Academic Papers Allegedly Use AI Text to Secure Positive Peer Reviews

An academic is reportedly concealing prompts in preprint papers for artificial intelligence tools, encouraging these tools to generate favorable reviews.

On July 1st, Nikkei reported that we examined research papers from 14 academic institutions across eight countries, including two in Japan, South Korea, China, Singapore, and the United States.

The papers found on the research platform Arxiv have not yet gone through formal peer review, and most pertain to the field of computer science.

In one paper reviewed by the Guardian, there was hidden white text located just beneath the abstract statement.


Nikkei also reported on other papers that included the phrase “Don’t emphasize negativity,” with some offering precise instructions for the positive reviews expected.

The journal Nature has also identified 18 preprint studies containing such concealed messages.

The trend seems to originate from a social media post by Jonathan Lorraine, a Canada-based Nvidia Research Scientist, suggesting the avoidance of “stricken meeting reviews from reviewers with LLM” that incorporate AI prompts.

If a paper is peer-reviewed by humans, the prompts might not cause issues, but as one professor involved with the manuscript mentioned, it counters the phenomenon of “lazy reviewers” who rely on others to conduct their peer review work.

Nature conducted a survey with 5,000 researchers in March and found that nearly 20% had attempted to use a large language model (LLM) to enhance the speed and ease of their research.

Biodiversity academic Timothee Poisau at the University of Montreal revealed on his blog in February that doubts arose regarding a peer review because it contained output from ChatGPT, referring to it as “blatantly written by LLM” in his review, which included “here is a revised version of the improved review.”

“Writing a review using LLM indicates a desire for an assessment without committing to the effort of reviewing,” Poisot states.

“If you begin automating reviews, as a reviewer, you signal that providing reviews is merely a task to complete or an item to add to your resume.”

The rise of a widely accessible commercial language model poses challenges for various sectors, including publishing, academia, and law.

Last year, Frontier of Cell and Developmental Biology gained media attention for including AI-generated images depicting mice standing upright with exaggerated characteristics.

Source: www.theguardian.com

Text Therapy: Study Reveals Couples Use Emojis in Messaging to Enhance Relationships

A key to nurturing a healthy relationship might involve gazing into the faces of those glued to their smartphones.

Recent research Published in Journal Plos One indicates that incorporating emojis in text messages strengthens personal connections and enhances satisfaction.


Researchers from the University of Texas conducted a study with 260 participants aged 23 to 67, asking them to review 15 text message exchanges differing solely by the presence of emojis.

Participants were prompted to envision themselves as the sender of each message while analyzing the recipient’s response, gauging aspects like responsiveness, likability, intimacy, and overall relationship satisfaction.

The findings showed that individuals who included emojis in their texts were perceived as more emotionally aware in their interactions compared to those who used text alone.

Moreover, emojis served as nonverbal indicators of attention and emotional investment.

Luke McGregor, 42, and Amy Thunig-McGregor, 37, shared their experiences with emoji use.

Luke recounted that he had to adapt to integrating emojis in his messages to Amy, as he hadn’t been a frequent emoji user at the relationship’s start.

“I traditionally didn’t use emojis much, but once I got together with Amy, I noticed she used them frequently. There were vulnerabilities and challenges I needed to overcome to start using them myself,” McGregor explained.

Emojis are significant for Amy Thunig-McGregor and her partner Luke McGregor.

“I wanted Amy to feel cherished, so regularly sending her emojis to express my affection was crucial for me, especially initially,” he mentioned.

Amy highlighted the effectiveness of emojis in enhancing communication.

“Both of us are autistic, which makes context essential… emojis help clarify tone and intention in ways that plain text can’t achieve,” they stated.

Dr. Raquel Peel, a senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Central Queensland and not involved in the study, noted that emojis can be a creative solution when face-to-face interactions aren’t possible with partners.

“I don’t believe emojis can replace direct interactions in intimate relationships. Yet, we must recognize that such interactions aren’t always viable,” Peel remarked.

“If meeting your partner isn’t feasible, using emojis becomes a valuable alternative.”

She advised not to undervalue communication in a relationship, emphasizing the need to stay connected in every possible way.

“Many forget that relationships benefit from humor and enjoyment,” Peel explained.

“If emojis can fulfill that role, they contribute to fun and connection through humor, which is incredibly important.”

Source: www.theguardian.com

Sexting Sensation: Why Text Messaging is the Hottest Trend in TV Shows

In the concluding episode of Ted Lasso’s second season, Ted sends a straightforward text to his ex-wife: “Knock, Knock.” It’s not particularly unusual, but the striking part is that this seems to be the very first message he ever sent to his son’s mother. Until now, she’s never texted him back. The empty spaces surrounding the message indicate that the characters have a history of communication.

