Discovering how our brains might soon get upgraded: Notes on Session 6 of TED2023

In a mind-bending Session 6 of TED2023, neurotech, mental health and breakthroughs in brain-computer interfaces took the mainstage, with seven incredible speakers sharing ideas on how our brains may soon get an upgrade.

The event: Talks from Session 6 of TED2023: Possibility, hosted by TED’s head of curation Helen Walters

When and where: Wednesday, April 19, 2023, at the Vancouver Convention Centre in Vancouver, BC, Canada

Speakers: Luis von Ahn, Andy Dunn, Francesca Hogi, Gus Worland, Maya Shankar, Nita Farahany, Conor Russomanno

The talks in brief:

We often think of education as an equalizing force, but unequal access to education actually worsens inequality. Motivated by his experience in his native Guatemala, educational equity technologist Luis von Ahn embarked on an ambitious mission: to boost access to education globally. The brainchild of that effort, Duolingo, now has hundreds of millions of users. But in designing Duolingo, von Ahn faced a big problem: How could an app designed to actually teach you something compete with platforms like TikTok and Instagram, some of the most addictive things humans have ever created? If Duolingo was the “broccoli” of smartphone apps, von Ahn decided he would have to “make broccoli taste like dessert.” The result: an app that harnesses the psychological techniques of social media and mobile games for a good cause.

Mental health truth-teller Andy Dunn began suffering from manic episodes due to bipolar I disorder in his early 20s, around the same time he was creating his immensely successful online retail company Bonobos. Such mental health issues have been shown to appear at higher rates among entrepreneurs, often applauded for their “crazy” ideas while their darker “shadows” are ignored. Dunn shares his journey to mental wellness and offers a vision of a future where entrepreneurs are “able to dream crazy dreams” while also being held accountable, in and out of the boardroom. He calls for more accessible, affordable healthcare for all and asks everyone to consider the truly conditional nature of love and leadership. “Entrepreneurs are not gods, even when we think we are,” says Dunn.

“You were born knowing how to love,” says love coach, podcast host and TED community member Francesca Hogi. She spent 10 years speaking to thousands of individuals about their romantic hopes and dreams, uncovering the pervasiveness of false marketing that claims “while you can’t buy love, you can buy your worthiness to be loved.” Hogi says this propaganda makes us believe love is external and scarce, instead of internal and infinite. To find true love, she says to begin with cultivating love for yourself within, and “transcend the shallow fantasy of love you’ve been sold for so long.”

Lots of people talk about the need to be physically fit, but mentally fit? Not as much. Radio host Gus Worland is trying to change that by helping people develop the skills and “emotional muscle” needed to recognize when they’re struggling, learn how to talk about it and be vulnerable enough to ask for help. With his nonprofit Gotcha4Life, Worland is spreading this work in the hopes of ending suicide and breaking the stigma around mental health issues. He shares the story of his best friend and mentor, who took his own life years ago and issues a call to everyone to “look after their own villages” and check in on the most important people in their lives – today. Where to start? It can be as simple as sending this text message to the people that mean the most to you, Worland says: “I love you. I miss you. See you soon xoxo.”

Who are you, and how do you transform in the face of change? Cognitive scientist Maya Shankar shares three questions you can ask to find out who you are when the world feels like it’s shifting under your feet. First: “How does this change change what you’re capable of?” Next, “How might this change change what you value?” And third: “How might this change change how you define yourself?” Shankar shares stories — and the science behind change — of people who stepped out of their comfort zones and rigid mindsets and found themselves changed for the better. Maybe through their experiences, and Shankar’s own story as well, a new, lesser-traveled yet more rewarding and expansive path rich with possibility awaits.

While we can track the minutiae of our bodies (heart rate, blood pressure, temperature and even whether we’re snoring too loud) via a host of wearables and other devices, there is very little technology that allows us to track our brain activity. All of that is about to change. Neurotechnology ethicist Nita Farahany demonstrates how we’re witnessing the dawn of technology that will allow us to record our most private data: the electromagnetic pulses that map our thoughts and desires. This information will then unlock (and, indeed, is already unlocking) the potential to self-program ourselves via brain stimuli that could help us treat everything from depression to epilepsy. There’s a catch, however. Who is collecting our brain data, and how will they use it? Farahany argues that without a recognized and protected “human right for cognitive liberty,” we could just as easily benefit from healing as we could also fall prey to microtargeting, surveillance and manipulation.

Years ago, when he was a student at Parsons, neurotechnologist and inventor Conor Russomanno dreamed of peering into the workings of his own brain and created a low-cost, single-channel EEG machine to do just that. From this initial breakthrough, Russomanno has developed technology that utilizes not only the brain but also neglected muscles of the human body to create mind-blowing human-computer interfaces. With the help of collaborator Christian Bayerlein, who is wheelchair-bound due to a motor disorder, Russomanno demonstrates a system that allows Bayerlein to fly a drone over the astonished audience, using vestigial muscle control coupled with an optical headset equipped with neurosensors. Russomanno’s work emphasizes that his ultimate dream — a two-way brain-computer interface — depends as much on our entire nervous system (cognition, or “the mind”) as it does on the brain itself.

