What to know about avian influenza in dairy cows and the risk to humans
Why is H5N1, or bird flu, a concern, how does it spread, and is there a vaccine? Here are the answers to some frequently asked questions about avian influenza.
"An astronaut riding a horse in a photorealistic style" or "a bowl of soup that is a portal to another dimension drawn on a cave wall," are just some of the infinite prompts you can offer to a new artificial intelligence (AI) system called DALL-E 2 to generate a piece of art for you.
Currently operating on a limited scale, with a waitlist available for professional artists, developers, or online creators, DALL-E 2 has been developed by a Microsoft-backed start-up called OpenAI and offers a text-to-picture service through artificial intelligence models.
OpenAI describes DALL-E 2 on its website as "a new AI system that can create realistic images and art from a description in natural language."
The new software builds on its original system called DALL.E, which was launched in 2021, generates higher-resolution pictures and offers more accurate results, according to OpenAI’s website.
"What DALL-E 2 does is basically something that until now had been considered one of the jobs that was automation-proof," Amol Kamath, a Toronto-based industrial designer told CTVnews.ca in a phone interview.
"It's been a long-held belief in my field that because what we do is creative, artificial intelligence is not ever going to be able to replace us. But, given what they've been able to do with this piece of software, where you can effectively just give a machine a prompt and it will give you back what it thinks is the best representation of that product, it is amazing. Previously, that would`ve been the domain of a graphic designer or an illustrator."
Kamath thinks it's unlikely that AI software will replace human designers completely, but rather that more simplistic assignments could potentially be handed off to machines.
“An example of a lower level project would be perhaps a newsletter assignment for a school or that a small entrepreneur looking for promotional materials... these can easily be done by a machine instead of a human,” he said.
Kamath says that for the above categories, companies may stop relying on freelancers or lower-level designers for assignments and start depending more on software.
The software is already being experimented with on monumental scales. On Monday, DALL-E 2 became the first AI software to design a magazine cover for Cosmopolitan magazine, which was facilitated by a group of the magazine's editors, researchers at OpenAI and digital artist Karen X. Cheng.
A similar experiment was completed at the Economist last week, which used a different AI bot to generate an image for the cover of their report on AI technology.
OpenAI has acknowledged on its website the possible concerns of using only AI-generated art forms and is conducting studies on its limitations that include removing the use of explicit content, that includes violent, adult or political ones.
“Ethical considerations and bias will always be a factor in the design world,” said Kamath.
“But, DALL-E 2 could be the final frontier for automation. And I think whenever they do actually come up with a finished product... it could put quite a lot of people out of work.”
Why is H5N1, or bird flu, a concern, how does it spread, and is there a vaccine? Here are the answers to some frequently asked questions about avian influenza.
An Ontario man who took out a loan to pay for auto repairs said his car was repossessed after he missed two payments.
Royal commentator Afua Hagan writes that when King Charles recently admitted Catherine to the Order of the Companions of Honour, it not only made history, but it reinforced the strong bond between the King and his beloved daughter-in-law.
Environmentalist groups are sounding the alarm about a steep increase in the number of pro-plastic lobbyists at the UN pollution talks taking place this week.
Breast cancer rates are rising in Canada among women in their 20s, 30s and 40s, according to research by the University of Ottawa (uOttawa).
Charlie Woods failed to advance in a U.S. Open local qualifying event Thursday, shooting a 9-over 81 at Legacy Golf & Tennis Club.
During a special winner celebration near their hometown, Doug and Enid shared the story of how they discovered they were holding a Lotto Max ticket worth $70 million and how they kept this huge secret for so long.
Courteney Cox's longtime partner Johnny McDaid once broke up with her in a therapy session.
A new survey by Dalhousie University's Agri-Food Analytics Lab asked Canadians about their food consumption habits amid rising prices.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.