Day: June 27, 2024

The German chemical giant BASF has pulled out of a $2.6bn project to refine nickel on the Indonesian island of Halmahera, after campaigners highlighted the plight of uncontacted people in the area.

The ‘Sonic Bay’ project, in partnership with France’s Eramet, was intended to refine nickel and cobalt mined by Weda Bay Nickel (WBN), whose operations have been held responsible by NGOs like Survival International for destroying the rainforest home to the uncontacted indigenous Hongana Manyawa tribe.

Weda Bay Nickel is part owned by Eramet.;

Survival International supporters had sent the companies more than 20,000 emails protesting at the plan, and Survival had repeatedly lobbied both BASF and the German authorities.

Survival’s campaign has revealed that much of the area being mined by WBN is the territory of uncontacted Hongana Manyawa people. A recent video showing an uncontacted Hongana Manyawa family coming to a mining camp to ask for food after their rainforest was destroyed went viral, and prompted senior Indonesian politicians to call for their land to be spared.

The uncontacted Hongana Manyawa are becoming effectively forced to beg for food from the same companies destroying their rainforest home.

Despite the scrapping of the refinery project, Weda Bay Nickel – which is the world’s biggest nickel mine – is currently set to continue. The nickel is destined for electric car batteries. Tesla, which has signed agreements worth billions of dollars with Indonesian nickel and cobalt suppliers, recently announced that it was ‘exploring the need for a no-go zone’ to protect uncontacted Indigenous peoples. The statement has been widely interpreted as signaling its concerns about nickel from Halmahera because of the mine’s impact on the Hongana Manyawa.

;”This major announcement by BASF comes after sustained pressure from Survival and tens of thousands of our supporters, who have consistently said that the ‘Sonic Bay’ project would turbo-charge nickel mining on Halmahera – and accelerate the destruction of the uncontacted Hongana Manyawa,” said Caroline Pearce, Director of Survival International.;

“BASF’s withdrawal means that they, at least, will not be complicit in the Hongana Manyawa’s destruction.

“But Eramet, and other companies, are still ripping up the rainforest and the uncontacted Hongana Manyawa simply won’t survive without it. They must stop now, for good, before it’s too late,” said Pearce.

When most people think of artificial intelligence, they’re probably thinking of — and worrying about — ChatGPT and deepfakes. AI-generated text and images dominate our social media feeds and the other websites we visit, sometimes without us knowing it, and are often used to spread unreliable and misleading information.

But what if text-generating models like ChatGPT could actually spot deepfake images?

 A University at Buffalo-led research team has applied large language models (LLMs), including OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, toward spotting deepfakes of human faces. Their study, presented last week at the IEEE/CVF Conference on Computer Vision & Pattern Recognition, found that LLMs’ performance lagged behind that of state-of-the-art deepfake detection algorithms, but their natural language processing may actually make them the more practical detection tool in the future. 

“What sets LLMs apart from existing detection methods is the ability to explain their findings in a way that’s comprehensible to humans, like identifying an incorrect shadow or a mismatched pair of earrings,” says the study’s lead author, Siwei Lyu, PhD, SUNY Empire Innovation Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, within the UB School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. “LLMs were not designed or trained for deepfake detection, but their semantic knowledge makes them well suited for it, so we expect to see more efforts toward this application.”

Collaborators on the study include the University at Albany and the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen. The work was supported by the National Science Foundation.

How language models understand images

Trained on much of the available text on the internet — amounting to some 300 billion words — ChatGPT finds statistical patterns and relationships between words in order to generate responses.

The latest versions of ChatGPT and other LLMs can also analyze images. These multimodal LLMs use large databases of captioned photos to find the relationships between words and images.;

“Humans do this as well. Whether it be a stop sign or a viral meme, we constantly assign a semantic description to images,” says the study’s first author, Shan Jai, assistant lab director in the UB Media Forensic Lab. “In this way, images become their own language.”