Tech comeback?! Notes from Session 5 of TEDMonterey

Session 5 ushers in the astonishing, challenging and sometimes playful innovations that could mold the future. From genetic technology to NFTs, six speakers give insights on what’s to come, celebrate the fusion of tech and human creativity and make the case for rousing the techno-optimist in us all.

The event: TEDMonterey: Session 5, hosted by TED’s Chris Anderson on Tuesday, August 3, 2021

Speakers: Zach King, Jeff Dean, Xiaowei R. Wang, Kayvon Tehranian, Ryan Phelan

Special guest: Cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker, live from the TED World Theater, discusses the topic of progress with host Chris Anderson. Pointing to notable indicators of progress in modern society like the reduction of poverty, the increase in life expectancy and the decline of war, Pinker defines progress as the application of information to achieve the betterment of humankind. “Progress isn’t a miracle,” he says. “It’s a fact.” But that doesn’t mean it’s inevitable. In today’s world, we face two threats to progress: the loss of truth and knowledge, based in our increasing inability to have productive conversations, and the loss of the common goal of human betterment. With the rise of negatively biased media and populist, authoritarian politics, Pinker believes we need to leverage our rationality (over our irrationality) to safeguard the future of progress.

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Zach King, filmmaker

Big idea: In need of a new idea? Start playing.

How? When Zach King was a kid, he got a bike for Christmas — but the box it came in was the real gift. It transformed into a time machine, a deep-sea submarine and even a secure bunker to hide from zombies during the zombie apocalypse. As King grew up, he lost his childlike wonder and his portal to endless awesome adventures turned back into a box — until he discovered his kids playing in one, exploring Jupiter and meeting friendly aliens. In a delightful talk, he brings his childhood imagination to life on and “off” stage using magic with a tech twist to remind us that creativity and fresh ideas are never fully outside our grasp, if we just engage in a little make-believe.

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Jeff Dean, computer systems developer

Big idea: We’ve made tremendous progress in neural networks and computational power over the past two decades. But to achieve the full power of AI, we need to fix three key things.

How? Jeff Dean, the head of Google’s AI efforts, has been embedded in the world of artificial intelligence for decades. Despite the exponential evolution of neural networks and computational power, he thinks there are three key areas of focus still in need of fixing to realize the true potential of machine learning. First off: multi-task models. Whereas current AI systems are trained for specific tasks and learn new tasks from scratch each time — a multi-task model enables a system to do thousands of tasks and leverage that expertise to complete totally new tasks. Likewise, Dean believes we should train AI across images, text, sound and video simultaneously — rather than just one-by-one, as current systems do. Lastly, he advocates for “sparse models” (instead of current dense models, which activate a whole system for each task) that would only activate relevant parts for a given task (much like the human brain). Drawing on these ideas, Dean reveals publicly for the first time the next phase in Google’s AI plans: a new system called Pathways, which aims to generalize across millions of tasks and take a major step forward in how we build powerful, responsible artificial intelligence.

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Xiaowei R. Wang, coder, artist, organizer

Big idea: Some of the most thoughtful, careful innovation is happening in rural areas — not in big cities.

How so? Taking us to small farms and villages across China and the US, Wang reveals how rural areas have become bastions of entrepreneurship, e-commerce and innovation — like a free-range chicken farmer in China who uses biometrics and blockchain to track the movement of his livestock through the supply chain and communities collaborating with blacksmiths to design new farming equipment. This kind of modernization doesn’t seek to scale to millions of users or raise VC funding, Wang says. Rather, its aim is more humble: to regenerate soil, maintain ecological balance and nurture community ties across generations — crucial steps toward building a livable future.

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Kayvon Tehranian, founder and CEO of Foundation

Big idea: NFTS aren’t a scam or a fad — they’re the future.

How? Much like the internet itself when it first entered the scene in the 1990s, many people today believe NFTs (non-fungible tokens) are a scam or a fad. Well, Kayvon Tehranian wants to clear the air: NFTs are here to stay. Just as the internet dissolved physical limits, so too do NFTs with economic boundaries. As a technological breakthrough, they put the power (and profit) back in the hands of content creators through certificates of ownership registered on the blockchain — acting, in many ways, similarly to a deed for a house — that accrue royalties as resold content becomes more desired, thus more expensive. It’s a brave new world reshaped beyond archaic copyright, one born from the spirit of the internet itself where creativity can be free, travel effortlessly and still pay despite the evolving digital landscape.

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Ryan Phelan, biotech entrepreneur, conservation innovator

Big idea: We should apply the genetic tools at our disposal to save endangered species and restore biodiversity.

