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dateMore Than a Year Ago
subjectPerformance And Reliability
authorScientific American
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Grading the Presidential Candidates on Science
From ACM Opinion

Grading the Presidential Candidates on Science

Two weeks ago, Scientific American asked for your help in grading the presidential candidates on their answers to 20 questions about various aspects of scientific...

Mind-Controlled Robo-Skeleton Enables Paraplegics to Regain Some Motion
From ACM Opinion

Mind-Controlled Robo-Skeleton Enables Paraplegics to Regain Some Motion

Patients paralyzed by a spinal cord injury can face a grim and grueling recovery process—one in which regaining function is far from a sure thing. But a new study...

Americans Are Wary About Body-Enhancement Technologies
From ACM Opinion

Americans Are Wary About Body-Enhancement Technologies

Emerging technologies that draw from biomedical technology, nanotechnology, information technology and other fields are developing at a rapid pace and may lead...

Rise of the Ag-Bots Will Not Sow Seeds of ­nemployment
From ACM Opinion

Rise of the Ag-Bots Will Not Sow Seeds of ­nemployment

Larry Stap's fifth-generation family dairy farm has come a long way since his great grandfather established it in Lynden, Wash., in 1910.

How the Computer Beat the Go Player
From ACM Opinion

How the Computer Beat the Go Player

The victory in March of the computer program AlphaGo over one of the world's top handful of go players marks the highest accomplishment to date for the burgeoning...

Machines that Talk to ­S May Soon Sense Our Feelings, Too
From ACM Opinion

Machines that Talk to ­S May Soon Sense Our Feelings, Too

After great promise in the 1960s that machines would soon think like humans, progress stalled for decades. Only in the past 10 years or so has research picked up...

Can Starshot Work?
From ACM Opinion

Can Starshot Work?

A couple of weeks ago the world heard about the most seriously funded (and perhaps the most serious) effort yet for starting us on the pathway to interstellar travel...

Who's Responsible When a Self-Driving Car Crashes?
From ACM Opinion

Who's Responsible When a Self-Driving Car Crashes?

Valentine's Day was a bummer in Mountain View, Calif. For the first time, one of Google's self-driving cars, a modified Lexus SUV, caused a crash.

The Internet Archive, Bricks and Mortar Version
From ACM Opinion

The Internet Archive, Bricks and Mortar Version

A heavily rusted cast iron ring sits on a bookshelf inside a neoclassical church a few blocks north of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. The ring is about an inch...

Why We Love the Games That Enrage ­S Most
From ACM Opinion

Why We Love the Games That Enrage ­S Most

One afternoon last fall a Reddit user with the handle "FranktheShank1" was enjoying a new video game on his PlayStation 4.

When Will We Be Able to Vote Online?
From ACM Opinion

When Will We Be Able to Vote Online?

Sooner or later everything seems to go online. Newspapers. TV. Radio. Shopping. Banking. Dating.

Psa: Do Not ­se the New Prime Number For Rsa Encryption
From ACM Opinion

Psa: Do Not ­se the New Prime Number For Rsa Encryption

You may have heard that there’s a new largest prime number in town.

Oh the Places We Won't Go: Humans Will Settle Mars, and Nowhere Else
From ACM Opinion

Oh the Places We Won't Go: Humans Will Settle Mars, and Nowhere Else

Humans will become a multi-planet species by making it to Mars, but no farther.

Searching For Life in Martian Water Will Be Very, Very Tricky
From ACM Opinion

Searching For Life in Martian Water Will Be Very, Very Tricky

NASA scientists announced today the best evidence yet that Mars, once thought dry, sterile and dead, may yet have life in it: Liquid water still flows on at least...

Do We Need to Prepare For the Robot ­prising?
From ACM Opinion

Do We Need to Prepare For the Robot ­prising?

For most of my life, I've been disappointed in robots.

­sing Technology to Break the Speed Barrier of Reading
From ACM Opinion

­sing Technology to Break the Speed Barrier of Reading

I grew up in a tiny New York City apartment, packed in alongside our four cats and my father's immense personal library of some 3000 books.

Move Over, Siri—the Next Generation of Virtual Assistants Is Almost Here
From ACM Opinion

Move Over, Siri—the Next Generation of Virtual Assistants Is Almost Here

Virtual voice-controlled assistants such as Siri, Cortana and Google Now are magical.

Why Is Blue Light Before Bedtime Bad For Sleep?
From ACM Opinion

Why Is Blue Light Before Bedtime Bad For Sleep?

In the modern age of technology it is not uncommon to come home after a long day at work or school and blow off steam by reading an e-book or watching television...

Will Artificial Intelligence Surpass Our Own?
From ACM Opinion

Will Artificial Intelligence Surpass Our Own?

Famed science-fiction writer Fredric Brown (1906–1972) delighted in creating the shortest of short stories. "Answer," published in 1954, encapsulated a prescient...

Will Millimeter Waves Maximize 5g Wireless?
From ACM Opinion

Will Millimeter Waves Maximize 5g Wireless?

Every decade or so since the first cellular networks appeared the companies that make mobile devices and the networks linking them have worked out new requirements...
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