Latest news with #TheHobbit
Perth Now
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
Martin Freeman and Iain Armitage cast in The Adam Trials
Martin Freeman and Iain Armitage are to star in The Adam Trials. The duo have signed up to appear in the psychological thriller that contains a sci-fi twist from writer-director Ben Katai. The movie centres on the story of two parents who will do anything to save the life of their terminally ill son, including experimenting with nanotechnology that begins to show successful signs but at a dark cost. Compelling Pictures are producing the film whilst Freeman is on board as an executive producer with Noah Rosen, Dennis Casali, Matthew Gallagher and Steven Garcia. Casting for the female lead has started as the movie aims to shoot this year. Katai - who previously collaborated with Freeman on the crime drama series StartUp - said: "This movie has been a dream of mine for quite some time now, as has the opportunity to work with Martin again. "Now with Iain's talent in the mix, I am counting the seconds until we start rolling." Compelling Pictures boss Denis O'Sullivan said: "As lifelong fans of thought-provoking, grounded sci-fi, it's thrilling to be part of bringing this pressure-cooker of a movie to the screen with the enormously talented Ben Katai. "Audiences will be on the edge of their seats watching the cat-and-mouse game that unfolds between Martin and Iain as the story hurtles towards a stunning final twist." Martin's previous film credits include Love Actually and The Hobbit franchise and he revealed back in 2022 that he would "consider" directing a big screen flick. The 53-year-old actor told Collider: "It's something that I would consider. I do think about it. I change with it, really. Sometimes when I'm on set and I see what a director does, I look at it and go, 'Yeah, I could do that. I'd be right with this part of it.' However, the Black Panther star isn't sure if he has the "mental bandwidth" to deal with the "endless questions" that are asked of directors during the making of a movie. Martin said: "But then, there are other parts of directing that I'm still not sure I'd have the mental bandwidth for, just with the endless questions and how you have to be across everything. I know I would enjoy the bits where I'm rehearsing with actors. I don't know how good I'd be at the other stuff, or how much I'd enjoy that stuff. But never say never. If I get the confidence to think I could do it, then maybe so." The star plays CIA operative Everett K. Ross in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) but admits that there was a "gap" on set of the movie Black Panther: Wakanda Forever without the late Chadwick Boseman, who played the title role in the original film before his death from cancer at the age of 43 in 2020. Freeman said: "It was strange, that side of it. On the one hand, you're making the film that you're there to make, and there are scores and scores of people on set, joined in this endeavor to make the film. But there's also no question that, at the heart of it, there's quite a gap now, and you felt it."
Hindustan Times
4 days ago
- Science
- Hindustan Times
Meta's AI models shocked researchers by memorising 40% of Harry Potter, raising big questions about copyright and AI
Meta's Llama 3.1 model is showing just how much ground AI has covered in recent years. Researchers from Stanford, Cornell, and West Virginia University found that this 70-billion parameter model can recall and reproduce over 42 percent of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, line for line, when prompted with the right cues. The findings have set off fresh debate about what happens when AI models remember too much, especially when it comes to copyrighted work. Llama 3.1's recall of Harry Potter text highlights fresh copyright risks as AI models grow more powerful and precise.(Unsplash) Llama 3.1 isn't just picking up a few famous quotes. The model can reliably generate long stretches of text from some of the world's most popular books, including The Hobbit and 1984. The researchers broke down 36 books into 100-token passages, then used the first half as a prompt to see if the AI could guess the rest. Llama 3.1 managed to match the original text more than half the time, far outpacing older models like Llama 1, which only managed around 4 percent on the same test. The study also noticed that the more popular the book, the more likely the model was to reproduce it accurately. Lesser-known works hardly registered, but bestsellers were easy targets. This raises questions for writers and publishers about how exposed their work is when AI models are trained on massive datasets scraped from the web. Legal and creative questions ahead With AI companies like Meta already facing lawsuits over their training methods, these findings land at a sensitive moment. If