Well. It’s been over a year since I posted in this blog. Things happen. Then things get better, and you remember to come back to some of the fun things – the extras – that you had to let go for a while. Our TED Talk lunches were a casualty of my down time. I’m hoping we can pick up where we left off!
Speaking of where we left off…
Here’s what we watched on our July 21, 2015 TED Talk lunch session. I don’t have any comments to add, since it was over a year ago! Still, I’m certain they were worth checking out.
I do remember this autism entry as being intriguing. I think I’ll watch it again on my lunch break!
Steve Silberman: The forgotten history of autism (13:48)
Decades ago, few pediatricians had heard of autism. In 1975, 1 in 5,000 kids was estimated to have it. Today, 1 in 68 is on the autism spectrum. What caused this steep rise? Steve Silberman points to “a perfect storm of autism awareness” — a pair of psychologists with an accepting view, an unexpected pop culture moment and a new clinical test. But to really understand, we have to go back further to an Austrian doctor by the name of Hans Asperger, who published a pioneering paper in 1944. Because it was buried in time, autism has been shrouded in misunderstanding ever since. (This talk was part of a TED2015 session curated by Pop-Up Magazine: popupmagazine.com or @popupmag on Twitter.)
Keith Barry: Brain magic (19:49)
First, Keith Barry shows us how our brains can fool our bodies — in a trick that works via podcast too. Then he involves the audience in some jaw-dropping (and even a bit dangerous) feats of brain magic.
Chris Urmson: How a driverless car sees the road (15:29)
Statistically, the least reliable part of the car is … the driver. Chris Urmson heads up Google’s driverless car program, one of several efforts to remove humans from the driver’s seat. He talks about where his program is right now, and shares fascinating footage that shows how the car sees the road and makes autonomous decisions about what to do next.