Hasta La Gadget!

When you work on a computer but you’re seldom at a desk that actually accommodates your height and comfort needs, you look for accessories to make the experience less strenuous. You want to make sure you’re not doing your body any harm, as long-term effects usually mean surgery. To make sure you’re going the ergonomic route, you don’t want to buy yourself a better desk, but you can buy pieces to make yours a better one.

Don’t go thinking that you’re going to be sawing pieces of another desk off, as what you are actually going to use is more of a support system for your arm to make sure that you’re getting the level of comfort you deserve. The Mouse Pad Arm-Stand will not only give you a solid space to mouse around on at a height that is comfortable for you, but forearm and wrist support as well. It’s made of a strong ABS plastic, and is said to be easy to install.

You have options to either Velcro it onto the armrests, or use a clamp to fix it onto your desk. It rotates 180 degrees, because it’s flat and is affixed at a hinge point with the clamp, and has grippy surfaces with raised plastic bits to make sure your arm doesn’t slip off, and your mouse can’t escape. This is a $25 desk accessory that will certainly help relieve some of that neck, shoulder and wrist strain.

Available for purchase on Fancy
[ The Mouse Pad Arm-Stand will make any chair feel like a proper desk copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]

Maine authorities have been searching day and night for a giant snake — reportedly the length of a truck — that they spotted slithering near a park and playground.

A patrolling police officer last saw the serpent, dubbed “Wessie” by locals, near Westbrook’s Riverbank Park at around 3:30 a.m. on Wednesday, the Westbrook Maine Police Department said.

“The snake was eating a large mammal, possibly a beaver (not joking),” the department posted on Facebook.

“A second officer arrived and they both watched it swim across the river to the Brown Street side of the Presumpscot River where it disappeared in the thick underbrush. They estimated its length to be at least 10 feet,” the post read.

Police noted that the snake is not native to the area, and suspect its former owner released it.

The creepy sighting came nearly a week after someone reported seeing a snake “as long as a truck” with a head “the size of a small ball” near a playground in the same area.

The officer who spotted the reptile on Wednesday wasn’t able to get a good picture of it because it was so early in the morning. Fortunately, creative members of the public have stepped in to provide their own drawings and alerts.

There’s even a mock Twitter account for the elusive reptile. “Wessie P. Thon” recently tweeted that police will “never take me alive!”

Police say members of the public should not try to capture the snake themselves if they see it.

“We ask the public to be mindful of the snake’s presence in the area and immediately report any sightings so we can remove the animal from the river,” the police department stated.

Because the animal just polished off a large meal, it’s expected to remain dormant for a few days.

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What are some ways parents can help educate their children on gun control and violence? originally appeared on Quora – the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique insights.

Answer by Michelle Sandberg, Pediatrician, founding board member Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, on Quora.

When discussing gun violence or other potentially frightening topics with children, it’s important to present information in an age-appropriate way that a child can understand. Start by asking a child what they have already heard or know, and what questions they have.

Especially for young children it is best to avoid graphic images and details. Young children may be frightened by violent images on television and social media — try to keep them protected from those visuals as much as possible.

For older children and adolescents who want to watch the news, it is best to watch with them. This allows you to stop and pause for discussion and questions as needed. Given the exposure older kids and teenagers have to news and graphic images through social media, it is helpful to be aware of what is out there and talk to them in advance about frightening topics like mass shootings. The reality is that children will hear about major events, and it’s much better for them to hear about it from a parent or trusted adult than from another child.

Regardless of age, it is best to be as straightforward, honest, and direct as possible (without going into unnecessary graphic detail). Tell your child that it is okay for them to be upset about violent incidents. Reassure them that you are there for them and will do your best to explain, discuss, answer questions, and help them process difficult information.

This question originally appeared on Quora. – the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique insights. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. More questions:​

• Guns and Firearms: As an ordinary U.S. citizen, what is the most effective thing I can do to contribute to gun control and gun safety in this country?
• Medicine and Healthcare: What’s it like to have a child go through Stanford’s food allergy trial?
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Should the CDC conduct gun violence research?

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What are some of the most interesting things about the history of photography? originally appeared on Quora – the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique insights.

Answer by Sarah Meister, Curator, Department of Photography, MoMA, on Quora.

There are so many! But I’ll begin with three:

1) For a variety of reasons (cultural, economic, social, technical), throughout the history of the medium a significant percentage of the greatest photographers have been women. In fact, it is possible to tell a coherent history of photography featuring only women artists: in 2010 I organized Pictures by Women: A History of Modern Photography (with two of my colleagues at MoMA) that did just this. There is a series of audio commentaries by and about artists included in the exhibition that Quora readers might enjoy. (I also wrote a blog post about the show.) In 1971 Linda Nochlin provocatively posed the question, “Why have there been no great women artists?” pointing to a structural bias in the definition of “artist” that overlooked achievements in fields such as photography.

2) The dialogue between photographs made for practical purposes and those intended by their creators to be works of art is uniquely vibrant and significant in the history of photography. MoMA collects and exhibits photographs across this spectrum, and I confess I’m often more interested in historical works that might be described as vernacular: snapshots, commercial assignments, news photos, studio portraits… everything other than self-consciously artistic objects.

3) I’ve been working at MoMA for a long time now, and there are still aspects of photography’s history that surprise and amaze me. I mentioned Gertrudes Altschul in a question about lesser-known photographs: in the 1950s she was a member of an incredibly inventive group in São Paulo called the Foto Cine Clube Bandeirante. As extraordinary as her individual achievement remains, I’m struck by the great number of talented amateur photographers associated with the group whose names were unknown to me even a year ago, and the dynamic contemporary network in which they operated that was in active dialogue with photographers around the world whose work I have long admired, such as Otto Steinert and his Fotoform group in Germany.

