The story of 'Oumuamua, the first visitor from another star system

An interstellar detective story. Open in your browser

This week on TED.com June 30, 2018

Talk of the week Karen J. Meech: The story of 'Oumuamua, the first visitor from another star system 13:24 minutes · Filmed Apr 2018 · Posted Jun 2018 · TED2018 In October 2017, Karen Meech got a call every astronomer waits for: NASA had spotted the very first visitor from another star system. The interstellar comet -- a half-mile-long object we named `Oumuamua, from the Hawaiian for "scout" or "messenger" -- raised intriguing questions: Was it a chunk of rocky debris from a new star system, shredded material from a supernova explosion, evidence of alien technology or something else altogether? In this riveting talk, Meech tells the story of how her team raced against the clock to find answers about this unexpected gift from afar. Watch now »

Playlist of the week Talks to help you find your purpose Not sure what to do with your one precious life? Browse these 7 talks to help find the path that only you could take. Watch » Total run time 1:13:53

catch up on this week's new TED Talks Whether you're obsessed with bridges or haven't given them a second thought, this talk from structural engineer Ian Firth will inspire you to see them in new ways. In this mesmerizing tour of bridges old and new, he explores the potential for innovation and variety in this essential structure. Spectacular bridges, he says, unleash our creativity, while they reveal our very human desire to connect. Watch » Multidisciplinary artist Paul Rucker is a collector of artifacts connected to the history of US slavery -- from branding irons and shackles to postcards depicting lynchings. In this mind-shifting talk, he shares how these objects carry history -- and how to take away their power now. "If we look at these objects and realize that they are part of our history, we can find a way to where they have no more power over us," Rucker says. (This talk contains graphic images.) Watch » Thousands of years ago, ancient Nubians drew pictures on tomb walls of a terrible disease that turned their eyelids inside out and made them blind. This disease, trachoma, is still a scourge in many parts of the world today -- but it's completely preventable, says Caroline Harper. Armed with data from a global mapping project, Harper's group, Sightsavers, has an audacious plan to wipe out this ancient disease, country by country. Watch » There's a creeping sameness in many of our newest urban buildings and streetscapes, says architect Vishaan Chakrabarti. And this sameness -- the result of regulations, mass production, safety issues and cost considerations -- has blanketed our planet in a social and psychological sameness, too. In this visionary talk, Chakrabarti calls for a return to magnetic, lyrical cities that embody their local cultures, uniquely and gorgeously. Watch » Travis Reider was prescribed strong opiates after a gruesome injury. But when it came time to taper off them, he realized that the doctor who gave him these deeply addictive drugs had no idea how to help him stop taking them. As he recounts his agonizing journey of opiod withdrawal, he raises questions about how this failure of the system is driving the US opiod crisis. How did we get here, and what can we do about it? Watch » Flight is about to get a lot more personal, says aviation entrepreneur Rodin Lyasoff. In this visionary talk, he imagines a new golden age of air travel in which small, autonomous air taxis allow us to bypass traffic jams and fundamentally transform how we get around our cities and towns. "In the past century, flight connected our planet," Lyasoff says. "In the next, it will reconnect our local communities." Watch »

Read more on ideas.ted.com Culture: How these parents are making life easier for kids with autism >> Zoos, museums and sports arenas can be an overstimulating nightmare for some kids. Meet a group that's creating places to take a sensory break Science: How do you discover a brand-new blue pigment? By accident >> Surprise! This chemist invented a new blue We humans: 7 tips on how to build closer relationships >> TED speakers share their best advice on creating connections

Quote of the Week “ NASA's been expecting to see an interstellar comet pass through the solar system since the 1970s, but until now, we'd never seen anything. Our own solar system is huge, so even getting a package from the nearest star system 4.4 light years away would take over 50,000 years. So this is a really big deal." Karen J. Meech The story of 'Oumuamua, the first visitor from another star system

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The surprising science of alpha males

