OK, but . . . we've been trying to create "AI" since the mechanical man that plays chess. And in fiction long before that. And, though in 100+ (1000+?) years we haven't achieved true AI at all. But we're jumping to the illogical extreme that . . . once successful, we'll be WILDLY over the moon successful, FAR outstripping human capabilities in an instant. Its like saying "Dude, I know we haven't even invented the wheel yet, but can't we even talk theoretically about the specs and floor-plan for the base on Mars?"

And point two . . . we already have Hitlers, and Dahmers, and a plethora of "plenty ordinary" villains. It may take us a few tries, but . . . eventually we find and deal with them. To our future Robotic Overloads I say . . . "Line for the evil villains starts back there. Take a number, we'll be with you in a minute."

Yeah, I'm lost on what they're talking about . . . pretty much every county / municipality around here has "water treatment plants" . . . which take human waste, process it, and return it to the river supply. So yes, I'm drinking recycled waste from someone upstream . . . but lots of people downstream are drinking mine too. Maybe its that in the "lap of 1st world luxury" we don't realize the 3rd world doesn't have this filtration/reprocessing on a widespread basis.

Just wait till he starts pushing the Soylent Green Crackers . . .

He was Kentucky State Police. Retired around 1985. At the time, mandatory 55 retirement. That's long gone now. Not sure if its unlimited, or if they switched to physical fitness tests.

Yes. Join a club. Photography Club. Outdoor Shooting Club. Hiking Club. Group Knitting Club.

ANYTHING that requires you to get up and out of the house if possible. Preferably sign up for some small responsibility (once a month short presentation to the club).

My father was in a job with forced retirement at age 55 (at the time, since lifted). Too many of his co-workers, seemingly healthy, dropped dead within a few years of retirement. Just "sitting around" with no responsibilities . . . is as much of a killer as anything else.

Exactly. "I" that is rapidly and mechanically (electronically) repeatable, not "AI" . . . in some half intelligence.

Autonomy (with its goals and value systems) will likely be a core precept for "true" repeatable intelligence.

Would anyone want a robotic doctor (Emergency Medical Hologram) that's little more then a "calculator"??? If no live-human doctor was available, I'd certainly prefer the substitute be autonomous, and goal oriented.

Therein lies the twin issue. Aside from the danger of a singularity taking over . . . if "that thing" is intelligent enough to dream and reason and have goals and values, enough to complete difficult tasks . . . is it right for us to enslave it?

Interesting and a good start but . . .

(Hard to tell clearly from the two articles but) these seem to use feed horns of a specific design and configuration (microwave transmissions usually do), that must be POINTED AT the receiver feed horn, so . . . if anyone is planning on "just plopping down the laptop" in any old orientation . . . it won't line up the transmission signals. Sure, for a trunk line between sites (buildings/planets) where critical alignment can be achieved . . . it'll work fine.

And some of the comments below seem confused . . . its not "faster" . . . its a "bigger pipeline". If it takes (on average, depending on planet position) 12.5 minutes for a signal to "reach mars" . . . it will still take 12.5 minutes. The signal won't "go faster" to get there in 6 minutes. When they say "faster" they mean . . . once the signal crosses the 12.5 minute distance . . . you can pump a higher bandwidth of data on that signal. But we won't be using this for "live control" of something like a Mars Rover. That's not the "faster" they mean.

Also, in terms of the "don't need USB cables any more, just put them close to the computer" . . . so, next time I enter the datacenter, I won't have to actually sneak in a USB thumb drive to tap the servers and steal data . . . I can just "walk nearby" and tap in? Sounds like a path ripe for exploitation. I know, its not that simple, and theoretically we can "tap into" keystroke/mouse streams that are RF now . . . but a USB "tap" seems more capable of nefarious activity than just a keyboard sniffer.

And I'd agree with the one point . . . (just like regular WiFi) other factors come into play and the high rate will drop off fast with distance . . . still. Always good to push the envelope . . . congratz all around to the dev's.

I too pitched the Blue LED Alarm clock. And have the windows blacked out, but to your other point . . .

Yes, a spinning wheel for artificially created gravity solves one problem, but leaving LEO and the protection inside the Van Allen Belts for geostationary orbit . . . I fear you'd sleep better, but you'd be sleeping in a microwave, having given up lots of your radiation shielding.

Water shielding or "building inside an asteroid" . . . are both currently unfeasible for lift-weight or maneuverability.

