AI, Just How Far?

 The Crimson has an interesting piece on AI and Medical Imaging. They note:

Harvard Medical School researchers and affiliates have discovered that the use of artificial intelligence in radiology is not universally beneficial, contrary to existing research. The study — released last Tuesday by researchers at MIT, Stanford, and the Rajpurkar Lab of Harvard Medical School — was a re-analysis of a previous study by the same researchers. Published in Nature, it centered on a high-performing AI model and studied its effectiveness in diagnosing patients based on chest X-rays. Pranav Rajpurkar, a Harvard Medical School professor who co-authored the study, emphasized the need for a more detailed understanding of AI in medicine. “While previous studies have shown the potential for AI to improve overall diagnostic accuracy, there was limited understanding of the individual-level impact on clinicians and what factors influence the effectiveness of AI assistance for each radiologist,” he wrote in an emailed statement. The study found that AI use in radiology “did not uniformly improve diagnostic accuracy, and could even hurt performance for some cases,” according to Kathy Yu, a researcher who was a member of the Rajpurkar Lab when the study was conducted.

 This is not at all surprising. When I first started to learn radiology one went through steps. Say one is looking at the lung. Start at the periphery, any fluids, compressions, nodules, then work in to see heart mediastinumn vasculature. Is there honeycombing, nodules etc. Namely there was a methodology developed over years of reading images.

In the days of pattern recognition, images were approached in a similar structured manner. However with AI one uses learning sets and then "trusts in the kindness of strangers" with some neural network. 

Thus one is hardly surprised.

GPS, Not So Much

 The NY Times has a piece of the vulnerability of GPS satellites. I have a long term involvement with GPS. In the 70s I taught a GPS course at GW University, for many sessions. I testified to Sen Kennedy's Committee, who feared Soviet advantage to missile attacks. But more importantly I designed the second backup navigation  system for Apollo, using a sextant and equipment for WW II fire control systems. Never thought it would be used until Apollo 13!

If GPS fails we always have maps and sextants. I still have my grandfathers. Plan Bs are critical. We always must avoid single thread systems. Maps are just fine. I still have a few in my cars. GPS and Garmin may not send me the best way, just their way. My sextant can always tell me where I am, just need a clock. I have a wind up watch! 

We have the problem of abandoning the past for the best of the present. Sometimes the present has problems. Always have a Plan B!!!!!

Perhaps you can rent my sextant and borrow my Bowditch. Worked for centuries.

Bridges and Harbors

 I grew up on Staten Island, only ferries to New York, before the Verrazzano. My grandfather was the Harbor Master during WW II so I got to know a lot of folks at the time. One of my lifeguard buddies was dating Justine Moran of the tugboat family so I got to see a lot of tugs. My uncle was a NY Fire Department Deputy Chief and in charge os such things as safety of the Verrazzano bridge, for fire and explosion reasons. As a lifeguard I watched summer by summer as the bridge was built, across the Narrows into the busiest shipping harbor in the US.

It was during the peak of the cold war and fear that a bomb would shut the harbor if it his the bridge. So the design was to insure that if it were hit it would not collapse and block the Narrows, but under great tension would swing back on State Island and Brooklyn. Needless to say a few folks in the way would be eliminated. Cold War thinking. 

One need look at the two bridges, the Verrazzano and the one in Baltimore. One bomb proof, albeit possibly slaughtering a few folks, and the second looking like a down scale Lionel train bridge. OK, I have to reveal I took some Civil Engineering courses and thus know a bit about bridges. The Baltimore one was a disaster from step one. 

Hopefully its replacement is more like the one in NYC, with perhaps a cold war view of life.

MIT Needs a Cleansing

 The NY Times presents a compelling article about MIT and its current management gross negligence. The legal papers filed are also compelling. This was not the MIT I spent years affiliated with. The Augean Stables need cleansing and perhaps this is the first step. The Times notes:

There is no excuse for hypocrisy. There is no excuse for harassment. It seems clear that M.I.T., Harvard and other campuses have failed to uphold their moral and legal responsibilities. Now it falls upon the engine of American justice to impose its consequences and to prove — to this generation and the ones that follow — that this truly is a government “which to bigotry gives no sanction, to persecution no assistance.”

MIT just announced a Vice President for DEI. Yet Jews get persecuted for their presence. One should read the complaint, it is terrifying, and a shame on the grossly defective Administration. 

This Patrol Thing is Out of Hand

 The NY Times reports:

Shortly after Gov. Kathy Hochul announced on Wednesday that hundreds of National Guard soldiers would be deployed to patrol the New York City subway system and check riders’ bags, her office made an adjustment: Soldiers searching bags would not carry long guns. The change, which was first reported by The Daily News, was ordered by Ms. Hochul on Wednesday for implementation on Thursday, according to a spokesman for the governor. Ms. Hochul issued a directive that National Guard members would be prohibited from carrying long guns at bag-check stations, he said. Soldiers not working at the stations would presumably be allowed to carry them.