This issue has been a thorn in the side of television. Why does Emily in Paris receive her boyfriend’s first text saying, “Hey, how about Paris?” Or when Rebecca mistakenly texts her crush using her eccentric ex-girlfriend’s best friend’s phone—why is their conversation history nonexistent when she sees a message about a house party several episodes later? In 2021, Wired journalist Zack Jason highlighted in a series of articles that these characters have no texting history, making it “not allowed and awkward to witness.”

It seems that studios and streamers have taken note. Nowadays, television writers strive to accurately portray their characters’ texting history.

In the dark comedy currently airing, friends and neighbors often text one another. When Jon Hamm’s character Coop wishes to meet up with his lover, we see a long history filled with previous booty calls, and even sexy snapshots. When his son texts his crush, it’s evident that she has previously replied with just “K.” Meanwhile, the newly released thriller series The Stolen Girl showcases text threads bursting with emojis between spouses and colleagues. Ted Lasso’s approach was revised in Season 3; viewers can now observe Ted’s interactions with various people, including a message to his upstairs neighbor stating, “I swear to you, I’m not playing music.”




“I swear to you, Mrs. Shipley, I’m not playing music”… A very unusual call in Ted Lasso’s Season 3. Photo: Amelia Tate

“It drives us all mad when there’s no text history. That’s something we’ve fought for years,” states Dave Henri, managing partner at Modern Motion, a California-based graphic design firm. The Magic Phone software can be installed on a set of prop devices. The app syncs with a Bluetooth keyboard that allows crews to trigger notifications, or a bubble that pops up when someone is typing, enabling actors to send past messages and display appropriate responses in real-time. Magic Phone allows productions to incorporate text message histories complete with convincing timestamps, and its realism is employed in several Apple TV+ productions, including morning shows, shrinks, and Ted Lasso.

“I believe studios and creatives are recognizing that viewers are accustomed to analyzing these devices,” Henri adds. “A lot of thought goes into this now because fans know to look for errors.”

A contemporary worker, Rodgers, collaborated on Ted’s extensive text history in Season 3. He notes that it went through 25 to 30 revisions before the visuals were perfected. “We engaged with the writers, directors, and showrunners, reflecting on what Ted had previously told his mother or what he said to his doctor three months back,” states Rogers. Several graphics were adjusted post-premiere to enhance viewer experience for those watching the show later. “If they realized that sending a message at 10:53 AM wasn’t feasible, they aimed to rectify it to ensure it was flawless.”




Ambika mod of The Stolen Girl. Photo: Matt Squire/Disney

An astonishing amount of effort goes into crafting what appears on the screen for just a moment. “You’re simply sending text messages, and there are 13 or 14 iterations. We think about what a character’s phone displays, what the contact image should be, or whether we even need that image,” Rogers explains. A unique gag for observant viewers shows that Ted’s mother had texted him previously, attaching a photo of a router without a plug and stating that her internet was down. “We loved the three or four different photos they provided of that router. That’s how detailed we get.”

While adding Easter eggs like this can be enjoyable, past texts must not distract from the central plot. This is because the audience tends to miss the “hero text” being sent or received during crucial moments. Script editor Charlie Neal faced this dilemma with The Stolen Girl. Important texts were written into scripts by head writers, but he filled in the conversation history, subsequently approved by writers and producers. “What’s needed is to keep the focus on what’s significant,” he emphasizes. Past texts must not be “quirky, attention-catching, or lengthy” as viewers’ attention can drift away. Conversely, overly mundane messages may also distract. If silence prevails, it becomes distracting too.

Neal even drew inspiration from his own real-life text exchanges. “What do you text your colleagues about?” might be something like, “I’m heading out for coffee, would you like something?” However, he had to ensure that nothing was added that could misrepresent the story or alter the audience’s perception of characters. Continuity is paramount—if a character receives a text on one day, it must be visible in the next day’s history, occasionally amidst random messages.




A booty call between friends and neighbors. Photo: Amelia Tate

In the end, Neal wrote 10-20 historical texts for each interaction, although only one or two appear on the screen. At one point in The Stolen Girl, a character scrolls through the DMs sent to a media outlet’s social media profiles, and Neal even had to “channel the voices of internet trolls” to craft these messages. He was also tasked with assigning names to the senders. All names displayed onscreen must receive approval from the legal department; for instance, if a journalist named Amelia Tait appears alongside another journalist named Amelia Tait, Neal named the troll after a fellow crew member.