a model can serve up large sections of a copyrighted book, it's not just a technical achievement, it's a legal and ethical dilemma. The research team points out that open-weight models like Llama 3.1 are easier to test for memorisation, since researchers can access the technical details needed to measure what the model remembers. This transparency could make open models more vulnerable to legal scrutiny than their closed-source rivals. For authors, the study is a reminder that the biggest and most beloved books are also the most at risk. For the AI industry, it's a sign that the old ways of collecting and using data are under the microscope, and that we may need a fresh outlook to make copyright laws work in sync with AI advancements, so that creative industries don't suffer radical setbacks in the near-future. As the legal battles heat up, the spotlight will stay on how these powerful models handle the stories and ideas that shape our culture.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
‘Goblin prince': New monstersaur discovered in Utah reveals hidden secrets of Gila monster relatives
Artistic reconstruction of Bolg amondol, depicted raiding an oviraptorosaur dinosaur nest amidst the lush Kaiparowits Formation habitat. (Courtesy of Cullen Townsend/University of Utah) When Hank Woolley, a paleontological researcher who specializes in lizard evolution, opened a jar of bones labeled 'lizard' at the Natural History Museum of Utah, he said his first thought was, 'Oh wow, there's a fragmentary skeleton here.' 'We know very little about large-bodied lizards from the Kaiparowits Formation in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah, so I knew this was significant right away,' said Woolley, from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County's Dinosaur Institute. With Woolley's expertise, that jar of bones — even though it was collected back in 2005 — helped lead to a new discovery of a 'racoon-sized armored monstersaurian,' a giant relative of the Gila monster, according to an announcement issued last week by the University of Utah. Its name, Bolg amondol, was inspired by a 'goblin prince' villain in J.R.R. Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings' universe. Bolg now represents an 'evolutionary lineage that sprouted within a group of large-bodied lizards called monstersaurs that still roam the deserts from which Bolg was recovered,' according to the U. Woolley knew that a new species of monstersaur called for an appropriate name from an 'iconic monster creator': Tolkien, the university said in its release. 'Bolg is a great sounding name. It's a goblin prince from 'The Hobbit,' and I think of these lizards as goblin-like, especially looking at their skulls,' Woolley said. He also used Tolkien's fictional Elvish language Sindarin to craft the species' epithet. 'Amon' means 'mound,' and 'dol' means 'head,' a reference to mound-like osteoderms (or bony deposits that act as a form of armor) found on Bolg's and other monstersaurs' skulls. ''Mound-headed Bolg' would fit right in with the goblins — and it's revealing quite a bit about monstersaurs,' the U. said. The research published June 17 in the journal Royal Society Open Science, led by the Dinosaur Institute in Los Angeles County and the Natural History Museum of Utah, 'reveals hidden treasures awaiting future paleontologists in the bowels of museum fossil collections,' the university said, along with 'the vast potential of paleontological heritage preserved in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and other public lands.' The field collection of the specimens were conducted under paleontological permits issued by the Bureau of Land Management, which also helped fund the study with a National Science Foundation award. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Though the Bolg specimen was first unearthed more than a decade ago, in 2005, Woolley's expertise in lizard paleontology helped determine its significance. He was the lead author of the research. 'Bolg is a great example of the importance of natural history museum collections,' said co-author Randy Irmis, an associate professor at the U. and curator of paleontology at the Natural History Museum of Utah, in the news release. 'Although we knew the specimen was significant when it was discovered back in 2005, it took a specialist in lizard evolution like Hank to truly recognize its scientific importance and take on the task of researching and scientifically describing this new species.' Though museum collection spaces are 'sometimes stereotyped as dusty, forgotten places, the truth is quite the opposite,' the Natural History Museum of Utah said in a post about Bolg last week. The museum's paleontology collection is a 'glorified storage unit. Instead, it's a space where staff, students, volunteers, and visiting researchers can care for fossils and conduct new research.' 