11 June 2009

Science and art, long-lost lovers, reunite for opening night of the World Science Festival

The second year of the World Science Festival got off to a spectacular start last night at New York's Lincoln Center, with a program star-studded from both science and the arts. We loved it here at TED, not just because it featured so many of our TED favorites -- physicist Brian Greene (who co-founded the Festival with partner Tracy Day), biologist E.O. Wilson, actor Anna Deavere Smith, Nobel winner James Watson, photographer Frans Lanting and cellist Yo-Yo Ma to name a few -- or because we share a lot of cross-disciplinary DNA with WSF, or because it was held in the new Alice Tully Hall (designed by TED speaker Liz Diller) but also for the its fresh, innovative approach and playful sense of fun.

The evening paid tribute to legendary biologist (and beloved TED Prize winner) E.O Wilson, on the occasion of his 80th birthday, but the program was really a love letter to science itself -- for its importance, yes, but also for the inspiration and wonder it offers, and for its deep but often-unacknowledged kinship with the arts.

"Tonight, science and art, long-lost lovers, reunite" Alan Alda said, as he opened the show. And that sensibility pervaded the program, as it blended science and the arts in innovative and unusual ways -- from a sequence of broadway musical stars singing light-hearted tributes to science (For example, a guided tour of the periodic table, set to the tune of Gilbert & Sullivan's "I am the very model of a modern major general". Brilliant!) to an intellectual pas de deux, featuring Brian Greene waxing eloquent on the nature of the universe, and Joshua Bell performing lyrically on the violin.

The evening included several heartfelt odes to Wilson -- the transcendent cellist YoYo Ma performed playfully as young "ants" wiggle-danced around him (Wilson's career was built on his research on ants); Anna Deavere Smith impersonated Wilson as only she could. And Nobel winner James Watson (of Watson & Crick double-helix fame) paid homage in his own eccentric way: "When we first met, Ed thought I was the most unpleasant person he'd ever known," Watson explained to a chuckling audience. "And when I first met Ed, I didn't think there was any point in knowing him. Because everyone knew: Biology was the dumb part of science."

READ MORE: The NY premiere of Frans Lanting's LIFE, live performance of the Philip Glass score and Wilson's central message.

Photos: Robert Leslie. Courtesy WSF

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15 July 2008

Scientist at Work: Paying a Visit to E.O. Wilson

To reach Edward O. Wilson’s office on the Harvard campus, one must first push through a door with a sign warning the public not to enter. Then, enter a creaky old elevator and press two buttons simultaneously. This counterintuitive procedure transports one into a strange realm. It is a space that holds the world’s largest collection of ants, some 14,000 species. Curators are checking the drawers, dominated by the tall figure of Dr. Wilson, who is trying to contain his excitement: the 14,001st ant species has just been discovered in the soils of a Brazilian forest...

Continue reading the insightful story by the New York Times (or watch E.O. Wilson's 2007 TED Prize speech on the Encyclopedia of Life, which is featured in the NYT article).

Plus: Andrew C. Revkin writes about E.O. Wilson's visit to the New York Times offices on the NYTimes blog Dot Earth.

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18 May 2008

How to get involved in TED Prize wishes

Since it began in 2005, the TED Prize has been making wishes that call on the power of the global TED community. Here's a roundup of current TED Prize wishes that you can get involved in -- in large or small ways, with money, ideas, time or skills:

+ In 2007, biologist E.O. Wilson wished that we would help him build a comprehensive catalog of life on Earth. The Encyclopedia of Life launched this spring and is growing -- with many ways for both scientists and non-scientists to contribute. Create an account on the site to hear about the latest updates and opportunities -- including the debut of a tool for uploading your own photos. Find out more about The Encyclopedia of Life and EOL.org>>

+ In 2005, photographer Edward Burtynsky wished for new ways to teach kids about environmental stewardship. Working with WGBH in Boston, his web cartoon show, The Greens, just celebrated its first anniversary and seventh episode. Watch shows online and download art and music, take a movie quiz and share the site with kids you know. Find out more about The Greens >>

+ At TED2008, physicist Neil Turok wished for the TED community's help in developing math and sciences talent all over Africa, though the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS). Our next Einstein, he says, could be African. At NextEinstein.org, learn more about AIMS, watch video interviews with students, and find many ways to help in this drive to open 15 math and sciences academies in Africa and fund scholarships for the best and the brightest on the continent. Find out more about NextEinstein.org >>

+ in 2008, writer and activist Dave Eggers gave a hilarious TED Prize talk about his wish: that we will all become personally involved in our local schools, and tell a story about it. Whether you volunteer with a chapter of Dave's 826 National foundation, or on your own, sign in at OnceUponASchool.org and share your story. Find out more about OnceUponASchool.org >>