Ultimately, while texting history may not make or break a show, it is certainly appreciated by the audience. “Today’s television viewers are so perceptive that they will notice if the minor text dated April 26th contradicts anything else in the script,” observes Neal. Actors enjoy interacting with these sound devices as well. “Helping an actor visualize and react to the message is truly one of the best experiences,” Henri remarks. Interestingly, Harrison Ford was reportedly a fan of the Magic Phone on a reduced set, and Kandy even notes how one actor’s typing appears like that of a skilled hacker due to the software, despite their actual method resembling “hunting and pecking with just two fingers.”

Nowadays, if a character’s text history is absent, viewers might feel confident that it was a deliberate choice. “When a typing bubble repeatedly appears and vanishes without any action, it’s a modern metaphor for unresolved communication,” Kandy points out—almost a sign that the text is meant to signify something. The team behind crafting these messages is pleased that their work is finally receiving recognition. “We often go unnoticed or are overshadowed in industry roles,” Rogers states. “But we’re continually evolving,” or to put it another way, people may not exclaim “OMG” at the moment, but if you know, you know (iykyk).

Source: www.theguardian.com

Do I truly need to save all of my text and photos? | In reality

a A few years ago, I encountered an unexpected problem: New York City had very few reliable phone repair shops, and even fewer that would repair a 2010 BlackBerry. No one seemed to understand my situation. Get your broken cell phone working again. It held text messages from my high school days. It was a significant part of my life.

For a brief moment, my BlackBerry actually turned on. I scrolled through my long-lost inbox, hoping to find some forgotten treasure: a written account of teenage heartbreak, memories of excitement, or moments shared with friends. However, my search yielded little. Most were emails about schoolwork.

I could never manage to get the device working again. This felt like a crisis, even if it was a personal and self-centered one. It felt tragic that all these materials — records of my feelings, communication, and my friends’ conversations during my teenage years — were stuck in a broken device.

Over time, the sadness faded, but my digital footprint continued to expand. Each day, I come across more content that I’ll want to revisit in the future: Numerous text messages. An average of 75 exchanges per day — Photos, videos, emails, social media likes, metadata from countless Google searches, group chat memes, “be there in 5 minutes” texts, my last message from my grandmother, and the complete story of a now-ended long-distance relationship.

I learned from my BlackBerry mishap. Instead of relying on a device destined to become outdated, I now invest in a cloud service that stores everything in a vast, overwhelming digital repository. For just $2.99 a month, I have over 200GB of digital storage, including 16,000 photos, eight years’ worth of Gmail, and 44GB of iMessages exchanged since I set my iPhone to “Don’t Delete” in 2017.

In the physical world, I lack the impulse to regularly discard old, irrelevant items without much consideration. However, I am sentimental and tend to engage in what experts label as “digital hoarding” — accumulating excessive digital content that leads to stress and anxiety.

Even with a more moderate approach, one’s digital footprint remains vast, dispersed, disorganized, and controlled by technology companies at their discretion. Experts reveal that each individual generates about 8MB to 2MB of data traveling online daily, a significant surge from 2MB ten years ago. The average American possesses about 500GB of storage, which includes social media usage, and this figure continues to grow amid escalating data demands. 328.77 million terabytes of new data are generated daily.

Our digital storage capacities are expanding, becoming more costly, and having a detrimental impact on the environment. The internet and digital industry’s annual emissions are equivalent to those of the aviation industry. Entering Cloud Storage Hell and facing storage limitations, there is a growing need for Data Storage Experts and financially struggling journalists to engage in Digital spring cleaning — eliminating duplicate photos as you would declutter old wardrobe items.

For many, including myself, the link between mobile phones and the cloud remains unclear and under-researched. Dr. Liz Silens, a psychology professor at Northumbria University and one of the few researchers to delve into this subject, discovered through Personal Digital Data Storage that most individuals don’t know where to begin with their data. “Is it genuinely mine? Is it stored in the cloud? Even if I delete content from my device, does it persist? Do I require additional backups if I can’t trust them? This exacerbates the data issue,” she remarked.

The topic of data makes me anxious as well because I’m not well-versed in technology and lack organizational skills. Data storage, like money, isn’t something I enjoy contemplating. If it’s accessible and usable, that suffices. Periodically, I attempt to transfer my data from the cloud in a casual, DIY manner, such as copying and pasting all my Facebook messages with my best friend at 16 into a Word document. I quickly become overwhelmed by technical terminology and multi-step processes recommended in various Reddit threads populated by individuals, like me, who fear losing themselves and remnants of their past. Digital Legacy of a Loved One.

