Fast-forward 20, 50, or even 100 years into the future — what will our lives be like? Will flying cars and 3D-printed dinners be the norm, or will they remain mostly science fiction? On Saturday, November 14, kids and teens from all five boroughs of New York City explored these possibilities at the Brooklyn Museum. With […]
The TED community has been doing some big things over the past few weeks. Below, some newsy highlights. Let’s interview our elders. This Thanksgiving, high school students across the United States will have an important assignment: Interview a grandparent or elder using the StoryCorps app. The Great Thanksgiving Listen — a partnership of StoryCorps, TED, […]
(Editor’s note, as of Nov. 1, 2019: Ameenah Gurib-Fakim stepped down as president of Mauritius in March 2018, following accusations that she misused a credit card given to her by a nonprofit. Read more here.) You’ve heard of a philosopher king. But what about a biologist president? Ameenah Gurib-Fakim — the biologist who gave the […]
In agricultural entrepreneur Trang Tran’s native Vietnam, farmers traditionally burn the straw and husks that remain after the rice harvest. This practice happens at least twice a year for two months at a time, releasing noxious smoke and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Tran’s solution: using rice straw to cultivate mushrooms. Her social enterprise Fargreen is […]
Planet Earth doesn’t exactly have a birthday. But every year on April 22, we celebrate Earth Day — the anniversary of the moment the environmental movement went mass. According to EarthDay.org, Earth Day was founded in 1970 by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson, who called for a “national teach-in on the environment” after witnessing the terrible effects […]
For the 50,000 people of the Faroe Islands, a self-governing country within the Kingdom of Denmark, hunting long-finned pilot whales — a dark gray species found in their waters — is a tradition that stretches back centuries. These whales are a food source, and hunting them is considered an important part of Faroese culture. Today, […]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVSYsKH2AJA&w=560&h=315%5D Above, Christine Sun Kim and Renée Hlozek share a snippet of conversation using American Sign Language and the Big Words app. Christine has been teaching Renée American Sign Language so they can communicate more directly. Renée Hlozek is a cosmologist from South Africa who studies the cosmic microwave background, radiation left over from the Big Bang. Christine […]
A three-wheeled half-motorcycle half-car, the Toyota i-Road is imagined as a future for urban transportation — tiny, battery-powered and hyper maneuverable, perfect for zipping along tightly packed urban streets. The concept car was launched in March 2013, but there are only three i-Roads in North America right now, and all of them are at TED2015 this week. Which is why I found myself down in the loading dock of the […]
“We need a different view of the world,” says Chris Anderson, the host of Session 6: Radical Reframe, on the Wednesday morning of TED2015. Enjoy these recaps of the speaker in this session, who might just flip your thinking on things you thought you knew — from antibiotics to papayas. New metaphors, not new medicines. We […]
Pamela Ronald is here to talk about her work as a plant geneticist, about her work “studying genes that make plants resistant to disease and tolerant of stress.” But first, she’d like to introduce us to her husband. “This is Raoul. He’s an organic farmer,” she says. “People say, ‘Really? An organic farmer and a plant geneticist? […]
This week, Apple turned the iPhone into a medical research tool with the launch of ResearchKit. This open-source framework, described in the video above, lets a medical researcher set up a project to gather anonymous patient data on diseases like asthma, breast cancer and diabetes. Using their own smartphones, patients who join a project can […]
Eco-entrepreneur Alasdair Harris is passionate about conserving marine biodiversity, and he’s doing it in unusual ways. While most marine conservationists focus on what’s in the water, Harris’ company Blue Ventures works with people in poverty-stricken coastal communities to engage them in rebuilding tropical fisheries and in the process of protecting both their ecosystems and livelihoods. The company’s approach: eco-tourism. We spoke […]
Picture a spillway gate that doesn’t just release water from an overflowing river, but manipulates sediments to create new streams, islands and wetlands. And imagine that the gate does this autonomously, guided by ecological data and shifting needs — essentially allowing nature to “evolve.” Computational landscape architect Bradley Cantrell is figuring how to do this by applying […]
Buying gifts? It is HARD. Especially when so many gift guides offer up ideas for what to get your dad, co-worker or sister without taking into account what actually interests those specific people in your life. A better way to locate the perfect gift? Think about what captures a person’s curiosity, and then seek ideas […]
Conservation ecologist Eric Sanderson makes a science out of envisioning New York City in the past and the future. His Mannahatta project was a 10-year deep dive into the green landscape of Manhattan as it existed 400 years ago – and his new project, Mannahatta 2409, asks the public to create their own future visions […]
By Cynthia Betubiza, Ella Dawson and Kate Torgovnick May Session 1 of TEDYouth 2014 brought us to many worlds imagined. From a look at other planets that could be like Earth, to an introduction to a mysterious dinosaur bigger than T. rex, to a beet-tastic vision for the future of food, this morning’s speakers brought wonder, passion […]