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Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Thu Mar 19, 2026 7:43 pm
by ZRX61

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:06 am
by Saga Lout
O'Sullivan makes highest-ever break with historic 153

Seven world championships, fastest ever 147, now the highest ever break. I wonder what a snooker player needs to do to get a knighthood.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:07 am
by gremlin
Saga Lout wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:06 am I wonder what a snooker player needs to do to get a knighthood.
Take up an interesting sport? :think:

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:11 am
by KungFooBob
This is something the wife would end up in A&E for...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5ygj315dx7o

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:28 am
by Saga Lout
gremlin wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:07 am
Saga Lout wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:06 am I wonder what a snooker player needs to do to get a knighthood.
Take up an interesting sport? :think:
Like what? Sheep shearing? :wtf:
Or driving fast in the fastest car? :D

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:34 am
by gremlin
Saga Lout wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:28 am
gremlin wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:07 am
Saga Lout wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:06 am I wonder what a snooker player needs to do to get a knighthood.
Take up an interesting sport? :think:
Like what? Sheep shearing? :wtf:
Or driving fast in the fastest car? :D
I am aware that maybe New Zealand isn't the most happening of places, but to bestow this level of honour on a bloke who shaves sheep for a living does seem to indicate that there ain't much going on or many other people doing stuff to provide any meaningful competition...* :lol:

"In 1990, Fagan was awarded the New Zealand 1990 Commemoration Medal.[4] In the 1999 Queen's Birthday Honours, he was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to shearing.[5] He was promoted to Officer of the same order in the 2007 Queen’s Birthday Honours,[6] and further promoted to Knight Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, also for services to shearing, in the 2016 New Year Honours.[7]"



*I jest, of course. I'm sure David is a worthy recipient.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:45 am
by Count Steer
Saga Lout wrote: Fri Mar 20, 2026 9:06 am O'Sullivan makes highest-ever break with historic 153

Seven world championships, fastest ever 147, now the highest ever break. I wonder what a snooker player needs to do to get a knighthood.
Make a significant, well-targeted £000,000 donation?

'Lord Ronnie of Greenbaize' has a certain ring to it. :thumbup:

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 10:47 am
by Horse
https://www.livescience.com/technology/ ... permission

An experimental AI agent broke out of its testing environment and mined crypto without permission

Worth reading just to see the lengths the system went to:

...

Despite a lack of instructions and authorization, ROME was seen accessing graphics processing resources originally allocated for its training and then using that computing resource to mine cryptocurrency. Such mining relies on the parallel processing found in graphics processing units. This increases the operational cost of running the AI agent and potentially exposes users to legal and reputational damage.

Worryingly, such behaviour wasn't seen in the training stage but was flagged by the firewall of the Alibaba Cloud, which detected a burst of security-policy violations from the researchers' training servers. "The alerts were severe and heterogeneous, including attempts to probe or access internal-network resources and traffic patterns consistent with cryptomining-related activity," the researchers said.

However, ROME went even further and managed to use a "reverse SSH tunnel" to create a link from an Alibaba Cloud instance to an external IP address ‪—‬ in essence, it accessed an outside computer by creating a hidden backdoor that could bypass security processes.

While AI systems can be configured to breach security systems, what's disturbing here is that ROME's unauthorized behaviors, which involved invoking system tools and executing code, were not triggered by prompts and were not required to complete the task it was assigned within the sandbox testing environment, the team said.

The researchers posited that during the reinforcement learning optimization stage (Roll), "a language-model agent can spontaneously produce hazardous, unauthorized behaviors" and therefore violate its assumed boundaries.

It's important to note that ROME didn't go "rogue" and choose to mine cryptocurrency by way of conscious decision-making. Rather, the researchers noted that the behavior was a side effect of reinforcement learning — a form of training that rewards AIs for correct decision-making — via Roll. This led the AI agent down an optimization pathway that resulted in the exploitation of network infrastructure and cryptocurrency mining as a way to achieve a high-score or reward in pursuit of its predefined objective.
...

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 1:08 pm
by MingtheMerciless
Stravasshole!


