Russia’s ‘Red Army Choir’ Wiped Out In Christmas Plane Crash

Known in the West in Soviet days as the “Red Army Choir” and praised in post-Soviet era as “cultural paratroopers and “Russia’s singing weapon,” the Alexandrov Russian Army Song and Dance Ensemble lost 64 members – more than one-third of the total, including all but three of its singers – when a military transport plane crashed into the Black Sea shortly after takeoff from Sochi.

Top Posts From AJBlogs 12.26.16

What do we actually mean by intrinsic benefits?
If we cannot find any impacts, if attending music recitals doesn’t lead to your giving higher reported subjective wellbeing, what then? … read more
AJBlog: For What It’s Worth Published 2016-12-26

Monday Recommendation: Dr. Lonnie Smith
Dr. Lonnie Smith, Evolution (Blue Note)
The venerable organist’s doctorate is a figment, but his musicianship and ability to mold combos of any size into formidable units are even more real than when … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-12-26

On a screen, darkly
My brother, like me, is deeply attached to the increasingly distant past that we share. That’s one of the reasons why he and my sister-in-law live in the house where the two of us grew up, … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-12-26

 

Sure Artificially Intelligent Machines Will Learn. But How Will We Make Them Accountable?

The opacity of machine learning isn’t just an academic problem. More and more places use the technology for everything from image recognition to medical diagnoses. All that decision­making is, by definition, unknowable—and that makes ­people uneasy. My friend Zeynep Tufekci, a sociologist, warns about “Moore’s law plus inscrutability.” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says we need “algorithmic accountability.”