TED Talk Thursdays – Beau Lotto: Optical illusions show how we see

For those of you not familiar with TED Talks here is a brief summery of them from www.ted.com:

“TED is a small nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. Along with two annual conferences — the TED Conference in Long Beach and Palm Springs each spring, and the TEDGlobal conference in Oxford UK each summer — TED includes the award-winning TEDTalks video site, the Open Translation Project and Open TV Project, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize”

Today’s video shows us optical illusions and how they effect what we see. What we see is much more about the brain than it is about the eyes. In watching this video I can’t help but ask the question, “Do we really ever know if what we are seeing is ‘real’?” And what makes something real? Is there anything that is “real” or is it all the perceptions of our brains? Thoughts to ponder as you watch.

In describing this video ted.com says:

“Beau Lotto’s color games puzzle your vision, but they also spotlight what you can’t normally see: how your brain works. This fun, first-hand look at your own versatile sense of sight reveals how evolution tints your perception of what’s really out there.”

“Beau Lotto is founder of Lottolab, a hybrid art studio and science lab. With glowing, interactive sculpture — and good, old-fashioned peer-reviewed research — he’s illuminating the mysteries of the brain’s visual system.”

Enjoy!

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I look forward to your thoughts and comments!

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TED Talk Thursday – Jeremy Rifkin on “the empathic civilization”

For those of you not familiar with TED Talks here is a brief summery of them from www.ted.com:

TED is a small nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. Along with two annual conferences — the TED Conference in Long Beach and Palm Springs each spring, and the TEDGlobal conference in Oxford UK each summer — TED includes the award-winning TEDTalks video site, the Open Translation Project and Open TV Project, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize.

Today’s video is from TED’s Best of the Web series. According to TED:

In this talk from RSA Animate, bestselling author Jeremy Rifkin investigates the evolution of empathy and the profound ways it has shaped human development and society.

Jeremy Rifkin is president of the Foundation on Economic Trends and the author of 17 bestselling books on the impact of scientific and technological changes on the economy, the workforce, society and the environment. His books have been translated into more than thirty languages and are used in thousands of universities, corporations and government agencies around the world.

“The Empathic Civilization is emerging. A younger generation is fast extending its empathic embrace beyond religious affiliations and national identification to include the whole of humanity and the vast project of life that envelops the Earth” – Jeremy Rifkin

Not only is Jeremy Rifkin insightful, his videos are delightful to watch. Enjoy!

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I look forward to your thoughts and comments!

Be sure to Subscribe to this blog either by RSS or Email via the forms on the top right column of the page.