Fresh water isn’t unlimited. Rainfall isn’t predictable. Just three percent of the world’s water is drinkable, and more than 70 percent of that freshwater is used for agriculture. Unnecessary irrigation wastes huge amounts of water – some crops are watered twice as …Continue reading
This Gadget Can Tell What’s Wrong with Your Air Conditioner by Listening to It
Augury’s gadget and iPhone app pay attention to ultrasonic sounds and vibrations to figure out what’s wrong with air conditioners and other big machines. If you’ve ever tried to diagnose a car problem just by listening to it run, you’ve got a …Continue reading
AI Hits the Mainstream
For Robert Welborn, head of data science for the insurer and finance company USAA, 2015 was the year machine learning started to make commercial sense. Access to improved machine-learning tools, cheaper processing technology, and a sharp decline in the cost of storing …Continue reading
Facebook’s Artificial-Intelligence Software Gets a Dash More Common Sense
Artificial-intelligence researchers at the company took on the project in an effort to explore how computers might learn some basic physical common sense. Understanding that, for example, unsupported objects fall, or that a larger object won’t fit inside a smaller one, is …Continue reading
Why Robots and Humans Struggled with DARPA’s Challenge
The falls and fumbles of robots in the DARPA Challenge point to the remaining hurdles for human-robot interfaces. When some of the world’s most advanced rescue robots are foiled by nothing more complex than a doorknob, you get a good sense of …Continue reading