+ In 2006, filmmaker Jehane Noujaim made an audacious wish: to connect the world for one day through the power of film. Last weekend's Pangea Day was a moving 4-hour festival -- and you can replay the day on PangeaDay.org. Watch the films, speakers and music you missed, find ways to take action, and discuss each film on the site (click on "Comments" to expand the discussion). Find out more about PangeaDay.org >>

+ In 2006, Cameron Sinclair asked TED to help him build an open-source platform to help architects connect with communities in need of designs. The result was the Open Architecture Network -- a successful website that acts as both a clearinghouse for building plans and a vibrant social network, allows its users to sample, remix and customize design work for their needs. To help Sinclair's wish come true, join the community at the Open Architecture Network's website.

+ In 2006, Dr. Larry Brilliant wished to start a global early warning system to prevent the spread of infectious disease. The organization that grew out of this wish, Innovative Support To Emergencies Diseases and Disasters (InSTEDD) is a venue for humanitarian collaboration with a focus on those involved in disease tracking and disaster response. You can help Dr. Brilliant now by test-driving an alpha version of their crisis assistance directory.

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01 May 2008

Vote for your favorite public intellectuals

Not to be outdone by the Time 100, the journals Foreign Policy and Prospect have together released a list of the Top 100 public intellectuals -- with voting. Many TEDTalks favorites appear on the list, and you can help choose the eventual top 20 by voting for your very own top 5. From Foreign Policy's site:

Although the men and women on this list are some of the world’s most sophisticated thinkers, the criteria to make the list could not be more simple. Candidates must be living and still active in public life. They must have shown distinction in their particular field as well as an ability to influence wider debate, often far beyond the borders of their own country.

TEDTalks speakers on this top 100 list include George Ayittey, Steven Pinker, Neil Gershenfeld, Malcolm Gladwell, Craig Venter, Al Gore, Richard Dawkins, Vilayanur Ramachandran, Larry Lessig, Steven Levitt, E.O. Wilson, Dan Dennett and Bjorn Lomborg -- and look for upcoming TEDTalks from others on this list, including Paul Collier, who spoke at TED2008 about "the bottom billion."

See the full list of 100 >>

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08 April 2008

Encyclopedia of Life film is nominated for a Webby

The beautiful film that helped launch the Encyclopedia of Life has been nominated for a 2008 Webby Award. Created by Avenue A | Razorfish, the film is just one outcome of E.O. Wilson's 2007 TED Prize wish: to "help create the key tool that we need to inspire preservation of Earth's biodiversity: the Encyclopedia of Life." You can watch the video on the Webby Award player and cast your vote >>

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28 February 2008

Encyclopedia of Life launches!

E.O. Wilson made this TED Prize wish in 2007: Help me build the key tool that we need to inspire preservation of Earth's biodiversity: the Encyclopedia of Life. Today, the Encyclopedia of Life website has launched, with the first 30,000 pages, each one describing a single species, with descriptions and photos contributed by scientists and naturalists and people around the globe. Within a decade, it'll have more than 1.5 million pages, each for a single species.

The New York Times has a great story giving more background on this wish >>

(Please note -- the site is going to be very busy tonight!)

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13 July 2007

E.O. Wilson on PBS: Why should we care if the woodpecker goes?

The last "Bill Moyers Journal", the weekly report on PBS, featured a long interview (video - transcript) by Moyers with biologist and TED Prize 2007 winner EO Wilson. The focus was very much on Wilson's career -- "No one in our time has added more to our understanding of Earth's ecology than Ed Wilson" is how Moyers described him -- but Moyers took the opportunity to also ask questions about the Encyclopedia of Life. The EOL is Wilson's TED Prize wish (video - summary - text): It's a vast project aimed at documenting all 1.8 million named species of animals, plants, and other forms of life on Earth, and those yet to be discovered ("We're maybe today about 1/10 through the discovery of species", says Wilson). Efforts towards an EOL have been underway since January 2006, but Wilson's TED2007 speech has significantly accelerated the process, with the McArthur Foundation leading a US$ 50 million funding commitment, leading scientific institutions including Harvard University and the Smithsonian teaming up, and agency Avenue A/Razorfish creating a first design concept for the Encyclopedia and a video to explain the ambitious vision behind the initiative, using photography by Frans Lanting (watch his TED 2005 speech) and others.

Moyers is a great interviewer. At a certain point, he asks Wilson: why should we care if the woodpecker goes? I mean, we've lost---how many species have we lost?

