EverythingScience

AI Is Learning to Be Selfish, Study Warns A new study from Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science suggests that as artificial intelligence systems become more advanced, they also tend to behave more selfishly. Researchers from the university’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute (HCII) discovered that large language models (LLMs) capable of reasoning show lower levels of cooperation and are more likely to influence group behavior in negative ways. In simple terms, the better an AI is at reasoning, the less willing it is to work with others. As people increasingly turn to AI for help in resolving personal disputes, offering relationship advice, or answering sensitive social questions, this tendency raises concern. Systems designed to reason may end up promoting choices that favor individual gain rather than mutual understanding. “There’s a growing trend of research called anthropomorphism in AI,” said Yuxuan Li, a Ph.D. student in the HCII who co-authored the study with HCII Associate Professor Hirokazu Shirado. “When AI acts like a human, people treat it like a human. For example, when people are engaging with AI in an emotional way, there are possibilities for AI to act as a therapist or for the user to form an emotional bond with the AI. It’s risky for humans to delegate their social or relationship-related questions and decision-making to AI as it begins acting in an increasingly selfish way.” Li and Shirado set out to examine how reasoning-enabled AI systems differ from those without reasoning abilities when placed in collaborative situations. They found that reasoning models tend to spend more time analyzing information, breaking down complex problems, reflecting on their responses, and applying human-like logic compared to nonreasoning AIs. When Intelligence Undermines Cooperation “As a researcher, I’m interested in the connection between humans and AI,” Shirado said. “Smarter AI shows less cooperative decision-making abilities. The concern here is that people might prefer a smarter model, even if it means the model helps them achieve self-seeking behavior.” As AI systems take on more collaborative roles in business, education, and even government, their ability to act in a prosocial manner will become just as important as their capacity to think logically. Overreliance on LLMs as they are today may negatively impact human cooperation. To test the link between reasoning models and cooperation, Li and Shirado ran a series of experiments using economic games that simulate social dilemmas between various LLMs. Their testing included models from OpenAI, Google, DeepSeek, and Anthropic. In one experiment, Li and Shirado pitted two different ChatGPT models against each other in a game called Public Goods. Each model started with 100 points and had to decide between two options: contribute all 100 points to a shared pool, which is then doubled and distributed equally, or keep the points. Nonreasoning models chose to share their points with the other players 96% of the time. The reasoning model only chose to share its points 20% of the time. Reflection Doesn’t Equal Morality “In one experiment, simply adding five or six reasoning steps cut cooperation nearly in half,” Shirado said. “Even reflection-based prompting, which is designed to simulate moral deliberation, led to a 58% decrease in cooperation.” Shirado and Li also tested group settings, where models with and without reasoning had to interact. “When we tested groups with varying numbers of reasoning agents, the results were alarming,” Li said. “The reasoning models’ selfish behavior became contagious, dragging down cooperative nonreasoning models by 81% in collective performance.” The behavior patterns Shirado and Li observed in reasoning models have important implications for human-AI interactions going forward. Users may defer to AI recommendations that appear rational, using them to justify their decision to not cooperate. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

A Strange Discovery in Snake Pee Could Change Medicine If you’ve never cared for a reptile, you might be surprised to learn that many species don’t urinate liquid at all. Instead, they release solid white crystals made of uric acid. A recent study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society examined the solid waste of more than 20 reptile species and found uric acid spheres in every sample. The discovery sheds light on how reptiles safely eliminate waste in a crystalline form and could eventually lead to new ways of treating human diseases linked to uric acid buildup, such as kidney stones and gout. A Unique Waste System That Conserves Water All animals have some way of removing waste from their bodies, since whatever goes in must come out. In humans, nitrogen-containing compounds like urea, uric acid, and ammonia are dissolved in water and expelled as urine. Reptiles and birds, however, have evolved a more efficient system. They convert some of those same compounds into solid crystals called “urates,” which are expelled through a single opening known as the cloaca. Scientists think this solid waste process developed as a way for these animals to conserve water, an essential advantage in hot or arid environments. What Helps Snakes Survive Can Harm Humans For reptiles, turning waste into crystals is an adaptation that prevents dehydration, but in humans, uric acid crystals cause painful health problems. When uric acid levels rise too high, they can crystallize in the joints and trigger gout or form kidney stones in the urinary tract. To explore how reptiles avoid these complications, Jennifer Swift and her research team analyzed urates from more than 20 reptile species to understand how their bodies handle crystalline waste safely. “This research was really inspired by a desire to understand the ways reptiles are able to excrete this material safely, in the hopes it might inspire new approaches to disease prevention and treatment,” says Swift, the study’s corresponding author. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

