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Opinion: AI is about to transform childhood in a big way. Are we ready?

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

With the introduction of GPT-4 and Claude, AI has taken another big step forward. GPT-4 is human-level or better at many hard tasks, a huge improvement over GPT-3.5, which was released only a few months ago. Yet amid the debate over these advances, there has been very little discussion of one of the most profound effects of AI large language models: how they will reshape childhood.In the future, every middle-class kid will grow up with a personalized AI assistant — so long as the parents are OK with that.Having an AI service for your child will be as normal as having a pet, except the AI service will never bite. It will be carried around in something like a tablet, though with a design that is oriented toward the AI.Recent developments suggest that AI models can be both commoditized and customized more easily and cheaply than expected. So parents will be able to choose what kind of companion they want their kids to have — in contrast to the free-for-all of the internet. The availabl...

Opinion: Feds’ Tesla recall doesn’t go far enough, California must act

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

California leaders needs to do what the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration so far failed to achieve: Keep Californians safe from Tesla’s flawed Full Self-Driving beta software.A nationwide recall of 362,758 Tesla vehicles equipped with Full Self-Driving, or FSD, software didn’t go far enough. Worse, NHTSA has been handling Tesla with kid gloves.Specifically, the recall indicated that the software may allow the vehicle to act unsafe around intersections, such as traveling straight through an intersection while in a turn-only lane; entering a stop sign-controlled intersection without coming to a complete stop; or proceeding into an intersection during a steady yellow traffic signal without due caution. The vehicle may respond insufficiently to changes in posted speed limits. And the FSD software does not adequately account for the driver’s adjustment of the vehicle’s speed to exceed posted speed limits.Still, numerous issues remain with the recall:• Teslas with FSD softwar...

Elias: Supreme Court case in works may cancel California’s EV mandates

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

California government bureaucrats call it the “Advanced Clean Car II Rule,” last August’s update to the state’s prior edict mandating that all new cars sold here be all-electric or plug-in hybrids by 2035. Between now and then, other benchmarks are also to be set, starting with 35% of new cars sold being electric vehicles (EVs) starting in 2026, just three years from today.Related ArticlesLocal Opinion | Opinion: Senior year is a costly high school rite of passage Local Opinion | Elias: California’s fentanyl death rate likely rising due to mislabeled pills Local Opinion | Elias: California’s transit budget cut makes sense in light of numbers Local Opinion | Elias: Six other states ganging up on California over Colorado River water Local Opinion | Elias: California’s slavery reparations plan won’t sell if it lacks credibility Since the rule passed, it’s been a theme for folks who l...

Correction: Britain-Russia-Ukraine story

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

LONDON (AP) — In a story published on March 20, 2023, about millions in extra funding pledged to support war crimes investigations in Ukraine by the International Criminal Court, The Associated Press erroneously reported that former Liberian President Charles Taylor was convicted by the ICC. He was convicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone.Source

Paul Newman’s camp for sick kids rises from the ashes

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

ASHFORD, Conn. (AP) — Amarey Brookshire was devastated when she heard about the fire at the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp for seriously ill children — her camp.The February 2021 blaze destroyed much of the retreat in the woods of eastern Connecticut, which was founded by the late actor Paul Newman in 1988 to give children with devastating medical conditions a place to, as he said, “raise a little hell.” The blaze burned the center of the camp, which had been made to look like an Old West town and housed the woodworking shop, the arts and crafts area, the camp store, and an educational kitchen. Fire investigators determined it was not arson but could not pinpoint a cause. Amarey, now 13, said she was in the hospital when her mom told her the news.“She told me that it was the arts and crafts and the wood shop area, so I was really sad because I love doing wood shop and like the arts and crafts,” she said. “I was really sad.”Amarey, who has sickle cell disease, thought about friends she m...