The Media Forensics Lab team decided to test if GPT-4 with vision (GPT-4V) and Gemini 1.0 could tell the difference between real faces and faces generated by AI. They gave it thousands of images of both real and deepfake faces and asked it to identify any potential signs of manipulation, or synthetic artifacts.;

ChatGPT advantages

ChatGPT was accurate 79.5% of the time on detecting synthetic artifacts in images generated by latent diffusion, and 77.2% of the time on StyleGAN-generated images.;

“This is comparable to earlier deepfake detection methods, so with proper prompt guidance, ChatGPT can do a fairly decent job at detecting AI-generated images,” says Lyu, who is also co-director of UB’s Center for Information Integrity.

More crucially, ChatGPT could explain its decision making in plain language. When provided an AI-generated photo of a man with glasses, the model correctly pointed out that “the hair on the left side of the image slightly blurs” and “the transition between the person and the background is a bit abrupt and lacks depth.”

“Existing deepfake detection models will tell us the probability of an image being real or fake, but they will very rarely tell us why they came to this conclusion. And even if we look into the model’s underlying mechanisms, there will be features that we simply can’t understand,” Lyu says. “Meanwhile, everything ChatGPT outputs is understandable to humans.”

That’s because ChatGPT bases its analysis on semantic knowledge alone. Whereas traditional deepfake detection algorithms distinguish real from fake by training on large datasets of images labeled real or fake, LLMs’ natural language abilities give them something of a common sense understanding of reality — at least when they’re not hallucinating — including the typical symmetry of human faces and the look of real photographs.

“Once the vision component of ChatGPT understands an image as a human face, the language component can make the inference that a face will typically have two eyes, and so on,” Lyu says. “The language component provides a deeper connection between visual and verbal concepts.”

ChatGPT’s semantic knowledge and natural language processing make it a more user-friendly deepfake tool for both users and developers, the study concluded.

“Typically, we take insights about detecting deepfakes and convert them into programming language. Now, all this knowledge is present within a single model and we need only use natural language to bring out that knowledge,” Lyu says.

ChatGPT drawbacks

ChatGPT’s performance was well below the latest deepfake detection algorithms, which have accuracy rates in the mid- to high-90s.

This was partly because LLMs can’t catch signal-level statistical differences that are invisible to the human eye but often used by detection algorithms to spot AI-generated images.;

“ChatGPT focused only on semantic-level abnormalities,” Lyu says. “In this way, the semantic intuitiveness of the ChatGPT’s results may actually be a double-edged sword for deepfake detection.”

And other LLMs may not be as effective at explaining their analysis. Despite performing comparatively to ChatGPT at guessing the presence of synthetic artifacts, Gemini’s supporting evidence was often nonsensical, like pointing out nonexistent moles.

Another drawback is that LLMs often refused to analyze images. When asked directly whether a photo was generated by AI, ChatGPT typically replied with, “Sorry, I can’t assist with that request.”

“The model is programmed not to answer when it doesn’t reach a certain confidence level,” Lyu says. “We know that ChatGPT has information relevant to deepfake detection, but, again, a human operator is needed to excite that part of its knowledge base. Prompt engineering is effective, but not very efficient, so the next step is going one level down and actually fine tuning LLMs for this task specifically.”

In a significant display of unity and solidarity, Mr. Nizar Baraka, the Secretary-General of the Istiqlal Party, recently welcomed a delegation of senior Palestinian figures from Jerusalem and Gaza at the Allal El Fassi Foundation. This delegation, led by Mr. Ashraf Hassan Abbas Al-A’war, the Palestinian Minister of Jerusalem Affairs, underscored a profound moment of camaraderie and mutual respect between Morocco and Palestine.

The visit was not merely a formal diplomatic engagement; it was a testament to the deep-rooted humanitarian and political bonds that tie the two nations. The Palestinian delegation’s commendation of the medical aid initiative to Gaza, directed by the noble instructions of His Majesty King Mohammed VI, epitomizes Morocco’s unwavering dedication to the Palestinian cause. This act of compassion and assistance highlights Morocco’s commitment to alleviating the suffering of the Palestinian people, a cause that resonates deeply within the Moroccan consciousness.