Alpha males: Not what you think. Open in browser

This week on TED.com June 23, 2018

Talk of the week Frans de Waal: The surprising science of alpha males 15:54 minutes · Filmed Nov 2017 · Posted Jun 2018 · TEDMED 2017 In this fascinating look at the "alpha male," primatologist Frans de Waal explores the privileges and costs of power -- while drawing surprising parallels between how humans and primates choose their leaders. His research reveals some of the unexpected capacities of alpha males -- generosity, empathy, even peacekeeping -- and sheds light on the power struggles of human politicians. "Someone who is big and strong and intimidates and insults everyone is not necessarily an alpha male," de Waal says. Watch now »

Playlist of the week How music affects us Music is part of our shared humanity -- but why does it make us feel the way we do? These talks explore our fascinating relationship with the music we love. Watch » 9 TED Talks to choose from • Total run time 2:59:06

catch up on this week's newest TED Talks What happens when technology knows more about us than we do? Poppy Crum studies how we express emotions -- and she suggests the end of the poker face is near, as new tech makes it easy to see the signals that give away how we're feeling. In a talk and demo, she shows how "empathetic technology" can read physical signals like body temperature and the chemical composition of our breath to inform on our emotional state. Watch » Netflix changed the world of entertainment -- first with DVD-by-mail, then with streaming media, then again with hit original shows like Orange Is the New Black and Stranger Things -- but not without taking its fair share of risks. In conversation with TED curator Chris Anderson, Netflix co-founder and CEO Reed Hastings discusses the company's bold internal culture and the algorithm that fuels your recommendations. Watch » The global refugee crisis is a mental health catastrophe too, leaving millions of adults and kids traumatized by forced dislocation and conflict. How can we help people grow strong enough to rebuild their lives? Child psychiatrist Essam Daod has been working in camps, rescue boats and the shorelines of Greece and the Mediterranean Sea to help refugees (a quarter of which are children) reframe their experiences through short, powerful psychological interventions. As he says: "We need to acknowledge that first aid is not just needed for the body, but it has also to include the mind, the soul." Watch » A talk in Spanish with English subtitles: Gastón Acurio started his restaurant Astrid & Gastón in Peru in the 1990s, hoping to elevate the home-style cooking he grew up with to haute cuisine. Since then, he's built a restaurant empire -- and last month he won the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award from Diners Club, placing him among the world's most legendary chefs. But at heart, he's still a home cook. In this warm, wonderful talk, he asks us to embrace our culinary roots and transform the world with the meals we prepare each day. Watch »   What can we learn from the slimy, smelly side of science? In this playful talk,  journalist Anna Rothschild shows us the hidden wisdom of "gross stuff" and explains how the creepy underbelly of nature, medicine and technology is an important source of knowledge about our health and the world. "When we explore the gross side of life, we find insights that we never would have thought we'd find," she says, "and we even often reveal beauty that we didn't think was there." Watch » Writer and artist James Bridle explores a dark, strange corner of the internet, where unknown creators on YouTube hack the brains of young children in return for advertising revenue. From "surprise egg" reveals and the "Finger Family Song" to algorithmically created mashups of familiar cartoon characters in violent situations, these videos exploit and terrify young minds -- and they tell us something about where our increasingly data-driven world is headed. Watch »

Read more on ideas.ted.com Gallery: The story behind some of the world's most adventurous wedding photos >> This photographer climbed Everest to get the perfect wedding shot Tech: Why can't we predict a refugee crisis? This woman is working on it >> Overwhelmed borders, overflowing camps: How AI could help Psychology: Two smart techniques to help you master your emotions >> New science to recognize and categorize your feelings -- and feel better

Quote of the Week “ I want to tell you about Omar, a 5-year-old Syrian refugee boy who arrived to the shore on Lesbos on a crowded rubber boat. Crying, frightened, unable to understand what's happening to him, he was right on the verge of developing a new trauma. I knew right away that this was a golden hour, a short period of time in which I could change his story, the story that he would tell himself for the rest of his life. Omar looked at me with scared, tearful eyes and said, "What is this?" as he pointed out to the police helicopter hovering above us. I said: "It's a helicopter! It's here to photograph you with big cameras, because only the great and the powerful heroes, like you, Omar, can cross the sea." Omar looked at me, stopped crying and asked me, "I'm a hero?" Now, to Omar, the smell of the sea will not just remind him of his traumatic journey from Syria. Because to Omar, this story is now a story of bravery." Essam Daod Why it's important to give refugees mental health care

