Lifeboat Foundation

The world’s most prestigious thinktank dedicated to advancing the most productive and quality years of life.

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At Singularity University, space is one of our Global Grand Challenges (GGCs). The GGCs are defined as billion-person problems. They include, for example, water, food, and energy and serve as targets for the innovation and technologies that can make the world a better place.

You might be thinking: We have enough challenges here on Earth—why include space?

Continue reading “Space and Technology Review: Our Home Among the Stars” »

Tough to be a doctor these days — Could be bad news for Providers with limited or no Cyber Risk Coverage.

Providers are focusing on cybersecurity with increased urgency. Cyberattacks on health-care organizations reached an all-time high in 2015 and aren’t expected to slow down in 2016, Harry Greenspun, director for Deloitte’s Center for Health Solutions, told Bloomberg BNA. One element of a comprehensive strategy to address data security is customized cyber risk insurance. Recent case law supports standing for class action litigants alleging future injuries, which may not be covered by some policy forms. We urge providers to review their cyber risk coverage with the increasing risks and this new case law in mind.

Specifically, it is critical that cyber risk insurance is designed to both: adequately mitigate future harm to those whose private information is compromised as a result of a data breach; and satisfy the full array of damages sought by such third parties, including damages for future injuries resulting from the anticipated improper use of data. These considerations are increasingly important because the policies available in today’s market are not standardized. While many absorb some of the costs associated with notification and fraud monitoring, existing forms may not protect against damages sought for susceptibility to identity theft.

Continue reading “Are you covered? Emerging issues for health care providers under cyber risk insurance” »

“Mining in space will take a leap from the realms of science fiction towards commercial reality on Wednesday when Luxembourg launches an official initiative to promote the mining of asteroids for minerals.”

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The game of Go has long been viewed as the most challenging of classic games for artificial intelligence due to its enormous search space and the difficulty of evaluating board positions and moves.

Google DeepMind introduced a new approach to computer Go with their program, AlphaGo, that uses value networks to evaluate board positions and policy networks to select moves. These deep neural networks are trained by a novel combination of supervised learning from human expert games, and reinforcement learning from games of self-play. Without any lookahead search, the neural networks play Go at the level of state-of-the-art Monte-Carlo tree search programs that simulate thousands of random games of self-play. DeepMind also introduce a new search algorithm that combines Monte-Carlo simulation with value and policy networks. Using this search algorithm, our program AlphaGo achieved a 99.8% winning rate against other Go programs, and defeated the European Go champion by 5 games to 0. This is the first time that a computer program has defeated a human professional player in the full-sized game of Go, a feat previously thought to be at least a decade away.

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“I was fortunate enough to meet Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently. Seeing a young, exciting Prime Minister and his colleagues in action was a breath of fresh air. At Davos, where too many people focus on the negatives, he was optimistic on topics ranging from drug policy to climate change to diversity.”

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MPs in the British Parliament are being asked to consider the question of introducing a universal basic income paid unconditionally to all citizens.

An Early Day Motion on the policy, tabled by Green Party MP Caroline Lucas, calls on the Government to commission research into the idea’s effects and examine its feasibility to replace the UK’s existing social security system.

The motion, which raises the profile of the idea but is very unlikely to be adopted into law, says the policy “has the potential to offer genuine social security to all while boosting entrepreneurialism”.

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Friends,

When Singularity Hypotheses was published, the technological singularity was (barely) a fringe academic topic. Three years later, and the singularity is in the headlines of every magazine and tabloid.

Yet the subject became even more controversial, with some very polarizing views confusing the public.

Continue reading “The Singularity Controversy, Part I: Lessons Learned and Open Questions: Conclusions from the Battle on the Legitimacy of the Debate” »

Are you a current or aspiring researcher working in the #aging field? Then you may be interested in the 23rd annual RAND Summer Institute in Santa Monica. This July, institute participants will attend a series of master lectures that offer insights into the science of aging, and the relationships between the aging field and health, economic status, and public policy. Register by March 15.

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