Mr. Baraka’s remarks during the meeting were a poignant reminder of where the Palestinian issue stands in Morocco’s national priorities. He emphasized that after the issue of the Moroccan territorial integrity, the Palestinian cause is paramount. This sentiment is not confined to political rhetoric; it is a reflection of the genuine concern and empathy that permeates the hearts of Moroccans, from ;the sovereign to the citizens.

The unity between Morocco and Palestine is not a recent development; it is a historical bond that has been fortified through shared struggles and aspirations. The Kingdom of Morocco has consistently stood by the Palestinian people, advocating for their rights on international platforms and providing tangible support in times of need. The Moroccan solidarity is rooted in a shared belief in justice, dignity, and the right of all peoples to self-determination.

As Mr. Baraka reiterated, Morocco’s support for the Palestinian quest for their legitimate rights is unwavering. The vision of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital is not just a political stance; it is a moral imperative that reflects Morocco’s commitment to justice and peace. This support is a constant in the Moroccan national policy, transcending political changes and remaining steadfast through time.

In these times of global uncertainty, the hope for a better future for the Palestinian people remains a guiding principle for Morocco. ;The dedication to their cause is a reflection of Morocco’s broader commitment to human rights and international solidarity. ‘It is our sincere belief that through collective efforts, justice will prevail, and the Palestinian people will achieve their rightful place among the nations of the world.”;

The meeting at the Allal El Fassi Foundation is a reminder of the enduring bonds between the two peoples. It is a call to the international community to recognize and support the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people. Morocco’s commitment, as articulated by Mr. Baraka, is a beacon of hope and a model of steadfast solidarity that we hope will inspire others to join in the pursuit of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.

In conclusion, Morocco’s stance on the Palestinian issue is clear and resolute. Morocco’s support is not a mere diplomatic gesture but a deeply held conviction. Mr Baraka stated:”We stand with the Palestinian people in their quest for justice, dignity, and independence. And we remain hopeful that, through perseverance and solidarity, a brighter and more equitable future awaits our Palestinian brothers and sisters.”

During recent periods of unusually warm water in the Gulf of Alaska, young Pacific cod in near shore safe havens where they typically spend their adolescence did not experience the protective effects those areas typically provide, a new Oregon State University study found.

Instead, during marine heat waves in 2014-16 and 2019, young cod in these near shore “nurseries” around Kodiak Island in Alaska experienced significant changes in their abundance, growth rates and diet, with researchers estimating that only the largest 15-25% of the island’s cod population survived the summer. Even after the high temperatures subsided, the cod have yet to return to pre-heat wave size and diet.

The findings, published in the journal Scientific Reports, may have broader implications for marine fish populations worldwide, as marine heat waves become longer and more frequent with climate change, the researchers said.

“These coastal habitats aren’t supporting fish in the same way that they used to as a result of marine heat waves,” said lead author Hillary Thalmann, a graduate student in OSU’s Department of Fisheries, Wildlife and Conservation Sciences. “That’s a novel finding, because we don’t always look at the nurseries as a place where size-selective mortality could be occurring rapidly.”

Pacific cod, a popular choice for fish and chips, is the second-largest commercial groundfish fishery off the coast of Alaska. The 2022 commercial harvest totaled 403 million pounds and was valued at $225 million, according to NOAA Fisheries. Cod also has a long history in Alaskan culture and is important to Indigenous communities in the region.

The nurseries are shallow areas along shorelines with lots of aquatic vegetation, including eelgrass, algae and kelp, which attract lots of food for the fish and provide hiding places where they can avoid predators. Typically, they are considered safe havens for small Pacific cod — areas where the fish go at around 3 months old to eat and grow as much as they can during their first summer and fall.

