Run-down TED, day 2: TED prizes

Posted March 1, 2008 at 7:58 pm by Eelco van Beek in General.

I’d like to start with my apology for the late run-down; the WiFi Guys in my hotel room refuse all cooperation. The TED Wednesday was dedicated to the TED Prizes. Each year three people get awarded the TED Prize. This prize symbolizes an appreciation of the initiative these people have taken up to make a difference in the world. TED supports the initiative and the winners also receive the sum of $100.000.

This year, honour was done to the following people:

Neil Turok is theoretical physicist, born in Africa. His dream is to strongly improve the quality of education in Africa. He opened a university centre in South-Africa: the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences. Students from all over Africa can get further education in math-based subject fields. Neil is now working on opening more similar institutions in different areas of Africa and wishes to broaden the number of subject fields even further.

Dave Eggers, author and philanthropist, specified in 2002 the idea to stimulate children (in the US) to develop and challenge themselves intellectually. He starts up the Pirate Store, a shop where pirate things can be purchased. Behind the shop is a big space for children to come after school where they get stimulated to broaden their knowledge of English and literature. Due to the attractive front (the pirate shop), and with the aid of volunteers who are willing to support lessons, his idea soon starts to take off. In the rest of the US, similar initiatives start up; the Super Hero shop, Spy shop, etc. Friday I attended a lunch with Dave and it’s great to see how passionate he is at helping people expanding his ideas. To be honest, I have no idea how extra support works in Dutch schools, but I can see how this could work in our country as well.

Karen Armstrong was a nun who eventually left the convent, gained more in-depth knowledge on different religions, and now expresses her opinion through her books. Although I don’t quite share her vision, she does state quite interestingly how religion influences the world and vice versa. Due to her well-founded vision and with the current increasing, religion based, extremism, she is a speaker much in demand for political discussions where faith has a major role.

Other highlights of this day:

Craig Venter has an amazing story on the progress in the field of genetic manipulation. In short, it comes to this: currently it is practically (it was indicated he was waiting for the affirmative phone call) possible to start up your own written code in an egg bacterium. This bacterium will then duplicate itself and the offspring will have the genetic properties as determined by Craig and his team. Eventually, he says, you could describe a life form in a computer programme after which an incubation process could bring it to life. The audience is worried about risks and consequences when this technology would fall in the wrong hands. Craig argues this is no reason not to continue this; in his eyes the effects of this research would mainly benefit humanity. He and his team are currently well advanced at optimizing a bacterium that can convert CO2 into methane. This could in the long run be a solution for both the CO2 as the energy supply problem.

Origami with DNA, is Paul Rothemund’s subject. He describes how DNA can be used as material to build basically anything. Some current issues with this are the structuring of chains (flawless), the creation of the helices, and the size of the ultimate objects. These objects can reproduce themselves, creating increasingly complicated objects. By using skilful folding and advanced techniques in the field of error-control it is possible to make simple switches. In the future this can lead to DNA based computers.

The interesting afternoon sessions include one by Philip Zimbardo, expert in the field of human behavioural changes. Zimbardo made name in this field with his University of Stanford experiment. One group of students acted as prisoners, the other as prison guards. It turned out the people who acted as prison guards -while research showed malice was not one of their traits- soon took to abusing the prisoners. Philip talks extensively about this experiment and compares it to what happened in Iraq between prisoners and guards.

Goldie Hawn (and I here I was thinking how old Meg Ryan looked, but they’re both present) comes on stage and speaks about Pangea Day. On the 10th of May, all over the world, films and music performances will take place on video screens in stadiums, internet, mobile phones and cinemas, with the goal to bring people closer together. The Pangea Day trailer, first shown on TED, can be found here. Pangea Day is an inititaive of Jehane Noujaim, TED winner 2006. In her 2006 talk she explains this concept.

All in all another great day, with, again, the most remarkable people.