They are NOT long guns, they are continuous fire M-16!  You know like the AR-15s they want to ban, but continuous fire rifles. It is amazing how this thing has been sanitized by the Press. This is worse than a Mussolini takeover, except by police who look more terrifying. A recent photo of a person returning from a pickle match, I gather having a beer bottle was being detailed by two chubby and short bearded slovenly NYPDs at the subway. What were they missing while they detailed this person. Got the picture just in case. 

I remember Mayor Daly in 1968 in Chicago. This Fall we may very see much worse. 

BTW, a long gun could be an M-1 or even an M-14, although M-14s can do rapid fire.

The NYC Subway

 Well, I did it, took the subway. From Penn Station thru Times Square and up to 72nd Street and return.

Guess what, not a single cop, soldier, M-16. 

 

Lots of people, no security, none, not even a glimpse! So what happened? The Buffalo Gnome got scared of the backlash? 

But wait. What was everywhere were the "immigrants" or "illegals" carrying babies on their backs holding large plastic trays filled with candy at every stairwell. Just try to figure out the economics of that trade. Also would you buy something to eat from a person from God knows where in a urine stained subway stop? If so then COVID should not have scared you! The baby on the back thing was interesting.

So is NYC safe? As long as you do not eat strange foods, stay well back from the train, make no eye contact, and avoid the police, then I guess it is as safe as Mogadishu.

Russia was Friendlier

 

I ran a company in Russia for several years. Not the most friendly to legal rights, so one is always careful. Now along comes the New York Gov sending troops to the subway. I have to go tomorrow and anticipate a possible search and seizure. The Gov and her Praetorian guards invoke their powers to search and seize law abiding citizens while leaving the one performing illegal acts free to continue. Moscow was much more friendly, as long as you did not debate the Vlad! 

The NY Times noted:

Just 24 hours after Gov. Kathy Hochul deployed the National Guard and the State Police in the New York City subway to quell fears of crime, the unusual show of force drew intense criticism on Thursday from various corners, some unexpected. On the left, Jumaane N. Williams, the city’s public advocate, warned that Ms. Hochul’s plan would “criminalize the public on public transit.” Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher, a democratic socialist from Brooklyn, said it was a “ham-fisted and authoritarian response” that “validates G.O.P. propaganda about urban lawlessness in an election year.” Centrists fretted that the deployment of troops carrying long guns — beamed across the country by Fox News and other cable outlets — would actually make New Yorkers and would-be tourists feel less safe, not more.

Indeed, less safe from the National Guard.  Think Kent State. Checking everyone's personal effects by untrained Guardsmen is incredible. Yes, that is me with my father on his first day on the NYC PD. Between him and his father they spent 60 years on the job. I learned how to identify suspects starting at the age of seven. Look at shoes, hair, clothes, hands, etc. Worked well with my former KGB partners. But I truly doubt these weapon carrying troops have any idea. Discharge an M-16 in the Times Square Station and you kill 50-60 people in seconds. The Gov has created a situation of imminent danger.

The Inferno

The NY Times notes, as above, the  expansion of police presence. The problem is clear from the above photo from the Times, the police just clump together totally disregarding the people. In addition one often sees a police office and wonders who this bearded creature is. Grooming and presence is 99% of the battle. It demands respect. Shabby dress and hirsute presentation does not.

As the NY Post notes:

Nearly 1,000 New York National Guardsmen, state police and MTA cops are being deployed to carry out bag checks in the Big Apple’s crime-ridden subway system, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Wednesday. The additional forces – made up of 750 guardsmen and 250 law enforcement officers — will work alongside the NYPD to patrol “the city’s busiest transit stations” amid a recent surge in underground violence, Hochul said. “These brazen heinous attacks on our subway system will not be tolerated,” Hochul said as she announced a five-point plan to crackdown on the city’s burgeoning underground crime wave.

 I am back into NYC this week but I suspect these 1,000 new faces will just hang in small groups glued to their smart phones. Going from Penn Station to Times Square and then to the East side is akin to trying a northbound trip on the Ho Chi Minh Trail in 1968 flying a US Flag!  

For the past ten plus years it has just become a crime ridden place, with police clearly ignoring the situation. Thus one wonders what 1,000 more eyes looking at smart phone screens will accomplish. 

So say a prayers for my safety, that may be the only way to move cross town. Oh yes, one could walk, but that is equally risky between the assaults and massive clouds of formerly illegal substances. 

Dante, you would have had fun with this place!