For a while now I’ve had a front-row seat at shake-me-up talks given by some of the world’s leading thinkers and cutting-edge theoreticians—people from extremely diverse fields. I’ve learned a bit about subject areas that were completely new to me, and I’ve even experienced new ways of thinking. All this from watching speakers such as:

• Atomic physicist Joshua Silver, Director of the Centre for Vision in the Developing World, who discussed his invention of the world’s first fluid-filled eyeglasses. Easily adjusted by the wearer, they correct vision at the lowest possible cost imaginable. Silver plans to distribute a billion pair to poverty-stricken people around the world by 2020.

• Planetary scientist Carolyn Proco, leader of the imaging team on the Cassini mission to Saturn, has been studying and interpreting images sent back by Cassini since 1999 (so far, many new rings and four new moons have been found). In her talk, Porco showed images from the mission and related fascinating tales about space exploration.

• Botanist Corneille Ewango discussed his work at the Congo Basin’s Okapi Wildlife Reserve and the Okapi Faunal Reserve (a World Heritage Site). The 2005 recipient of the Goldman Environmental Prize, Ewango frequently faces down poachers and soldiers who threaten the delicate eco system he’s trying to protect.

• Biologist Sheila Patek loves speed, especially the speed of animals. She talked about her work measuring the feeding strike of the mantis shrimp; that may not sound exciting, but that particular strike is one of the fastest movements in the animal kingdom (bug-snapping ant jaws are even faster). Patek uses high-speed video cameras in her work, capable of recording up to 20,000 frames per second.

• Biodiversity warrior Cary Fowler (USA), executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, discussed his work with the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Buried within a frozen mountain in Norway—about 800 miles from the North Pole—the vault serves as a “backup system” of the world’s biological diversity, with approximately 1.5 million distinct agricultural seed samples stored for food crops that have always nurtured human beings.

• And here’s my favorite lecturer (so far, anyway): brain scientist Jill Bolte Taylor. In 1996, at age 37, Taylor experienced a massive stroke. She “watched” as her brain functions (motion, speech, self-awareness) shut down one by one. Her recovery took eight years, during which she—as a brain specialist—had an inside seat to observe the process. Her story, and her discoveries about her own (and human) nature, are fascinating.

And then there are talks by more familiar people such as former US Vice President/eco-gladiator Al Gore, anthropologist Jane Goodall, biz phenom Sir Richard Branson, writer Amy Tan, performance artist Anna Deavere Smith, musician Peter Gabriel, basketball coach John Wooden, historian Doris Kearns Goodwin…

These fantastic folks—and oh, so many others—have opened my mind and expanded my horizons again and again. And they’re always happy to do so whenever I have the time and inclination.

They’ll do it for you, too. All you have to do is visit TED: Ideas Worth Spreading, and select for viewing one of the hundred or so talks given at the annual Ted Conference. And the coolest thing? Each one is only about 18 minutes long.

The nonprofit TED began in 1984 as a conference intended to bring together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, and Design. Today its scope is much, much broader. Along with the annual TED Conference in Long Beach, California, and the TEDGlobal conference in Oxford UK—where the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers are challenged to give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes—TED includes the award-winning TEDTalks video site, the Open Translation Program, the new TEDx community program, this year’s TEDIndia Conference and the annual TED Prize.

Check TED out. It’s definitely worth while, and you are bound to learn a thing or two.  As Bill Gates said after attending a TED conference, “I wasn’t prepared for this conference to be so profound. The combined IQ of the attendees is incredible.”

© Suzanne Rodriguez

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