Can film erase borders? The people of Japan, Australia, Kenya and France sing the national anthems of Turkey, Lebanon, India and the United States in the latest sampling of inspiring — if subversive — videos released by Pangea Day. The series was produced by creative agency Johannes Leonardo. Could this provoke peace? Watch Kenya sing […]
In his TEDTalk released today, physicist Stephen Hawking asks Big Questions about life, the universe and everything. His talk was recorded at Cambridge, in a borrowed classroom — whose well-used blackboard happens to contain the Answer to life, the universe and everything. It’s visible in the upper-right-hand corner of the shot above, and in this […]
At next week’s gala for the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), Paul Simon will be joined by TEDTalks favorite Vusi Mahlasela for an evening that celebrates the albums Graceland and Rhythm of the Saints. Vusi is among the many guest musicians set to join Simon onstage on the night — others include Cyro Baptista, David […]
Deborah Scranton‘s latest “virtual embed” documentary film, Bad Voodoo’s War, premieres April 1, 2008, on PBS’s Frontline and online. From the Frontline site: In June 2007, as the American military surge reached its peak, a band of National Guard infantrymen who call themselves “The Bad Voodoo Platoon” was deployed to Iraq. To capture a vivid, […]
Ode Magazine writes of the inspiring efforts of TEDGlobal Fellow and agriculture activist Thomas George to build fair-play marketplaces for poor farmers in Kenya. His organization, Vipani, is a resource for workers on small farms — people without credit, connections or know-how — to access networks of other farmers, buyers, suppliers and lenders. George’s work […]
At TED 2006, Dan Dennett spoke out for the unbiased study of religion as a natural, biological phenomenon. His hope may come true. The Economist writes of recent headway made into understanding of religious belief — in particular a new project called Explaining Religion, the “largest-ever scientific study of the subject.” EXREL’s goal is to […]
Ben Saunders, who spoke at the 2005 TED Conference about his solo trip to the Geographic North Pole, is heading north again in an attempt to set a world speed record. From Ward Hunt Island in Canada he’ll ski against bitterly cold winds across the Arctic Ocean’s frozen, fluctuating surface. He hopes to complete the […]
Robert Full (watch his TEDTalk on gecko feet) and his team at UC Berkeley have uncovered more oddly-worth-knowing facts about geckos and how they move. It turns out that, along with their amazing sticky paws, geckos use their tails as a kind of fifth limb to help them balance while they climb walls. The team […]
A recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine offers new details on how mirror therapy addresses phantom limb pain — a topic covered by Vilayanur Ramachandran in his 2007 TEDTalk. Inspired by Dr. Ramachandran’s work, a team of researchers from military hospitals tested a group of 22 patients with amputated lower limbs, […]
The TED office is running in circles trying to get the word out about Pi Day, that special day for number nerds that only comes around once a year. We’d love to hear what TED fans are doing to celebrate — whether watching Pi, baking a pie or taking an irrational out to dinner. If […]
The Cassini mission to Saturn (see Carolyn Porco’s stunning TEDTalk on this mission) today makes its closest flyby yet of Enceladus, a geologically active moon. With its frozen surface and plumes of ice, Enceladus is a fascinating body, and the Cassini probe will be imaging the moon in several areas with many different instruments. From […]
The wonderful Jill Sobule is playing at Largo tonight in LA, then swings back to NY to play at Ethel‘s 10th birthday party on March 20, along with Rives. But honestly, we were mainly looking for an excuse to share this great photo of Jill (left), taken 10 days ago at TED@Aspen…
Pangea Day‘s Saralena Weinfield writes: With two months until May 10, planning for Pangea Day is in full swing. And we are still glowing from the wonderful reception we received at TED! We hope you’ll get involved by hosting a viewing party on Pangea Day. You’ll be in good company: People all around the world […]
Two Johns Hopkins researchers have isolated the part of the brain that is most active during improv — the part that Jennifer Lin accesses during her TEDTalk performance, and that Robin Williams used the other night during the BBC debate at TED in Monterey. Setting up six right-handed jazz pianists inside an fMRI, researchers Charles […]
You can now read journalist Andrew Mwenda‘s newspaper, The Independent, online. Based in Kampala, Uganda, the paper promises “uncensored news, views and analysis” — a promise that has already led to government threats against the paper’s printer. Mwenda spoke at TEDGlobal 2007 and was a panelist on the BBC debate hosted last week at TED […]
Photo: David Geller/whatcounts Memeticist Susan Blackmore uses the hotel-bathroom toilet-paper fold as an example of a useless meme — a meme that has spread throughout the world, even though there is no human reason for it to exist. The persistence of this meme easily disproves the comfortable notion that we humans only spread ideas that […]