One holiday season, my sister gifted me a subscription to iMazing, a service that backs up your iPhone and converts your iMessages into easily readable PDFs. However, after numerous failed attempts and frustration due to inadequate storage space on my 2017 MacBook, I abandoned the endeavor. For months, I manually removed photos from texts to address the memory shortage on my phone. Subsequently, rather than risking unintentional deletion from the cloud, I opted to purchase a new phone.

Archivist Margot Note highlighted a growing trend of private clients seeking to preserve caches of digital treasures, particularly text messages documenting “everyday history and significant moments.” Analogous to physical letters, they reveal the evolution of relationships over time, she mentioned.

The desire to safeguard such content stems from curiosity: What conversations did my best friend and I have in 2018, fresh out of college, full of vigor, and continents apart? How did my former partner indicate our relationship exceeded friendship? When did our bond begin to unravel?

The predominant emotion driving this preservation effort is anxiety. Losing these emails would mean forfeiting evidence of myself and my connections. It would signify losing one of the few constants after a loved one’s passing: their voice, its evolution over time, and their unique tone addressing me. Reflecting on her diary in Ongoingness, writer Sarah Manguso articulated the wish to shield “against awakening at the end of one’s life and realizing you’ve missed it.”

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“Just the thought of data triggers anxiety because of its enigmatic nature. It can be overwhelming,” Silens remarked. “Anxiety serves as a significant barrier to addressing the reorganization and management of one’s digital information.”

Engagement with social media introduces its own set of risks. In her book The End of Forgetting: Growing Up with Social Media, cultural and media scholar Kate Eichhorn contends that the internet’s ability to swiftly transport us back in time undermines our capacity to develop adult identities, evolve, and mature. “There’s a risk in the fact that anything can resurface in your life,” she noted. “We haven’t fully grasped the psychological repercussions of that yet.”


Whenever I delve into my 44GB repository of texts, I emerge feeling overwhelmed by information, nostalgic for the past, and acutely aware of the relentless march of time. Memory’s fallibility becomes apparent, as the records don’t always align with my idealized view of history. These texts aren’t my memories but fragments of experiences frozen in time. What’s the harm in forgetting? What do we truly gain from revisiting the past?

Both Eichhorn and Silens question the necessity of retaining such copious digital content. Eichhorn highlights the incessant accumulation of data. “Is this an archive? Or is it simply another form of clandestine, socially acceptable storage?” Silens proposes that tidying up the cloud could evolve into a routine, akin to filing taxes: “Review your day’s photos and only delete those you know won’t be needed in the future.”

I appreciate the notion of being more discerning. We can begin to be deliberate about our digital archives. We can organize and discard unnecessary items. Apps like “Second Brain App” serve as external memory for various content, from text to tasks. Note, the archivist, reassured me that my struggle to organize my digital repository isn’t foolish. There currently isn’t an optimal solution. While institutions possess robust preservation mechanisms, “it requires significant effort and resources,” she noted. “This hasn’t trickled down to personal digital archives yet. It’s likely to happen eventually, but the necessary solutions remain largely unknown to the public.”

Hence, I’ll likely procrastinate until my cloud storage reaches capacity before making a decision. At that point, I’ll likely purchase additional storage. My cloud storage operates quietly in the background, easy to delay, always present but forgotten. Similar to the old BlackBerry tucked away in a desk drawer, never to be used again but comforting in its mere existence.

Source: www.theguardian.com

OpenAI Introduces Sora, a Tool that Generates Videos from Text in Real-time Using Artificial Intelligence (AI)

OpenAI on Thursday announced a tool that can generate videos from text prompts.

The new model, called Sora after the Japanese word for “sky,” can create up to a minute of realistic footage that follows the user’s instructions for both subject matter and style. The model can also create videos based on still images or enhance existing footage with new material, according to a company blog post.



“We teach AI to understand and simulate the physical world in motion, with the goal of training models that help people solve problems that require real-world interaction.” says the blog post.

One video included among the company’s first few examples was based on the following prompt: Movie trailer featuring the adventures of a 30-year-old astronaut wearing his red woolen knitted bike in his helmet, blue sky, salt desert, cinematic style shot on 35mm film, vibrant colors .”

The company announced that it has opened up access to Sora to several researchers and video creators. According to the company’s blog post, experts have “red-teamed” the product and implemented OpenAI’s terms of service, which prohibit “extreme violence, sexual content, hateful images, likenesses of celebrities, or the IP of others.” We will test whether there is a possibility of evasion. The company only allows limited access to researchers, visual artists and filmmakers, but CEO Sam Altman took to Twitter after the announcement to answer questions from users about a video he said was created by Sola. posted. The video contains a watermark indicating that it was created by AI.