How? Elizabeth Ann is a cute, black-footed ferret native to the grasslands of North America. Kurt is a sturdy Przewalski’s horse, adapted for survival on the harsh Mongolian steppe. Both are genetic rescue clones helping to restore diversity to their extinction-threatened species. Ryan Phelan advocates for these cloned animals, which are created using the powerful tools of genomics and synthetic biology to reintroduce almost entirely extinct species back into the wild, diversify gene pools and edit DNA to help quicken adaptation to an increasingly changing environment. From genetically modified coral that’s more tolerant of warming waters, to a blight-resistant American Chestnut tree, Phelan introduces us to the many efforts around the globe aimed at restoring the Earth’s natural abundance and balance. With the success these programs have had over the years, one of the biggest challenges now is speed and public support. “We don’t have the luxury of time to stand by and wait to see what happens,” she says. “We can choose to create the future we want, not overreact to a future we fear.”

Leadership: Notes from Session 2 of the Countdown Global Launch

Countdown is a global initiative to accelerate solutions to the climate crisis. Watch the talks, interviews and performances from the Countdown Global Launch at ted.com/countdown.

The climate crisis demands leadership at every level. Governments, cities and businesses are three key players in designing and implementing the necessary transition. In Session 2 of the Countdown Global Launch, cohosted by climate advocate Al Gore and actor, musician and activist Jaden Smith, speakers discussed putting climate back on the political and social agenda, rethinking cities and what businesses can do to transform.

Gore and Smith opened the session by talking about how young people are at the forefront of climate activism, and discussed the global art collaboration between Countdown and Fine Acts: ten public artworks on the topic of climate change, аll launching on 10.10.2020 in ten cities around the world, all created by TED Fellows.

The talks in brief:

Severn Cullis-Suzuki, environmental educator

Big idea: Nearly 30 years ago, 12-year-old Severn Cullis-Suzuki spoke at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit in hopes of reversing the planet’s slide into ecological disaster. Some at the summit listened, producing the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, among other then-radical documents. But for the rest of the world, it was business, politics and full-steam-ahead economic growth. Now in 2020, with the Paris Agreement once again stoking the fervor to fight climate change, it’s time to make sure governments actually listen. 

How? Cullis-Suzuki believes that crises can show us not only the potential for societies to react decisively against existential threats, but also expose the inequities, injustices and weaknesses of our infrastructure. COVID-19 is one such crisis: it has sparked calls for social justice and shown just how deadly indecision can be. Cullis-Suzuki believes it’s a warning. She reminds us that if we don’t change, next time could be far worse. This time, if we can make our actions reflect our words around climate change, we can work towards a better world for our children.  

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Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission

Big idea: The European Union has committed to becoming the first carbon-free continent by 2050, with the goal of reducing emissions by at least 55 percent by 2030. These ambitious goals are vital — and possible — and they require everyone’s participation. 

How? The evidence of climate change is unfolding before us: melting glaciers, forest fires, unpredictable weather. This is only the beginning. Such extreme circumstances call for extreme action, and that is exactly what Ursula von der Leyen has laid out in response. Resolving not to be derailed by COVID-19, the EU’s commitment to climate action milestones is now stronger than ever, von der Leyen says. She details some of the 50 actions in the European Green Deal aimed at building a more sustainable world, such as planting trees, creating a circular economy, recycling and more. With the crisis escalating every day, she calls for action from every direction.

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Olafur Eliasson, artist

Big idea: Known for big, attention-grabbing installations — like his four towering waterfalls in New York’s East River — Olafur Eliasson has scaled down his latest project: an art platform for kids designed to spur budding climate activists to lead discussions on some of the biggest issues on the planet.

How? Inspired by world-shaping movements helmed by the planet’s youngest environmentalists, Eliasson built Earth Speakr, an app that helps concerned kids get serious messages in front of adults in a fun, novel way. The app uses AR to let kids animate photos of anything — trees, rocks, water — and record a message from nature, speaking in their own voices. These recorded messages help get the word out about the issues kids care about most — conservation, climate change, pollution and more.

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Rebecca Henderson, capitalism rethinker

Big idea: Capitalism is driving climate change — but for-profit businesses can also help fix it. 

How? “We let capitalism morph into something monstrous,” says economist Rebecca Henderson. Companies emit massive amounts of greenhouse gases that wreck the environment and harm human health, and governments don’t hold them accountable to pay for the damages. If governments won’t do it, Henderson says, it’s time for businesses themselves to step up on their own. Sound counterintuitive? Henderson thinks it may be the only option: it’ll be hard to stay in business if the world continues to be rocked by the negative effects of climate change. She’s confident that business leaders can start to marshal change with a four-pronged framework: start paying for the climate damage they cause; persuade competitors to do the same; let investors know there’s money to be made in a clean economy; and convince governments to implement these changes far and wide. “The truth is: business is screwed if we don’t fix climate change,” Henderson says.

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Elif Shafak, novelist and political scientist

Big idea: There is a sublime art at the heart of storytelling: the art of foregrounding silence, bringing to light things that we don’t talk about, and using these things to “speak louder than demagoguery and apathy.” Writers can learn to voice the unspoken loudly enough to inspire action.

How? “One of the many beauties of the art of storytelling is to imagine yourself inside someone else’s voice,” says writer Elif Shafak. Surprisingly, we can learn a lot from imagining the voices of trees, whose experience of time, stillness and impermanence are utterly different than our own. Listen to the trees, she says, and discover that “hidden inside [their] story is the past and the future of humanity.” 

