Edward Snowden: Here's how we take back the Internet

For some time now I've wanted to see Edward Snowden speak to see what he had to say about his actions and why he released the documents. I have to say that I was impressed with the discussion. He is a very articulate champion of a free and open internet.

Harald Haas: Wireless data from every light bulb

Another bit of up and coming technology of which I was totally unaware.

From TED:

What if every light bulb in the world could also transmit data? At TEDGlobal, Harald Haas demonstrates, for the first time, a device that could do exactly that. By flickering the light from a single LED, a change too quick for the human eye to detect, he can transmit far more data than a cellular tower -- and do it in a way that's more efficient, secure and widespread.

Erik Johansson: Impossible photography

This guy is doing with photography and digital manipulation what René Magritte and M.C. Escher did with drawing and painting. Pretty interesting stuff. I wish they didn't cut off his talk at the end, he was just getting around to explaining how he actually created these images.

Cleaning Up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in Just Five Years Time

A nineteen year old inventor has come up with a method that he says could clean up the great pacific garbage patch in just five years time, and at a profit.

DNA Portrait

This short documentary is about the intersection between visual art and cutting edge science.

From TED Blog:

 DNA Portrait is a lovely short documentary shot by TED's own Kari Mulholland. It features the work of the artist Heather Dewey-Hagborg, who spent time collecting hairs shed in public spaces... and then sequencing the DNA therein to print 3D sculptures of what those hairs' owners might look like. Whoa. The film is also the secret story of the lab run by TEDGlobal 2012 speaker, Ellen Jorgensen. At Genspace, people are able to experiment with DNA-based technology, regardless of their scientific knowledge or experience. As Jorgensen comments in the film, Dewey-Hagborg's work is super interesting, not to mention searingly contemporary. "It's a very accessible way for the public to engage with this new technology. It really brings it to light how powerful it is, the idea that a hair from your head can fall on your street and a perfect stranger can pick it up and know something about it," she says, adding: "With DNA sequencing becoming faster and cheaper, this is the world we're all going to be living in."

Hendrik Poinar: Bring Back the Woolly Mammoth!

Allan Savory: How to fight desertification and reverse climate change

Allan Savory's solution to the problem of desertification runs completely counter to my intuition and everything I've been taught about why desertification happens in the first place, but his solution seems to be proven to work.

From TED:

“Desertification is a fancy word for land that is turning to desert,” begins Allan Savory in this quietly powerful talk. And it's happening to about two-thirds of the world’s grasslands, accelerating climate change and causing traditional grazing societies to descend into social chaos. Savory has devoted his life to stopping it. He now believes -- and his work so far shows -- that a surprising factor can protect grasslands and even reclaim degraded land that was once desert.

Is Our Universe The Only Universe?

This is one of the most persuasive lectures I have seen discussing the possibility of a multiverse, which is the idea our own universe may be just one among a boiling sea of universes. This lecture is more action-packed, but on a very similar subject to a lecture I posted a few years ago by Lawrence Krauss.

Miguel Nicolelis: A monkey that controls a robot with its thoughts. No, really.

One of the most amazing TED talks I've seen in a long time.

Can we use our brains to directly control machines -- without requiring a body as the middleman? Miguel Nicolelis talks through an astonishing experiment, in which a clever monkey in the US learns to control a monkey avatar, and then a robot arm in Japan, purely with its thoughts. The research has big implications for quadraplegic people -- and maybe for all of us. (Filmed at TEDMED 2012.)

Bill Harley - Stories Out Loud

As a teacher, keeping students from falling asleep while you're talking is a craft... But getting them to remember your points intuitively is a fine art known by the best storytellers...

Aaron Koblin: Artfully visualizing our humanity

http://www.ted.com Artist Aaron Koblin takes vast amounts of data -- and at times vast numbers of people -- and weaves them into stunning visualizations. From elegant lines tracing airline flights to landscapes of cell phone data, from a Johnny Cash video assembled from crowd-sourced drawings to the "Wilderness Downtown" video that customizes for the user, his works brilliantly explore how modern technology can make us more human.

Jonathan Haidt: Religion, evolution, and the ecstasy of self-transcendence

http://www.ted.com Psychologist Jonathan Haidt asks a simple, but difficult question: why do we search for self-transcendence? Why do we attempt to lose ourselves? In a tour through the science of evolution by group selection, he proposes a provocative answer.

Copyright Math

It's been a while since I've posted a TED talk. This one is really good.

http://www.ted.com Comic author Rob Reid unveils Copyright Math (TM), a remarkable new field of study based on actual numbers from entertainment industry lawyers and lobbyists.

Lee Cronin: Making matter come alive

Watch it on TED here.

Before life existed on Earth, there was just matter, inorganic dead "stuff." How improbable is it that life arose? And -- could it use a different type of chemistry? Using an elegant definition of life (anything that can evolve), chemist Lee Cronin is exploring this question by attempting to create a fully inorganic cell using a "Lego kit" of inorganic molecules -- no carbon -- that can assemble, replicate and compete.

Rebecca MacKinnon: Let's take back the Internet!

http://www.ted.com/talks/rebecca_mackinnon_let_s_take_back_the_internet.html

Nick Veasey: Exposing the invisible

Nick Veasey shows outsized X-ray images that reveal the otherworldly inner workings of familiar objects -- from the geometry of a wildflower to the anatomy of a Boeing 747. Producing these photos is dangerous and painstaking, but the reward is a superpower: looking at what the human eye can't see.

David Christian: Big history

http://www.ted.com Backed by stunning illustrations, David Christian narrates a complete history of the universe, from the Big Bang to the Internet, in a riveting 18 minutes. This is "Big History": an enlightening, wide-angle look at complexity, life and humanity, set against our slim share of the cosmic timeline.

A Driverless Car

I apologize, TED Talks and Blogspot just do not seem to work well together. Blogspot always cuts off the right side of the TED talk screen and TED talks simply will not reduce down to the width allowable by Blogspot. So here is the link if you want to watch it fullscreen.

The birth of a word: Deb Roy on TED.com

One of the best TED Talks I have ever seen.

Charles Leadbeater on innovation

In this deceptively casual talk, Charles Leadbeater weaves a tight argument that innovation isn't just for professionals anymore. Passionate amateurs, using new tools, are creating products and paradigms that companies can't