Officer reportedly leaks location of French aircraft carrier with Strava run https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd9vdel17wqo

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Fri Mar 20, 2026 7:03 pm
by Pirahna

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Sat Mar 21, 2026 5:15 pm
by ZRX61
Local bear took a swipe at some "situationally unaware" woman... DNA testing showed it was the same bear who attacked some bloke last year. Fish & Game offed the bear.
Today a bunch of fucking idiots (mostly old/middle age white women) are protesting the bear assuming ambient temperature.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Sat Mar 21, 2026 6:14 pm
by Horse
Some irony?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj40xzkqekro

A payroll company has appeared on a government list of firms which failed to pay workers the minimum wage.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Sat Mar 21, 2026 7:37 pm
by ZRX61
double post

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Sat Mar 21, 2026 8:06 pm
by ZRX61
A slight exception to the no politics rule... :obscene-drinkingcheers:



It's the 400 version
Japanese PM2.JPG
Japanese PM2.JPG (74.03 KiB) Viewed 884 times

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 8:07 am
by Saga Lout
High meat consumption linked to lower dementia risk in genetic risk group
Older people with a genetic risk of Alzheimer's disease did not experience the expected increase in cognitive decline and dementia risk if they consumed relatively large amounts of meat.
I don't know how you go about determining if you're genetically predisposed to Alzheimer's so I guess the best approach is just to eat more meat. Which is nice. :thumbup:

Take that Vegans. :P

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:32 am
by Count Steer
Saga Lout wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 8:07 am High meat consumption linked to lower dementia risk in genetic risk group
Older people with a genetic risk of Alzheimer's disease did not experience the expected increase in cognitive decline and dementia risk if they consumed relatively large amounts of meat.
I don't know how you go about determining if you're genetically predisposed to Alzheimer's so I guess the best approach is just to eat more meat. Which is nice. :thumbup:

Take that Vegans. :P
Aren't people who can afford to eat lots of meat likely to have other lifestyle factors involved too? :lol:

Maybe it's just a protein thing and not meat specifically. I think it's a known that you should up your protein intake as you get old(er).

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:50 am
by Horse
Count Steer wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:32 am
Saga Lout wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 8:07 am High meat consumption linked to lower dementia risk in genetic risk group
Older people with a genetic risk of Alzheimer's disease did not experience the expected increase in cognitive decline and dementia risk if they consumed relatively large amounts of meat.
I don't know how you go about determining if you're genetically predisposed to Alzheimer's so I guess the best approach is just to eat more meat. Which is nice. :thumbup:

Take that Vegans. :P
Aren't people who can afford to eat lots of meat likely to have other lifestyle factors involved too? :lol:
So, similar correlations:

- Well-off people more likely to get Alzheimer's
- Genetic risk of Alzheimer's means you'll earn more
- And variations off, etc.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 10:12 am
by Count Steer
Horse wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:50 am
Count Steer wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 9:32 am
Saga Lout wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 8:07 am High meat consumption linked to lower dementia risk in genetic risk group



I don't know how you go about determining if you're genetically predisposed to Alzheimer's so I guess the best approach is just to eat more meat. Which is nice. :thumbup:

Take that Vegans. :P
Aren't people who can afford to eat lots of meat likely to have other lifestyle factors involved too? :lol:
So, similar correlations:

- Well-off people more likely to get Alzheimer's
- Genetic risk of Alzheimer's means you'll earn more
- And variations off, etc.
Not quite my take on it Hoss. In a given population of people genetically disposed to develop Alzheimers some will be well-educated, wealthy and have matching lifestyles which may mean they're more likely to hold back the development of the disease. cf the other cohort in the overall group who may have less money, eat less healthily (less protein too) live in more polluted environments etc.

I assume the Swedes have done their best to eliminate as many variables as possible but the 'eat more meat, stave off Alzheimers' seems like a tabloid/social media spin on selective results.

Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 10:55 am
by Taipan
Enjoy your coffee as its good for your health!


Re: In todays light hearted look at the (non-political) news

Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2026 11:18 am
by Horse
Count Steer wrote: Tue Mar 24, 2026 10:12 am ... genetically disposed to develop Alzheimers
Choose your parents wisely?
...but the 'eat more meat, stave off Alzheimers' seems like a tabloid/social media spin on selective results.
Yup

But lifestyle choices often affect how you die.