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Jesper Brodin, CEO of Ingka Group (IKEA), in conversation with Pia Heidenmark Cook, CSO of Ingka Group (IKEA)

Big idea: Success in business doesn’t mean being at odds with the Earth. What’s good for climate can be good for business, too. 

How? Jesper Brodin and Pia Heidenmark Cook discuss the company’s ambitious commitment to go climate positive (going beyond net-zero emissions by actually removing carbon from the atmosphere) by 2030 — and still remain profitable. The popular Swedish furniture and design company is rethinking how to make their entire business sustainable, from their raw materials and supply chain and to their products’ disposal. Their plan includes sourcing sustainable cotton for fabrics, buying wood from solely sustainable sources by the end of 2020 and committing to fully renewable and recycled materials for all their products by 2030. They’re also thinking about how to extend the life of products, once people have already bought them, through reuse, repurposing or recycling. The exciting part about their plan, Brodin and Cook say, is that none of these innovations will affect the quality, form, function and affordability of their products.

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Dave Clark, SVP of worldwide operations at Amazon, and Kara Hurst, head of worldwide sustainability at Amazon

Big idea: Amazon is making a commitment to sustainability across its expansive array of businesses — and inviting other companies to do the same.

How? In 2019, Amazon cofounded the Climate Pledge, a commitment to become a net-zero carbon company by 2040. Dave Clark and Kara Hurst discuss how they’re working together to reduce Amazon’s carbon footprint across all aspects of business, from embedding sustainability teams throughout the organization to rethinking entire supply chains. For instance, last year Amazon ordered 100,000 electric delivery vehicles from the startup Rivian in an effort to begin converting the company’s fleet to renewable energy. The scale of transformation will be massive, Clark and Hurst say, and they’re encouraging other companies to follow suit. “One thing we know about the scale of the urgent challenge we have in front of us is that it’s going to take everyone. We cannot do it alone,” Hurst says, “It’s going to take companies and governments, communities and individuals, to come up with solutions, new innovations and technologies.”

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Aparna Nancherla, comedian

Big idea: Taking out the trash can be fun.

Why? If you love garbage, you can get an endless supply with “the stuff that our modernist, consumer, carbon-powered culture makes us buy endlessly, and often for no good reason,” says Aparna Nancherla. She runs through the pleasure and pain of garbage, from “micro-decluttering” by throwing things away, to the fact that only 10 percent of our plastic gets recycled. Nancherla shares the dire state of our recycling industry (imagining the Pacific garbage patch as a wedding destination), but there’s also plenty of humor around just how hard it is to stay green in a world that’s choking on ever-larger piles of trash.

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Carlos Moreno, scientific director, Panthéon Sorbonne University-IAE Paris

Big idea: Urban areas should be built to function as “15-minute cities,” so that inhabitants have access to all services they need to live, learn and thrive within their immediate vicinity.

How? City life has become more inconvenient than ever, with long commutes, underutilized spaces and lack of access. Our acceptance of this dysfunction has reached a peak. Carlos Moreno invites us to ask ourselves: “What do we need to create a 15-minute city?” This would mean access to necessities like school, work, parks, cultural centers, shops and living space all within a 15-minute walk, at all times. Moreno’s ideas to create cities like this are guided by four principles: ecology, proximity, solidarity and participation, with inhabitants actively taking part in their neighborhoods’ transformations. He calls for urban areas to adapt to humans, not the other way around. 

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Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, Mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone

Big idea: Trees offer us a crucial way to trap carbon and save the climate. Get planting.

How? Driving home one day outside Freetown, Sierra Leone’s capital, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr gazed out at the landscape in horror. The lush green forest she used to know had disappeared, replaced with barren hills. The shock wasn’t merely visual. Without trees standing as a critical bulwark against land erosion, the citizens of Freetown — where more than 70 informal settlements have sprung up in the last two decades — are at great risk of catastrophic effects of climate change, a fact driven home in August 2017, when a massive landslide killed 1,000 people there in less than five minutes. In that moment, Aki-Sawyerr vowed to save her city in the most direct way she could — she ran for mayor, won and has now committed to making Freetown a “tree town” once again. She’s on track to increase vegetation cover in the city by 50 percent by the end of her term in 2022, planting one million trees along the way. Freetown citizens have planted half a million seedlings so far, all tracked using a custom app, setting the stage for a safer environment and stirring collective civic pride. “A million trees is our city’s small contribution to increasing the much-needed global carbon sink,” Aki-Sawyerr says.

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Actress and musician Yemi Alade joins the show to close out the session, singing and dancing to the upbeat tune “True Love.”

