News You Can Use

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US Marines could deploy robots and 'HyperSubs' to storm future beaches | Fox News

The U.S. Marines could deploy a host of futuristic military technology to "storm the beaches."

Included in the new technology are machine-gun toting robots that charge up the beaches as advance assault, as well as speedboats that instantly transformed into small stealthy submarines diving beneath the surface to avoid detection.

For the past two weeks, the Navy and Marine Corps have been quietly testing about 50 new fascinating technologies out at Camp Pendleton, at the Ship-to-Shore Maneuver Exploration and Experimentation Advanced Naval Technology Exercise 2017, in California.

The exercise is investigating how the military can leverage the latest technological advances for ship-to-the-shore, or the space between the Naval ship and the beach where they could potentially land.

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Violent street gang MS-13 puts Long Island towns in its grip

MS-13 has been blamed for a trail of 11 corpses of mostly young people discovered in woods and vacant lots in Brentwood and neighboring Central Islip since the start of the school year.

The bloodshed in the two blue-collar towns has gotten the attention of President Donald Trump, who says the killings are the result of lax immigration policies that let too many criminal "scum" slip through.

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Judge: Mostly white Southern city may secede from school district despite racial motive - The Washington Post

Still, Haikala ruled Monday that Gardendale may move forward with the secession, basing her decision in part on sympathy for some parents who want local control over schools and in part on concern for black students caught in the middle. The judge wrote that she feared they would bear the blame if she blocked the city’s bid.

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Russian 'combat robot' can shoot guns, lift weights in training at the gym and even drive a car - Mirror Online

A terrifying Russian robot has been built with the ability to shoot guns, do push-ups and even drive a car.

The terminator-style cyborg could even reportedly be programmed to make its own decisions in the future using artificial intelligence.

Officially named the Combat Robot F.E.D.O.R, Russian officials insisted the machine will not be used as a killing machine to "terminate" enemies.

In terrifying footage the robot is seen at a shooting range, firing a gun with alarming accuracy. In other clips it is seen lifting weights and behind the wheel of a car.

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Meet the People Who Train the Robots (to Do Their Own Jobs) - The New York Times

SAN FRANCISCO — What if part of your job became teaching a computer everything you know about doing someone’s job — perhaps your own?

Before the machines become smart enough to replace humans, as some people fear, the machines need teachers. Now, some companies are taking the first steps, deploying artificial intelligence in the workplace and asking their employees to train the A.I. to be more human.

We spoke with five people — a travel agent, a robotics expert, an engineer, a customer-service representative and a scriptwriter, of sorts — who have been put in this remarkable position. More than most, they understand the strengths (and weaknesses) of artificial intelligence and how the technology is changing the nature of work.

Here are their stories.

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All of these robot articles coming out on the same day makes me wonder.

A robot that picks apples? Replacing humans worries some

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — Harvesting Washington state's vast fruit orchards each year requires thousands of farmworkers, and many of them work illegally in the United States.

That system eventually could change dramatically as at least two companies are rushing to get robotic fruit-picking machines to market.

The robotic pickers don't get tired and can work 24 hours a day.

"Human pickers are getting scarce," said Gad Kober, a co-founder of Israel-based FFRobotics. "Young people do not want to work in farms, and elderly pickers are slowly retiring."

FFRobotics and Abundant Robotics, of Hayward, California, are racing to get their mechanical pickers to market within the next couple of years.

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Apple's self-driving car seen on the road for first time 

It is no secret that Apple has been working furiously to develop self-driving car technology in a bid to compete with rivals including Google and Tesla. Until now, the operation has been kept from the public eye. 

Images have emerged of Apple's first autonomous car on the roads of Silicon Valley. The car appears to be a Lexus RX450h that is fitted with a range of sensors, radar scanners and cameras.

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Refugee girl sentenced for 60 fake 911 calls

A young Syrian refugee with a traumatic past and a hostile attitude toward police has ended up with a criminal record at only 12 years old.

The 12-year-old girl, who recently arrived in Winnipeg with her family, was charged with public mischief and assaulting a police officer after she and her younger sister called 911 60 times between July and August last year. They used different cell phones they found, making false reports that were designated as high-priority and wasted police’s time, court heard. After the final 911 call on Aug. 24, police responded to the family’s home, diverting resources away from investigation of a bomb threat that was happening simultaneously downtown.

When officers arrived, the 12-year-old punched one while he had his back turned, and tried to hit him a second time. She threatened to make false allegations that the police had "touched her," and threatened to kill the officers.

"I am going to work for ISIS. I hate you guys," she told police, according to details shared in court during the girl’s sentencing this week.

She also said in her statement to police that she thought the 911 calls were funny and she would do it again. She spent 21 days in jail at the Manitoba Youth Centre following the charges.