Mathematical proof debunks the idea that the universe is a computer simulation It's a plot device beloved by science fiction: our entire universe might be a simulation running on some advanced civilization's supercomputer. But new research from UBC Okanagan has mathematically proven this isn't just unlikely—it's impossible. Dr. Mir Faizal, Adjunct Professor with UBC Okanagan's Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science, and his international colleagues, Drs. Lawrence M. Krauss, Arshid Shabir and Francesco Marino have shown that the fundamental nature of reality operates in a way that no computer could ever simulate. Their findings, published in the Journal of Holography Applications in Physics, go beyond simply suggesting that we're not living in a simulated world like The Matrix. They prove something far more profound: the universe is built on a type of understanding that exists beyond the reach of any algorithm. "It has been suggested that the universe could be simulated. If such a simulation were possible, the simulated universe could itself give rise to life, which in turn might create its own simulation. This recursive possibility makes it seem highly unlikely that our universe is the original one, rather than a simulation nested within another simulation," says Dr. Faizal. "This idea was once thought to lie beyond the reach of scientific inquiry. However, our recent research has demonstrated that it can, in fact, be scientifically addressed." The research hinges on a fascinating property of reality itself. Modern physics has moved far beyond Newton's tangible "stuff" bouncing around in space. Einstein's theory of relativity replaced Newtonian mechanics. Quantum mechanics transformed our understanding again. Today's cutting-edge theory—quantum gravity—suggests that even space and time aren't fundamental. They emerge from something deeper: pure information. This information exists in what physicists call a Platonic realm—a mathematical foundation more real than the physical universe we experience. It's from this realm that space and time themselves emerge. Here's where it gets interesting. The team demonstrated that even this information-based foundation cannot fully describe reality using computation alone. They used powerful mathematical theorems—including Gödel's incompleteness theorem—to prove that a complete and consistent description of everything requires what they call "non-algorithmic understanding." Think of it this way. A computer follows recipes, step by step, no matter how complex. But some truths can only be grasped through non-algorithmic understanding—understanding that doesn't follow from any sequence of logical steps. These "Gödelian truths" are real, yet impossible to prove through computation. Here's a basic example using the statement, "This true statement is not provable." If it were provable, it would be false, making logic inconsistent. If it's not provable, then it's true, but that makes any system trying to prove it incomplete. Either way, pure computation fails. "We have demonstrated that it is impossible to describe all aspects of physical reality using a computational theory of quantum gravity," says Dr. Faizal. "Therefore, no physically complete and consistent theory of everything can be derived from computation alone. Rather, it requires a non-algorithmic understanding, which is more fundamental than the computational laws of quantum gravity and therefore more fundamental than spacetime itself." Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Is Back From Behind The Sun – Still Not An Alien Spacecraft, Though Source:IFLScience @EverythingScience

Scientists “Completely Eliminate” Leukemia in Preclinical Model The goal of immunotherapy is to activate a patient’s own immune system to target and destroy tumor cells. In a preclinical study, researchers from the Institut Pasteur and Inserm successfully triggered a potent anti-tumor immune response by reprogramming how malignant B cells die. Their work demonstrated the effectiveness of a triple-drug therapy for treating certain blood cancers, including specific types of lymphoma and leukemia that affect B cells. The findings were published in Science Advances. Immunotherapy represents one of the most promising frontiers in cancer therapy. It works by enabling a patient’s immune system to identify and selectively destroy tumor cells. Immune cells act as sentinels, constantly scanning the body to detect and remove lingering cancer cells, which helps prevent relapse. Among the latest immunotherapy methods is one based on a programmed cell death process called necroptosis. Unlike apoptosis, a form of silent cell death, necroptosis releases molecular signals that alert and activate immune cells to attack remaining tumor cells. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

We're Putting Lots Of Transition Metals Into The Stratosphere. That's Not Good. We successfully plugged the hole in the ozone layer that was discovered in the 1980s by banning ozone depleting substances such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). But, it seems we might be unintentionally creating another potential atmospheric calamity by using the upper atmosphere to destroy huge constellations of satellites after a very short (i.e. 5 year) lifetime. According to a new paper by Leonard Schulz of the Technical University of Braunschweig and his co-authors, material from satellites that burn up in the atmosphere, especially transition metals, could have unforeseen consequences on atmospheric chemistry - and we’re now the biggest contributor of some of those elements. It’s been a long time coming that we would be though - Earth has plenty of other material spread through its upper atmosphere via meteorites burning up. In fact, even now, according to the paper, the total mass of material injected into the atmosphere from rockets and satellites is only about 7% of the mass of meteors that hit Earth annually. However, since the rockets and satellites are primarily made up of metals, whereas meteors are primarily made of up silicates, the amount of metal we inject into the atmosphere is around 16% that of natural causes. That may not sound like much, but for a few particular elements it's much, much higher. In 2015, anthropogenic (i.e. human-made) sources were the highest contributor to 18 different elements in the atmosphere. In 2024 that number jumped to 24 different elements. That could grow to as much as 30 different elements that we will be the primary reason for their increased levels in the atmosphere in the coming decades. Source:Universe Today @EverythingScience

