Understanding intelligence and creating intelligent machines are grand scientific challenges of our times. The ability to learn from experience is a cornerstone of intelligence for machines and living beings alike. In a remarkably prescient 1948 report, Alan Turing – the father of modern computer science – proposed the construction of machines that display intelligent behavior. He also discussed the “education” of […] … learn more→

There’s been a lot of … stuff going on at my university lately (just Google “Australian National University” on the news setting and you’ll see what I mean). People are, to put it mildly, upset. So upset that they’ve taken to writing articles for and against said management in our local city newspaper, The Canberra […] … learn more→

The wellness industry is one of the fastest growing markets, with an estimated global value of US$6.3 trillion in 2023. Gen Z and millennials are driving much of this growth, spending more on wellness products and services than older generations. The challenge, however, is that the wellness industry has few guardrails, allowing social media influencers and media […] … learn more→

Last year, the Coalition made the surprise decision to oppose Labor’s plans for new international student caps. On Sunday, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton proposed an even more radical policy of his own to limit the number of international students in Australia. He announced a combination of tighter enrolment limits, increased visa application fees and changes to temporary graduate visas, which allow […] … learn more→

Music uses sounds and silences to evoke emotions and create aesthetic experiences in the listener. Its ability to convey feelings and emotions makes it a powerful medium for emotional communication. It is a cultural product that has been present in all human societies, reflecting and shaping the traditions and values ​​of each culture. As Ludwig van […] … learn more→

Even before President Donald Trump took office, university presidents expressed concern about the impact of his agenda on higher education. Now they must lead their institutions in the wake of executive orders and directives that appear to undermine their authority and autonomy. They include cuts to research grant funding and the prohibition of diversity programs. The Trump administration has also proposed the dismantling […] … learn more→

One of the first things parents want to ask their children after school is “how was your day?” We simply want to know how they are going and what happened at school. But these conversations can feel like pulling teeth. Often you may only get a “good” or “fine” (if you’re lucky). Why are children […] … learn more→

In 1948, the founder of information theory, Claude Shannon, proposed modelling language in terms of the probability of the next word in a sentence given the previous words. These types of probabilistic language models were largely derided, most famously by linguist Noam Chomsky: “The notion of ‘probability of a sentence’ is an entirely useless one.” In 2022, […] … learn more→

While online video games create new spaces for interaction between teenagers, they can also be a source of social pressure when the obsession with victory becomes too strong. 52% of 12-17 year-olds spend more than three hours a day in front of screens . While social media plays a prominent role in their digital habits, video games are also […] … learn more→

I teach history in Connecticut, but I grew up in Oklahoma and Kansas, where my interest in the subject was sparked by visits to local museums. I fondly remember trips to the Fellow-Reeves Museum in Wichita, Kansas, and the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. A 1908 photograph of my great-grandparents picking cotton has been used […] … learn more→