She was sentenced to one year of probation, during which she must complete 75 hours of community service work and write letters of apology to the police officers involved.

The girl spent time in a refugee camp before her family was able to come to Canada and settle in Winnipeg.

Provincial court Judge Murray Thompson said the fake 911 calls were "no joke" and explained the consequences of wrongly diverting emergency resources.

"The reason she spent 21 days in jail was because these were very serious charges," he said. "Even though she’s very young and she had a lot of trauma in her young life, and she’s new to this country, she knows that hitting a police officer is wrong."

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Bloomberg Interview: Trump Weighs Breaking Up Wall Street Banks, Raising U.S. Gas Tax - Bloomberg

President Donald Trump said he’s actively considering a breakup of giant Wall Street banks, giving a push to efforts to revive a Depression-era law separating consumer and investment banking.

“I’m looking at that right now,” Trump said of breaking up banks in a 30-minute Oval Office interview with Bloomberg News. “There’s some people that want to go back to the old system, right? So we’re going to look at that.”

Trump also said he’s open to increasing the U.S. gas tax to fund infrastructure development, in a further sign that policies unpopular with the Republican establishment are under consideration in the White House. He described higher gas taxes as acceptable to truckers -- “I have one friend who’s a big trucker,” he said -- as long as the proceeds are dedicated to improving U.S. highways.

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Lab-Grown Meat Coming to Supermarket Shelves Soon? | Fox Business

If this Silicon Valley food-tech startup has its way, its lab-grown meat—which includes chicken, duck and beef—will be on a supermarket shelf near you within the next five years.

“[We’re] trying to put products on the shelves by 2021/2022,” Uma Valeti, Memphis Meats co-founder and CEO, tells FOX Business.

In March, the company announced that it created the “world’s first chicken strip from animal cells,” following their animal-free meatball debut in 2016. Lab-grown beef was previously developed in 2012 by a group of Dutch scientists.

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Student penalized for using word 'man' on his essay - The College Fix

At the University of Florida, a student was recently penalized for writing “man” instead of “humankind” in a class paper.

History major Martin Poirier wrote “Water is a thing prior to man” on a paper for a history class called “History of Water.”

“Thoughtful paper, although the writing-mechanics errors are killing you,” Professor Jack Davis wrote at the bottom of the paper. He gave the student a B minus, according to a copy of the essay published in the student news outlet the Daily Nerv.

Davis circled “man” and referenced his Writing Mechanics Exercise #20, which draws a distinction between “mankind” and “humankind.”

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Sent to Prison by a Software Program’s Secret Algorithms - The New York Times

When Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. visited Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute last month, he was asked a startling question, one with overtones of science fiction.

“Can you foresee a day,” asked Shirley Ann Jackson, president of the college in upstate New York, “when smart machines, driven with artificial intelligences, will assist with courtroom fact-finding or, more controversially even, judicial decision-making?”

The chief justice’s answer was more surprising than the question. “It’s a day that’s here,” he said, “and it’s putting a significant strain on how the judiciary goes about doing things.”

He may have been thinking about the case of a Wisconsin man, Eric L. Loomis, who was sentenced to six years in prison based in part on a private company’s proprietary software. Mr. Loomis says his right to due process was violated by a judge’s consideration of a report generated by the software’s secret algorithm, one Mr. Loomis was unable to inspect or challenge.

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Mayor Asking FBI For Help With Investigating City Crime « CBS Baltimore

BALTIMORE (WJZ) — Baltimore’s mayor is asking for help from the FBI as the city struggles to contain a soaring murder rate. But will bringing in the feds stop the killings?

Catherine Pugh pulled no punches earlier this week when she said the violence is out of control.

“I’m calling on all the assistance we can possibly get because I can’t imagine going into our summer months with our crime rate where it is today, what that’s going to look like by the end of the summer,” Mayor Pugh said. “… Murder is out of control.”

Some people are skeptical that the FBI will be able to help matters.

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1,665 Pages: GOP Spending Bill Longer Than Obama’s Stimulus

(CNSNews.com) - The new federal spending bill proposed in the Republican-controlled Congress to fund the government through the end of September--which is now posted on the House Rules Committee website--is 1,665 pages long and includes an average of approximately 210 words per page.

That makes this bill approximately 350,000 words long—or about twice as long as the stimulus law (the “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act”) that President Barack Obama signed less than a month after his inauguration in 2009.

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Synthetic DNA scientist says it could be inside humans within 5 years

The Human Genome Project (HGP) took 13 years and $3 billion to complete.
Scientists planning to synthesize human DNA think it is as little as 5 years away.
They are seeking $100 million, and believe it will in total cost less than HGP.
Their aim is to get the cost of making a DNA base pair down to one cent.