So, its a win-lose situation for the moment.

We're certainly, with Arduino / XBee / Raspberry Pi and the like, in a "Maker" DIY Bull Market. Even the video/text Blog sites like GeekBeat are finally "coming into their own."
But that seems more like a "we've finally made it" than a "we've over-promised and overshot".
YMMV

Exactly the same reasoning I used to wear a helmet riding a Motorcycle. I know I can't survive the 70+ mile per hour head on with a one ton car . . . but that bump from behind at 5 mph at a stop-light, that tosses me head-first into the curb, that one I could walk away from unharmed with a helmet.

So . . . police won't be able to use the Restroom for an entire shift . . . since they can't turn off the camera and, while they may be willing, can't require others in the Restroom to permit filming them ???

Seems like we still have a few loopholes to work through.

I found a cure for Cancer . . . but its only effective against 55% of the cancers out there, so it hardly seems worth immunizing the public since its not 100% effective.

As long as the overhead of trapping/blocking the 55% of computer virus attacks is unobtrusive to me . . . Thanks, I'll gladly take what protection I can get.

I used punch cards in College and had to wait hours to get my turn.

For work . . . we started a Machine Monitoring System for the factory floor around 1985. Back then a "compile everything" on the older Motorola Versados computers took five and a half hours.

Now on the PC-Linux its running on, that same "compile everything" takes . . . 3 minutes 23 seconds.

100 times faster . . . is a nice change.

Makes sense to me . . .
1. I pay for Netflix (content charge) and can watch movies without commercials.
2. I watch Broadcast TV with commercials, and should pay only for xyz's cable system infrastructure (lines, repeaters, dvr boxes . . .) to get me clear picture/sound.
3. Or I pay no one and watch OTA broadcasts (and pay by watching commercials.)
Paying for BOTH #2 and #3 AND paying a content charge on top . . . is double or triple dipping of fees for the same viewing.
Yes, I understand Netflix in #1 has "servers and infrastructure" and I'm paying for both content and infrastructure, but that's my point, if they're telling me I must pay for both content and infrastructure on the cable system . . . why should I also suffer watching commercials too?
Its all inconsistent billing as its setup currently.

Omniscience . . . not omnipotence.

With omniscience . . . you don't need omnipotence. With omniscience you don't need ANY power because you know how to create (from nothing) or seize control, of any power, in any time frame, to achieve any effect.

Having omnipotence without omniscience . . . you can really only blow $hit up.

From the standpoint of being able to be "on par" with the government, so it remains such that "we" rule the government, and not the other way around . . . then nuclear weapons and such may be justified.

My father always tried to wiggle out of the right to bear arms with the "So do you want explosives too?" argument.
I fell back on the "line of sight" justification. If its important enough (protecting my family from a burglar in our home in the middle of the night) that I'm willing to stand within his "line of sight" and risk my life from his pistol/rifle . . . then I ought to have every bit the same amount of firepower to protect myself and my family in direct response.
That of course does NOT justify . . . planting an IED and being "safe and secure" 100 miles away . . . while others die at my remote hands. (And so, since I can be "far away" and out of danger . . . it does not justify the nuclear/biological or other weapons.)

Its hard for citizens or the government to justify taking away my right to defend myself when I'm in "line of sight" (imminent) danger/threat.

That brings up another point . . . "vigilante". We're missing a word in the English/American language . . . and end up constantly substituting "vigilante" for this missing word.
If a man is robbing my store, and police arrest him, and handcuff him, and take him to jail, and I gather my friends and torches and pitchforks and seize that thief from custody and try and lynch him . . . THAT is being a vigilante."
The alternate case is where we need the missing word.
If the robber is ACTIVELY SHOOTING AT ME, and the Police have arrived but I'm STILL IN imminent danger . . . I have no constitutional, legal, moral, or ethical responsibility to throw down my gun and "hope the police can protect me". At that point, I'm NOT being a vigilante, I'm . . . simply fighting for my life. A right which can never be abdicated or be taken away.
As soon as the police have the robber disarmed, and in custody . . . if I continue to fire, NOW I've converted to vigilante.
As an American (maybe a world) society, we've developed this delusional view, that "since we live in a civilized society" . . . I threw away my right to fight to live and have to hope the police get here in time and can save me.
And . . . it just isn't so.

(That's more than just a response to your point . . . just something that needed to be said.)