This question originally appeared on Quora. – the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique insights. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. More questions:​

• Photography: What is your advice to amateurs who want to improve their photography?
• Museum of Modern Art: What are some of the best, less well-known photographs on display at MoMA?
• Iconic Images: What are some photographs that you believe everybody should see?

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) And Global Geopolitics
– From “Atoms for Peace” to “AI for Mankind” –

Artificial Intelligence (AI), a top priority for the ubiquitous American tech companies, for Industry 4.0 or digital China, is already reshaping global business, but this major scientific and technological disruption will also deeply impact the relations between powers.

While narrow AI has moved from the labs to our daily lives, informed personalities like Stephen Hawking, Nick Bostrom, Bill Gates or Elon Musk have rightly raised concerns about the risks inherent to a strong AI capable of equaling or even surpassing human intelligence.

Anticipating the emergence of an even more powerful and increasingly autonomous AI reinforced by quantum computing, these engaged voices are asking for a collective reflection upon what could constitute an external challenge to mankind, a technology which could dominate its creator.

The recent win of the AlphaGo computer program over the Korean Go champion Lee Sedol was indeed a strong signal of the rapid development of machine learning at the intersection of computer science and neuroscience.

However, a more immediate danger connected with the advancement of intelligent machines is an AI fracture enlarging what is already known as the digital divide. While AI’s algorithms and big data increase the productivity of a small segment of the global village, half of the world population still does not have access to internet. “Don’t be evil” can be Google’s slogan, but exponential technologies carry with them the risks of unprecedented inequalities.

While AI’s social and political effects are often discussed the geopolitical implications of the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” have been surprisingly absent from the public debates.

How AI could affect the Sino-Western relations and, more specifically, the Sino-American relations, the major determinant of today’s international order? For decades, nuclear weapons stood as the frightening symbols of the Cold War, will AI become the mark of a 21st century Sino-Western strategic antagonism?

For humanity, the atomic age has been a time of paradoxes. In the aftermath of the 1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings an arms race involving the most lethal weapons defined the U.S.-Soviet relations in what constituted also a permanent existential threat to human civilization. But, analysts will also argue that it is the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) doctrine acting as a deterrent among rational actors which prevented a direct conflict between the two superpowers.

As the 2015 Plan of Action for Iran’s nuclear program demonstrates, 70 years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, world powers actively collaborate to avoid nuclear proliferation even if North Korea appears to be a counter example of this dominant trend.

But the Sino-Western convergence of views on the issue of nuclear proliferation does not apply in the cyberspace. Despite a certain level of interconnection between some private Chinese and American internet companies and financial institutions, the overall Sino-American relations in the cyberspace are characterized by strategic mistrust.

Besides, in space science and in the exploration of the universe, the U.S. and China are unfortunately following two separate courses. While China prepares to operate her own modular space station, the International Space Station (ISS) shows that in this strategic field the West can work with Russia but that Sino-Western synergies are almost impossible to reach.

Any responsible approach to AI has to take into account the combined lessons of the atomic age, of the digital dynamics and of the space exploration. Should a Western AI and a Chinese AI develop on two separate trajectories one would dangerously increase the risks of creating an irreversible Sino-Western strategic fracture for AI does not increase power in a limited quantitative manner but it modifies its nature.

In this context and following the appreciation of the interactions between AI and global politics an International Artificial Intelligence Agency should be established inspired by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

It is in the “Atoms for Peace” address to the United Nations General Assembly that U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969) proposed in 1953 the creation of the IAEA. Today, our actions must be guided by the spirit of “AI for Mankind”.

A United Nations International Artificial Intelligence Agency involving academics, private businesses, the world civil society and, of course, the governments should at least give itself the following four objectives.

First, it has to create the conditions for AI’s awareness across our societies and for a debate to take place on AI’s ethical implications. Scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, legal experts, philosophers, economists have to analyze AI from all possible angles, its future(s), its potential effects for humanity.

Second, this international body should take all possible actions to prevent an AI fracture which would dangerously enlarge the digital divide. One can’t accept to have, on one side, a tiny segment of humanity making use of a series of Human Enhancement Technologies (HET) and, on the other side, the vast majority of the world population becoming de facto diminished, what transhumanism revealingly abbreviates as H+ can’t be a plus for a few and a minus for all the others.

Third, the agency should ask for transparency in the AI research at both the governmental and the company level. The issue of nuclear proliferation and therefore the creation of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) followed the secretive Manhattan Project and the use of nuclear bombs to end the war in the Pacific, if humanity really wants to protect itself from the military use of strong AI and its tragic consequences it has to define a set of rules and policies which would maintain research within reasonable and collectively accepted limits. The IAEA imperfectly manages an existing threat, the AI agency would aim at preventing the realization of what could be an even greater danger.

Fourth, an international AI body should encourage knowledge sharing and international cooperation. Elon Musk’s OpenAI initiative is certainly a constructive force encouraging openness and collaboration but the “AI for Mankind” ideal can not depend only on a group of private entrepreneurs.

Artificial Intelligence, more than any other technology, will impact the future of mankind, it has to be wisely approached on a quest toward human dignity and not blindly worshiped as the new Master of a diminished humanity, it has to be a catalyst for more global solidarity and not a tyrannical matrix of new political or geopolitical divisions.

David Gosset is director of the Academia Sinica Europaea at CEIBS and founder of the Euro-China Forum. He has established the New Silk Road Initiative.

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