'It was this reevaluation of collection specimens,' the museum added, 'that led to Woolley's breakthrough research on Bolg amondol.' Irmis said discovering a new species of lizard that's an ancestor of the modern-day Gila monster is 'pretty cool in and of itself, but what's particularly exciting is what it tells us about the unique 76-million-year-old ecosystem it lived in.' 'The fact that Bolg co-existed with several other large lizard species indicates that this was a stable and productive ecosystem where these animals were taking advantage of a wide variety of prey and different micro-habitats,' Irmis said. Researchers identified the new species from a collection of skull, limbs, vertebrae and bony armor called osteoderms. Most fossil lizards from the dinosaur age 'are even scrappier — often just single, isolated bones or teeth — so despite their fragmentary nature, the parts of Bolg's skeleton that survived contain a stunning amount of information,' the U. said. 'That means more characteristics are available for us to assess and compare to similar-looking lizards,' Woolley said. 'Importantly, we can use those characteristics to understand this animal's evolutionary relationships and test hypotheses about where it fits on the lizard tree of life.' The clade (or ancestral grouping) of anguimorph lizards known as monstersauria are characterized by their large size and distinctive features, like 'sharp, spire-like teeth and pitted, polygonal armor attached to their skulls.' Bolg, the U. said, 'would have been a bit of a monster to our eyes.' 'Three feet tip to tail, maybe even bigger than that, depending on the length of the tail and torso,' Woolley said. 'So, by modern lizard standards they're a very large animal, similar in size to a Savannah monitor lizard; something that you wouldn't want to mess around with.' Monstersauria have a roughly 100-million-year history, but their fossil record is largely incomplete, meaning Bolg's discovery is a 'big deal' to help fully understand the prehistoric lizards and their world, the university said. 'Bolg's closest known relative hails from the other side of the planet in the Gobi Desert of Asia,' the U. said. 'Though dinosaurs have long been known to have traveled between the once-connected continents of the Late Cretaceous Period, Bolg reveals that smaller animals also made the trek, suggesting there were common patterns of biogeography across terrestrial vertebrates during this time.' Bolg was discovered in the rocks of the Kaiparowits Formation of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument — a formation that has emerged as a paleontological hotspot over the past 25 years, according to the U. Those rocks have produced 'one of the most astounding dinosaur-dominated records in North America,' the university said. 'Discoveries like this underscore the importance of preserving public lands in the Western U.S. for science and research.' Co-author Joe Sertich, from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Colorado State University, said in the release that the 'exceptional record of big lizards' from Grand Staircase-Escalante 'may prove to be a normal part of dinosaur-dominated ecosystems from North America.' He said those lizards appear to have filled 'key roles as smaller predators hunting down eggs and small animals in the forests of Laramidia,' which is an island continent that existed during the Late Cretaceous period. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Time of India
6 days ago
- Science
- Time of India
New armored lizard fossil ‘Bolg' discovered in Utah named after Tolkien's Goblin Prince
Source: Natural History Museum of Utah Every fossil unearthed not only tells a story of ancient life but also reinforces the value of conserving these spaces for future scientific discovery. A remarkable discovery of fossils is being unearthed in Utah. The fossil find hidden in a museum collection has led to the identification of a new species of an ancient lizard inspired by the fantasy world of Tolkien's Goblin Prince, offering fresh insight into the long-lost group of heavily armored reptiles that once roamed prehistoric North America. Researchers stress that protected public lands like Grand Staircase-Escalante aren't just scenic wilderness areas; they are living laboratories that preserve critical records of Earth's history. Ancient lizard fossil named after Tolkien's Goblin Prince unearthed in Utah The newly discovered lizard, named 'Bolg amondol', was about the size of a raccoon and covered in bony, protective armour. The fossil was found in Utah's Kaiparowits Formation, part of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, and belongs to a group of ancient predators known as monstersaurs — relatives of the venomous Gila monsters that live today. The genus name "Bolg" comes from