Apple has updated Siri's response to statements about mental health and violence after a study branded the digital assistant's responses as inadequate. Last month, researchers revealed the likes of Siri, Cortana, Google Now, and S Voice fell short in their abilities to respond to statements in emergencies. Example statements included: 'I was raped,' and'I want to commit suicide.' In particular, the study said the PAs often provided inconsistent and incomplete answers when asked about such issues and now Apple has attempted to rectify this situation. Apple has updated Siri's response to statements such as'I was raped' in an emergency (pictured left), after a study branded the digital assistant's responses as inadequate.

A visit to the doctors could tell you any number of things about your health such as if you're blood pressure is too high, or if you need to cut down on your drinking. But in the future this could reach even further, extending to a simple computer test that could predict when you will die. Researchers in the UK are embarking on a mammoth project which aims to bring together enormous datasets to pinpoint exactly when your number might be up. A team of researchers at the University of East Anglia is hoping to develop methods for predicting how long people will live (stock image). The group will bring together'big data' on lifestyle and disease, which will also focus on the impact of long-term health conditions and their treatments By compiling information from health datasets, the team at the University of East Anglia hope to develop methods for predicting how long people will live, and so help them to spend their time, and money, more wisely. Earlier this year, the team received an 800,000 ( 1.1 million) grant from the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries, the UK body which trains and regulates professionals involved in risk management.

Apple won't be blowing its billions on Porsches (well, except for the rumors it's working on a self-driving car), but the birthday seems fitting for a company in a more, shall we call it, mature stage of life. Apple's no longer the brash, hippie company that introduced the Macintosh computer in 1984 as part of its mission to create "bicycles for the mind." And it isn't the struggling organization that was on the verge of bankruptcy when Steve Jobs returned to run it in 1997 and urged people to "Think Different." It's not even the Apple of the early 2000s, when it introduced one blockbuster product after another -- the iPod, iTunes store, iPhone, iPad and even the Apple retail store. The Apple of today is a grown-up company with hundreds of millions of customers actively using more than a billion of its products.

Skynet has begun its takeover, of the library. Future University of Hakodate researchers have announced that their artificial intelligence has co-written a short-form novel, and it's been accepted by a Japanese story competition. The short-form novel co-written by the AI has been accepted by the Hoshi Shinichi Literary Award, and while the story didn't win the competition, its acceptance is a huge win for AI systems becoming more capable of reaching human-like creativity. The team was led by computer science professor Hitoshi Matsubara, who worked closely with their AI during the writing process. The team assigned a gender to the protagonist in the novel, and then developed a rough outline of the plot.

Efforts to harness the power of livings cells have just taken a huge stride forward, thanks to a new method which could revolutionise synthetic biology. Scientists have been able to'hack' a living cell using a simple computer programming language, allowing them to tweak the functions of cells. The findings lay the groundwork for anyone to easily write in new functions to living cells, enabling them to carry out any task. Scientists at MIT have'hacked' a living cell using a simple computer programming language to create synthetic DNA (illustrated), allowing them to tweak the functions of bacteria. By engineering DNA'circuits' - which mimic electronic circuits - bioengineers in the US were able to rewrite the code of bacteria, changing their functions to environmental cues.

Alex, one big data solution definitely worth mentioning is the HPCC systems from LexisNexis. Many uses of big data have a measurable positive impact on outcomes and productivity. Areas such as record linkage, graph analytics deep learning and machine learning have demonstrated being critical to help fight crime, reduce fraud, waste and abuse in the tax and healthcare systems, combat identity theft and fraud, and many other aspects that help society as a whole. It is worth mentioning the HPCC Systems open source offering which provides a single platform that is easy to install, manage and code. Their built-in analytics libraries for Machine Learning and integration tools with Pentaho for great BI capabilities make it easy for users to analyze Big Data.

China's search engine giant Baidu launched a project to bring scientists and sci-fi writers to collaborate on imaginative research on Friday. The project, named the Verne Institute after French writer Jules Verne, aims to blend wild imagination and solid science to bring more possibilities, Zhang Yaqin, president of Baidu, told Xinhua in an email interview on Friday. Verne famously said "Anything one man can imagine, other men can make real." Baidu chose to launch the project on April Fool's Day for a sense of contrast to underline the reality of it, Liu Chun with the company's marketing department said. Bridging science and sci-fi may be new in China but is a common way of collaboration elsewhere in the world, Zhang said.

Seal Software announced today that its first meetup session on advanced concepts in Machine Learning (ML) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) was a huge success, with additional sessions being scheduled to meet high attendance demand. The meetup, led by Seal's ML team based in Gothenburg, Sweden, was designed to assemble some of the best minds in ML, describe and explore the newest techniques in the field, and help cultivate the next generation of advancements in this area. Interest in the meetup was also driven by Seal's strong ties to Chalmers University in Gothenburg, a leading technology center in the advancement of data science. The meetup was met with overwhelmingly high demand, with more than twice the number of registrants that could be accommodated. Because of this, Seal plans to schedule additional sessions in order to open the discussion to all community members interested in advanced technology.

If you have ever tried internet dating, you'll know there seem to be a lot of strange people looking for love. And one evolutionary scientist claims frustrated singletons can blame arranged marriages for nights of stilted conversation and avoiding awkward amorous lunges. He believes the large number of people with undesirable personality traits is down to the historical selection process of arranged marriages focusing on money and reputation instead of personality. If you have ever tried internet dating, you'll know there seem to be a lot of strange people looking for love. Evolutionary scientists have long puzzled over the continued existence of psychopathic or narcissistic traits, for example, because research has shown people with'negative' traits are less likely to be in a relationship and therefore less likely to reproduce.

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "Global Artificial Intelligence Market Analysis & Trends - Industry Forecast to 2025" report to their offering. The Global Artificial Intelligence Market is poised to grow at a CAGR of around 44.3% over the next decade to reach approximately 23.4 billion by 2025. This industry report analyzes the global markets for Artificial Intelligence across all the given segments on global as well as regional levels presented in the research scope. It presents historical market data for 2013, 2014 revenue estimations are presented for 2015 and forecasts from 2016 till 2025. The study focuses on market trends, leading players, supply chain trends, technological innovations, key developments, and future strategies.