The company debuted its still image generator Dall-E in 2021 and its generated AI chatbot ChatGPT in November 2022, quickly gaining 100 million users. His other AI companies have also debuted video generation tools, but those models could only generate a few seconds of footage that had little to do with the prompt. Google and Meta said they are developing a video generation tool, although it is not publicly available. on wednesday, announced the experiment We’ve added deeper memory to ChatGPT to remember more of your users’ chats.



OpenAI told the New York Times how much footage was used to train Sora, except that the corpus includes videos that are publicly available and licensed from copyright holders. He also did not reveal the source of the training video. The company has been sued multiple times for alleged copyright infringement in training generative AI tools that digest vast amounts of material collected from the internet and mimic the images and text contained in those datasets. .

Source: www.theguardian.com

Are You Suffering from Text Neck? The Physical Effects of Phone Usage on Our Bodies | Life and Style

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Earlier this year, a patient came to physical therapist Teresa Marco complaining of neck pain. Marco, who is based in New York City, began the interview as usual, asking a series of questions about lifestyle, habits, and attitude. Soon, a person believed to be the culprit appeared. It was a woman’s cell phone.

Marco, who declined to give her name for privacy reasons, said the woman typically used her phone or tablet with her head down on her lap. “She’s going to be very, very bent over, so it’s going to put a lot of strain on her neck,” Marco said.

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Marco says he often talks to his patients about how to use their phones. “I don’t think people end up coming to physical therapy because they realize they have a problem with their cell phone,” Marco says. But as she solves problems, it often becomes a focus.

While the negative effects on mental health associated with smartphone use are often discussed, the physical effects can also be significant.serious consequences like
Selfie-related injuries and deathscan occur, but chronic problems are much more common, especially in the upper body.
This year is research
Using hospital data, they estimated that between 2011 and 2019, hand and wrist injuries caused by cell phone use nearly doubled, reaching about 7,300 cases per year.

“Like [phone] Carolyn Somerich, director of the Human Factors/Ergonomics/Safety Engineering Laboratory at The Ohio State University, said: These sentiments are not new, but according to a Gallup poll,
Number of people who reported using a smartphone
“Too much” increased from 39% in 2015 to 58% in 2022. He was 84% most likely to feel this way.

Source: www.theguardian.com

AI technology capable of translating brain waves into text

AI can decode brainwave recordings and predict words someone is reading

Vertigo3d/Getty Images

A team of scientists has announced that a sensor-equipped helmet, combined with artificial intelligence, can translate a person’s thoughts into text.

In this study, participants read passages of text while wearing hats, and their brain electrical activity was recorded through the scalp. These electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings were converted to text using an AI model called DeWave.

Lin Ching Tian Researchers from Australia’s University of Technology Sydney (UTS) say the technology is non-invasive, relatively cheap and portable.

The system is far from perfect, with an accuracy of about 40%, but recent data currently under peer review shows an improvement in accuracy of more than 60%, Lin said.

In a study published in NeurIPS conference In New Orleans, Louisiana, the DeWave program does not use spoken language, but instead has participants read sentences aloud. However, in the researchers’ latest study, participants read the text silently.

Last year, the team he led was jerry tan Researchers at the University of Texas at Austin reported similar accuracy in converting thoughts into text, but used MRI scans to interpret brain activity. Using EEG is more practical because the subject does not have to remain still in the scanner.

UTS team member Charles Zhou said the DeWave model was trained by looking at many examples where brain signals matched a particular sentence.

“For example, when you think of saying ‘hello,’ your brain sends a specific signal,” Zhou says. “DeWave learns how these signals relate to the word ‘hello’ by looking at many examples of these signals for different words and sentences.”

Once DeWave had a good understanding of the brain signals, the team connected it to an open-source large-scale language model (LLM) similar to the AI ​​that powers ChatGPT.

“This LLM is like a smart writer who can craft sentences. We tell these writers to pay attention to the signals from DeWave and use that as a guide to craft their sentences. ” says Zhou.

Finally, the team trained both DeWave and a language model together to further improve their ability to write sentences based on EEG data.

Researchers predict that further improvements to the system could revolutionize communication for people who have lost language due to stroke or other conditions, and could also have applications in robotics.

craig gin from the University of Sydney said he was impressed by Lin’s team’s work. “It’s great progress,” he says.

“People have long wanted to convert brainwaves to text, and the team’s model shows amazing accuracy. A few years ago, EEG-to-text conversion was complete and utter nonsense. .”

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Source: www.newscientist.com