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4 billion years of evolution in 6 minutes

We're all just leaves on the tree of life. Open in browser

This week on TED.com June 16, 2018

Talk of the week Prosanta Chakrabarty: Four billion years of evolution in six minutes 05:41 minutes · Filmed Apr 2018 · Posted Jun 2018 · TED2018 Did humans evolve from monkeys or from fish? In this enlightening talk, ichthyologist Prosanta Chakrabarty dispels some hardwired myths about evolution, encouraging us to remember that we're a small part of a complex, four-billion-year process -- and not the end of the line. "We're not the goal of evolution," Chakrabarty says. "Think of us all as young leaves on this ancient and gigantic tree of life -- connected by invisible branches not just to each other, but to our extinct relatives and our evolutionary ancestors." Watch now »

Playlist of the week Talks to watch on a sleepy day in Looking to unwind? Here are seven enlightening and rejuvenating TED talks for your day in. Watch » 7 TED Talks to choose from • Total run time 1:19:41

This week's new TED Talks Many artificial intelligence researchers expect AI to outsmart humans at all tasks and jobs within decades, enabling a future where we're restricted only by the laws of physics, not the limits of our intelligence. MIT physicist and AI researcher Max Tegmark separates the real opportunities and threats from the myths, describing the concrete steps we should take today to ensure that AI ends up being the best -- rather than worst -- thing to ever happen to humanity. Watch » Robots are designed for speed and precision -- but their rigidity has often limited how they're used. In this illuminating talk, biomedical engineer Giada Gerboni shares the latest developments in "soft robotics," an emerging field that aims to create nimble machines that imitate nature, like a robotic octopus. Learn more about how these flexible structures could play a critical role in surgery, medicine and our daily lives. Watch » In a poetic, personal talk, TED Fellow Katlego Kolanyane-Kesupile examines the connection between her modern queer lifestyle and her childhood upbringing in a rural village in Botswana. "In a time where being brown, queer, African and seen as worthy of space means being everything but rural, I fear that we're erasing the very struggles that got us to where we are now," she says. "Indigenizing my queerness means bridging the many exceptional parts of myself." Watch » In this imaginative talk, neuroengineer Sam Rodriques takes us on a thrilling tour of the next 100 years in brain science. He envisions strange (and sometimes frightening) innovations that may be the key to understanding and treating brain disease -- like lasers that drill tiny holes in our skulls and allow probes to study the electrical activity of our neurons. Watch » In her brutally honest, ironically funny and widely read meditation on death, "You May Want to Marry My Husband," the late author and filmmaker Amy Krouse Rosenthal gave her husband Jason very public permission to move on and find happiness. A year after her death, Jason offers candid insights on the often excruciating process of moving through and with loss -- as well as some quiet wisdom for anyone else experiencing life-changing grief. Watch » Our leaders and institutions are failing us, but it's not always because they're bad or unethical, says venture capitalist John Doerr -- often, it's simply because they're leading us toward the wrong objectives. In this practical talk, Doerr shows us how we can get back on track with "Objectives and Key Results," or OKRs -- a goal-setting system to create and execute on our most audacious goals. Watch »

Read more on ideas.ted.com Science: Would you donate a kidney to a stranger? Here's why you might » How one donation can lead to 94 more transplants (and counting) We humans: 7 ways that your company could help the world's refugees » Help people rebuild their lives and start contributing to society Psychology: How to get more time out of the day? Start savoring » By developing the skill of savoring, you can maximize your moments — and your experience of time

Quote of the Week “ My friend Jaan Tallinn likes to point out that, just as with rocketry, it's not enough to make our technology powerful. We also have to figure out, if we're going to be really ambitious, how to steer it and where we want to go with it." Max Tegmark How to get empowered, not overpowered, by AI

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