8812+Notes

Updated guidelines for Section 516A reporting
Under Section 516A of the //Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999// (EPBC Act) Commonwealth organisations have a statutory requirement to report on their environmental performance and how they accord with and advance the principles of ecologically sustainable development (ESD).

The guidelines were developed to assist organisations in meeting their statutory ESD and environmental performance reporting requirements under S.516A of the EPBC Act.

The guidelines have been revised and now include a set of indicators to measure environmental performance.


 *  [|Guidelines for Section 516A reporting – //Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999//]

These guidelines outline an approach that aims to simplify and enhance the quality and consistency of ESD reporting across the Commonwealth.

It would be appreciated if reporting agencies could provide feedback on how useful the revised guidelines were for reporting against S.516A of the EPBC Act.

Any feedback should be directed to esd.enquiries@environment.gov.au.

**Computing Machinery and Intelligence**, written by [|Alan Turing] and published in 1950 in // [|Mind] //, is a seminal paper on the topic of [|artificial intelligence] in which the concept of what is now known as the [|Turing test] was introduced to a wide audience. Turing's paper considers the question "Can machines think?" Since the words "think" and "machine" can't be defined in a clear way that satisfies everyone, Turing suggests we "replace the question by another, which is closely related to it and is expressed in relatively unambiguous words." [|[1]] To do this, he must first find a simple and unambiguous idea to replace the word "think", second he must explain exactly which "machines" he is considering, and finally, armed with these tools, he formulates a new question, related to the first, that he believes he can answer in the affirmative.

**Moore's law** is the observation that over the [|history of computing hardware], the number of [|transistors] on [|integrated circuits] doubles approximately every two years. The period often quoted as "18 months" is due to [|Intel] executive David House, who predicted that period for a doubling in chip performance (being a combination of the effect of more transistors and their being faster). [|[1]]

The law is named after Intel co-founder [|Gordon E. Moore], who described the trend in his 1965 paper. [|[2]] [|[3]] [|[4]] The paper noted that the number of components in integrated circuits had doubled every year from the invention of the integrated circuit in 1958 until 1965 and predicted that the trend would continue "for at least ten years". [|[5]] His prediction has proven to be uncannily accurate, in part because the law is now used in the [|semiconductor] industry to guide long-term planning and to set targets for [|research and development]. [|[6]]

The capabilities of many digital electronic devices are strongly linked to Moore's law: [|processing speed], [|memory capacity] , sensors and even the number and size of [|pixels] in [|digital cameras]. [|[7]] All of these are improving at (roughly) [|exponential] rates as well (see [|Other formulations and similar laws] ). This exponential improvement has dramatically enhanced the impact of digital electronics in nearly every segment of the world economy. [|[8]] Moore's law describes a driving force of technological and social change in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. [|[9]] [|[10]]

This trend has continued for more than half a century. Sources in 2005 expected it to continue until at least 2015 or 2020. [|[note 1]] [|[12]] However, the 2010 update to the [|International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors] has growth slowing at the end of 2013, [|[13]] after which time transistor counts and densities are to double only every three years.