TED Global Oxford Day 4
This last day started with a theme of "Small Matters".
Paul Bennett of IDEO captured our attention by asking us to look at problems from different angles - e.g. designing storage for childrens' toys under the table rather than in the cupboard, as that is where children play. He suggested a four point mantra for creativity. 1. Look from the person out. 2. Find yourself in the margins. 3. Use a beginner's mind (see this blog's heading!). and 4. Pick battles small enough to win, and big enough to matter. Cool ideas throughout.
Vijai Viathesswaren stressed that micro power sources already provide more energy than the world's nuclear power plants, and built a strong case that the future was indeed micro - from fuel cells, to unique one-home generators and so on. He believes that the oil industry in particular will change for ever as a result.
Niklas Zennstrom (who founded file sharer Kazaa) lead us through the development of Skype, how the network is enabling ever faster adoption of such ideas, and why VOIP is the future.
Taking the "Long View" ...
Nick Bostrom is a philosopher who highlighted that we face three big problems - death, existential risk ("will an asteroid hit earth"?) and the fact that life is not as good as it should be. Whilst he suggested the possibility of multiple universes (domains?) where things are better for us, it was hard to reach conclusions on what to do.
Peter Diamandis helped set up the X-Prize for the first private spaceship reaching suborbital height. His intense enthusiasm and careful business thinking made most of us believe that, yes, by 2025 we will indeed be taking holidays in space, and that space travel really is in our future best interests. His ideas around using prizes as a major motivational device and the inevitability of human lives being lost as we explore new frontiers sparked an interesting discussion.
And so it all started to draw to a close, with an hilarious conference summary from Tom Rielly, and some words on the future of TED and the TED prize from Chris Anderson, Ted's curator.
And I am making no apologies for including TED in a "leadership blog". We need to understand where science and society is going, if we are ever going to effectively lead. And we need to understand the problems as well as the opportunities if we are going to make a difference.
Paul Bennett of IDEO captured our attention by asking us to look at problems from different angles - e.g. designing storage for childrens' toys under the table rather than in the cupboard, as that is where children play. He suggested a four point mantra for creativity. 1. Look from the person out. 2. Find yourself in the margins. 3. Use a beginner's mind (see this blog's heading!). and 4. Pick battles small enough to win, and big enough to matter. Cool ideas throughout.
Vijai Viathesswaren stressed that micro power sources already provide more energy than the world's nuclear power plants, and built a strong case that the future was indeed micro - from fuel cells, to unique one-home generators and so on. He believes that the oil industry in particular will change for ever as a result.
Niklas Zennstrom (who founded file sharer Kazaa) lead us through the development of Skype, how the network is enabling ever faster adoption of such ideas, and why VOIP is the future.
Taking the "Long View" ...
Nick Bostrom is a philosopher who highlighted that we face three big problems - death, existential risk ("will an asteroid hit earth"?) and the fact that life is not as good as it should be. Whilst he suggested the possibility of multiple universes (domains?) where things are better for us, it was hard to reach conclusions on what to do.
Peter Diamandis helped set up the X-Prize for the first private spaceship reaching suborbital height. His intense enthusiasm and careful business thinking made most of us believe that, yes, by 2025 we will indeed be taking holidays in space, and that space travel really is in our future best interests. His ideas around using prizes as a major motivational device and the inevitability of human lives being lost as we explore new frontiers sparked an interesting discussion.
And so it all started to draw to a close, with an hilarious conference summary from Tom Rielly, and some words on the future of TED and the TED prize from Chris Anderson, Ted's curator.A great conference, with a great deal of food for thought, and many personal and intellectual linkages now to be made.
And I am making no apologies for including TED in a "leadership blog". We need to understand where science and society is going, if we are ever going to effectively lead. And we need to understand the problems as well as the opportunities if we are going to make a difference.
posted by mick yates @ 6:00 PM permalink
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