Thanks to a very alert student, I was turned on to a terrific video source with the very plain sounding name of “TED.” According to the About TED website, TED stands for “technology, entertainment, and Design.” The group started in 1984 and began offering conferences where speakers were challenged to bring these disciplines together in the “talk of their lives”–in only 18 minutes. As a professor who has been trained to talk in 50 minute intervals, I know how hard it is for these people to do this.
In case you can’t find the $6000 it costs to attend (conferences only accommodate 1000, and there are waiting lists), you can see videos on the site of some of the speakers. One of my favorites is illusion master Al Seckel, who gives a terrific talk on visual illusions. Seckel used to host one of my favorite visual illusion sites “Illusionworks,” but had to take it down, I believe, because it took up too much of Cal Tech’s server resources. Fortunately, a German site has retained much of Al’s original material. The explanations are terrific for students, and include references that can be used for more in-depth exploration. You might also enjoy Al’s many books and calendars featuring illusions. Al recommends eyetricks for additional illusions.
Other great videos (you can spend a lot of time on this site) include Jane Goodall and Daniel Goleman (on emotional intelligence).
Enjoy! And many thanks to the TED people for making this content available.
6 Comments
l.ogden · April 26, 2008 at 10:46 am
I thought I was coming to your blog to leave a comment and leave within 10 minutes. Instead I have been on TED for and hour and a half. That website is very interesting! My favorite video showed fish of the sea and how amazing an octopus can be when blending into its surroundings. I think TED will be my new default website for when I want to procrastinate.
I also went to the eyetricks website. I was looking through the optical illusions and am confused by the still images that appear to move because of the color patterns. The brain does some crazy things.
Mind · April 26, 2008 at 3:10 pm
I think that’s the thing about TED that separates it from so many other conferences, it really becomes more about speakers helping the world than their own personal companies.
And I’ll have to attest what l.ogden said, even though I’ve already heard of TED I almost try to watch as many of their videos as possible, it really helps you reminisce about how past innovators started out…
KCCHAFFEE · April 26, 2008 at 7:26 pm
I checked out TED, and loved it. I watched the one with Jane Goodall, and found it very interesting. She is an amazing women, I read her first book “In the Shadow of Man” for an biological anthropology class a year ago, and was surprised to find that I found it very interesting. I would recommend watching her video if you are looking for a good one.
There are so many times I have sat down and turned on the television just to watch something I got nothing out of. I now have somewhere I can go when I am bored and actually learn something. Thanks!
Laura Freberg · April 27, 2008 at 3:27 pm
I wish I could afford the $6000 it costs to see a TED in person 🙂
mbernie · April 28, 2008 at 1:30 pm
It is always quite a trip seeing illusions. The mind, brain and eye are all delicately “faked out” or intertwined to give you something that really isn’t there; well I guess one could argue whether the image is there or not. However, in my mind an illusion is the blending of the brain, mind, and eye and now after the talk of hallucinogens in todays class it makes me wonder if drugs such as LSD or whatever causes an internal blend of these three separate yet connected entities in some kind of internal conceptual portrayal of reality. The difference between illusion and hallucinogen is the internal blending (drug/hallucinogen) or external blending (picture/illusion) of the three entities listed above.
I’m not sure if that really made sense to anyone but hopefully the message does get across.
crdrews · April 30, 2008 at 3:03 pm
I went to the TED website and found it very cool. There were so many videos to choose from that it was hard to make a decision. I guess I can also watch them when I have some free time. I looked at the “underwater astonishments” with David Gallo and it showed bioluminescent fish that would light up in the darkest areas of the ocean. Also the way that octupus’ can blend into their environment was amazing.
I also looked at Chistopher DeCharms, “Looking inside the brain in real time.” This showed how fMRI can be used so that an individual can see the activity of their brain in real time. He said that in the near future this could help with healing chronic pain, dealing with emotions, or even disease treatments. This is a wonderful discovery that seems like it would have a huge impact on the future, although it may be a bit expensive.
I will definitely be visiting this website again in the near future.
Comments are closed.