The celebration of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China at the beginning of this month promised plenty of pomp and power projection. In the days leading up to the grandiose parade through Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, Chinese citizens began sharing photos of tarp-covered vehicles and missiles being rolled into Beijing for a rehearsal.

Welcome new subscribers! Today we celebrate The Interface’s second birthday. For two years now, we’ve done our best to bring you the day’s most important developments in technology and democracy. The next year, which will bring us a US presidential election, promises to be the most consequential yet. Thank you for reading it and sharing with your friends and coworkers. And if you’re in San Francisco and would like to meet us in person, there are still some tickets available for our first...

Companies and industries that are not moving towards zero-carbon emissions will be punished by investors and go bankrupt, the governor of the Bank of England has warned. Mark Carney also told the Guardian it was possible that the global transition needed to tackle the climate crisis could result in an abrupt financial collapse. He said the longer action to reverse emissions was delayed, the more the risk of collapse would grow.

Ad claims CEO backs Trump – then admits it’s not true – after company admits letting politicians make false statements

In January 2016, Charles Flores, a Texas prisoner, was moved to death watch, where inmates awaiting execution spend their final months. Seventeen years earlier, Flores had been convicted of murdering a woman in a Dallas suburb in the course of a robbery, a crime he says he did not commit. All of his appeals had been denied and his lethal injection was scheduled for 2 June.

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EPFL scientists are developing new approaches for improved control of robotic hands – in particular for amputees – that combines individual finger control and automation for improved grasping and manipulation. This interdisciplinary proof-of-concept between neuroengineering and robotics was successfully tested on three amputees and seven healthy subjects. The results are published in today’s issue of Nature Machine Intelligence.

Apple plans to release a software update later this year that will make Siri more flexible with third-party messaging apps like WhatsApp, Skype, and Facebook Messenger, the company told Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.

A team of researchers has investigated the potential for artificial intelligence (AI) to detect diseases in medical images as well as humans can.

A futuristic high-speed train travel pod that creators hope will one day zip passengers from New York to DC in just 30 minutes was unveiled in Manhattan on Friday.

The number of meltwater lakes on the surface of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet is more significant than previously thought, according to new research. A study led by Durham University, working with researchers from Lancaster University, discovered more than 65,000 supraglacial lakes using high-resolution satellite imagery covering five million square kilometres of the ice sheet, including areas where surface melting was previously thought to be less intense.

A recently-published study found an association between living near spaces with more plants and a lower risk of obesity and heart disease.

Ariane 6, Europe's next-generation launch vehicle, has passed another key development milestone. Its Vulcain 2.1 liquid-fuelled engine has now completed its qualification testing, which means combined tests can now begin.

Ahead of the UN climate summit and the global climate strike, the world's largest search engine announced that the tech behemoth will make its biggest corporate purchase of renewable energy yet, signing on to a series of agreements that will increase Google's wind and solar investments by 40 percent, as Quartz reported.

A new University of Liverpool study has concluded that the anglers’ myth ‘that fish don’t feel pain’ can be dispelled: fish do indeed feel pain, with a similarity to that experienced by mammals including humans.

Clive Palmer, an Australian billionaire often called the Donald Trump from Down Under, is threatening to sue YouTuber Friendly Jordies for defamation if he doesn’t pay $500,000. The popular YouTube personality and comedian, whose real name is Jordan Shanks, posted a video with the threatening letter he recently received from Palmer’s attorney which, among other things, claims that Palmer was defamed because the YouTuber called him “Fatty McFuckhead” and a “dense Humpty Dumpty.”

The Ontario government will consider all options including new legislation to shield farmers from animal rights activists, the province's agriculture ministry said Friday. The assurances from Agriculture Minister Ernie Hardeman's office come as livestock producers press for action to prosecute those who trespass on their properties and aggressively protest at processing plants.

Deepfake artist Hao Li said that soon we will get to the point where there is no way to actually detect deepfakes.

Video shows Steven Weber proposing through the window of a submerged cabin off Tanzania.

SeekHealing, a program for addicts in North Carolina, is also tackling the loneliness epidemic.

The UK’s next wave of offshore windfarms will generate clean electricity at no extra cost to consumers after record low-subsidy deals fell below the market price for the first time. New offshore wind projects will power millions of British homes under “zero-subsidy” support contracts within the next four years, following a record-breaking government subsidy auction.

It’s not just bees that are being harmed by the pesticides called neonicotinoids, it’s birds too. A study in Canada has shown that migrating white-crowned sparrows lose weight just hours after eating seeds treated with the neocotinoid imidacloprid, delaying their onward migration by several days. Although the main manufacturer of the pesticide disputes the findings.