Essay by Eric Worrall
In addition to a £31 million “Trustworthy AI” grant.
University of Southampton receives £15m AI funding from government
By Curtis Lancaster
BBC News
A university has been given £15m for a training centre aimed at developing artificial intelligence to tackle climate change.
The government funding was awarded to the University of Southampton in the hope of training at least 70 PhD students.
They will learn to use an AI technology that works on sustainability, called SustAI, the university said.
It was also awarded £31m in June towards developing trustworthy AI.
…
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-hampshire-67277518
The university press release;
Southampton awarded millions to lead Britain’s AI revolution
Published: 31 October 2023
Southampton will be at the forefront of government plans to make the UK a leading force for artificial intelligence after it was awarded millions of pounds.
A new £15million training centre at the University of Southampton will be tasked with nurturing British tech talent and developing AI to tackle climate change.
The funding package, which includes £8million from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), will forge the new AI Centre for Doctoral Training in AI for Sustainability, known as SustAI.
It will train at least 70 PhD students in sustainable AI, with plans to advance the tech for use across renewable energy and reducing carbon emissions.
SustAI director Professor Enrico Gerding, from the University of Southampton, said: “Environmental sustainability is one of the greatest challenges our world is facing – and many countries are setting ambitious targets to reduce emissions and increase renewable energy production.
“AI will be key to achieving these targets and, through SustAI, we will nurture the next generation of researchers, engineers and technologists who will be trained to create a sustainable future using AI.”
The £15million SustAI centre was announced ahead of this week’s AI safety summit, held at the famed Bletchley Park estate, which intends to fuel the UK’s ambitions to be a tech superpower.
It comes just months after Southampton was awarded £31million, also from UKRI, to launch the Responsible AI UK consortium to develop trustworthy artificial intelligence.
Associate Professor Dr Lindsay-Marie Armstrong, from the SustAI team, added: “Sustainability is at the heart of the centre, both in its research and ethos. We will equip our students with the ability to transform academic research and make a real change to businesses and society.”
More than ten other training facilities across Britain were also announced by UKRI, as part of a £117million package, all aimed at developing artificial intelligence.
UKRI chief executive Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser said the UK is in a strong position to harness the power of AI to transform many aspects of our lives for the better.
She added: “Crucial to this endeavour is nurturing the talented people and teams we need to apply AI to a broad spectrum of challenges, from healthy aging to sustainable agriculture, ensuring its responsible and trustworthy adoption.”
Applications for students to enrol onto the University of Southampton centre will open soon – ready for the start of the 2024 academic year.
Get the latest updates about SustAI by signing up to its enewsletter.
Or contact the SustAI team at eg@ecs.soton.ac.uk.
Source: https://www.southampton.ac.uk/news/2023/10/southampton-awarded-millions-to-lead-uk-ai-revolution.page
I doubt applying AI to sustainability goals will achieve much, any more than applying “Quantum Computing” to climate goals will achieve.
AI is good at optimisation problems, for example the AI in your automobile satellite navigation system can figure out an optimal route to your destination much faster than a human can.
But the fundamental problem, what to do when the sun goes down and the wind stops, or what to do about the utterly predictable collapse of renewable energy generation every winter. An optimising satnav AI cannot find a route to a destination, when there is no possible route to the desired destination.
The following is an example of an AI solving an optimisation problem – in this case finding the shortest line which joins all the dots. But the AI can only solve such an optimisation problem if a solution is possible.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
If AI had any ability to unravel the logic problems involved in climate (weather predictions included) we would have seen these abilities applied already. Remember what passes for evolved AI is actually hype since the seriously difficult problems for a logic machine – languages, imagination, plot twists, random coin tossing, intuitive activity etc – are all fails and fails big time.
Full marks to Gates and company for having got politicians wrapped around their fingers to keep computers as seemingly magical machines that can do things humans cannot do. The truth is humans can do lots of stuff contemporary computers will never ever be programmed to mimic. And I would guess we are as far away from improving technology as we have ever been before with complete idiots in charge who think none of us is capable of detecting lies when they are told. That’s why they love computers which do exactly what the programmer tell them to do – lies included – and bots which apparently will get you through exams. There’s nothing new in that either.
But at least we know that those selected for this group will have the correct views on Jews and Hamas as those on the UKRI selection board have posted their hatred of Jews, support for baby-beheading Hamas terrorists and for Palestine.
More than half the grant will be used to force AI to accept that the sun, planets and gravity play little or no role in Earth’s climate change, CO2 is an evil pollutant in spite of the fat that all life on Earth depends on it, and CO2 is the primary cause of every bad weather event since the public execution of all the witches.
“A new £15million training centre at the University of Southampton will be tasked with nurturing British tech talent and developing AI to tackle climate change.”
Retrying the 2000 tech boom? Internet was not a progressive, leftist place in its first 10 years, unless you consider the type of pictures that drove modem tech development to be “progressive”. People who wonder why parents would restrict their kids cell phone ap use might not understand what it meant to be the only computer-literate human in a house at age 16 during that era.
It took the left a while to capture Internet made by introverted young men, for introverted young men. “They” won’t let that one happen again.
Ask ChatGPT: Who else has been censured by the House in the past ?
The House of Representatives has censured several members of Congress in the past. Here are some examples:
…
2. Pete Rose: In 1990, the House censured Pete Rose, a former baseball
player, for betting on baseball games while he was a player and manager.
.. is £15 Million enough ?