TED and Future Stewards announce Countdown, a global initiative to champion and accelerate solutions to the climate crisis

Prince William, His Holiness Pope Francis, Yemi Alade, Monica Araya, Xiye Bastida, Jesper Brodin, Don Cheadle, Dave Clark, Christiana Figueres, Al Gore, António Guterres, Chris Hemsworth, Kara Hurst, Lisa Jackson, Rose Mutiso, Johan Rockström, Prince Royce, Mark Ruffalo, Sigrid, Jaden Smith, Nigel Topping and Ursula von der Leyen join scientists, activists, artists, schools and leaders from business and government to accelerate and amplify solutions

Countdown, a global initiative to champion and accelerate solutions to the climate crisis, will launch on October 10, 2020 with a free five-hour live virtual event featuring leading thinkers and doers. This is the moment to act, and they will outline what a healthy, abundant, zero-emission future can look like—turning ideas into action. The event will combine TED’s signature blend of actionable and research-backed ideas, cutting-edge science, and moments of wonder and inspiration. Countdown is one part of a broader series of actions and events this fall including the Bloomberg Green Festival, Climate Week NYC and others, all with the collective objective of informing and activating millions in the lead-up to a successful UN Climate Change Conference in November 2021.

The Countdown launch will be streamed live on TED’s YouTube channel. This global event will be the first-ever TED conference that is free and open to the public. Segments from the event, including the biggest talks and performances, will be made available immediately across all digital platforms. The program includes 50+ pieces of content—talks, performances, animations and more. Speakers will touch on topics such as:

• Climate science and the climate crisis: Where are we today?

• Why climate justice matters

• Putting climate back on the political and social agenda

• What businesses can do—and are doing—to transform and transition

• Rethinking our cities

• Stepping up at work and at home

• The path to a safer, cleaner, fairer future for people and the planet

A full agenda and speaker list can be found here.

In addition to the live global event, over 500 TEDx Countdown virtual events in nine languages are planned around the world, encouraging communities and citizens to take action locally while also feeding local solutions and ideas into the global conversation. Countdown has also convened a global Youth Council of recognized activists who will help shape the Countdown agenda throughout the year. Additionally, Countdown is working to engage people through art with ten public art installations in global cities around the 10.10.20 event and open calls for art––illustration and photography––to run throughout the year on the Countdown website.

“The moment to act on climate change has been upon us for too long, and now is the time to unite all levels of society—business leaders, courageous political actors, scientists and individuals—to get to net-zero emissions before 2050,” said Chris Anderson, Countdown founding partner and Head of TED. “Climate is a top priority for TED and members of our community, and we are proud to fully dedicate our organization in the fight for our collective future.”

“Countdown brings together a powerful collaboration of partners from all sectors to act on climate change,” said Lindsay Levin, Countdown founding partner and CEO of Leaders’ Quest. “We need to work together with courage and compassion to deliver a healthy, fair, resilient future for everyone.”

With so many people who have already committed to addressing climate change, Countdown is about radical collaboration—convening all stakeholders to build on the critical work already underway and bringing existing, powerful solutions to an even broader audience. Powered by TED and Future Stewards, Countdown aims to answer five fundamental, interconnected questions that inform a blueprint for a better future:

• ENERGY: How rapidly can we switch to 100% clean power?

• TRANSPORT: How can we upgrade the way we move people and things?

• MATERIALS: How can we re-imagine and re-make the stuff around us?

• FOOD: How can we spark a worldwide shift to healthier food systems?

• NATURE: How do we better protect and re-green the earth?

Countdown is asking companies and organizations to join the Race to Zero through Business Ambition for 1.5°C, which is a commitment to set science-based targets aligned with limiting global warming to 1.5°C, and through The Climate Pledge, which calls on signatories to be net-zero carbon by 2040—a decade ahead of the Paris Agreement goal of 2050.

“We can inspire others through action and example, because there is no hope without action,” said 17-year-old climate justice activist Xiye Bastida, a lead organizer of the Fridays for Future youth climate strike movement. “We are fighting to ensure this planet survives and flourishes for future generations, which requires intergenerational cooperation. Countdown is about coming together across ages and sectors to protect the earth and ensure we leave it better than we found it.”

“Five years after the unanimous signing of the Paris Agreement, many countries, companies and citizens are doing what they can about the climate crisis. But this is not enough,” said Christiana Figueres, former UN climate chief (2010-2016), now co-founder of Global Optimism. “We have this decisive decade to achieve what is necessary—cutting global emissions in half over the next ten years is vital to meeting the goal of net zero by 2050. I am delighted to partner with Countdown to increase the global stock of stubborn optimism that is needed to push every company and country—and engage citizens—in actions that decouple carbon from our economy and way of life in this decade.”

Following the launch, Countdown will facilitate a number of sector leader working groups along with the initiative’s network of partner organizations through November 2021. These will focus on delivering breakthrough progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the lead-up to the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow. During next year’s Countdown Summit (October 12-15, 2021, Edinburgh, Scotland), the initiative will share an actionable blueprint for a net-zero future and celebrate the progress that’s already been made.

Citizens are the critical component of this initiative and anyone can #JoinTheCountdown by:

• Joining us—sign up to become part of the movement

• Bringing Countdown to your community—by hosting your own TEDx event

• Tuning in on 10.10.2020—for the live event

• Committing to taking and inspiring action—at work and in your community

• Spreading the word on your own social media and throughout your networks

Connect at Countdown@ted.com

About TED

TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading, often in the form of short talks delivered by leading thinkers and doers. Many of these talks are given at TED conferences, intimate TED Salons and thousands of independently organized TEDx events around the world. Videos of these talks are made available, free, on TED.com and other platforms. Audio versions of TED Talks are published to TED Talks Daily, available on all podcast platforms.