But during the two recent marine heat waves in the Gulf of Alaska, water temperatures were recorded at 58 degrees Fahrenheit, almost 6 degrees above normal. Together, the two heat waves are considered the most extreme warming events on record in the Northeast Pacific Ocean, and the effects on the cod population were so severe that the fishery was closed in 2020 and a federal disaster was declared in 2022.

Previous OSU research has found that the higher temperatures triggered earlier reproduction and high mortality among young Pacific cod. The new study focuses on the physiological disruptions the young cod experienced while occupying the coastal nurseries.

Researchers used juvenile Pacific cod collected by the NOAA Alaska Fisheries Science Center Fisheries Behavioral Ecology program from 16 sites around Kodiak Island in mid-July and late August for the years 2006-2019. This sampling was part of routine population monitoring for the cod fishery.

For the July sample, researchers looked at the fishes’ otoliths, tiny bony structures that chronicle a fish’s growth similar to the rings of trees. Measuring the otoliths allowed researchers to calculate the fishes’ precise rate of growth up to the July sampling date, and then calculate their projected size based on maintaining that same growth rate into August.

However, when they looked at the August sample, the fish were 30% bigger than the size predicted by the established growth rate, and there were almost no small fish present in the sample. The only way researchers were able to account for the size of the fish in August was to remove all the small fish from the July sample and leave just the largest 15-25% of fish following the projected growth rate trajectory.

“If we removed the little guys and grew the big guys — the top 15-25% — through to August based on the growth rates we saw earlier in the summer, then we got the size range that we see in those heat wave years,” Thalmann said. “It’s important to show that with heat events like this, size-selective mortality can continue in the cod population beyond just their early life in the open water,” where the larvae spend their first three months.

Size-selective mortality is the phenomenon of survival being determined by an organism’s size; here, only the biggest fish appear to have survived.;

“We saw these differences in size in the nursery, and we tried to explain them with growth rates and tried to explain them with diet, but we couldn’t explain it all,” Thalmann said. “There was something out there, probably size-selective mortality, that was the major driver for what we were seeing.”

Moving forward, researchers say changing ocean conditions may mean that Pacific cod have to move further north to find optimal growth environments, or there may be a shift toward bigger cod being the only ones to survive and contribute genetic information to subsequent generations.

“If the marine heat waves continue, there will probably be some changes in both the distribution and the quality of these populations,” Thalmann said. “I don’t think it’s the end of fish and chips, but I do think it’s a cautionary tale for climate change and the shifting dynamics of fisheries in warm temperatures.”

NPR News: 06-27-2024 6PM EDT

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Reps. Eshoo and Smith Introduce Bipartisan Resolution Condemning Azerbaijan’s Ethnic Cleansing of Artsakh  Asbarez Armenian News

Slush – water-soaked snow – makes up more than half of all meltwater on the Antarctic ice shelves during the height of summer, yet is poorly accounted for in regional climate models.

Researchers led by the University of Cambridge used artificial intelligence techniques to map slush on Antarctic ice shelves, and found that 57% of all meltwater is held in the form of slush, with the remaining amount in surface ponds and lakes.

As the climate warms, more meltwater is formed on the surface of ice shelves, the floating ice surrounding Antarctica which acts as a buttress against glacier ice from inland. Increased meltwater can lead to ice shelf instability or collapse, which in turn leads to sea level rise.

The researchers also found that slush and pooled meltwater leads to 2.8 times more meltwater formation than predicted by standard climate models, since it absorbs more heat from the sun than ice or snow. The results, reported in the journal Nature Geoscience, could have profound implications for ice shelf stability and sea level rise.

Each summer as the weather warms, water pools on the surfaces of Antarctica’s floating ice shelves. Previous research has shown that surface meltwater lakes can contribute to ice shelf fracture and collapse, as the weight of the water can cause the ice to bend or break. However, the role of slush in ice shelf stability is more difficult to determine.

“We can use satellite imagery to map meltwater lakes across much of Antarctica, but it’s hard to map slush, because it looks like other things, such as shadows from clouds, when viewed from a satellite,” said lead author Dr Rebecca Dell from Cambridge’s Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI). “But using machine learning techniques, we can go beyond what the human eye can see and get a clearer picture of how slush might be affecting ice in Antarctica.”

