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In 1995, Benjamin Santer was the lead author on a chapter of the second Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that would alter climate science forever. In a culmination of more than a year of meticulous research, the chapter came to a groundbreaking conclusionconfirming an international scientific consensus that humans were having a discernible impact on the climate. The pushback was immediate and immense. Lobbyist groups erroneously accused Santer of removing discussion of scientific uncertainty in the report. Frederick Seitz, former president of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and a founding member of the environmental skeptic conservative think tank the George C. Marshall Institute, published an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal claiming, I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process. Despite being backed up by the climate science community, Santer underwent congressional hearings, personal threats, and calls for his dismissal at his lab. Despite the pushback, Santer has continued to do groundbreaking research identifying human fingerprints in many different observed climate variables and received a number of awards for his work, including a MacArthur Fellowship in 1998. Santer recently spoke to Fast Company about the threats the second Trump administration poses to the future of climate science and shared advice for the next generation of scientists entering a contentious time. (This interview has been edited for length and clarity.) How does the current state of climate research compare to other peaks and valleys you have seen over your career? I think this is the deepest valley that I’ve ever been in in my entire scientific career. It feels different from anything else that I’ve encountered, and I encountered some pretty deep valleys after publication of the discernible human influence finding in the 1995 IPCC report. But this is different because it’s so targeted. The intent of the administration is to destroy, to tear down a capability to do basic science, to understand how and why the world around us is changing, to understand the inequities of climate change, to invest in low-carbon energy sources and support the development of low-carbon energy. All of these things have happened in the first 100 days of the Trump administration, and so much destruction has impacted not only our long-term futuresin academia, in research, the grants that will be available for us, the opportunities at universitybut also the leadership of this country and science and technology. And of course, not only in climate science and green energy, but also increasingly in health, the development of novel vaccines, the development of cancer drugs, all of that is imperiled. To turn away from those challenges as this administration is doing makes no sense whatsoever. What are some of the concrete steps this administration is taking to reduce climate protections? It’s been a full-court press, I would say: not only the illegal termination of probationary employees, tens of thousands of them across agencies like NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration], EPA [Environmental Protection Agency], and NASA, but the changing of language [around climate change]. This willful ignorance seems very reminiscent of COVID under the first Trump administration. You may recall that President Trump argued that COVID was no worse than the seasonal flu. He seemed intent on downplaying any danger to the U.S. public that might interfere with the economy. Why do I mention that? Because it’s the same deal with climate change. If you pretend it doesn’t exist, then you can go on with business as usual, Drill baby, drill, all that kind of stuff. And that’s what’s happening. The administration is pretending that human-caused climate change isn’t happening, and everything’s fine, when it isn’t. In addition to the firings, in addition to the censorship, againas has been widely reportedaccess to data is reducing. [For example,] because of some of the firings at NOAA, there aren’t scientists to launch weather balloons. At a number of locations, weather balloons are critically important. They make measurements of temperature and moisture, and those measurements are ingested by weather forecast models. They help the weather forecast models to know something about the current state of the atmosphere and the surface of the ocean, and that information is extremely important in making a reliable weather forecast. Because of the firings, we’re losing some of the weather balloon information that flows into weather forecasts. So all of this taken together, when you take a step back and look at it, is an effort to keep the public ignorant about the reality and seriousness of climate change. Do you think that there’s any possibility that other countries might be able to step in to fill the gaps the U.S. is creating? I hope that there are folks in space agencies like the European Space Agency, the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (German Aerospace Center), and in Japan and China, who understand the seriousness of the threat to the continuity of these records. These aren’t records that just the U.S. uses. The entire world uses these estimates of global-scale changes in the atmosphere, the ocean, the land surface for evaluating climate models, for doing fingerprint research, for improving our basic understanding of the atmospheric and ocean general circulation. And the U.S. has been a leader in this Earth observation enterprise and in making these datasets available to the international community. Now all of that work is imperiled, so the hope is that there are indeed folks who are contingency-planning in other countries who are trying to figure out, well, what do we do? But if these satellites go away, the unfortunate thing is that it takes time, right? You can’t just launch a satellite and do this gap-filling very quickly. The development of new satellites and the launching of new satellites is the stuff of years, not the stuff of months. It also would mean a huge financial investment in gap-filling, in the ocean, and in the satellite measurements of temperature, moisture, winds, you name it. So it is concerning. Hopefully there are those in Congress who will push back against the president’s budget request for NASA and will recognize that if the U.S hands off the baton of leadership in Earth observation to other countries, it will be difficult to flip a switch and restart. In part because they will lose hundreds, perhaps thousands of good people who have no prospect of employment given what’s happened with NSF [National Science Foundation] grants and firings and cuts to NOAA and NASA. If you lose that expertise, then even with a change of the administration, it’s difficult to restart. This is why it’s so critically important for folks to use their voices and speak publicly about the harms caused by this willful ignorance, and I’m going to try continuing to do that as long as I possibly can. Scientists don’t have the hippocratic oath that doctors do, but we should. If you see that harm to the stability of climate and to present and future generations is being caused, then, in my opinion, you have a moral and ethical responsibility as a climate scientist to speak out against that. Do you have any advice for young people looking to get into the sustainability world in this tumultuous time? Keep plugging away. If you’re passionate about the science, if it’s part of your identity, find a way to do it. I can’t imagine not doing research. It’s part of who I am. It’s part of what I think about when I get up in the morning. For anyone who is really concerned about the kind of world in which they and their loved ones will grow up, find a way of continuing to [work on climate research and advocacy], even if it’s only in your spare time and you have to have a different day job. Science has to find a way of continuing. It’s a harsh world out there now with a lot of powerful people wanting to fundamentally change the scientific enterprise in the United States and remove consideration of inequities in our society causing unequal impacts of climate change. Science has to find a way of continuing, of living, of tackling the big questions of the day, irrespective of whether the administration likes or does not like the answer.
