“The whole planet needs a lot of energy,” begins Michel Laberge, in an understatement. So far, he says, we’ve been running on fossil fuels, and it’s been difficult to find something as cost-effective to replace them. Laberge is a fan of nuclear power, which he thinks is the best solution to that problem in the […]
Session 2 of Fellows talks at TED2014 was just as unexpected as Session 1. Here, read a recap of each talk in the session. Somi, singer + cultural activist East African songstress Somi brings her smoky voice to the TED Fellows stage, with “Brown, RoundThings for Sale” from her album The Lagos Music Salon. Often […]
Janet Echelman is installing her new sculpture as we speak. Not in a gallery or on a pedestal, but instead soaring over the middle of downtown Vancouver. The installation involves cranes, hard hats and anchor points engineered atop two buildings: a 24-story hotel and the Vancouver Convention Centre where TED2014 will be held. “After three […]
The McGregor Reading Room at the University of Virginia is sometimes referred to as the “Harry Potter Room.” All bookshelves, oriental carpets and chandeliers, the room earned its nickname for its posh look and the fact that it’s a favorite spot for studying. But last December, this room filled with a little real-life magic: the […]
TED2014, our 30th anniversary conference, is less than a month away! If you’re counting the days like we are, get a head start by reading some of the insightful and compelling books by the groundbreaking thinkers who will speak in Vancouver. Books from speakers in Session 1, “Liftoff” Being Digital, by Nicholas Negroponte. This 1995 […]
Last year, MIT neuroscientists Xu Liu and Steve Ramirez manipulated the memory of a mouse. In a fascinating and mildly troubling breakthrough caused by a laser and the protein channelrhodopsin, they “activated” fear memories in a mouse. The impetus, says Ramirez, was the awful feeling of a break-up, the desire, Eternal Sunshine-style, to erase the […]
The word ‘translate’ means to bring words from one language to another. So you might think that the Open Translation Project — TED’s globe-spanning initiative to bring the ideas from talks beyond the English-speaking world — would only need volunteers who speak multiple languages. But being bilingual is not a necessity. The OTP needs single-language […]
The image you see above is Amanda Palmer just before stepping onto the TED2013 stage to give her talk, “The art of asking.” She asked one of the crew members to snap this photo of her with daisy in hand. As our lineup of TED2014 speakers finish writing their talks and start the long process […]
I was a foreign correspondent based in China when I attempted suicide, twice. A big factor was the fear that if anyone knew what I was feeling, I would be fired and my career would be over. Here I was, a journalist since the age of 16, whose far-flung life — Peace Corps volunteer in […]
It’s time to nominate someone for the 2015 TED Prize, a $1 million award to a visionary with a great big idea for creating change in the world. Through Monday, March 31, you can nominate a mentor, a hero, a co-worker, even yourself. TED is looking for someone who has not only a great wish, […]
TED2014 is our 30th-anniversary conference, and the speaker lineup is — in a word — thrilling. Speakers will touch on topics ranging from technology, entertainment, design and education to climate change, architecture, music, physics, parenting, typography, fireflies and the Golden Gate Bridge. Randall Munroe of xkcd will talk about his passion for What If questions. […]
Kylie Dunn has come up with the perfect analogy for her Year of TED, a self-improvement project she dreamed up in 2011 to infuse ideas from TED Talks into her everyday life. She says that the experience was akin to the Wizard of Oz, with herself playing each of the main characters. Dunn was recently […]
By the second week of January, that resolution that once seemed so reasonable — go to the gym every other day, read a book a week, only drink alcohol on weekends — is starting to seem very … hard. As you are teetering on the edge of abandoning it all together, Kelly McGonigal is here to help. […]
If you’re dreading the inevitable day your New Year’s resolutions—to lose weight, get a better job, and drink less, perhaps?—fall flat, it might be because you need different resolutions. Instead of focusing on outcomes, why not set your sights on process this year? Here, 10 resolutions inspired by TED Talks. They just might inspire you […]
Great gifts aren’t always tangible. Just think back to the last time someone made your holiday season by gifting you an experience, or by writing you a card that got you just a little choked up. And so we ask: why not give the gift of an idea? This week, we’ve asked some of our […]
Alicia Eggert makes kinetic sculptures that investigate the nature of language and time. Meanwhile, Ryan Holladay is a musical artist who creates sound-specific installations and GPS compositions as part of the duo BLUEBRAIN. Just a week before TED2013, Eggert and Holladay made contact for the very first time. See, Holloday is a curator of new media at Artisphere. And he was […]