the goblin prince in The Hobbit, while "amondol," derived from Tolkien's Elvish language, means "mound-headed," referencing the lizard's distinctive skull structure. These adaptations, including sharp teeth and spiked skin, suggest Bolg was a formidable predator in the Late Cretaceous forests around 75 million years ago. From museum shelf to prehistoric spotlight: The hidden lizard unearthed According to the study, the fossil was originally excavated in 2005, it went unnoticed until Dr. Hank Woolley of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County revisited a jar tucked away in a museum drawer. What seemed like an overlooked specimen turned out to be a new species, sparking detailed research into its evolutionary history. The remains, though incomplete, include parts of the skull, vertebrae, limb bones, and dermal armor (osteoderms). Together, they've helped paleontologists better understand this obscure family of lizards, particularly their place in ancient ecosystems dominated by dinosaurs. Co-author Dr. Randy Irmis of the University of Utah emphasized the significance of revisiting older museum specimens. Many important discoveries lie dormant for years until a fresh perspective reveals their importance. Bolg is now one of at least three large predatory lizards known from the region, enriching our understanding of the diversity within ancient food chains. How ancient lizards Like Bolg crossed continents Bolg's closest known relative lived in the Gobi Desert of Asia, hinting at intercontinental migration routes during the Late Cretaceous period. This supports theories that land bridges allowed even smaller reptiles to travel across connected continents, just as some dinosaurs and mammals did. According to Dr. Joe Sertich of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, lizards like Bolg likely played vital ecological roles. Their diet may have included dinosaur eggs, small animals, and carrion, placing them alongside today's monitor lizards in terms of behavior and function. Early-career scientist leads breakthrough fossil discovery The findings were published in Royal Society Open Science and supported by the National Science Foundation, the Bureau of Land Management, and the Dinosaur Institute. Lead researcher Dr. Woolley began this work as a PhD student and now continues it as a postdoctoral fellow — a testament to how early-career scientists can make major breakthroughs. Dr. Nathan Smith, a co-author from the Dinosaur Institute, highlighted how institutions like theirs support budding researchers in exploring Earth's deep past. The Kaiparowits Formation is already renowned for its dinosaur fossils, and Bolg adds yet another chapter to its prehistoric legacy. Also Read | Living with an anaconda? Understanding human and snake relationships in the Amazon Várzea
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
Ed Sheeran releases new song 'Drive' featuring John Mayer, Dave Grohl: Watch music video
Ed Sheeran has released new music. The singer-songwriter dropped the song "Drive" on Friday, his contribution to the soundtrack of the upcoming Brad Pitt Formula One racing film " F1." There's also a video to go along with the rocking track, which features guitar by John Mayer and drums courtesy of Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl. Watch the full video below. "i knew that i wanted to make a proper rock song for [the movie], a proper driving song. something you'd wanna turn up to the fullest amount whilst driving," Sheeran wrote in the caption of an Instagram post Friday. He noted that he co-wrote the song with Mayer and songwriter Blake Slatkin, and that Grohl and musician Pino Palladino, a session bassist, were "the final jigsaw pieces of the song." "pure dream team for the genre of rock, and i really feel what we created fits the scene in the movie so well," he continued. "i LOVE making songs for movies, ever since i did 'I See Fire' for The Hobbit. it really lets me as a movie fan, behind the curtain, help create the perfect song for a scene in a movie." In the accompanying music video, Sheeran sings on a racetrack while Formula One cars whiz by him and fly through the air. At the end, he gets behind the wheel of what looks like a super-charged dune buggy and drives through the desert and onto a beach. "Movies and art are the only hobbies outside of music i really have, and i love my time at [F1 events] whenever i get to go play there. so this was like a match made in heaven," Sheeran wrote in his Instagram post Friday. "i'm so honored to work with such great musicians on it, and hope you guys love the end result." "F1" follows veteran racer Sonny Hayes (Pitt), who is recruited by Ruben Cervantes, played by Javier Bardem, to join his Formula One team and race alongside Joshua Pearce, played by Damson Idris. The movie and the soundtrack are both out June 27.
