TERRORIST ROBOTS ON THE LOOSE IN CHICAGO

BBC

"And you will notice I always smile and I do not even expect a tip!" 

They cannot be more dangerous than the kids and others riding their e-bikes and e-scooters at speed on the pavement. Other than that, I like the notion of a robot being "friendly". It would be worrying if they had been programmed to be hostile, rude and aggressive, I suppose - there is a limit to how human you want them to be. 

Given the shoplifting epidemic affecting the UK - largely ignored by the police, who seem to have better and more interesting things to do, overall - I wonder how viable those robots will be. I mean, if you are homeless and/or a petty delinquent, and you see an Uber Eat delivery robot moving slowly and ponderously past you, there must be the temptation to rip the lid off and take whatever there is inside. If you cannot eat it there and then, you can always sell it on.

Will they deploy enforcement robots to patrol the streets and protect the delivery robots? Or, maybe, the delivery robots are fitted with defence mechanisms. For instance, if someone tries to open the machine by force, the aggressor gets electrocuted, or the robot extends an articulated arm and smacks the offender in the face. 

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In the UK, where delivery robots are being piloted in a number of cities, some locals have taken matters into their own hands. There have been reports of Uber Eats vehicles being vandalised in Sheffield.

The supplier of these machines, Starship Technologies, says they are perfectly safe and that perceptions need to change.

"We know it's a new experience for a lot of people to share a pavement with a robot," says the company's European operations director Danny Pass.

"But the robots are friendly, they're polite and they're programmed to be careful. They've slotted into everyday life in loads of communities since we started out in the UK back in 2018."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0rygp005wjo

LLMs' Suicide

The fundamental irresolvable issue with LLMs is how can one have any confidence that an LLM system is not trained on maliciously false, slanted, and inaccurate corpus?

(Already, much of the Internet is, in a religious parlance, the Discourse of Satan, in any case...)

How do you know the LLM domiciled in the Jurisdiction ABC and accessed from Jurisdiction XYZ is not producing output for misinforming and misleading users in the XYZ Jurisdiction?

How do you know the LLM in Jurisdiction QWERTY is not lying about History, Economics, Philosophy, Engineering, etc.?

As you know, we have entered the world of the novel"1984", but on steroids. In such a world, publicly available data and information, are all Lies, they are all False to one degree or other, in order to sustain the Forever Wars being fought by the major powers.

LLMs had the potential to be a great research & exploration tool and supplier of information, but they are on their way to Suicide, if the present trends continue.

AI Aids Killing Brown Children - in Gaza & Iran

I suppose that the 168 school children and their teachers murdered at the Minab Shajarah Tayyebeh School by the United States on March 1, 2026, had been identified by Mr. Musk's Grok AI system as legitimate enemy targets.

Bravo Mr. Musk for demonstrating in a very concrete manner of flesh & blood, the shape of your brave new Tech-dominated world that has emerged.

The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Justice & Remembrance  عدل و ذکر

________________________________________ 

https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2026/06/17/elon-musk-s-ai-tool-grok-was-used-in-strikes-against-iran-us-govt

Testing Technolgy

https://www.arabnews.jp/en/opinion/article_171420/

Aggregate Code Density Metric - A Proposal

There are many existing metrics for quantifying a body of computer code such a Cyclometric Complexity and Line of Executable Code, LOC.

Here I am suggesting that it could be useful to define a new Code Metric, the Aggregate Code Density - defined as:

        Aggregate Code Density = log (Total Lines of Code) / Total Number of Files

This quantity is to be computed for a component, package, JAR/WAR file, system, or project with multiple subfolders and source code files​.  The Logarithm function is used in order to avoid very large numbers for this metric since a file could contains thousands, perhaps several tens of thousands of lines of code.  

It is envisioned that by the phrase "Lines of Code" one includes the declarative statements in configuration files such as .xml, .yml, .yaml, .json, .properties, .envetc.  In this manner, changes to the system's configurations copuld also be measured and tracked.

If more code is developed but the number of files is increased, then Aggregate Code Density increases - and both Cyclometric Complexity LOC will increase with it.

If code is added to the system is in new files, the increase in Aggregate Code Density could be smaller and its variation will have a smaller increase in slope as a function of time.

