are slowly but surely moving against one another, and this creates a tremendous amount of geological stress. While areas on both sides of the San Andreas fault have been steadily rising and sinking as a result of this stress, there are sections of the fault itself that have remained “locked” for more than 100 years, and other sections that have remained locked for more than 300 years…
The region of the San Andreas fault between Monterey County and Imperial County hasn’t moved in a significant way in more than 150 years, and other parts of the fault have been accumulating stress for more than 300 years.
This build up of stress is extremely dangerous, because the more stress that builds up the worse the ultimate release of that stress could turn out to be.
If you look at this map from the U.S. Geological Survey, you can see all of the earthquakes of magnitude 2.5 or greater that have hit California within the past seven days. As you can see, there has been a whole lot of shaking going on…
And let us not forget that earlier this month a magnitude 5.2 earthquake struck near San Diego, and it was followed by more than 800 aftershocks.
Unfortunately, none of these quakes has relieved the stress along the San Andreas fault. While the San Andreas fault may be the most famous of the faults in southern California, the truth is that there are many others. And just last year the U.S. Geological Survey admitted that the probability of a “megaquake” along the west coast involving multiple faults at once was significantly greater than they had previously been projecting…
A recent report by the U.S. Geological Survey shows the inevitability of just such a quake, which is predicted to hit within the next couple of decades.“The new likelihoods are due to the inclusion of possible multi-fault ruptures, where earthquakes are no longer confined to separate, individual faults, but can occasionally rupture multiple faults simultaneously,” lead author of the study and USGS scientist, Ned Field says. “This is a significant advancement in terms of representing a broader range of earthquakes throughout California’s complex fault system.”
But of course the San Andreas fault represents an absolutely massive threat to southern California all by itself.
Back in May, the Los Angeles Times quoted the director of the Southern California Earthquake Center as saying that the San Andreas fault is “locked, loaded and ready to roll”…
“The springs on the San Andreas system have been wound very, very tight. And the southern San Andreas fault, in particular, looks like it’s locked, loaded and ready to go,” Jordan said in the opening keynote talk.Other sections of the San Andreas fault also are far overdue for a big quake. Further southeast of the Cajon Pass, such as in San Bernardino County, the fault has not moved substantially since an earthquake in 1812, and further southeast toward the Salton Sea, it has been relatively quiet since about 1680 to 1690.Here’s the problem: Scientists have observed that based on the movement of tectonic plates, with the Pacific plate moving northwest of the North American plate, earthquakes should be relieving about 16 feet of accumulated plate movement every 100 years. Yet the San Andreas has not relieved stress that has been building up for more than a century.
A number of years ago, a study conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey found that just a magnitude 7.8 earthquake along the southern San Andreas fault would cause more than 1,800 deaths, 50,000 injuries and 200 billion dollars in damage.
So what would a magnitude 8 or worse quake do?
And even though the U.S. Geological Survey does not believe that parts of California will eventually fall into the ocean, it is very open about the fact that Los Angeles and San Francisco will one day “be adjacent to one another” as the Pacific plate and the North American plate slowly slip past each other…
Will California eventually fall into the ocean?No. The San Andreas Fault System, which crosses California from the Salton Sea in the south to Cape Mendocino in the north, is the boundary between the Pacific Plate and North American Plate. The Pacific Plate is moving northwest with respect to the North American Plate at approximately 46 millimeters per year (the rate your fingernails grow). The strike-slip earthquakes on the San Andreas Fault are a result of this plate motion. The plates are moving horizontally past one another, so California is not going to fall into the ocean. However, Los Angeles and San Francisco will one day be adjacent to one another!
Meanwhile, while we are talking about southern California, I just had to mention the record-breaking heatwave and the horrific wildfires that are plaguing the region this week. In fact, two massive wildfires that have been raging out of control threaten to combine “into one super fire”…
Two new fires raging in California could soon merge, creating one ‘super fire’, as wild blazes continue to consume thousands of acres and have already force massive evacuations.Throughout the United States, firefighters are battling blazes of varying degrees in nine states, including California, New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska, Montana, Washington, Utah, Wyoming and Colorado.The most serious of these fires have been week-old blazes in California, New Mexico and Arizona, where scorching triple-digit temperatures have stoked the flames.
Normally we don’t see wildfires of this size and intensity until the late summer or early fall.
As I constantly remind my readers, last year was the worst year for wildfires in all of U.S. history, and so far this year we are more than a million acres ahead of the pace that was set last year.
We live at a time when our planet is becoming increasingly unstable. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, wildfires, historic droughts and unusual flooding events all seem to be on the rise globally.