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Duolingo isnt just a cute green owl, its a masterclass in psychology, gamification, and habit-building. In this video, we break down the hidden tactics Duolingo uses to keep you coming back. From streaks and notifications to clever sound design and reward systems, you’ll discover how this app turns language learning into something you can’t stop engaging with. Whether you’re a language nerd or just curious how apps keep you hooked, this explainer will open your eyes.
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Like it or not, artificial intelligence has become part of daily life. Many devicesincluding electric razors and toothbrusheshave become AI-powered, using machine learning algorithms to track how a person uses the device, how the device is working in real time, and provide feedback. From asking questions to an AI assistant like ChatGPT or Microsoft Copilot to monitoring a daily fitness routine with a smartwatch, many people use an AI system or tool every day. While AI tools and technologies can make life easier, they also raise important questions about data privacy. These systems often collect large amounts of data, sometimes without people even realizing their data is being collected. The information can then be used to identify personal habits and preferences, and even predict future behaviors by drawing inferences from the aggregated data. As an assistant professor of cybersecurity at West Virginia University, I study how emerging technologies and various types of AI systems manage personal data and how we can build more secure, privacy-preserving systems for the future. Generative AI software uses large amounts of training data to create new content such as text or images. Predictive AI uses data to forecast outcomes based on past behavior, such as how likely you are to hit your daily step goal, or what movies you may want to watch. Both types can be used to gather information about you. How AI tools collect data Generative AI assistants such as ChatGPT and Google Gemini collect all the information users type into a chat box. Every question, response and prompt that users enter is recorded, stored, and analyzed to improve the AI model. OpenAIs privacy policy informs users that we may use content you provide us to improve our Services, for example to train the models that power ChatGPT. Even though OpenAI allows you to opt out of content use for model training, it still collects and retains your personal data. Although some companies promise that they anonymize this data, meaning they store it without naming the person who provided it, there is always a risk of data being reidentified. Predictive AI Beyond generative AI assistants, social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok continuously gather data on their users to train predictive AI models. Every post, photo, video, like, share, and comment, including the amount of time people spend looking at each of these, is collected as data points that are used to build digital data profiles for each person who uses the service. The profiles can be used to refine the social media platforms AI recommender systems. They can also be sold to data brokers, who sell a persons data to other companies to, for instance, help develop targeted advertisements that align with that persons interests. Many social media companies also track users across websites and applications by putting cookies and embedded tracking pixels on their computers. Cookies are small files that store information about who you are and what you clicked on while browsing a website. One of the most common uses of cookies is in digital shopping carts: When you place an item in your cart, leave the website and return later, the item will still be in your cart because the cookie stored that information. Tracking pixels are invisible images or snippets of code embedded in websites that notify companies of your activity when you visit their page. This helps them track your behavior across the internet. This is why users often see or hear advertisements that are related to their browsing and shopping habits on many of the unrelated websites they browse, and even when they are using different devices, including computers, phones, and smart speakers. One study found that some websites can store over 300 tracking cookies on your computer or mobile phone. Data privacy controlsand limitations Like generative AI platforms, social media platforms offer privacy settings and opt-outs, but these give people limited control over how their personal data is aggregated and monetized. As media theorist Douglas Rushkoff argued in 2011, if the service is free, you are the product. Many tools that include AI dont require a person to take any direct action for the tool to collect data about that person. Smart devices such as home speakers, fitness trackers, and watches continually gather information through biometric sensors, voice recognition, and location tracking. Smart home speakers continually listen for the command to activate or wake up the device. As the device is listening for this word, it picks up all the conversations happening around it, even though it does not seem to be active. Some companies claim that voice data is only stored when the wake wordwhat you say to wake up the deviceis detected. However, people have raised concerns about accidental recordings, especially because these devices are often connected to cloud services, which allow voice data to be stored, synced, and shared across multiple devices such as your phone, smart speaker and tablet. If the company allows, its also possible for this data to be accessed by third parties, such as advertisers, data analytic firms, or