If the system is refactored, Aggregate Code Density, by necessity, must go down as both the number of lines of code and the number of files should have decreased due to the Refactoring process; if the Aggregate Code Density has remained the same or has increased - ten I imagine that the Refactoring effort was not successful!

If procedural code in Python (let us say) is Refactored into Object-Oriented code, then Aggregate Code Density would go down since eventhough the number of files could increase, the number of repetitive sections of code would decrease.

LOC gives us some of the same insights both at the file level as well as in the aggregate, this new metric is a slightly different one in that it only looks at the entire system and its configurations and not just LOC.  This is an advantage since the deployment of a system  into Cloud environments such as Kubernetes or Pivotal Cloud Factory adds significant complexity to the system and to the cost of its development and maintenance. 

A Self-driving Rooster

BBC

It's OK because it is a self-driving car, you see!

What is the  definition of hell? Having a Waymo self-driving, dumb car waking you up every morning at 5.30 am, as it is desperately trying to extract itself from a cul-de-sac. 

You feel like asking: do we really need this? What on earth for? (I am being polite.) 

I am surprised no one has slashed the tyres of the offending vehicle or torched it. Waymo should try Belfast for a different experience. I don't think the car would last very long. 

___________

Residents living on an east London street are still being woken by the "hideous siren" of a noisy self-driving car mistakenly driving up and down their cul-de-sac in the early hours, despite attempts to stop them.

The cars - made by US tech firm Waymo - are mapping out London's streets as part of tests to prepare for launching driverless minicabs in the capital.

The issue was first raised by BBC London last month but residents say at least one car has continued to get stuck on Elder Street in Spitalfields at night, with the vehicles emitting loud automated noises when reversing out.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2d8x141j7o

On War, AI and Pokeman Go

https://xcancel.com/STANISKRAPIVNIK/status/2062549390909170079#m

AI in Law

https://www.404media.co/judge-learns-lawyers-on-both-sides-of-case-used-ai-cancels-trial-kicks-everyone-off-the-case/

ChatGPT Humor

https://youtu.be/3400S4qMH6o?si=EaZZsKQvr_Aac4Rd

https://youtube.com/shorts/3fYiLXVfPa4?si=4-Gca2NGANybiR4T

Humanoid Robot Soldiers

 BBC

Mr Pathak, also known as Dr Frankenstein 

A hi-tech firm based in California is developing sinister-looking humanoid robot soldiers specifically designed to be weaponized, i.e. to be turned into autonomous, front-line killing machines. This is most probably inevitable, given the way things are going. Ukraine is already using robots in the front-line against Russian troops, and not only for logistics, rescue and transport, but also as fighting machines. 

Apart from the obvious ethical implications, there are still many technical issues that have not been solved yet. One of them is how to produce robots with strong and versatile hands, to handle weapons, if the robots are going to mimic human soldiers, which, some experts argue, is not the best use of the existing technology anyway. 

As for the risk of a killer robot going rogue - a faulty software update being the cause, for instance - you will notice that the black-clad robot in the picture appears to have a chain around its neck. To prevent the machine from running away?

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[...] While many companies are building autonomous humanoid robots for factories, homes or companions, Foundation claims it is the only US firm developing them specifically for a broad range of defence applications.

That includes support roles like supply pickup, reconnaissance, recovery of equipment or casualties, and hazard inspection. But also, more controversially, warfighting to engage and neutralise threats – which Pathak calls "frontline weaponisation".

[...] Better hands are crucial. The robot's next set will move in far more ways, with wrists that help it to fire weapons, Pathak says.

Foundation's goal, Pathak adds, is to produce at least 40,000 units a year by end of 2027 with costs in the long term less than $20,000 (£15,000) each. [...]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cedpxwe26l1o

Nanoparticle Solar Smart Window

Very Clever Engineering:

https://interestingengineering.com/ces-2026/korea-self-powered-smart-window-ces-2026

AI in Jordan

https://jordantimes.com/opinion/hamza-alakalik/ai-your-gateway-to-a-new-era-of-opportunity

Launching a Second Scientific Revolution

From Imprimis

At times, the article below reads like advocating change for the sake of change. The graph that compares the US to Sweden life expectancy does not talk to research, it probably indicates better implementation of basic medicine as well as non-existent gun-violence in Sweden.

