Three years ago, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana suffered a rare brain stem stroke that left him fully conscious, yet his entire body paralyzed. It’s a condition known as “locked-in syndrome.” Last month, TED Fellow Kitra Cahana spoke of her father’s experience at TEDMED (watch her talk, “My father, locked in his body but soaring free”), revealing […]
Gratefulness isn’t always something that comes easily. Below, some reading and watching to get you into a thankful headspace. Watch: “Want to be happy? Be thankful.” This TED Talk from David Steindl-Rast is the perfect Thanksgiving appetizer. In it, the Benedictine monk and interfaith scholar talks about what, exactly, it means to be grateful and offers a simple process for living […]
By Susan Zimmerman David Steindl-Rast has the honor of closing this year’s TEDGlobal. The Benedictine monk, whose words made an appearance in Louie Schwartzberg’s classic talk “Nature. Beauty. Gratitude,” is known for bridging Catholicism and Buddhism. In the book The Ground We Share, he reveals that the key to both faiths, when you boil it […]
A few years ago, Lesley Hazleton, self-described “accidental theologist,” found herself waking each morning with the same question: What happened to Muhammad the night he received the revelation of the Koran? An agnostic Jew, Hazleton was writing a biography of the man who stood in the desert outside of Mecca in the year 610 at […]
The TED Prize’s Charter for Compassion reached Pope Benedict XVII this week, just days before the Pope announced to the world that he would be resigning. A plaque engraved with the Charter was presented to the Pope on Wednesday in Vatican City by TED’s European director, Bruno Giussani. The meeting, pictured above, took place on the margins […]
The core mystical moment of Islam took place in the year 610, or “half the world and almost half of history away,” as Lesley Hazleton, biographer of Muhammad, puts it. On a hot desert night, this previously ordinary man received the first revelation of the Koran on a mountain outside Mecca. “What struck me even […]
If living in Richard Dawkins’ world is to live without an omnipotent creator, to explain life’s most wondrous mysteries with scientific fact, is it also to live in a world devoid of beauty and magic? No, says Dawkins, in his newest book, The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True, which makes its […]
In “THE 99,” Naif Al-Mutawa‘s new generation of comic book heroes fight more than crime — they smash stereotypes and battle extremism. Named after the 99 attributes of Allah, his characters reinforce positive messages of Islam and cross cultures to create a new moral framework for confronting evil, even teaming up with the Justice League […]
Today, we posted Diane Benscoter’s revealing talk on being a Moonie and how cult thought can lead people to do the unthinkable. It’s a topic that’s not often talked about and that fascinates many, so, to bring you more from Diane the TEDBlog caught up with her for an interview. We talked about her time […]