Robots are Better than Doctors in Medical Diagnosis

 Pepper is an 'emotional' robot which has been available to buy
since June 2015 ( AFP/Getty Images )
Pepper is an 'emotional' robot which has been available to buy since June 2015 ( AFP/Getty Images )
TT

Robots are Better than Doctors in Medical Diagnosis

 Pepper is an 'emotional' robot which has been available to buy
since June 2015 ( AFP/Getty Images )
Pepper is an 'emotional' robot which has been available to buy since June 2015 ( AFP/Getty Images )

Artificial intelligence has proved remarkable abilities in diagnosing various conditions and has outperformed specialists in many fields. Russia's Kommersant newspaper reported that a competition was held between an artificial intelligence system designed for medical diagnosis and a group of experienced doctors from various clinics and hospitals in Moscow.

The doctors were given radiographies and analysis, and were asked to verify whether the patient had a tumor or arrhythmia. The same data was entered into the automated system, which gave a more accurate result.

The head of a technical group working on artificial intelligence technologies said: "Artificial neural networks are able to see patterns that humans cannot easily see, so these networks define the areas to focus on during diagnosis. The size of nodal formations of the tumor, for example, may be very small, and often the robot will identify it and guide the doctor to the area he has to focus on." 

However, experts in the medical and technical fields warned from the errors that may occur in the work of artificial intelligence, and explained that doctors' reliance on it would lead to a decline in their experience. 

However, specialists in the development of artificial neural networks assured doctors that this technical development would not be a substitute for them, but would be helpful to them, and will help them reduce the rate of error in diagnosis.

It is worth noting that a team of technical specialists and doctors are currently working on the design of a unified diagnostic system in Russia that depends on artificial intelligence. 

The main idea behind ​​the project is to pump data into this system with information on the most accurate details of diseases, as well as data on the pathology of the patient. 

The system will be trained on diseases' diagnosis. It will not be confined to a specific hospital or residential area, but will be a unified network connecting various medical institutions in Russia. 

The system is expected to achieve a quantum leap in the medical diagnosis field, with more speed and accuracy.



Trump Vexes New Zealanders by Claiming One of Their Proudest Historical Moments for America 

British scientists Dr. E.T.S. Walton, left, and Dr. F.D. Cockroft, right, stand with Lord Rutherford outside the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge, UK, May 2, 1932. (AP)
British scientists Dr. E.T.S. Walton, left, and Dr. F.D. Cockroft, right, stand with Lord Rutherford outside the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge, UK, May 2, 1932. (AP)
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Trump Vexes New Zealanders by Claiming One of Their Proudest Historical Moments for America 

British scientists Dr. E.T.S. Walton, left, and Dr. F.D. Cockroft, right, stand with Lord Rutherford outside the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge, UK, May 2, 1932. (AP)
British scientists Dr. E.T.S. Walton, left, and Dr. F.D. Cockroft, right, stand with Lord Rutherford outside the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge, UK, May 2, 1932. (AP)

Among other false and misleading claims in US President Donald Trump's inauguration addresses on Tuesday, his declaration that Americans “split the atom” prompted vexed social media posts by New Zealanders, who said the achievement belonged to a pioneering scientist revered in his homeland.

Ernest Rutherford, a Nobel Prize winner known as the father of nuclear physics, is regarded by many as the first to knowingly split the atom by artificially inducing a nuclear reaction in 1917 while he worked at a university in Manchester in the United Kingdom.

The achievement is also credited to English scientist John Douglas Cockroft and Ireland's Ernest Walton, researchers in 1932 at a British laboratory developed by Rutherford. It is not attributed to Americans.

Trump’s account of US greatness in one of Monday's inauguration addresses included a claim that Americans “crossed deserts, scaled mountains, braved untold dangers, won the Wild West, ended slavery, rescued millions from tyranny, lifted millions from poverty, harnessed electricity, split the atom, launched mankind into the heavens and put the universe of human knowledge into the palm of the human hand.”

New Zealand politician Nick Smith, the mayor of Nelson, where Rutherford was born and educated, said he was “a bit surprised” by the claim.

“Rutherford’s groundbreaking research on radio communication, radioactivity, the structure of the atom and ultrasound technology were done at Cambridge and Manchester Universities in the UK and McGill University in Montreal Canada,” Smith wrote on Facebook.

Smith said he would invite the next US ambassador to New Zealand to visit Rutherford’s birthplace memorial “so we can keep the historic record on who split the atom first accurate.”

A website for the US Department of Energy's Office of History and Heritage Resources credits Cockroft and Walton with the milestone, although it describes Rutherford's earlier achievements in mapping the structure of the atom, postulating a central nucleus and identifying the proton.

Trump's remarks provoked a flurry of online posts by New Zealanders about Rutherford, whose work is studied by New Zealand schoolchildren and whose name appears on buildings, streets and institutions. His portrait features on the 100-dollar banknote.

“Okay, I’ve gotta call time. Trump just claimed America split the atom,” Ben Uffindell, editor of the satirical New Zealand news website The Civilian, wrote on X. “That’s THE ONE THING WE DID.”