TED 2011: Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

This review was written by Nina Khosla.

Score: 5 balloons

Eric Whitacre, a well-known composer, began his talk with a personal story. He described how one day, he logged onto his computer to find a YouTube video recorded by a teenage girl who was singing one of his songs. The young singer, Britlin, left a message for Whitacre:

Britlin's message to Mr. Eric Whitacre... I was REALLY nervous!!! but hopefully he will see this video and see how thankful I am for him... he is the one who inspired me to compose!!! I hope to talk with him or meet him one day... wouldn't that be a dream come true!!!!!

It was this video that gave Whitacre the inspiration for his latest experiments - virtual choirs. He realized that by having individuals record each of the parts of a song, he could stitch them all together, creating a complete recording. This allowed him to connect all these individuals through music. 

Whitacre put a call out for submissions on his website, and has received thousands of submissions. He shared two videos and the process used to construct them: his first virtual choir, Lux Aurumque, and a reveal of the beginnings of his second, in-progress virtual choir.

 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED 2011: Sebastian Thrun on Google's Driverless Cars

Score: 9 balloons


Here's a tasty 4 minute TED snack on how and why Google promises to vastly improve the nature of automotive transportation.



 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED 2011: Eythor Bender, Human Exo-Skeletons

Score: 7 Balloons

Eythor Bender of Berkeley Bionics brings onstage two amazing exoskeletons, HULC and eLEGS -- robotic add-ons that could one day allow a human to carry 200 pounds without tiring, or allow a wheelchair user to stand and walk. It's a powerful onstage demo, with implications for human potential of all kinds.

About Eythor Bender

Eythor Bender is the CEO of Berkeley Bionics, which augments humans with wearable, powered and artificially intelligent devices called exoskeletons or "wearable robots.

 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED2011: Sarah Kay, Performance Poetry

Score: 9 balloons


Sarah Kay shared her experiences as an underage fan of poetry readings, and her use of poetry as a teacher to connect with students. She also performed her original works to a standing ovation. Her talk was widely viewed as a surprise highlight of this year's TED. Her work is animated and sharp, reaching young and old alike. Just listen...



 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED 2011: Janna Levin, Soundtrack of the Universe

This review was written by Nina Khosla.

Score: 6 balloons


Janna Levin was TED's first speaker of the conference, and a physicist who focused on exploring and discovering a particular phenomenon - the sounds of space. While much of physics has focused on light - "most of what we know about the universe," she explained, "comes from light." But what about the sounds of space? What would space sound like if we could hear it? “The universe has a soundtrack, and that soundtrack is played on space itself," she began.

Levin took us on a journey to black holes, starting with the basic science of black holes. In particuar, black holes are interesting because you can't "see" a black hole using traditional methods - light tends to pass through a black hole rendering it all but invisible. From there, Levin shared with us the music and noises that a black hole would make in various situations - the drumbeat of black holes on space itself.



 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED2011: David Brooks

This review was written by Nina Khosla.

Score: 8 balloons





David Brooks has a certain, calm demeanor and stood up on stage in the presentational equivalent of being stark naked - it was just him, in front of a podium, sharing with us his insights from many years as a journalist and observer of human nature.

In a thread continued from many of his columns, and as an introduction to the ideas in his new book, Brooks asked and explored a perplexing mystery: when did our views of human nature become so flat-minded, particularly in the way we approach it from an economic or political point of view? This revolution is slowly happening, as we begin to understand more about human nature, and this is being particularly driven by new scientific insights.

What particularly caught my imagination was Brooks' descriptions of the kinds of things that are unmeasurable, but predict so much of our success. While we would like to be able to measure the human capital available in our economic institutions through SAT and IQ scores, the human mind and potential incorporates much more depth. He describes a few of these factors, for example, the human capacity for "mind sight," which   describes our ability to empathize, to place our selves in another's mind and imagine the world from their perspective. Other intangibles include things such as our ability to work in a group - "it's not the IQ of the group, it's how well they communicate," that defines success in groups, and our sensitivity to our physical environment, which encapsulates our ability to notice things from around us and see patterns.



 See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.

TED 2011: Deb Roy's Unusual Home Movies

Score: 9 balloons

The MIT Media Labs Cognitive Machines Group's director Deb Roy wanted to understand how his infant son learned language -- so he wired up his house with 11 videocameras and 14 microphones to catch every moment (with exceptions) of his son's life, then parsed 7 million words spoken in 90,000 hours of home video to hear "gaaaa" slowly turn into "water." Astonishing, data-rich research with deep implications for how we learn.

See the Guide to TED Talks 2011.