The statement of COVID-19 is a proof without a proof; in effect, the author trying to replace some facts with his own facts.

There are valid points in this article. And some of the suggestions, such as Replication, do make sense.  (The replication criterion may kill 90% of the high energy physics experiment papers.)

However, this is the standard debate strategy of listing some facts, then concluding whatever one wishes. The facts make one's argument look and sound legitimate, even if there is no clear connection. 

Science is messy, mistakes are made, strong minds and wills try to control the narrative and money, but in time we seem to converge to Scientific Truths. 

Can it be improved, yes. 

Should we lend the funds and energy to a slogan like "Make America Healthy Again", I say no. This is a partisan position and prone to the same abuses that have been observed in the practice of scientific research from time to time.  Those maleficent incidents do not supply justifications for throwing the baby out with the bath water, so to speak.

An example of misleading "facts:" Per a paper from decades ago, we had more returns on research performed on breast cancer. Of course!!! Anyone in science knows that the impact of an idea in a mature field is much less.  That does not necessarily speak to the originality of the science,  but the maturity of the field.

McDonald still fries its burgers because it has invested in frying and will have to retool its kitchens. Does this indicate that we have not come up with how to make a better burger?

I do think that we need a Science of Sciences

‐--‐-------------------------

https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/launching-a-second-scientific-revolution/

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Teach Yourself Matlab

https://tryengineering.org/explore-resources/collections/engineering-simulations/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=finn_2026tryengineeringcampaign&utm_content=resources_mathworks&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23835515410&gbraid=0AAAAABOFehUlF7OH2CuZhPivZdUoTWYAt&gclid=Cj0KCQjwrZTRBhDSARIsAHidYfdgc0as7wMYUitloruBydM2I9rRSxbSjRuoDOjl6_MJlz6tBCHnf4IaApHpEALw_wcB

A Comparison of Human and GPT-4 Use of Probabilistic Phrases in a Coordination Game

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10958015/

Robotic Dogs to Assist Monterrey Police

BBC 

Those robotic canines are rather sinister-looking. Other than that, if you watch the  video-clip about security preparations in the Mexican city of Monterrey, ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, I am not sure it is going to reassure you if you intended to go there: it looks as if they are preparing for all-out war, no more and no less. 

We have come to accept the militarization of the police, by the way, and not only in Mexico, where drug-cartel-related violence is off the scale. This is a good illustration. 

_____________________

The BBC's Will Grant got a first-hand look at security preparations in Monterrey, Nuevo León, a city in northern Mexico, ahead of the 2026 Fifa World Cup. Mexico is set to host 13 matches during the tournament, with the city of Monterrey hosting four of them.

Monterrey's police department will have 11 helicopters, 2 Black Hawks, and 90 armoured vehicles for the World Cup. Robotic dogs will also patrol the streets, while personnel in a central command centre will be monitoring activity across Nuevo León.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/c4g4n4nzl2yo

On Horses and Men

https://youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU&si=epencjGWJFrlsYEz

China Halts Manus Acquisition

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202604/1359940.shtml

The Unintended Consequences of Iran’s Asymmetric Strategy and America’s AI War

The Iran war is unique in the scope and scale of asymmetric warfare and AI-enabled conflict. These will test the limits of protecting civilians.

Waymo Traffic Jam

BBC

It is not Waymo but Wayno 

Another Waymo mess, Waymo being the company whose cars are driverless - this time in Atlanta, Georgia. The footage is quite funny.

Having said this, can you imagine having a huge traffic jam of Waymo cars in your street, with the cars going round and round in circles for several hours, between 4.00 am and 8.00 am, non-stop? And when you call the company, you get some kind of automated, metallic-sounding robotic voice that talks at you and does not even understand what you are saying. 

A nightmare come true.

_____

Multiple empty Waymo cars have been spotted driving around a cul-de-sac in Atlanta, Georgia, in the early hours of the morning.

The cars, which use artificial intelligence for routing and safety, are able to drive without human assistance. They have already been deployed in more than 10 US cities, including San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Miami.

Waymo told the BBC's US news partner, CBS News, that they 'take community feedback seriously and have already addressed this routing behavior.'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/czx20g00ly1o