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Study finds human brains did not shrink 3,000 years ago

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  • Largely accepted concept is that size of human brain changed 3,000 years ago.
  • It is posited that group thinking caused brain to shrink.
  • New paper refutes concept, says human brain remained “remarkably stable over last 300,00 years”.

Refuting a common and largely accepted concept, a new paper published in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution argues that the size of the human brain did not change 3,000 years ago — or ever, for that matter.

Anthropologist Brian Villmoare from the University of Nevada and scientist Mark Grabowski of Liverpool John Moores University have responded to a paper by Jerome DeSilva of Dartmouth College and colleagues in 2021.

The 2021 paper suggested that in the Iron Age, the human brain lost up to 150 cubic centimetres of its volume, which is nearly the size of a lemon. 

DeSilva’s team posited that “self-domestication” and more group thinking than individual thinking caused the brain to shrink.

While DeSilva’s study analysed 10 million years of evolution including apes, Villmaore said that it was useless and pointless to compare sapiens’ brains to any other species.

One reason was the lack of sufficient fossils of other human species. The author explained that we have been entirely different species.

Villmaore told Haaretz they doubted the statistical treatment of data in DeSilva’s paper. Therefore, the no shrinkage study used the same data as they found it “the most complete”. 

However, their statistical methodology was different and so were their conclusions, eventually.

“The point was that we need to toss all this stuff about human devolution out,” he said. “It is just not true.”

Their study concluded that the size of the human brain had remained “remarkably stable over the last 300,00 years” and that shifting to agriculture and community did not affect brain size.

Responding to DeSilva comparing ants and human societies saying that collective intelligence reduced size in both the clades, the no shrinkage paper pointed out differences between the two.

Villmaore said that humans were a competitive species, unlike ants who are mostly just slaves. Vertebrae, he said, make alliances, are aggressive, social and have larger brains.

He said that we could compare elephants and rhinos as the former live in herds while the latter does not.

“The elephant brain is six times bigger than that of the rhino,” he said.

He also pointed out another flaw. He said that DeSilva said that the shrinking occurred globally while tying it with the agricultural revolution.

However, this revolution would have taken place at different times in different parts of the planet. This does not explain all human brains shrinking in the world.

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Cybersecurity firm reports exposure of sensitive DeepSeek data on the internet.

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The New York-based cybersecurity firm Wiz has discovered a cache of sensitive data from the Chinese artificial intelligence business DeepSeek that was mistakenly exposed to the public internet.

In a blog post released on Wednesday, Wiz reported that examinations of DeepSeek’s infrastructure revealed that the company had inadvertently exposed over a million lines of unencrypted data. The materials were digital software keys and chat logs that seemingly documented prompts transmitted from consumers to the company’s complimentary AI assistant.

The chief technical officer of Wiz stated that DeepSeek promptly safeguarded the data following the notice from his organisation.

“It was removed in under an hour,” stated Ami Luttwak. “However, this was exceedingly easy to locate, leading us to believe we are not the sole discoverers.”

DeepSeek did not promptly respond to a request for comment.

DeepSeek’s rapid success after the introduction of its AI helper has exhilarated China and incited concern in America. The Chinese company’s evident capacity to rival OpenAI’s skills at a significantly reduced cost has raised concerns regarding the viability of the business models and profit margins of U.S. AI behemoths like Nvidia and Microsoft.

By Monday, it surpassed the U.S. competitor ChatGPT in downloads from Apple’s App Store, prompting a worldwide decline in technology stocks.

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WhatsApp launches bulk channel management functionality

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WhatsApp has initiated testing of a bulk channel administration feature on iOS for select beta users, enabling the simultaneous selection of many channels, hence enhancing the efficiency of managing following channels.

This essential update enables users to perform bulk activities, including muting many channels simultaneously, designating them as read, and altering notifications. If the chosen channels are muted, users will now have the option to activate notifications. Users can swiftly silence unmuted channels in one action.

Additionally, this feature enables users to unfollow many channels simultaneously, thereby optimizing the process of decluttering their channel list. This change is particularly beneficial for users that oversee numerous subscriptions, as reported by WABetaInfo.

Previously, users were required to manage each channel individually, rendering tasks such as muting or designating channels as read laborious and time-consuming.

The functionality provides enhanced flexibility and control over channel subscriptions, enabling users to efficiently manage notifications. The solution streamlines laborious operations for consumers who subscribe to numerous channels, hence enhancing their entire experience.

Accessibility
The bulk management feature is presently accessible exclusively to a limited number of beta testers who installed the latest WhatsApp beta for iOS using the TestFlight application. WhatsApp, owned by Meta, plans to expand the feature’s availability to a larger user base in the next weeks.

This update demonstrates WhatsApp’s dedication to enhancing user experience by offering a clear and efficient method for managing channels and notifications.

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Pakistani internet slowdown: ongoing submarine cable issue

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Even after two weeks, the global submarine cable AAA-1 problem that was discovered on January 2 near Qatar has not been fixed, causing sluggish internet connection in several Pakistani towns.

According to a representative for Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), the issue has affected customers’ capacity to effectively access social media applications and browse the online. Even with initiatives to fix the problem, social networking sites still lag during busy times.

Internet traffic has been redirected via alternate channels to lessen the impact, and more capacity has been set up to stabilize the service.

The PTCL representative promised that “Internet service across the country is operating normally, and there will be no issues with web browsing,” noting that social media applications’ lag is common during

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