With the expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) and developments in robotics and quantum computers, technology has by no means been so vital in shaping our lives because it was in 2024. From rogue AI to swarms of drones sparking UFO reviews, listed here are our prime 10 tech tales of the yr.
Poisoned AI went rogue
As AI turns into ubiquitous, researchers have grown louder in their calls to regulate the software to forestall it from harming society. Of all of the research warning of machine studying’s exceptional potential to lie and cheat, maybe essentially the most troubling one got here at first of the yr, when researchers behind one study deliberately poisoned their AI so it will evade all makes an attempt to turn out to be extra sincere.
It doesn’t matter what coaching method or mannequin measurement they used, a big language mannequin that had been poisoned continued to misbehave. And one method even taught the AI to acknowledge the set off for its malicious actions and higher disguise its unsafe conduct from human scrutiny.
ChatGPT’s GPT-4 handed the Turing check
The Turing check, first urged by laptop scientist Alan Turing in 1950 because the “imitation sport,” is a thought experiment used to determine when a machine’s clever conduct is indistinguishable from a human’s. And this yr, one paper showed that GPT-4 handily passed it: It fooled human individuals into considering that it was an actual individual 54% of the time.
Nonetheless, that does not imply machines have reached or surpassed human intelligence. The Turing check is not actually meant to measure intelligence however moderately to focus on how poorly human assumptions about it map onto machine conduct. Nonetheless, AI’s means to idiot us may turn out to be a problem for future interactions with the technology and a trigger for paranoia concerning the true nature of on-line interactions in the years to return.
AI received the Nobel Prize, twice
AI analysis leaped into the best ranks of scientific honors this yr, nabbing the Nobel Prize in each physics and chemistry. The physics prize, awarded to Geoffrey Hinton and John Hopfield for his or her pioneering work in creating synthetic neural networks and machine studying algorithms, stunned many scientists, with some even arguing that AI is unrelated to the fields it received prizes for.
Hinton shared a few of this astonishment, saying he was “flabbergasted” upon receiving the information. He in contrast developments in machine studying to the economic revolution, “however as a substitute of exceeding folks in bodily energy,” he stated, “it’ll exceed folks in mental means.”
In the meantime, the chemistry prize went to David Baker, Demis Hassabis and John Jumper, for his or her work in utilizing laptop and AI technology to revolutionize our understanding of how proteins fold.
Pokémon Go has been secretly farming person knowledge to energy future robotic navigation
The controversy surrounding AI’s farming of person knowledge took an sudden flip this yr when Niantic, the corporate behind the favored augmented actuality sport Pokémon Go, revealed that it had been scraping data from users to help future robots navigate the physical world.
The information, taken from scans made whereas customers had been out searching Pokémon, has already been used to coach 50 million native neural networks (collections of machine studying algorithms structured just like the human mind) to function in greater than 1,000,000 places worldwide, the corporate stated. Specialists warned that not all the functions will probably be benign.
Google’s AI search function made a weird debut
One large challenge with AI is its tendency to make issues up when it lacks coaching knowledge. So when Google’s Gemini-powered AI overview function appeared this yr, social media reacted with amusement and dismay to a flood of crazed suggestions made by the chatbot — together with recommendation to eat rocks, add glue to pizza, and leap from the Golden Gate Bridge to treatment despair.
Google has stated it has taken motion to take away the inaccurate recommendations and is working to enhance the standard of the overview’s responses. However the general accuracy of the device for particular queries and its broader impacts on the news ecosystem it makes use of for coaching stay unclear.
A quantum laptop smashed an error document by an element of 100
Whereas nonetheless being in their infancy, quantum computer systems made a sequence of serious advances in 2024. As an illustration, Quantinuum’s 56-qubit H2-1 laptop demonstrated a remarkable reduction in its error rate — a essential space of enchancment for quantum computer systems to exchange classical ones sometime. This yr, H2-1’s error charge improved to 35% of the time, in line with a brand new examine. This represents a dramatic 100-fold enchancment in the 2019 error charge demonstrated by Google’s Sycamore quantum laptop.
China’s maglev prepare broke the sound barrier, and it might be sooner than a passenger jet quickly
China‘s T-Flight prepare, a prototype high-speed prepare that makes use of magnets to drift above its observe, reached a blistering 387 mph (623 km/h) this year, breaking a earlier document by 12 mph (19 km/h). However what generated buzz was the subsequent plan for the prepare: a theoretical prime velocity of 621 mph (1,000 km/h), which the China Aerospace Science and Trade Corp. intends to succeed in in testing quickly.
Drones sparked UFO fever in New Jersey
For weeks, folks throughout New Jersey and different states have been spotting clusters of drone-like objects flying across night skies, main state officers to push the FBI for solutions.
The precise clarification for the uptick in sightings stays unclear, however plainly elevated drone flights in the realm, together with a wholesome sprint of social media hysteria, are behind the phenomena. This is not the primary time that drones have caused UFO panics, and with their rising accessibility all over the world, it is unlikely to be the final.
The quickest humanoid robotic was introduced
Humanoid robots have been rising in sophistication over the previous decade, and this yr was no completely different. The Chinese language firm Robotic Period unveiled its STAR1 bipedal robot, which broke data with a prime velocity of over 8 mph (3.6 meters per second) over a wide range of terrains. A part of this accomplishment is owed to some bespoke sneakers hooked up to the robotic’s ft, giving it an additional increase of velocity.
AI created proteins “not discovered in nature”
In July, scientists introduced that they’d used a large language model to create a new type of protein that shares solely 58% of its sequence with these discovered in nature. The mannequin, dubbed ESM3, may show helpful in discovering new medicine and in designing chemical compounds that may decompose plastics, the researchers stated.