Accompanying technology development in the Human Brain Project:From foresight to ethics management

This paper addresses the question of managing the existential risk potential of general Artificial Intelligence (AI), as well as the more near-term yet hazardous and disruptive implications of specialised AI, from the perspective of a particular research project that could make a significant contribution to the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI): the Human Brain Project (HBP), a ten-year Future and Emerging Technologies Flagship of the European Commission. The HBP aims to create an ICT-based scientific research infrastructure for brain research, cognitive neuroscience, and brain-inspired computing. This paper builds on work undertaken in the HBP’s Ethics and Society subproject (SP12). Collaborators from two activities in SP12, Foresight and Researcher Awareness on the one hand, and Ethics Management on the other, use the case of machine intelligence to illustrate key aspects of the dynamic processes through which questions of ethics and society, including existential risks, are approached in the organisational context of the HBP. The overall aim of the paper is to provide practice-based evidence, enriched by self-reflexive assessment of the approach used and its limitations, for guiding policy makers and communities who are, and will be, engaging with such questions

Effects of Impact and Target Parameters on the Results of a Kinetic Impactor: Predictions for the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) Mission

The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft will impact into the asteroid Dimorphos on 2022 September 26 as a test of the kinetic impactor technique for planetary defense. The efficiency of the deflection following a kinetic impactor can be represented using the momentum enhancement factor, β, which is dependent on factors such as impact geometry and the specific target material properties. Currently, very little is known about Dimorphos and its material properties, which introduces uncertainty in the results of the deflection efficiency observables, including crater formation, ejecta distribution, and β. The DART Impact Modeling Working Group (IWG) is responsible for using impact simulations to better understand the results of the DART impact. Pre-impact simulation studies also provide considerable insight into how different properties and impact scenarios affect momentum enhancement following a kinetic impact. This insight provides a basis for predicting the effects of the DART impact and the first understanding of how to interpret results following the encounter. Following the DART impact, the knowledge gained from these studies will inform the initial simulations that will recreate the impact conditions, including providing estimates for potential material properties of Dimorphos and β resulting from DART’s impact. This paper summarizes, at a high level, what has been learned from the IWG simulations and experiments in preparation for the DART impact. While unknown, estimates for reasonable potential material properties of Dimorphos provide predictions for β of 1–5, depending on end-member cases in the strength regime

Averting biodiversity collapse in tropical forest protected areas

The rapid disruption of tropical forests probably imperils global biodiversity more than any other contemporary phenomenon¹⁻³. With deforestation advancing quickly, protected areas are increasingly becoming final refuges for threatened species and natural ecosystem processes. However, many protected areas in the tropics are themselves vulnerable to human encroachment and other environmental stresses⁴⁻⁹. As pressures mount, it is vital to know whether existing reserves can sustain their biodiversity. A critical constraint in addressing this question has been that data describing a broad array of biodiversity groups have been unavailable for a sufficiently large and representative sample of reserves. Here we present a uniquely comprehensive data set on changes over the past 20 to 30 years in 31 functional groups of species and 21 potential drivers of environmental change, for 60 protected areas stratified across the world’s major tropical regions. Our analysis reveals great variation in reserve ‘health’: about half of all reserves have been effective or performed passably, but the rest are experiencing an erosion of biodiversity that is often alarmingly widespread taxonomically and functionally. Habitat disruption, hunting and forest-product exploitation were the strongest predictors of declining reserve health. Crucially, environmental changes immediately outside reserves seemed nearly as important as those inside in determining their ecological fate, with changes inside reserves strongly mirroring those occurring around them. These findings suggest that tropical protected areas are often intimately linked ecologically to their surrounding habitats, and that a failure to stem broad-scale loss and degradation of such habitats could sharply increase the likelihood of serious biodiversity declines.Keywords: Ecology, Environmental scienc

The Thermal Conductivity of the Earth's Lower Mantle and Implications for Heat Flow at the Core-Mantle Boundary