Follow TED on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and on LinkedIn.

About Future Stewards

Future Stewards is a coalition of partners (Leaders’ Quest, Global Optimism and We Mean Business) working together to build a regenerative future – where we meet the needs of all, within the means of the planet. Founded after the Paris Agreement, Future Stewards equips individuals, businesses and communities with the awareness and tools required to tackle systemic problems, scale what works and build cross-sector collaboration.

Meaning Seekers: Notes from Session 5 of TEDWomen 2019

Session 5 of TEDWomen 2019 is all about seeking meaning: in our political lives, creative lives, healthcare systems, criminal justice and beyond.

The event: TEDWomen 2019, Session 5: Meaning Seekers, hosted by Helen Walters and Anna Verghese

When and where: Thursday, December 5, 2019, 5pm PT, at La Quinta Resort & Club in La Quinta, California

Speakers: Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, Priti Krishtel, Robin Steinberg, Manoush Zomorodi, Denise Ho, Denise Zmekhol, Smruti Jukur, Debbie Millman

The talks in brief:

Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone

Big idea: We can catalyze positive change by channeling feelings of dissatisfaction into collaboration and action.

How? After learning of the devastating rebel invasion of Sierra Leone in 1999, and the details of the 2014 Ebola epidemic, Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr was struck by profound feelings of anger and discontent. But instead of becoming frozen and overwhelmed by those feelings, she decided to act. This movement from dissatisfaction to action is the key to creating dramatic change, Aki-Sawyerr says. In 1999, she cofounded the Sierra Leone War Trust for Children, supporting and advocating for refugees of Sierra Leone’s rebel invasion. During the Ebola epidemic, Aki-Sawyerr designed the Western Area Surge Plan, which prioritized collaborating with community members to stop the spread of the virus. Now, as mayor of Freetown, she’s bringing together the city to translate their frustrations into actionable solutions.

Quote of the talk: “The steps to address that deep sense of anger and frustration I felt didn’t unfold magically or clearly. That’s not how the power of dissatisfaction works. It works when you know that things can be better, and it works when you decide to take the risks to bring about that change.”

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Priti Krishtel, pharmaceutical reformer

Big idea: High drug prices are fueling crushing debt, causing families immense hardship, including loss of life. These prices, in turn, are made possible by an outdated patent system that’s easily exploited by the pharmaceutical industry to perpetuate drug monopolies that extend for years beyond their original patents.

How? Between 2006 and 2016, drug patents doubled. But consider this: the vast majority of medicines associated with new drug patents are not new, with nearly eight out of ten being for existing medicines, like insulin or aspirin. Priti Krishtel believes that US patent reforms would dramatically reduce medical costs. We can start by banning new patents for trivially modified drugs, removing financial incentives for the Patent Office (which currently gets paid based on granted patents), increasing the transparency of the patent process, empowering the public to challenge patents in court, and introducing robust patent oversight mechanisms.

Quote of the talk: “The higher a patent wall a company builds, the longer they hold on to their monopoly. And with no one to compete with, they can set prices at whim — and because these are medicines and not designer watches, we have no choice but to pay.”

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Robin Steinberg, public defender, activist, CEO of The Bail Project

Big idea: We need to end the injustice of cash bail in the United States criminal justice system.

Why? In conversation with journalist Manoush Zomorodi (the new host of the TED Radio Hour), Robin Steinberg gives an update on her 2018 TED Talk about the work of her nonprofit The Bail Project. Here’s the problem: on any given night, more than 450,000 people in the US are locked up in jail simply because they don’t have enough money to pay bail. The sums in question are often around $500: easy for some to pay, impossible for others. This has real human consequences: people lose jobs, homes and lives, and it drives racial disparities in the legal system. Now, with support from the The Audacious Project, Steinberg’s nonprofit is scaling up their efforts — growing their revolving bail fund, expanding the on-the-ground presence of their bail disruptors and rolling out a community-based model that gives local support to people before they are convicted of a crime.

Quote of the talk: “Each and every one of us is implicated in what our criminal legal system looks like. There is no escaping that.”

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Denise Ho, singer and democracy activist

Big idea: In a stirring talk and performance, banned Cantopop superstar Denise Ho gives the TED audience a taste of a dissident’s life in 2019 Hong Kong — and a glimpse into a protest movement that persists in the face of constant oppression by the Hong Kong government and their allies on the mainland.

How? As an activist in the 2014 pro-democracy Umbrella Movement, Denise Ho joined her fellow citizens on the streets of Hong Kong for 79 days. Although she was ultimately arrested, censored and banned, she moved her career underground. She remains a crucial voice for democracy and a dedicated fighter in a leaderless movement battling to preserve autonomy for Hong Kong through spontaneous actions that the authorities are unable to predict or control.