Using optical data from NASA’s Landsat 8 satellite, the Cambridge researchers, working with researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder and the Delft University of Technology, trained a machine learning model to obtain monthly records of slush and meltwater lakes across 57 Antarctic ice shelves between 2013 and 2021.

“Machine learning allows us to use more information from the satellite, since it can work with more wavelengths of light than the human eye can see,” said Dell. “This allows us to determine what is and isn’t slush, and then we can train the machine learning model to quickly identify it across the whole continent.”

“We’re interested in learning how much slush is present during the Antarctic summer, and how it’s changed over time,” said co-author Professor Ian Willis, also from SPRI.

Using their machine learning model, the researchers found that in the peak of the Antarctic summer in January, over half (57%) of all meltwater on Antarctica’s ice shelves is held in slush, with the remaining 43% in meltwater lakes.

“This slush has never been mapped on a large scale across all of Antarctica’s large ice shelves, so over half of all surface meltwater has been ignored until now,” said Dell. “This is potentially significant for the hydrofracture process, where the weight of meltwater can create or enlarge fractures in the ice.”

Meltwater affects the stability of the floating ice shelves that fringe the Antarctic coastline. As the climate warms and melt rates in Antarctica increase, meltwater – whether in the form of lakes or slush – can get into cracks on the ice, causing the cracks to get bigger. This can cause fractures in the ice shelf, and could cause vulnerable ice shelves to collapse, which in turn would allow inland glacier ice to spill into the ocean and contribute to sea level rise.

“Since slush is more solid than meltwater, it won’t cause hydrofracture in the same way that water from a lake does, but it’s definitely something we need to consider when attempting to predict how or whether ice shelves will collapse,” said Willis.

In addition to the potential implications of slush on hydrofracture, it also has a large effect on melt rates. Since slush and lakes are less white than snow or ice, they absorb more heat from the sun, causing more snowmelt. This extra melt is currently unaccounted for in climate models, which may lead to underestimates in projections of ice sheet melting and ice shelf stability.

“I was surprised that this meltwater was so poorly accounted for in climate models,” said Dell. “Our job as scientists is to reduce uncertainty, so we always want to improve our models so they are as accurate as possible.”

“In future, it’s likely that places in Antarctica that currently don’t have any water or slush will start to change,” said Willis. “As the climate continues to warm, more melting will occur, which could have implications for ice stability and sea level rise.”

Over the past three decades, Cambodia and Brunei Darussalam have nurtured a robust diplomatic relationship. Their friendship and cooperation have flourished across multiple sectors, including politics, culture, trade, and economics. This multifaceted partnership has been formalised through various agreements and Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs), solidifying the countries’ commitment to mutual growth and collaboration. Despite efforts to strengthen economic ties, trade between Cambodia and Brunei remains modest. The bilateral trade volume reached approximately $35 million in 2022 but declined to about $22 million in 2023.

As such, Phnom Penh and Bandar Seri Begawan can explore ways and means to expand cooperation, leveraging considerable untapped potential to maximise the economic interests of the two peoples. Hence, this article will examine the possibility of bolstering cooperation in key sectors such as agriculture, halal industry, tourism and regional partnerships to boost mutual growth for the two countries.

Agriculture Cooperation;

Global food security has become a pressing concern, exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine conflict, rising regional tensions, and climate change. In response, Cambodia and Brunei could explore agricultural cooperation to boost mutual economic growth and development.