The thermal conductivity of the Earth's lowermost mantle controls the rate of heat flow across the core-mantle boundary, and is thus a critical parameter for determining the core and mantle thermal state and evolution. This parameter and its dependence on pressure, temperature, and composition are poorly known, in part due to the inherent difficulties in determining thermal conductivities at the high pressures and temperatures (135 GPa and 3800 K) that occur at the base of the mantle. In this dissertation I estimate the thermal conductivity of the lower mantle using measurements of the thermal conductivity of MgO and (Mg,Fe)SiO3 perovskite made at high pressure and high temperature in the laser-heated diamond anvil cell. Using three-dimensional heat flow modeling, I demonstrate that the steady-state temperature distributions that form during laser heating experiments in the diamond anvil cell depend on the sample thermal conductivity as well as the experimental geometry. Relative thermal conductivity can be determined by comparing measured temperature vs. laser power curves with a numerical model. I use this technique to determine the pressure-dependence of thermal conductivity of MgO and (Mg,Fe)SiO3 perovskite, and then I extrapolate absolute measurements of thermal conductivity taken near ambient pressure to lower mantle conditions. I also estimate the contribution of radiation to heat transfer in the lower mantle. My resulting value for the thermal conductivity of the lowermost mantle is approximately 6 W/m*K, lower than the commonly assumed value of 10 W/m*K. When combined with estimates for the lower mantle boundary layer temperature gradient, the total core-mantle boundary heat flow is roughly 7 TW. This heat flow implies a slow growth rate for the Earth's inner core

The Role of Ethics in the Data Governance of Large Neuro-ICT Projects

The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version.Objective We describe current practices of ethics-related data governance in large neuro-ICT projects, identify gaps in current practice, and put forward recommendations on how to collaborate ethically in complex regulatory and normative contexts. Materials and Methods We undertake a survey of published principles of data governance of large neuro-ICT projects. This grounds an approach to a normative analysis of current data governance approaches. Results Several ethical issues are well covered in the data governance policies of neuro-ICT projects, notably data protection and attribution of work. Projects use a set of similar policies to ensure users behave appropriately. However, many ethical issues are not covered at all. Implementation and enforcement of policies remain vague. Conclusion The data governance policies we investigated indicate that the neuro-ICT research community is currently close-knit and that shared assumptions are reflected in infrastructural aspects. This explains why many ethical issues are not explicitly included in data governance policies at present. With neuro-ICT research growing in scale, scope, and international involvement, these shared assumptions should be made explicit and reflected in data governance

Fluid Homes: Navigating Gender, Sexuality, and Housing Insecurity Discourses on Social Media

Abstract As part of the Sexuality Summer Research Fellowship organized and facilitated by the California Institute for Integral Studies, this dataset focuses on 2SLGBTQI+ experiences and perceptions of housing insecurity and homelessness. Housing and rental affordability pressures, particularly for low-income earners, have become a pressing issue worldwide, especially as inflation has escalated over the past three years (Barrett, 2022). Much of this can be attributed to the build-up and fallout of the global financial crisis of 2008, where the culmination of stagnant growth in real wages and a sustained reduction in access to social security and welfare provisions has pushed many households into poverty and caused rising homelessness (Delclós & Vidal 2021; Broadbent, et al., 2023). The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated much of these pre-existing pressures, as measures to curb the spread of the virus such as lockdowns, revealed the absence of safe and secure housing, especially for vulnerable groups such as the 2SLGBTQI+ community (Salerno, et al., 2020; Lederer et al., 2021). According to Cox et al. (2017), housing insecurity exists on a continuum of multidimensional housing-related issues, including stability, affordability, quality, safety, neighborhood safety, and neighborhood quality. Homelessness also exists on the continuum as the most extreme form of housing insecurity, which consists of the lack of a fixed, regular, and nighttime residence (Broton & Goldrick-Rab, 2018; Cox et al., 2017). Queer-and-trans youth are disproportionately overrepresented in such experiences as 28% of 2SLGBTQI+ youth reported experiencing homelessness or housing instability at some point in their lives in the United States while 24% of youth experiencing homelessness in the UK identify as 2SLGBTQI+ (Bhandal & Horwood, 2021; DeChants, et al. 2021). Family rejection when “coming out” or being “outed” is a leading factor in causing 2SLGBTQI+ homelessness, leading to many queer-and-trans folx to rely on informal support networks for temporary shelter such as couch surfing (Abramovich, 2012; Petry, et al. 2021). Those who do end up on the streets can be exposed to dangerous and harmful situations such as substance misuse and violence. Furthermore, living on the streets can have a longer-term impact on the emotional, physical, and psychological well-being of queer-and-trans folx, especially for youth (Abramovich, 2012). As shelter services predominantly operate on a cisheteronormative basis, it means that systemic and cultural barriers prevent queer-and-trans folx from accessing safe and supportive services that cater to their specific needs (Abramovich, 2017; Fraser, et al. 2019)

