📌 TOPINDIATOURS Hot ai: 100-year-old mystery about log coffin that fell off cliff

Initially discovered in 1899, the nicknamed the “Princess of Bagicz” because the only wooden sarcophagus to be found from the Roman Iron Age held a woman with stunningly well-preserved artifacts.

Carved from a single log, its existence rarely survives as the coffin was made of wood, but the wet, humid environment ended up preserving it, giving modern-day viewers an unprecedented look at a rare wooden Roman-era coffin.

In a study published in Archaeometry, the long-standing puzzle concerns her date of burial, one that inspired archaeologists to dub her a princess, regardless of whether she really was one.

Thought to have died in Roman times, the scientific analyses have never failed to return with conflicting dates. The latest research sought to finally bring an end to the confusion by finally determining when the Princess of Bagicz was buried.

A Goth woman fell off a cliff one day

Back in 1898, the “Princess of Bagicz” coffin, which appears almost fairytale-like, dug out of a wooden log, fell off a coastal cliff in Bagicz in northwestern Poland. Over time, wind and water eroded the coffin, which revealed what it contained, according to Archaeology News.

The grave in question came from a cemetery that belonged to the Wielbarks, so the Princess was Goth. The adult woman was buried with grave goods that aligned with that culture, including a cowhide, bronze pin, a necklace of glass and amber beads, and a pair of bronze bracelets, Live Science reports.

However, Archaeology News continues that earlier reports also identified a wooden stool and a cattle hide that did not survive, in fact. Nonetheless, previous excavations of the nearby cemetery pinpointed the culture from which she came, but archaeologists failed to find a conclusive date.

The epic begins.

A long journey to find a date

In the 1980s, archaeologists studied the goods, which placed this princess somewhere between 110 and 160 CE. Close to 40 years later, another team analyzed her tooth, which challenged previous research, placing her life somewhere between 113 BCE and 65 CE, which left an insurmountable 100-year gap between the two findings.

Abandoning the project for some more years, another team of archaeologists decided to reopen the unsolvable case. This time, they did the obvious: they studied the tree as the answer usually lies in plain sight. They applied dendrochronology to the oak coffin, measuring tree rings, and they determined that the tree was cut down around 120 CE, as per Live Science.

The results aligned with earlier analyses that placed the burial on the later end of the estimates. But archaeologists didn’t stop there, not this time. Stable isotope analysis of the woman’s bones revealed a large amount of animal protein and freshwater fish. Interestingly, when people consume fish, it can alter the dating results, so they often show that the person died earlier than they actually did.

Specifically, Archaeology News continues, that aquatic organisms living in hard water can absorb carbon, which contributed to the older dates, which confounded archaeologists for years.  

And why stop there? They used strontium isotopes to assess her origin just to ensure the date was accurate and thorough— Scandinavia, if not Öland.

This study not only clarified the date of the burial, which drove archaeologists practically mad, as no one could determine why the dates kept coming back so broadly, but also settled the matter once and for all. It goes to show the need to use multiple methods when studying ancient remains, Archaeology News concludes.

🔗 Sumber: interestingengineering.com

📌 TOPINDIATOURS Update ai: Hollywood Is Lying to Everyone About How Much AI They’r

Is Hollywood “cooked”? Do video generating AI models mean its “over” for filmmakers? The jury’s out on that. But according to one Hollywood insider, the whole industry is “lying” about how much AI they’re using.

“The thing with AI right now in Hollywood: Everyone’s lying just a little bit,” Janice Min, a former editor of Hollywood Reporter and CEO of cinema industry media group Ankler Media, told Business Insider in a new interview.  “Studios are lying about how much they’re using it.”

When the interviewer asked if that meant studios are using AI more or using it less, she clarified: “Using it more.”

“Companies are lying about the capability of their products. And for creative people, they’re lying about the fact that they’re not using it,” Min continued. “I dare you to find a screenwriter who is staring at a blank page and not talking to Claude or ChatGPT at the same time.”

Last year, the Oscar-winning film “The Brutalist” became the center of controversy after its director Brady Corbet confirmed that AI was used to help enhance the Hungarian accents of lead actors Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones. But according to Min, this wasn’t an exceptional case.

“This year, it is crickets,” she said of the lack of AI controversy. “Even the Academy, the most precious, legacy-protecting institution in Hollywood, has not come out in a really firm way about AI. They basically have a don’t ask, don’t tell policy. I would say with some certainty that every single best picture nominee this year has used AI in its production process.”

It’s worth taking these claims with some skepticism. To be sure, Hollywood studios are probably using some form of “AI” in post-production, especially in applications like visual effects. But AI could describe a multitude of tools that aren’t necessarily generative AI, and are merely powerful algorithms that have been around long before ChatGPT and image or video generators became a phenomenon. 

Artists also tend to be ardently against AI, perhaps more so than any other field or demographic. AI protections were a major factor in the 2023 strikes led by actors and screenwriters that were some of the longest in Hollywood history. That makes it hard to believe that most screenwriters are using AI chatbots.

Moreover, it’s the same alarmist narratives being pushed by AI boosters, who see it as a cause of celebration rather than concern. Every minute there’s a new AI-generated video being cranked out with the video generator du jour — right now it’s Seedance 2.0 — featuring deepfaked celebrities, usually accompanied with the common refrain that “Hollywood is cooked.” 

But like many displays in the AI industry, many of these tend to be theater. That viral AI video of Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt fighting on a rooftop that had credulous Marvel screenwriters quivering in their boots and AI bros prematurely dancing on actors’ graves? It turned out to just be a digital reskin of a video of two flesh and blood humans fighting in front of a green screen. The only thing that’s “cooked,” maybe, are the brains of people that believe every claim that comes out of AI circles.

More on AI: OpenAI’s Hardware Device Just Leaked, and You Will Cringe

The post Hollywood Is Lying to Everyone About How Much AI They’re Using, Says Consummate Hollywood Insider appeared first on Futurism.

🔗 Sumber: futurism.com