Facebook said on Monday that it plans to remove posts with erroneous claims about vaccines from across its platform, including taking down assertions that vaccines cause autism or that it is safer for people to contract Covid-19 than to receive the vaccinations. From a report: The social network has increasingly changed its content policies over the past year as the coronavirus…
Tag: autism
Is Misinformation on Nextdoor Impacting Local Politics?
Was Nextdoor’s impact on the world exemplified by a crucial funding referendum for the Christina School District of Newark, Delaware? Medium’s tech site OneZero reports: As the 2019 referendum approached, I saw Nextdoor posts claiming that the district was squandering money, that its administrators were corrupt, and that it already spent more money per student than certain other districts with higher…
Simon Baron-Cohen: Why autism and invention are intimately related
The prehistoric cognitive revolution that saw an explosion of inventions was driven by a new, pattern-seeking network in the brain – and that’s highly correlated with autism today, says researcher Simon Baron-Cohen Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24833113-700-simon-baron-cohen-why-autism-and-invention-are-intimately-related/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Microsoft Wants AI To Be More Helpful For People Who Are Blind or Use Wheelchairs
People who are blind or who use a wheelchair or who have autism often are early adopters of technology to complete everyday tasks like communicating, reading, and traveling. Artificial intelligence powers many of these services such as voice and object recognition. In many cases, these products are trained on data from able-bodied or neurotypical people. This means that the algorithms may…
Cancer Patient Complains: My Facebook Feed Is Full of ‘Alternative Care’ Ads
The author of an opinion piece in the New York Times describes what happened after sharing their cancer diagnosis on Facebook:
Since then, my Facebook feed has featured ads for “alternative cancer care.” The ads, which were new to my timeline, promote everything from cumin seeds to colloidal silver as cancer treatments. Some ads promise luxury clinics — or even “nontoxic cancer…
Slashback: Forced Social Isolation Causes Neural Craving Similar To Hunger
This is the first story in a new occasional article series we’re calling Slashback. We’ll be covering a topic that may not be breaking news, but is interesting to us. Today’s Slashback story features an article from Scientific American highlighting the profound effect of severe social isolation on the brain. From the report: The feeling of “wanting” something has repeatedly been…
Autism isn’t a defect – here’s why we should embrace neurodiversity
After finding out she was autistic, Siena Castellon sparked a global school movement that celebrates neurodiversity, which now includes nearly half a million students Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24532721-700-autism-isnt-a-defect-heres-why-we-should-embrace-neurodiversity/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Babies Are Prewired To Perceive the World
In an investigation of neural connectivity in 30 infants ranging from six to 57 days old (with an average age of 27 days), neuroscientists found that circuit wiring precedes, and thus may guide, regional specialization, shedding light on how knowledge systems emerge in the brain. An anonymous reader shares a report from Scientific American: In the study, published Monday in Proceedings…
How Google Interferes With Its Search Algorithms and Changes Your Results
Long-time Slashdot reader walterbyrd shared this report on “arguably the most powerful lines of computer code in the global economy,” the Google algorithms that handle 3.8 million queries every single minute. But though Google claims its algorithms are objective and autonomous, the Wall Street Journal reports Google “has increasingly re-engineered and interfered with search results to a far greater degree than…
Acetaminophen In Pregnancy May Be Linked To Higher Risk of ADHD, Autism
schwit1 tipped us off to an interesting new study. Newsweek reports: Babies of women who took acetaminophen — a common painkiller marketed in the U.S. under the brand name Tylenol — near the end of pregnancy had a higher likelihood of being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders or with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), according to a study published in JAMA…