Wilson: How many species going extinct or becoming very rare do you think it takes before you see something happening? We now know from experiments and theory that the more species you take out of an ecosystem like a pond, a patch of forest, a little bit of marine shallow environments, the more you take out the less stable it becomes. If you have a tsunami or a severe drought or a fire, it is less likely that that ecosystem, that body of species in that particular environment, is going to come back all the way. So it becomes less stable with fewer species. And then we also know it becomes less productive. In other words, it's not able to produce as many kilograms of new matter from photosynthesis and passage through the ecosystem. It's less productive. It sure is less interesting, though, isn't it? And more than that: we lose the services of these species.

Moyers: The services of these species.

Wilson: Yes, services of these species to us. Like pollination and water purification.

Moyers: That we get free from nature.

Wilson: Yeah. Here's an easy way to remember it.

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04 April 2007

2007 TED Prize winner E.O. Wilson on TEDTalks

As E.O. Wilson accepts his 2007 TED Prize, he makes a plea on behalf of his constituents, the insects and small creatures, to learn more about our biosphere. We know so little about nature, he says, that we're still discovering tiny organisms indispensable to life; and yet we're steadily, methodically, vigorously destroying nature. Wilson identifies five grave threats to biodiversity (a term he coined), and makes his TED wish: that we will work together on the Encyclopedia of Life, a web-based compendium of data from scientists and amateurs on every aspect of the biosphere. (Recorded March 2007 in Monterey, CA. Duration: 24:21)

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Posted by June Cohen | Permalink

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10 March 2007

TED2007 Day Three: things that knocked my hat in the creek

Wow!  Day Three at TED2007 ROCKED!  A magical day which got crank-started by a truly electric presentation on the perils of Local Warming. 

This was a day which just can't wait for the TEDTalks to come out.  Daniel Goleman made a wonderful connection between emotional intelligence and the empathy which will be required -- by all of us -- to make more informed, broader-scope consumption and action decisions in the future.  Later in the day Eames Demetrios, grandson of Charles Eames (and a true design thinker in his own right) made the same point in a different way -- humanity has got the information now; we just need to start making better choices.

Today (actually, yesterday, since once again I find myself blogging at 4 in the morning -- funny that...) was one of those classic TED days where almost everything was mind-blowing,where just about everything knocked my hat in the creek.  Highlights for me were JJ Abrams and his Mystery Box; Jeff Skoll and his enlightened humanity; Deborah Scranton and her movie The War Tapes, which every global citizen must see and experience; Will Wright and his latest "game" which I couldn't help but think was the fortuitous answer to the TEDPrize wish of 2007 TEDPrize winner E.O. Wilson; Jaime Lerner as a vibrant example of the power of pure enthusiasm; Eames Demetrios for giving us the gift of previously unseen movies which exposed the vernacular power of iterative prototyping, as well as a parable of a banana leaf which pretty much sums up TED 2006+2007 in a nutshell (you MUST watch this TEDTalk when it comes out!); and of course Tracy Chapman and Isabel Allende for their artistry and authenticity.

It was a good day.

Above, all, I want to express my personal gratitude for Thomas Dolby and the musicians of the Jazz Mafia for the musical punch they give to all of TED:

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09 March 2007

TED2007: Day two wrap-up

Quotes of the day:

Former US president Bill Clinton, TEDprize 2007 winner: "Help me in creating a better future for Rwanda by assisting my foundation, in partnership with the Rwandan government, to build a sustainable, high quality rural health system for the whole country, that can then be a model for other countries. We have a chance here to prove that a country that almost slaughtered itself out of existence (while none of us, most of all me, did anything to help) can practice reconciliation, reorganize itself, focus on tomorrow and provide comprehensive healthcare to its citizens."

News photographer James Nachtwey, TEDprize 2007 winner: "I am a witness and I want my testimony to be honest and uncensored. I also want it to be powerful and eloquent and do justice to the people I'm photographing."

Biologist E.O. Wilson, TEDprize 2007 winner: "I've come on a special mission on behalf of my constituency, the millions of trillions of insects and other small creatures, to make a plea for them. Please keep in mind that if we would wipe out insects from the planet - which we are trying hard to do - the rest of life would disappear within a few months."

Author Michael Pollan: "Looking at the world from other species' point of view is a cure for human self-importance."

Former Microsoft CTO Nathan Myhrvold: "I have this picture up on my computer screen, and a woman comes up and asks whether that's a Jackson Pollock painting, but no, it's a picture of penguin shit on rocks."

VC John Doerr: "I'm scared. I don't think we're gonna make it." (About climate change)

Former Nigerian Finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala: "There is an Africa that you don't hear often about, the Africa that's changing, the Africa of people that are taking their destiny into their hands."

TED Media Director June Cohen: "The newest digital technologies are returning us to the most ancient form of media — one in which a natural order is restored; our individual stories take center stage, with the rest of the world as a backdrop."

Creative Commons founder Larry Lessig: "We have to recognize they kids different from us. We watch TV, they make TV. It is technology that has made them different."

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