Quote of the talk: “Creativity is what the tyrants cannot control, nor repress. WIth their very powerful but slow machine, it takes time for them to react to new ideas. Whether it is the protest on the streets that is taking a new fluidity, or the way that people reinvent themselves, the system needs time to counter it to find solutions. … When they do, we would have already moved on to the next idea.”

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Denise Zmekhol, filmmaker

Big idea: The memory of Pele de Vidro, the iconic São Paulo tower, continues to be a poignant reflection of Brazil’s past, present and future.

Why? The Pele de Vidro (which translates to “Skin of Glass”) has been a symbol of modernity in Latin America since the early-1960s, when Denise Zmekhol’s father designed the São Paulo landmark. Yet, it wasn’t until many years after his death that she learned what went on behind its closed doors. As she reconnected with her late father’s memory and filmed a documentary in 2017, she discovered that “the glass walls of this building became a mirror reflecting the glory and turmoil of our beloved Brazil.” But before she could set foot inside, the unimaginable happened: a massive fire swallowed the iconic building. Zmekhol grieved for the city and her father. But today, she is hopeful. Architects are planning to build a cultural lab at the site of the Pele de Vidro to pay tribute to her father and the landmark that meant so much for so many.

Quote of the talk: “Ironically, only after the building was gone could I understand the role it played in so many lives.”

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Smruti Jukur, urban planner

Big idea: What if those in poverty were a part of the city planning process?

Why? Within many cities there exists another city — informal communities, hundreds of thousands of people strong. 881 million people across the world who live in these settlements and slums — some as large as townships (Kibera, Nairobi; Dharavi, Mumbai; and Khayelitsha, South Africa, to name a few) — are under threat of being displaced at any time in the name of real estate development. Smruti Jukur urges governments and those in power to work in tandem with these settlements, instead of choosing what they think is right for their citizens. Jukur offers a real-world example, happening right now in Mukuru, Nairobi, where respect, empowerment and collaboration is helping leaders and their residents build a more inclusive city for tomorrow.

Quote of the talk: “Poverty only changes affordability. It does not change aspirations.”

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Debbie Millman, designer

Big idea: The ability to create meaning through symbols and logos doesn’t just belong to big corporations. It belongs to all of us. 

Why? Since the early days of human society, we have created community through shared symbols. In fact, some of the first religious symbols were not created by any church or leader, but by communities themselves, explains Debbie Millman. Unique marks and logos have come to indicate ownership or belonging in a variety of ways, from branding cattle to the first trademarked brand in the United States: a beer. But for the last few hundred years, this ability has largely belonged to companies with the means to trademark and advertise something as recognizable as the Nike swoosh. Now, online culture is changing things, Millman says. Social media can amplify messages, and branding has reverted to something created by and for people. The creation of the pussy hat for the 2017 Women’s March is just one example of how the internet grants us the democratic capacity to make shared meaning.

Quote of the talk: “Branding is not just a tool of capitalism. Branding is the profound manifestation of the human spirit.” 

Gathering together: Notes from Session 4 of TEDWomen 2018

In a searching session of talks hosted by curator and photographer Deborah Willis and her son, artist Hank Willis Thomas (who spoke together at TEDWomen 2017), 12 speakers explored conflict, love, the environment and activism, and more. The session featured duet talks from Paula Stone Williams and Jonathan Williams, Neha Madhira and Haley Stack, Aja Monet and phillip agnew, Beth Mortimer and Tarje Nissen-Meyer, and William Barber and Liz Theoharis, as well as solo talks from Jan Rader and Yvonne Van Amerongen.

A story of redemption. Paula Stone Williams and her son Jonathan Williams know that the truth will set you free — but only after it upends your carefully constructed narrative. In a moving, deeply personal talk, they share the story of Paula’s transition from male to female. Her devotion to authenticity caused her to leave her comfort zone as a nationally known religious leader. In the process, Paula lost all of her jobs, most of her friends and was rejected by her church. “I always taught the kids that when the going gets tough, you have to take the road less traveled — the narrow path — but I had no idea how hard it would become,” she says. Jonathan faced a personal reckoning himself, questioning his childhood memories and asking himself: “Had my father even ever existed?” After a long process of reconciliation, Jonathan ultimately shifted his personal and professional outlook, turning his church into an advocate for the LGBTQ community. “I could not ask my father to be anything other than her true self,” he says. Nowadays, Jonathan’s kids lovingly refer to Paula with a new team of endearment: “GramPaula.”

How empathy can catalyze change in the opioid crisis. Compassion and education can save lives in the opioid epidemic, says Huntington, West Virginia, fire chief Jan Rader. As she saw rising levels of drug overdoses and deaths in her city, Rader realized that, unlike rescuing someone from a fire, helping someone suffering from substance abuse disorder requires interwoven, empathy-based solutions — and she realized that first responders have an important role to play in the overdose epidemic. So she developed programs like Quick Response Team, a 72-hour post-overdose response team of recovery coaches and paramedics, and ProAct, a specialty addiction clinic. Rader also established self-care initiatives for her team of first responders, like yoga classes and on-duty massages, to help alleviate PTSD and compassion fatigue. These programs have already had a remarkable impact — Rader reports that overdoses are down 40 percent and deaths are down 50 percent. Stigma remains one of the biggest barriers in tackling the opioid crises, but when a community comes together, change can happen. “In Huntington, we are showing the rest of the country … that there is hope in this epidemic,” Rader says.