The Relative Effects of Surface and Subsurface Morphology on the Deflection Efficiency of Kinetic Impactors: Implications for the DART Mission

The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission impacted Dimorphos, the moonlet of the binary asteroid 65803 Didymos, on 2022 September 26 and successfully tested a kinetic impactor as an asteroid deflection technique. The success of the deflection was partly due to the momentum of the excavated ejecta material, which provided an extra push to change Dimorphos’s orbital period. Preimpact images provided constraints on the surface but not the subsurface morphology of Dimorphos. DART observations indicated that Dimorphos contained a boulder-strewn surface, with an impact site located between a cluster of large surface boulders. In order to better understand the momentum enhancement factor ( β ) resulting from the impact, we performed impact simulations into two types of targets: idealized homogeneous targets with a single boulder of varying size and buried depth at the impact site and an assembly of boulders at the impact site with subsurface layers. We investigated the relative effects of surface morphology to subsurface morphology to put constraints on the modeling phase space for DART following impact. We found that surface features created a 30%–96% armoring effect on β , with large surface boulders measuring on the order of the spacecraft bus creating the largest effect. Subsurface effects were more subtle (3%–23%) and resulted in an antiarmoring effect on β , even when layers/boulders were close to the surface. We also compared our 2D axisymmetric models to a 3D rectilinear model to understand the effects of grid geometry and dimension on deflection efficiency computational results

AIDA DART asteroid deflection test: Planetary defense and science objectives

International audienc

Monitoring great ape and elephant abundance at large spatial scales: measuring effectiveness of a conservation landscape.

Protected areas are fundamental to biodiversity conservation, but there is growing recognition of the need to extend beyond protected areas to meet the ecological requirements of species at larger scales. Landscape-scale conservation requires an evaluation of management impact on biodiversity under different land-use strategies; this is challenging and there exist few empirical studies. In a conservation landscape in northern Republic of Congo we demonstrate the application of a large-scale monitoring program designed to evaluate the impact of conservation interventions on three globally threatened species: western gorillas, chimpanzees and forest elephants, under three land-use types: integral protection, commercial logging, and community-based natural resource management. We applied distance-sampling methods to examine species abundance across different land-use types under varying degrees of management and human disturbance. We found no clear trends in abundance between land-use types. However, units with interventions designed to reduce poaching and protect habitats--irrespective of land-use type--harboured all three species at consistently higher abundance than a neighbouring logging concession undergoing no wildlife management. We applied Generalized-Additive Models to evaluate a priori predictions of species response to different landscape processes. Our results indicate that, given adequate protection from poaching, elephants and gorillas can profit from herbaceous vegetation in recently logged forests and maintain access to ecologically important resources located outside of protected areas. However, proximity to the single integrally protected area in the landscape maintained an overriding positive influence on elephant abundance, and logging roads--even subject to anti-poaching controls--were exploited by elephant poachers and had a major negative influence on elephant distribution. Chimpanzees show a clear preference for unlogged or more mature forests and human disturbance had a negative influence on chimpanzee abundance, in spite of anti-poaching interventions. We caution against the pitfalls of missing and confounded co-variables in model-based estimation approaches and highlight the importance of spatial scale in the response of different species to landscape processes. We stress the importance of a stratified design-based approach to monitoring species status in response to conservation interventions and advocate a holistic framework for landscape-scale monitoring that includes smaller-scale targeted research and punctual assessment of threats