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These things come out in clusters. There are news stories clusters every week. Pay attention. What news clusters do you notice?

Japan's 'peace constitution' under pressure at 70

Tokyo (AFP) - Japan's American-written "peace constitution" has survived unchanged for 70 years, but nationalists seeking an overhaul are gearing up for a major new push as concerns grow over North Korean belligerence.

Conservatives have long called for the document they see as a national humiliation to be amended, but current political alignments and growing security concerns suggest they now have their best chance of success.

"The time is ripe," Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Monday in a speech to supporters of change. "We will take a historic step towards the major goal of revising the constitution in this milestone year."

Nicolás Maduro Calls for New Venezuelan Constitution - WSJ

CARACAS—Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro on Monday signed an order to convene a special assembly to redraft the country’s constitution, the latest in a string of efforts to retain power in the face of mounting protests and civil unrest.

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Trump budget plans fade, conservatives protest | McClatchy Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON
Look out, Republicans up for re-election in 2018. Look out, House Speaker Paul Ryan.

The fiery, never-give-in ultra-conservative wing of the GOP is highly displeased with the budget agreement reached this week.

“Instead of fighting for President Trump’s conservative budget priorities, they have surrendered to the Democrats once again,” Ken Cuccinelli, a former Virginia attorney general who heads the Senate Conservatives Fund, said of congressional Republican leaders

Democrats are elated over the $1.07 trillion budget deal, which reads almost like an Obama administration blueprint.

“Early on in this debate, Democrats clearly laid out our principles,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. “At the end of the day, this is an agreement that reflects those principles.”

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Kansas archbishop announces split from Girl Scouts

"We prefer to partner with youth organizations that share our values and vision for youth ministry, not ones that we have to monitor constantly to protect our children from being misled and misinformed," the archbishop wrote.

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Apple has more money than the UK and Canada combined | Daily Mail Online

Set to report quarterly financial results, which is double from 4 years ago
Likely has $246.09 billion total cash, cash equivalents and securities off shore
Keeping money off shore has allowed Apple to avoid the 35% US corporate tax

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SOCOM wants drugs to turn its K9s into super dogs | We Are The Mighty

Officials in charge of equipping America’s top commando units are looking for some high-tech drugs to help boost the performance if their 150 “multi-purpose canines.”

According to news reports, U.S. Special Operations Command wants to find pharmaceutical products or nutritional supplements that will enhance canine hearing, eyesight and other senses.

Think of it as a “Q” for America’s four-legged special operators.

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DARPA Is Planning to Hack the Human Brain to Let Us "Upload" Skills

In March 2016, DARPA — the U.S. military’s “mad science” branch — announced their Targeted Neuroplasticity Training (TNT) program. The TNT program aims to explore various safe neurostimulation methods for activating synaptic plasticity, which is the brain’s ability to alter the connecting points between neurons — a requirement for learning. DARPA hopes that building up that ability by subjecting the nervous system to a kind of workout regimen will enable the brain to learn more quickly.

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Trump to sign order lifting ban on political activity by churches | Reuters

President Donald Trump is expected to take executive action on Thursday to effectively lift a ban on political activity by churches and other tax-exempt institutions, a senior White House official said on Wednesday.

Trump will mark the National Day of Prayer by issuing guidance to federal agencies like the Treasury Department on how to interpret a law that says churches and religious organizations risk losing their tax-exempt status if they participate in political campaigns.

The order is expected to give the Treasury Department guidance on how strictly to enforce the 1954 law known as the Johnson Amendment, the White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity as details of the action were still being worked out.

Trump frequently complained about the amendment during his campaign for the presidency, bolstering his support among religious conservatives who contend it violates free speech and religious freedom rights.

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Puerto Rico turns to courts for debt protection | McClatchy Washington Bureau

SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO
Puerto Rico's governor turned to the courts Wednesday to protect the U.S. territory from a crushing $73 billion debt in the largest effort ever made by a U.S. government to shield itself from creditors.

Gov. Ricardo Rossello made the announcement after negotiations with Puerto Rico's bondholders failed. Rossello said a federal control board overseeing the island's finances agreed with his request to put certain debts before a federal bankruptcy court.

The outcome of the case could have implications for financially troubled U.S. cities or states.

"We're going to protect our people," the governor said hours after the territory was hit with multiple lawsuits from creditors seeking to recuperate the millions of dollars they invested in bonds issued by Puerto Rico's government, which has declared several defaults amid a 10-year recession.

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Why the Retail Crisis Could Be Coming to American Groceries - Bloomberg

These five forces are going to shake up the American supermarket.

It Looked As Though There Was Safety Selling Food
Now Groceries Are Everywhere
Grocery Prices Are Falling Fast
Food Shopping Isn't a Weekly Behavior Any More
Amazon Is Hungry for Groceries