When is a free press not really free? The freedom to publish critical journalism is more important than ever. Neha Madhira and Haley Stack remind us that this should apply “to everyone, no matter where you live or how old you are.” Madhira and Stack — who work at the Eagle Nation Online, a high school newspaper in Texas — learned the hard way that student journalists “don’t have the same First Amendment rights” everyone else had. In 2017, their principal pulled three stories, on topics like a book that was removed from a class reading list, and the school’s response to National Walkout Day. He instituted “prior review” and “prior restraint” policies on all stories, banned editorials, and fired the paper’s advisor. They had no choice but to fight. Madhira says, “How were we supposed to write our paper… if we couldn’t keep writing the relevant stories that were impacting our student body?” They received an outpouring of support from around the country, which eventually persuaded the principal to overturn his policy. But this all could happen again — which is why they now lobby for New Voices, a law which would extend First Amendment protections to student journalism, and which has now passed in 14 states. Madhira and Stack hope it will pass nationwide.

Art as organizing. Activists and artists Aja Monet and phillip agnew connected the way many young couples meet today — on Instagram. What started on social media quickly turned into a powerful partnership they call “Love Riott.” Together, they founded Smoke Signals Studio, a space for community-based art and music in Little Haiti, Miami. As they describe it, Smoke Signals is a place “to be loved, to be heard and to be held.” It’s a place where art and organizing become the answer to anger and anxiety. Both Monet and agnew have dedicated their lives to merging arts and culture with community organizing — Monet with the Community Justice Project and agnew with the Dream Defenders. “Great art is not a monologue. Great art is a dialogue between the artist and the people,” Monet says.

The enigmatic language of elephants. To study the language of elephants, one needs a seismometer — a device that measures earthquakes — which is how biologist Beth Mortimer and geophysicist Tarje Nissen-Meyer came to work together. Elephants communicate simultaneously through the land and air over long distances using infrasonic vocalizations, meaning that they make sounds deeper than the human ear can detect. “These vocalizations are as loud as 117 decibels, which is about the same volume as a Coachella rock concert,” says Nissen-Meyer. By using seismology to study wildlife, the pair is developing a noninvasive, real-time and low-cost study method that is practical in developing countries to help them fight poaching. Eventually, they’d like to go beyond elephants, and they have plans to continue eavesdropping on the silent discos of the animal kingdom, keeping an ear to the ground to help protect the world’s most vulnerable societies, precious landscapes and iconic animals.

Living a good life with dementia. How would you prefer to spend the last years of your life: in a sterile, hospital-like institution or in a comfortable home that has a supermarket, pub, theater and park within easy walking distance? The answer seems obvious now, but when the Hogeweyk dementia care center was founded by Yvonne Van Amerongen 25 years ago, it was seen as a risky break from traditional dementia care. Located near Amsterdam, Hogeweyk is a gated community consisting of 27 homes with more than 150 residents who have dementia, all overseen 24/7 by well-trained professional and volunteer staff. (The current physical village opened in 2009.) People live in groups according to shared lifestyles. One home, where Van Amerongen’s mother now lives, contains travel, music and art enthusiasts. Surprisingly, it runs on the same public funds given to other nursing homes in the Netherlands — success, Van Amerongen says, comes from making careful spending decisions. As she puts it, “Red curtains are as expensive as gray ones.” The village has attracted international visitors eager to study the model, and direct offshoots are under construction in Canada and Australia. Whether people have dementia or not, Van Amerongen says, “Everyone wants fun in life and meaning in life.”

America’s fusion is our story. Reverends William Barber and Liz Theoharis have traveled from the Bronx to the border, from the deep South to the California coast, meeting mothers whose children died because of a lack of healthcare, homeless families whose encampments have been attacked by police and communities where there’s raw sewage in people’s yards. Closing session 4 of TEDWomen 2018, the two make a powerful call to end poverty. “America is beset by deepening poverty, ecological devastation, systemic racism and an economy harnessed to seemingly endless war,” Barber says. In a nation that boasts of being the wealthiest country in world, 51 percent of children live in food-insecure homes, and 250,000 people die every year of poverty and low wealth. “If we have a different moral imagination, if we have policy shifts guided by moral fusion, we can choose a better way,” Theoharis says. This past spring, Barber and Theoharis helped organize the largest, most expansive simultaneous wave of nonviolent civil disobedience in the 21st century and perhaps in history, re-inaugurating the Poor People’s Campaign started by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The campaign is changing the narrative around poor people, refuting the idea that it’s not possible for everyone to survive and thrive. Barber and Theoharis are organizing hearings, holding community BBQs, going door to door registering people for a movement, holding freedom schools and developing public policies that will improve people’s lives. “This is a moral uprising … a new and unsettling force of people who are repairing the breach, who refuse to give up, and refuse to settle and surrender to suffering,” Barber says.