Thailand sets May 14 election, populist party tops polls

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — Thailand’s general election will take place on May 14, the country’s election regulator said Tuesday, one day after the dissolution of Parliament initiated by Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, who is seeking a fresh term. The Election Commission said registration of candidates would begin April 3.The election will pit the popular opposition Pheu Thai party, backed by billionaire populist Thaksin Shinawatra, against parties representing the conservative establishment and closely linked to the military, which has staged two coups in the last two decades. Other parties are likely to win enough seats to be wooed to join a coalition government.Prayuth dissolved Parliament just ahead of the end of the four-year term of the House of Representatives. Early dissolution allows candidates for the lower house to switch party affiliations just 30 days before the election, instead of the usual 90 days. Parties led and backed by Thaksin have won the most seats in every election sinc...

Reborn Ringling Bros. circus to leap on tour — minus animals

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus has been reimagined and reborn without animals as a high-octane family event with highwire tricks, soaring trapeze artists and bicycles leaping on trampolines.Feld Entertainment, which owns the “Greatest Show on Earth,” revealed to The Associated Press what audiences can expect during the show’s upcoming 2023 North American tour kicking off this fall.The 75 performers from 18 countries will include performers on a triangular high wire 25 feet off the ground, crisscrossing flying trapeze artists, a spinning double wheel powered by acrobats and BMX trail bikes, unicycle riders and skateboarders doing flips and tricks.The tour kicks off in Bossier City, Louisiana, from Sept 29-Oct. 1 and then goes to Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Maryland, Michigan, Indiana and ends the year in Oklahoma. It restarts in 2024 in Florida, home to Feld Entertainment.The show is a complete rethink of a modern ...

Jehovah’s Witnesses: Hamburg attack survivors out of danger

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

BERLIN (AP) — The Jehovah’s Witnesses say all of the survivors of a shooting at one of its halls in Hamburg earlier this month are out of danger.A 35-year-old German shot dead six people during a service on March 9. Nine people were wounded, including a woman who lost her unborn child. He then killed himself as police arrived. “We are happy to say that meanwhile all are out of danger of death,” the church in Germany said in a statement late Monday, adding that four people remain hospitalized.“All feel a strong need to spend time together, be it in person or by videoconference,” it added. “Sharing what they have experienced obviously helps them to process it.”Some of the survivors are “severely traumatized,” it said. “Their recovery will realistically be a long road.”The gunman, identified by German authorities only as Philipp F. due to privacy rules, was a former member who left the church two years ago. Investigators have said his departure from the church was “apparently not...

When is it legal to drive in passing lane in Colorado?

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) -- Picture this: you're cruising down the highway and someone passes you. After that, they hang out in the left lane, while keeping others from getting around.That scenario can be very frustrating for many drivers. But is it illegal? In certain situations, yes. Can you turn left at a red light in Colorado? Left lane lawColorado has a left lane law, which is used to help ease congestion and improve traffic flow, especially during peak travel periods.“A person shall not drive a motor vehicle in the passing lane of a highway if thespeed limit is sixty-five miles per hour or more unless such person is passing othermotor vehicles that are in a non-passing lane or turning left, or unless the volumeof traffic does not permit the motor vehicle to safely merge into a non-passing lane," Colorado law states. Should you slow down if a car is merging into your lane? In short, that means that if you're on a highway with a speed limit of 65 mph or more, the left lane law applies,...

Inflation is even taking a bite out of Coloradans' Big Macs

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 14:57:00 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) — This one hurts. With inflation still running rampant across a fiscally exhausted U.S., there are few breaks to catch. There is some small reprieve as rents and housing prices have ceased their upward march early in 2023, but the pandemic has still raised costs of living across the board faster in the last two years than at any point in the last 40 years. McDonald's famed Big Mac isn't immune. Denver metro 4th in nation for inflation since 2020 Global financial magazine The Economist has analyzed worldwide Big Mac prices since 1986 as a gauge for consumer buying power. This year has seen the iconic double-pattie bite of Americana rise in price faster than any of the last 10 years. The average price of a Big Mac in the United States was $5.36 as of December 2022, the highest it's ever been. In 2000, the burger cost less than half the current price - $2.24. Between December 2021 and December 2022, the Big Mac rose 6.35% in price. The last time it jumped that much in ...