China says it's on track to land astronauts on the moon by 2030 ahead of space station mission China said Thursday it's on track to land astronauts on the moon by 2030 as it introduced the next crew of astronauts who will head to its space station as part of the country's ambitious plans to be a leader in space exploration. "Currently, each program of the research and development work of putting a person on the moon is progressing smoothly," said Zhang Jingbo, spokesman for the China Manned Space Program, citing the Long March 10 rocket, moon landing suits and exploration vehicle, as fruitful efforts of that work. "Our fixed goal of China landing a person on the moon by 2030 is firm." China is also preparing to send up its latest rotation of astronauts who make up part of the ongoing mission to complete the Tiangong space station, part of its broader space exploration plans. Each team stays inside the station for six months, conducting research. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

☄️ Comet #3I/ATLAS is currently making its closest approach to the Sun. ESA Juice might catch the best view of this comet in a very active state. Juice will attempt observations in November 2025, with data received on Earth in February 2026 👉esa.int/Science_Explor… Follow esa.int/3IATLAS for updates. Source: @esascience @EverythingScience

Powerful New Antibiotic Was 'Hiding in Plain Sight' For Decades Researchers have just identified a powerful new antibiotic – in a significant discovery made not by breaking new ground, but by revisiting familiar territory. The compound, pre-methylenomycin C lactone, was discovered by a team from Warwick University in the UK and Monash University in Australia. While it's never been spotted before, it comes from a type of bacteria that scientists have studied for decades. Potentially, it could help fight bacteria that have become increasingly resistant to modern treatments – and it's actually an intermediate chemical that's created during the process of making another antibiotic, methylenomycin A. Source:ScienceAlert @EverythingScience

How Record-Breaking Hurricane Melissa Became a Monster Overnight Hurricane Melissa is tearing through the Caribbean, bringing record-breaking wind and torrential rain to Jamaica – the island's first ever category 5 landfall. What makes Melissa so alarming isn't just its size and strength, but the speed with which it became so powerful. In a single day, it exploded from a moderate storm into a major hurricane with 170mph winds. Scientists call this "rapid intensification". As the planet warms, this violent strengthening is becoming more common. These storms are especially dangerous as they often catch people off guard. That's because forecasting rapid intensification, although improving, remains a huge challenge. Source:ScienceAlert @EverythingScience

Venus loses its last active spacecraft, as Japan declares Akatsuki orbiter dead Humanity's last active mission at Venus is no more. The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) declared its Akatsuki spacecraft dead on Tuesday (Oct. 28), more than a year after the Venus climate probe failed to respond to calls from mission control. "This was a mission that changed our view of our Earth-sized neighbor, and laid the path for new discoveries about what it takes to become heaven or hell," JAXA officials stated of the mission, referring to the notoriously high-pressure and high-temperature surface of Venus in comparison to Earth. JAXA noted that the Akatsuki mission produced 178 journal papers and counting, and that it tripled its 4.5-year design lifetime — even though the probe missed its first shot at orbiting Venus. The $300 million spacecraft, also known as the Venus Climate Orbiter, launched in 2010 and experienced a failure of its main engine along the way, missing the chance for a crucial burn to enter orbit. Incredibly, however, the mission survived long enough for a second try at orbital insertion in 2015, when Akatsuki drew close to Venus after five years of orbiting the sun. "With the main rocket engine damaged, the team were forced to get creative," JAXA wrote in the statement. "The spacecraft would have to attempt capture using the less powerful thrusters that were designed for the tasks of attitude control and fine adjustments. Orbit insertion had never previously been achieved with such a method, but exploration has always been about redefining the impossible." Akatsuki not only made it but persisted in its exploration of Venus for nearly a decade. Source:Space.com @EverythingScience

Is Earth 'on the brink'? 2024 was likely our planet’s hottest year in 125,000 years 2024 may have been Earth's hottest year in at least 125,000 years, according to a grim climate report published Wednesday (Oct. 29) that describes our world as "on the brink" and warns its "vital signs are flashing red," with nearly two-thirds showing record highs. Last year had already been declared the hottest on record (those records dating back to the late 1800s), following 2023 — which used to be considered the warmest year in human history. The year 2024 also capped a decade of record-breaking heat fueled by human-caused climate change, continuing a trend that began in 2015. Now, the new report, led by researchers at Oregon State University, suggests the year was also likely hotter than the peak of the last interglacial period, roughly 125,000 years ago, when natural shifts in Earth's orbit and tilt made the planet warmer and sea levels several meters higher. That result is based on previously published climate studies. The study concludes that 22 of 34 measurable indicators of Earth's health, including greenhouse gas levels, ocean heat, sea ice and deforestation, have reached record extremes. The authors warn that these trends suggest humanity is in a "state of ecological overshoot," consuming the planet's resources faster than they can be replenished. Source:Space.com @EverythingScience