Brunei, facing constraints in its agricultural manpower, has actively pursued regional partnerships in rice cultivation, with a focus on investments from government-linked entities to ensure food security for the country. In this sense, Cambodia emerges as the potential partner for this sectoral cooperation, aligning with the government’s ambition to transform Cambodia into one of the world’s top ten agricultural-producing countries. Cambodia is the hub of a vibrant young workforce with 65 per cent of its population aged between 15 and 64 years, and the agricultural sector is one of the national backbones of its economy. Last year, the agricultural sector accounted for approximately 22 per cent of Cambodia’s gross domestic product (GDP).;

Cambodia and Brunei can also cooperate on sustainable agriculture initiatives, including shared research projects, knowledge exchange, and eco-friendly farming techniques. This partnership aims to enhance crop yields and strengthen both nations’ ability to withstand climate-related challenges. This agricultural partnership is likely to attract investment, creating jobs and expanding trade between the two countries. Enhancing food production capabilities, in this regard, supports both nations’ sustainable development goals while offering economic benefits to local people.

Halal Industry Cooperation;

There is room for Cambodia and Brunei to jointly develop the halal industry and trade. The two nations can collaborate on the certification and standardisation of halal products, guaranteeing that they comply with the requirements of Muslim consumers worldwide.;

Brunei is poised to become a global halal hub thanks to the country’s stringent standards of halal food and strict regulations like the Public Health Act and Wholesome Meat Order 2011.; In this regard, Brunei can provide a halal brand to the global market to nurture the government’s concerted efforts, aiming at stimulating economic diversification for the attainment of its Wawasan 2035— Brunei’s national vision aims to become a country with a well-educated, highly skilled workforce, high living standards, and a vibrant, sustainable economy by 2035.

Cambodia also has a keen interest in the collaboration of the halal industry with other countries to boost the export of Cambodian halal products in the international market.; It is worth noting that as a society upholding religious harmony, Cambodia is also home to a Muslim population of around 800,000 people. Between 2017 and 2022, there were 123 companies obtaining certificates of compliance with halal standards for 823 products.;

As a result, the collaboration in developing the halal industry will open a window for both sides to boost their economic diversification as well as enhance the market access for their halal product export.;

Tourism Cooperation;

Having a connecting flight between both countries will surely facilitate a seamless connection for tourists to travel to their destinations; thus, becoming a key driver to boost tourism between the two countries.

Despite Cambodia having a Muslim population of around 5 per cent, it appears that Cambodian Muslims have less contact with Bruneians in comparison to the interactions between Malaysians and Indonesians who are also Muslims. In this sense, during the discussion between Cambodian tourism minister Sok Soken and Bruneian ambassador to Cambodia Pengiran Kasmirhan Pengiran Tahir early this year, they highly considered the possibility of encouraging tourism cooperation to promote people-to-people ties and cultural exchange between the two nations.; This will not only enable the two countries to foster their socio-economic progress but also promote greater understanding and friendship between the peoples of both countries.;

Given the current circumstances, the two nations should explore the possibility of establishing a connecting flight service. This initiative could serve as an interim measure to boost tourist traffic between the countries, particularly if direct routes are not yet feasible. Such a move would likely facilitate smoother travel for visitors, potentially catalysing growth in both countries’ tourism sectors.

Regional Cooperation

As small states, Cambodia and Brunei share a “common perception” of today’s world challenges. With that said, it is necessary for Phnom Penh and Bandar Seri Begawan along with other member states to work together within the framework of ASEAN on issues pertinent to security, counterterrorism, disaster management, and environmental sustainability. This cooperation will help strengthen regional peace and stability.

Additionally, these concerted efforts will enhance the region’s ability to address emerging threats, improve the emergency response capabilities, protect diverse ecosystems and address climate change for the region at large.;

Furthermore, both governments should leverage ASEAN to advance their longstanding partnership for regional development, greater prosperity and security. Through this regional framework, they can bilaterally build upon their achievements and prioritise the immense importance of peaceful coexistence and well-being of their peoples.;

Conclusion

As the relations between the two countries hold great promise for mutual benefits, Phnom Penh and Bandar Seri Begawan should seize the opportunity to deepen their partnership in various sectors to fully capitalise on the unlocked potential. Undoubtedly, this will map out a course toward shared prosperity and peace not only for the respective countries but also for the region. 

• A version of this article was published at Asian Vision Institute

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