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NEWS & TECHNOLOGY
Machines make
the next Super
Mario
YOUR plucky blue box bounds over
gaps and hops onto platforms, the
pulsating red wall never more than
half a screen behind. If it catches you,
it is game over. Then the wall falls into
a hole, you bounce on it and it is gone.
This is Super Mario reimagined by
artificial intelligence.
Matthew Guzdial and Mark Riedl
at the Georgia Institute of Technology
RAVEENDRAN/AFP/GETTY learning system that has taught itself
in Atlanta have created a machine-
the basics of video game design by
watching videos of people playing
classic games, such as Super Mario,
Kirby and Mega Man.
WHO calls for end A demonstration against virginity the interactions between characters
This allows the AI to learn about
tests in New Delhi, India, in 2009
and objects: what happens when this
to virginity testing hymen. In rape cases in India and thing goes over there, what happens
Virginity tests don’t stop at the
when this thing touches that thing.
neighbouring countries, medical It then takes the patterns it has
or police examiners insert two identified in individual games and
Debora MacKenzie hymens of women who had fingers into the vagina, to assess remixes them into new ones. “Some
or hadn’t had penetrative the “laxity” of the vaginal muscles, are good, some are bad,” says Guzdial.
DOCTORS, police and employers intercourse were insignificant. thought to reflect whether a The above game, nicknamed Death
should be banned from using Another study found that hymen woman has become “habituated” Wall, was one success. Another, called
so-called virginity tests on women inspection accurately identified to sex. Killer Bounce, has the player jumping
and girls, and those who continue less than 10 per cent of the women But vaginal muscle tone reflects across blocks that disappear when
to use them should be prosecuted, who had experienced penetration. no such thing, says the WHO. you touch them, forcing you to keep
the World Health Organization Yet in Indonesia, a woman wanting Nevertheless, in court a diagnosis bouncing. It was the result of the
has declared. to join the military must have a of past sexual activity can weigh system taking the Super Mario rule
Such tests are used around the “virginal” hymen. against an unmarried woman that you dispatch enemies by
world in rape investigations and Virginity tests are also used who has been raped. Aruna bouncing on them and then making
even in hiring women for certain to humiliate women in prisons, Kashyap of Human Rights Watch everything in the game an enemy
professions. The WHO is calling including demonstrators in says that doctors in India “obsess (arxiv.org/abs/1809.02232).
on governments to ban these Egypt’s 2011 Arab Spring. In South about vaginal evidence”, even At the moment, Guzdial’s system
practices, and to educate doctors, Africa, girls who fail virginity tests though rape often leaves no produces very abstract, blocky
police and others that these tests vaginal injuries. games, but he would like to add
don’t indicate past sexual activity. “Virginity tests are used to India’s most recent guidelines more recognisable character designs
For centuries, many people humiliate women in prison, on how to treat women who and backdrops. These could also be
have believed that the hymen – including demonstrators in report being raped no longer machine-generated. Guzdial has
a fringe of tissue inside most Egypt’s 2011 Arab Spring” include the “two-finger test”. But previously used AI to generate new
vaginas – can be used as a sign the guidelines have only been Pokémon, for example.
of virginity. But there is no may be ostracised, and some adopted in nine of India’s 36 states Eventually, he would like anyone
evidence that the hymen can employers have held policies of and territories. “A lot needs to be to be able to use such systems.
reveal if a woman has had sex, only hiring women who pass. done,” says Kashyap. “People often say they want a game
as underscored by a review of Women who fail virginity While virginity tests are most that’s a bit like one thing and a bit like
available research co-authored tests – regardless of whether they common in parts of Africa, the another,” says Guzdial. “Wouldn’t it
by the WHO’s Claudia Garcia- have ever had sex – suffer socially Middle East and Asia, the WHO be great if you could show the AI
Moreno last year. and psychologically, says the says they also occur in immigrant Fortnite and Minecraft and it spat
In one study, doctors found WHO. Some attempt suicide; communities in rich nations, out something new you could play?”
that the differences between the others are killed by their families. including the UK. ■ Douglas Heaven ■
10 | NewScientist | 27 October 2018
