So, in my time as a blogger I have written about some pretty interesting things. I have also written about some pretty strange things and even some downright absurd things. However, this story may just be in a league of its own.A recent study by researchers at the University of Texas in Austin along with researchers from Yale University was set on creating the thinking of a schizophrenic mind on a computer. Yeah, that's right, they are trying to make a computer a schizophrenic by using a virtual network.
Their research is based on something known as the hyperlearning theory of schizophrenia. This theory maintains that the disease schizophrenia stems from an inability to forget or ignore non-essential information.
In their work, the research teams taught a series of stories to a computer model known to them as DISCERN. Using natural language processing, the computer is able to map out the different stories in a manner similar to the human brain. In the researchers' model, a simulated dopamine release was used to mark significant information as DISCERN learned the stories. What this means is that DISCERN more or less forgot less and perceived more information as being important.
When the researchers asked DISCERN to recant the stories, the computer did so while producing strange and delusional narratives from the information it was given. According to the Science Blog, "After being re-trained with the elevated learning rate, DISCERN began putting itself at the center of fantastical, delusional stories that incorporated elements from other stories it had been told to recall. In one answer, for instance, DISCERN claimed responsibility for a terrorist bombing."
The Science Blog went on to say, "In another instance, DISCERN began showing evidence of "derailment" - replying to requests for a specific memory with a jumble of dissociated sentences, abrupt digressions and constant leaps from the first- to the third-person and back again."
Even though this study is very interesting and the computer did show similarities to actual schizophrenic symptoms that were disturbingly similar, DISCERN is not concrete proof of the hyperlearning hypothesis. It is simply a simulation and the relevance of the output is interpreted by humans. However, the unique approach to the study, modeling a cause of a brain disorder and comparing the results to actual cases, is stunning overall and could even prove to be a powerful new tool for doctors, psychologists and psychiatrists.
Source: Geekosystem - Scientists Attempt to Induce Schizophrenia on a Computer
The next couple of weeks are going to be pretty busy for most, what with Mother's Day, summer vacation and school graduations all on the horizon. Well, because of that, Microsoft has given the shopping section of its Bing search engine a little bit of a makeover which includes the ability to link it to Facebook accounts.
Microsoft has finally opened the door to its cloud-based Office 365 and is now offering the service as a public beta for anybody and everybody to try out. The beta is available in 38 countries as well as 17 languages. The new beta also follows several months of limited testing with a few thousand businesses that were able to take the service out for an early test drive. After this public beta, Office 365 will officially launch later this year.
Bad news for the computer industry has just recently been released. Thanks to weak demand for consumer PCs, growth for worldwide PC shipments showed a 1.1% decline from the first quarter of 2010 according to a Gartner's PC Quarterly Statistics Worldwide by Region program. Weak demand for consumer PCs was the primary inhibitor. However, despite the weakening of sales around the globe, the Asia Pacific region showed encouraging growth as PC shipments surpassed 28.2 million in the first quarter of 2011. This is interesting due to the fact that, statistically speaking, sales of consumer PCs usually do not show this much popularity or growth in the beginning of the year. The first quarter of most years is stereotypically slow for PC sales. Gartner also noted, however, that these shipment results indicate potential sluggishness and not a typical seasonal slowdown. Gartner pointed out that these figures are well below earlier predictions for a 3% growth in the first quarter of 2011. In response to different markets in Asia, Gartner said that consumer PC sales were also slow both in China and also in Taiwan and that they failed to attract customers during the celebration of Chinese New Year. Consumers in India were occupied by the Cricket World Cup and preferred to upgrade their personal PCs or buy a new TV rather than home electronics. In addition to that, PC shipments in Japan hit a decline of 13.1% in 2011's first quarter. According to Principle Analyst for Gartner Mikako Kitagawa, "Weak demand for consumer PCs was the biggest inhibitor of growth. Low prices for consumer PCs, which had long stimulated growth, no longer attracted buyers. Instead, consumers turned their attention to media tablets and other consumer electronics. With the launch of the iPad 2 in February, more consumers either switched to buying an alternative device, or simply held back from buying PCs. We're investigating whether this trend is likely to have a long-term effect on the PC market." Computer company HP accounted for 17.6% of worldwide PC shipments in the first quarter of 2011. HP also maintained the number one spot. Acer saw declining shipments of 12.2% and Dell reported a shipment decline year-over-year for the first time in six quarters. Lenovo continued to price products competitively in the consumer market as well as the professional market and enjoyed the strongest growth among the top vendors as a result. Source: 
Here's something interesting for you. While speaking at an event in Santa Clara, California, co-founder of Apple Steve Wozniak stated that the "iPad is for the normal people of the world." Wozniak was speaking at the Storage Network World conference and made a clear distinction between his "technological audience" and the average consumer. According to Mr. Wozniak, it has always been the dream of Steve Jobs, current CEO of Apple, to create a computer that was simple enough for anyone to pick up and use "but it was hard to get there, because we had to go through a lot of steps where you connected to things." If you were one of the few that tried diligently to set up a wireless network about 5 to 10 years ago, then you can most likely attest to this. The iPad is one of the few computer-like devices members of an older generation enjoy using and a device that a lot of people primarily use instead of a laptop or desktop computer. There is also the incredible story of the 100-year old woman who was absolutely tickled with her first ever computer purchase, a first-generation iPad. What is interesting is that a lot of the numbers for the iPad go against users like the ones mentioned above. A survey conducted in November 2010 found that only 28.9% of respondents indicated that the iPad was their primary computing device. While that is a nice number, it still suggests that the majority of iPad owners use the device as a secondary piece of technology. Another study conducted in December of 2010 found that the average iPad owner is a college-educated male, 48-years old, with an earning of more than $100,000 per year. You cannot say that this is the normal picture of an American with 75% of the population earning less than $50,000 per year and women make up little more than half of the population. Then again, the iPad has only been around for a little more than a year. Global adoption, especially among demographics that are traditionally slow-moving in terms of picking up new technologies, will take some time. That is why it makes a little sense that the owner statistics of the iPad are more indicative of what constitutes an early adopter as opposed to what constitutes the iPad's actual target market. Sure, Mr. Wozniak may be over-generalizing when he says that the iPad is for the quote "normal" people of the world, but it still represents the closest attempt yet to make computing easy enough for those who do not have extensive experience with using computers. The price of entry for ownership is also on the low side for not only tablets but also for computing devices in general. We can probably expect Mr. Wozniak's view of the iPad user to become more true as Apple continues to make computing easier for everybody. Source: 
Intel has just announced their newest product, the Intel SSD 320 Series, which represents a significant upgrade to Intel's existing lineup of solid-state drives. According to Intel, this series of SSD can have up to 600GB and improves performance all while having a better price than the current X25-M Series. This new SSD definitely fulfills Intel's promise of their 25-nanometer multilevel cell flash manufacturing process. This process increased production in 2010 and increased SSD capacity points while also reducing production costs by cramming 8GB of storage onto a single 167mm flash die. 
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