a law enforcement agency with a warrant. Privacy rollbacks This potential for third-party access also applies to smartwatches and fitness trackers, which monitor health metrics and user activity patterns. Companies that produce wearable fitness devices are not considered covered entities and so are not bound by the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA). This means that they are legally allowed to sell health- and location-related data collected from their users. Concerns about HIPAA data arose in 2018, when Strava, a fitness company released a global heat map of users exercise routes. In doing so, it accidentally revealed sensitive military locations across the globe through highlighting the exercise routes of military personnel. The Trump administration has tapped Palantir, a company that specializes in using AI for data analytics, to collate and analyze data about Americans. Meanwhile, Palantir has announced a partnership with a company that runs self-checkout systems. Such partnerships can expand corporate and government reach into everyday consumer behavior. This one could be used to create detailed personal profiles on Americans by linking their consumer habits with other personal data. This raises concerns about increased surveillance and loss of anonymity. It could allow citizens to be tracked and analyzed across multiple aspects of their lives without their knowledge or consent. Some smart device companies are also rolling back privacy protections instead of strengthening them. Amazon recently announced that starting on March 28, all voice recordings from Amazon Echo devices would be sent to Amazons cloud by default, and users will no longer have the option to turn this function off. This is different from previous settings, which allowed users to limit private data collection. Changes like these raise concerns about how much control consumers have over their own data when using smart devices. Many privacy experts consider cloud storage of voice recordings a form of data collection, especially when used to improve algorithms or build user profiles, which has implications for data privacy laws designed to protect online privacy. Implications for data privacy All of this brings up serious privacy concerns for people and governments on how AI tools collect, store, use, and transmit data. The biggest concern is transparency. People dont know what data is being collected, how the data is being used, and who has access to that data. Companies tend to use complicated privacy policies filled with technical jargon to make it difficult for people to understand the terms of a service that they agree to. People also tend not to read terms of service documents. One study found that people averaged 73 seconds reading a terms of service document that had an average read time of 29 to 32 minutes. Data collected by AI tools may initially reside with a company that you trust, but can easily be sold and given to a company that you dont trust. AI tools, the companies in charge of them and the companies that have access to the data they collect can also be subject to cyberattacks and data breaches that can reveal sensitive personal information. These attacks can by carried out by cybercriminals who are in it for the money, or by so-called advanced persistent threats, which are typically nation or state-sponsored attackers who gain access to networks and systems and remain there undetected, collecting information and personal data to eventually cause disruption or harm. While laws and regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation in the European Union and the California Consumer Privacy Act aim to safeguard user data, AI development and use have often outpaced the legislative process. The laws are still catching up on AI and data privacy. For now, you should assume any AI-powered device or platform is collecting data on your inputs, behaviors, and patterns. Using AI tools Although AI tools collect peoples data, and the way this accumulation of data affects peoples data privacy is concerning, the tools can also be useful. AI-powered applications can streamline workflows, automate repetitive tasks and provide valuable insights. But its crucial to approach these tools with awareness and caution. When using a generative AI platform that gives you answers to questions you type in a prompt, dont include any personally identifiable information, including names, birth dates, Social Security numbers, or home addresses. At the workplace, dont include trade secrets or classified information. In general, dont put anything into a prompt that you wouldnt feel comfortable revealing to the public or seeing on a billboard. Remember, once you hit enter on the prompt, youve lost control of that information. Remember that devices which are turned on are always listeningeven if theyre asleep. If you use smart home or embedded devices, turn them off when you need to have a private conversation. A device thats asleep looks inactive, but it is still powered on and listening for a wake word or signal. Unplugging a device or removing its batteries is a good way of making sure the device is truly off. Finally, be aware of the terms of service and data collection policies of the devices and platforms that you are using. You might be surprised by what youve already agreed to. This article is part of a series on data privacy that explores who collects your data, what and how they collect, who sells and buys your data, what they all do with it, and what you can do about it. Christopher Ramezan is an assistant professor of cybersecurity at West Virginia University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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