The skies over the United States were a little more crowded than usual following a test by the Department of Defense that sent more than 100 drones scattering across the sky, according to a report from the BBC. A total of 103 of the miniature, unmanned flying vehicles were released from a trio of Three F/A-18 Super Hornets, a popular Navy fighter aircraft. Called Perdix drones, the flyers have a wingspan of just 12 inches and move entirely autonomously--no human control required. Footage of the devices in action from October 2016, taken from Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, was recently released by the Department of Defense. In it, the drones can be seen being released into the sky and swarming together, making use of the collective brain that controls them.

The MIT Media Lab and the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University will serve as the founding anchor institutions for a new initiative aimed at bridging the gap between the humanities, the social sciences, and computing by addressing the global challenges of artificial intelligence (AI) from a multidisciplinary perspective. "Artificial intelligence agents will impact every part of our lives in every society on Earth. Technology and commerce will see to that," says Alberto Ibargüen, president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which is among those supporting the initiative. Initially funded with $27 million from the Knight Foundation; LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman; the Omidyar Network; the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation; and Jim Pallotta, founder of the Raptor Group, the Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence Fund's mission is to catalyze global research that advances AI for the public interest, with an emphasis on applied research and education. The fund will also seek to advance public understanding of AI. "AI's rapid development brings along a lot of tough challenges," explains Joi Ito, director of the MIT Media Lab.

Our work focused on how, in the coming age where big data and machine learning algorithms enable you to learn and infer stuff about individuals that are profoundly invasive, marketers – and companies in general – will need to openly explore where their ethical boundaries lay. Before we get into it, I have a confession: AI ethics makes my brain hurt. The issues and questions are that big. Never mind corporate behavior; people, governments, policies and global geopolitics will all evolve differently depending on how we answer those questions. My brain is hurting right now. But if you're a marketer planning to use AI, you're going to hurt a lot more than your brain if you don't start examining the ethical questions.

Marvel's Agents of SHIELD returns from its winter break on Jan. 10, and after a fiery batch of fall episodes courtesy of Ghost Rider (Gabriel Luna), the next story arc is taking an altogether more chilling turn. Starting with episode 409, the focus shifts to Life Model Decoys -- lifelike androids that are designed to be indistinguishable from humans, like Aida (Mallory Jansen). Unbeknownst to our heroes, they already have another LMD in their midst, after the midseason finale revealed that Agent May (Ming-Na Wen) had been captured and replaced with an LMD duplicate by Aida. Since we still have no idea why Aida made the switcheroo, the implications are pretty worrying -- but they're even more disconcerting in light of the final moments of episode 408, which saw the LMD version of May sharing an intimate drink with Coulson (Clark Gregg). During a recent Agents of SHIELD set visit, Jansen was cagey about Aida's motivations for kidnapping May, teasing reporters, "I was made a specific way and anything I do is really what I think is right, or what I'm programmed to do." Was she acting under her own burgeoning free will -- if she has it -- or is her creator, Dr. Radcliffe (John Hannah) calling the shots?

Matthew Peterson is a pretty inspirational guy. As a dyslexic child he found math class difficult, so as an adult he resolved to totally change the way math is taught. After completing his studies in biology, electrical engineering, and Chinese language and literature at the University of California, Irvine, Peterson co-founded the nonprofit MIND Research Institute and set about developing "Spatial Temporal (ST) Math," a computer game-based method of teaching that doesn't rely on language as a medium. Instead it uses spatial-temporal reasoning--the ability to move stuff around in your mind and work out how it fits together. Proponents point to recent findings in neuroscience and education research--showing that early music training can enhance spatial-temporal reasoning, for example--as justification for this shift.

As we go into 2017 the incipient'technologisation' or'IT-isation', if you'll excuse the terms, of our lives is gathering pace and becoming much plainer to see. AI and deep learning are worth calling out for particular attention. In research consultancy Gartner's'Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2007' survey,[4] Gartner Vice-President and Fellow David Cearley said "over the next 10 years, virtually every app, application and service will incorporate some level of AI. This will form a long-term trend that will continually evolve and expand the application of AI and machine learning for apps and services." Deep learning, a machine learning technique, is emerging as AI's'killer app' enabler.

The federal government spent millions of taxpayer dollars studying if women can pick Barbie out of a lineup, creating robot flowers, and building a computer that binge watches "Desperate Housewives," according to a new report on wasteful spending. Sen. Jeff Flake, R.-Ariz., on Tuesday released Wastebook: PORKémon Go, the latest chronicle of waste in a series started by former Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, a Republican. The report covers 50 items and more than $5 billion in spending on outrageous government programs and frivolous projects. "Within mere days, the national debt will top $20 trillion, the largest amount ever owed by any nation in history, and the federal government's authority to borrow expires in March," Flake wrote in the introduction to the report. "But rather than making a long overdue resolution to be fiscally responsible, the promises from Washington are to spend even more."

The Pentagon may soon be unleashing a 21st-century version of locusts on its adversaries. This is after it successfully tested a swarm of 103 micro-drones that many are tipping to be its next'super-weapon'. The drones are capable of confusing enemy defences and blocking radar signals. They could be used as a swarm of spy cameras to track down terrorists running to escape. Improvements in artificial intelligence allowed scientists to design the robots that work together as a team.

Director Denis Villeneuve's "Arrival" may be an alien movie, but you won't hear the sounds of warp speed, Martian death rays or beeping robots in it, say supervising sound editor Sylvain Bellemare and re-recording mixer Bernard Gariépy Strobl. "Denis really insisted on having a sound that was not electronic," Bellemare says of the film starring Amy Adams as a linguist trying to communicate with an alien species. "He wanted to do another type of science fiction. So he wanted to use an approach of [making] the sound really organic." Bellemare and Gariépy Strobl knew what they were in for, having worked together on several previous films, including Villeneuve's 2008 short "Next Floor."

By 2035, developers will have learned to automate many jobs. Investments in artificial intelligence (A.I.) and robotics will surge, displacing workers. And a more connected world will increase -- not reduce -- differences, increasing nationalism and populism, according to a new government intelligence assessment prepared just in time for President-elect Donald Trump's administration. The "Global Trends" report, unveiled Monday, is produced every four years by the National Intelligence Council. It is released just before the inauguration of a new or returning president.