The inaugural World Science Festival, a celebration of science and discovery, will take place May 28-June 1, 2008, in New York City. Organized by physicist Brian Greene, who explained string theory at TED2005, the event will bring together a range of speakers — including many TEDTalks favorites such as philosopher Dan Dennett, inventor and futurist […]
From the blog of TED’s musical director, Thomas Dolby: I’ve done a remix of Radiohead’s gorgeous ‘Nude’ from the Rainbows album. This was not solicited by the band. They are running a remix contest for their single, and I just went to iTunes and bought the ’stems’ to the song for $5 just like everybody […]
Photo: Shaul Schwarz/Reportage, for The New York Times. Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company The New York Times Magazine recently tagged along with Nokia researcher Jan Chipchase and got an arresting look at the impact of mobile phones in the Third World. Chipchase, a “user anthropologist,” spoke at TED in 2007 to talk about […]
2006 TED Prize winner Larry Brilliant is profiled in the latest Rolling Stone. The long piece talks about Brilliant’s amazing life, from the hippie days of the 1960s, to his time in India helping eradicate smallpox, to his current job as head of Google.org, charged with spending some of Google’s money to solve global health […]
How can we use the Web to drive social change? Learn from the story of Architecture for Humanity, which leveraged a 2006 TED Prize to build the Open Architecture Network, linking communities around the globe with architects and designers who can help them solve problems. Tomorrow night, at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, a […]
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 […]