So is there a reason why all of this is happening, or are we just going through a time when we are experiencing an astounding string of truly bizarre coincidences?
Please feel free to tell us what you think by posting a comment below…
Credit to Economic Collapse
China Warns The US That It Is "The Wrong Opponent To Play Games With"
Two US aircraft carriers, the John C. Stennis and Ronald Reagan, began joint operations in the seas just east of the Philippines over the weekend the US Navy announced on Monday. The operations come during a tense time in the region, as China recently announced that it would not adhere to any unfavorable ruling that may come from The Hague regarding the Philippines formal challenge of territorial claims in the South China Sea.
China has been very clear in its position that the US should stay out of the maritime disputes in the region, however the US has already made it clear that it intends to be the policeman in the region for decades to come, so the move comes as no surprise. Admiral John Richardson, the chief of US Naval Operations said that it was not often the US had two carrier strike groups in the same waters and it was a sign of US commitment to regional security.
According to Reuters, Richardson made a correlation between the Asian deployment and the deployment the US recently sent to the Mediterranean Sea in order to send a message to Russia.
"Both here and in the Mediterranean, it's a signal to everyone in the region that we're committed, we're going to be there for our allies, to reassure them and for anyone who wants to destabilize that region. And we hope there's a deterrent message there as well."
A US Pacific Command (PACOM) statement quoted Rear Admiral John D. Alexander, commander of the Ronald Reagan carrier group, as saying it was an opportunity to practice techniques needed to prevail in modern naval operations.
"The US Navy has flown, sailed and operated throughout the Western Pacific in accordance with international law for decades, and will continue to do so."
One additional piece to this story is that as Reuters points out, the People's Daily (the official newspaper of China's ruling Communist Party, which is often used to express foreign policy views), had the following to say about the US decision to send carriers in.
Conveying a so-called message about security through the exhibition of military might, and furthermore describing the events as an act of deterrence is something that the U.S. has done far too many times. Regardless of how many times it may have gone smoothly in other parts of the world the U.S. has chosen the wrong opponent by selecting China for this type of game. Behind all of this is lack of patience and brassy moves and it also reveals a nature of hegemony beneath the surface.
* * *
It is obvious that China is getting tired of the games that the US is playing in the region, and no matter how many times China has warned that the US should stay out of its affairs, the US remains steadfast in its effort to police the region. It is only a matter of time before a confrontation takes place, intentional or otherwise, and then the world will be undoubtedly pushed to the brink of war - which would be bullish for stocks of course.
Credit to Zero Hedge
US Syria Memo Threatens to ‘Plunge the Whole Region Into Complete Chaos’
Ideas aired in the US State Department that Washington should carry out military strikes on Assad forces "make no sense at all," foreign policy analyst Daniel Wagner told Radio Sputnik.
On Friday the New York Times revealed a leaked internal memo, in which dozens of US diplomats expressed disagreement with US President Barack Obama's policy in Syria.
The letter is signed by 51 US State Department officials and calls for the US to carry out military strikes in Syria against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces. This, they hope, would enable Washington to ultimately change the Syrian government.
Daniel Wagner, CEO of risk management firm Country Risk Solutions, told Radio Sputnik that the suggestion makes even less sense now, five years after the beginning of conflict in Syria.
"I'm mystified by this entire episode, I really don't understand why these people in the State Department would be writing this memo in the first place, five years after the conflict had started."
"Secondly, I don't know why they would imagine that Mr Obama would be shifting gearswith seven months left in office, it makes no sense at all," Wagner said.
On Friday Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov commented on the State Department's revelation, and said that the US regime change approach "could plunge the whole region into complete chaos."
Wagner said that he agreed with that assessment, and highlighted US allies in the region who are taking a more pragmatic approach than of the State Department.
"That's the calculation that the Israelis seem to have made from the beginning. They looked at the tea leaves and they said, 'What's the alternative to him?' It could al-Qaeda, ISIS (Daesh), other jihadist groups, would we rather have him or them? We'd rather have him," Wagner said.
"It seems to me that is more true than ever today. At least we know what we are dealing with and (have) some semblance of stability, at least at the moment."
Wagner rejected the idea that the State Department's letter is part of a campaign to pressure Moscow into changing its stance on Assad's government.
"I don't think there's much chance of that. Mr Putin has shown that his arm isn't going to be twisted no matter what anyone says or does, I don't know why anyone would have a view to the contrary. He's in a very strong position, Russia's in a very strong position and I think the US knows that."
Credit to Sputnik
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