Ever since finding a superb Spore video by Will Wright on TED.com, I’ve been keeping an eye on the website for new videos which are released on a regular basis. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design and is an annual conference in which respected thinkers from all aspects of the world come to give fascinating speeches about their pet subjects. Only recently has the website started giving access to these speeches to anyone who didn’t attend the conference.
As well as Will Wright’s speech (and if you haven’t watched at least one presentation about the forthcoming groundbreaking game, you should), there’s a recent video by bioengineer Hod Lipson about his work on small robots which can learn and self-replicate. The website and video player is cleverly designed with an ingenious overlay on the bottom of the video telling you about the subsections of the talk, how long they go on for and what the subtopics are. Other enjoyable talks include speakers like Al Gore on global warming, Carolyn Porco on flying to Saturn with Cassini, James Kunstler’s engaging criticism of the tragedy of suburbia and Aubrey de Grey’s controversial belief that we can defeat ageing. That’s barely scratching the surface – I could spend weeks watching nothing but TED talks and not get bored. Have a browse and find the ones that engage you.
