This week’s post features a roundup of 5 awesome TED talks.
1. Cameron Russell: Looks Aren’t Everything. Believe Me, I’m A Model.
In a bold and honest TED talk, Cameron Russell discusses the factors that led her to be a model and the insecurities that work in the industry engenders. Addressing issues such as the perks of being a model, racial inequality within the industry and what she would say to girls who aspire to be models, this is a fascinating and very open TED talk, well worth watching.
2. Karen Thompson Walker: What Fear Can Teach Us
Karen Thompson Walker opens her talk with the story of shipwrecked sailers in the Pacific, which was later to inspire Melville’s Moby Dick. The tragic story illustrates the way fear operates in our minds: fear helps us to project ourselves into a future situation and see it as a story.The cognitive vividness with which we do so helps us to decide on courses of action. Unfortunately, because of its nature, fear can suspend rational thought and lead us to make ill-informed decisions.
3. Andy Puddicombe: All It Takes is 10 Mindful Minutes
The human mind is our most powerful asset – but, Andy Puddicombe observes, it is also an asset that we take very little care of. Indeed, many of us will take more care over our cars or our hair than our minds. Refreshing our minds for just 10 minutes a day, by sitting comfortably and being present, can have a significant impact on our health and happiness.
4. Richard Weller: Could the Sun be Good for Your Heart?
In a fascinating TED talk, Richard Weller, a Scottish dermatologist, reveals a little-known benefit of sunlight that current research indicates could help to reduce heart disease. Seeking to explain the division in health between warmer and colder countries, Weller began researching the effects that sunlight has on the body. His research indicated that Vitamin D in sunlight was not the only cause of greater health. In fact, the UV radiation from sunlight helps release a chemical contained in the skin – nitric oxide – which has a strong positive impact on blood pressure and the cardiovascular system.
5. Hadyn Parry: Re-engineering Mosquitoes to Fight Disease
In my favourite TED Talk of the selection here, Hadyn Parry looks at the single greatest killer of human beings and what we can do to stop them. Mosquitoes have killed more human beings than wars or plague; dengue fever and malaria account for millions of human deaths every year. And now, Parry presents an ingenious solution to reduce their population size. In a research lab in Oxford, Parry and his colleagues have genetically re-engineered male mosquitoes such that their offspring die quickly after birth. Effectively, these are ‘sterile’ mosquitoes. Because mosquitoes have such a short life, by tactically releasing these re-engineered mosquitoes into towns and villages, in a short time period the mosquito population can be reduced by over 80%, thus significantly reducing the risk of mosquito-borne diseases like malaria and dengue fever. Trials have been extremely effective and the technology is now being distributed to Brazil and other affected areas.
AWESOME INSPIRATION 