Have you heard about TED?

Those of you who know me well know that I am absolutely fascinated by the world of ideas, memes, and the spread of information. I love thinking about "big picture" concepts, and can be extremely cerebral in my approach to the world.

Very recently, I discovered an absolutely marvelous wellspring of cutting edge memes and idea synthesis. While reading my favourite blog, BoingBoing (Subtitled "A Directory of Wonderful Things," I read it every day because there is always cool stuff on there), I found reference to a video of Richard Dawkins, one of my favourite authors and thinkers, speaking at something called the TED Conference. I had no idea what TED was, but I wanted to watch Dawkins, so I did. It was a fascinating lecture about the "queerness of science," and how our brains have evolved to navigate a world on a scale that makes it difficult for us to comprehend the universe on other levels, such as the microscopic, the universal, and the quantum levels. Fascinating stuff.

After watching the video, I wondered, "What is this TED conference?" Well it turns out that TED (Which stands for Technology Entertainment & Design) is an annual 4-day conference, held in Monterey, California, USA, where 1,000 of the most talented, smartest, and most creative minds in the world come together to share their ideas. It's truly a who's who of the best and the brightest -- the top minds from the worlds of science, the arts, Hollywood, music, literature, social activism, theatre, philosophy, business, academia, and even politics -- all share what they are doing and creating and thinking about, and cross-pollinating their ideas.

It's a very exclusive event, by invitation only, and costs quite a bit to attend: $4,400 for the conference. (I'd love to go, but I don't ever see myself being invited.)

BUT -- and since the conference is subtitled "Ideas Worth Sharing" it makes sense -- this past summer, TED began releasing video & audio segments of the featured speakers at the conference to the public, titled TED Talks. You can watch them or download them at the web site, or through an RSS feed, or through iTunes' free podcast subscription, which is how I have been getting them.

Some of these talks have been absolutely mind-blowing.

If you're interested in expanding your mind, and being exposed to the cutting edges of human thought, TED is a great website to visit.

-Hagrid

A mind-blowing TED Talk: Eva Vertes on Cancer

When I was an art student (years ago), my drawing instructors used to tell us, "Don't draw the object. Start by drawing the negative space around the object. Do that, and the object will reveal itself." It was an "a-hah" moment for me, and when I started doing it, discarding my preconceived notions about how an object "should" appear, instead focusing on the shapes around the object... my art improved.

I had a similar experience tonight, when I watched a TED Talk by Eva Vertes, the Canadian Wunderkind who made a name for herself as a teenager, doing cutting-edge research on Alzheimer's while still in high school in Ontario.

Now, I had heard of Ms. Vertes before. I follow the Canadian Media, and I remember when commentators in the Canadian press were bemoaning her decision to go to Princeton for her university education instead of a Canadian institution (The infamous brain drain). I had heard how impressive her ideas in medical research were, especially for one so young. Tonight, I got to hear her speak on TED, and am even more impressed.

Ms. Vertes has changed her medical research focus to cancer, and she has come up with a radical hypothesis: What if cancer was the result of the body's self-repair system gone awry? What if stem cells in the body, that are sent by the body to repair damage (caused by smoking in the lungs, drinking in the liver, sunlight on the skin, etc.) are the ultimate source of cancer? STEM CELLS! What if cancer isn't a disease, per se, but a malfunction in a body system we don't know much about yet? What if the process that initiates cancer is actually a beneficial one, but just doesn't proceed correctly?

It's only a hypothesis, but there's another damn good reason to do stem cell research.

But she didn't stop there. Proving that fresh minds, thinking outside the box, can come up with radical new ideas, she went on:

Have you ever heard of heart cancer? Why not? Or any kind of muscle cancer, for that matter? Muscle cancer happens, but it is very, very, very rare. Why?

This was the "negative space" thinking "a-ha" moment I had tonight. She started asking these questions, about parts of the body and body systems where cancer DIDN'T happen. Why?

And you know what? She revealed that, when she started this investigation, there had been almost ZERO research into the matter!

You mean to tell me, with all the decades of research and ZILLIONS of dollars poured into cancer research, no one had ever stopped to ask why the heart and other muscles almost never get cancer?

D'OH!

Medical researchers, bless their hearts, had been so focused on understanding and treating cancer where it was, no one had stopped to think about where it was not. And understanding WHY it doesn't develop in some parts of the body might just be the key to understanding why it develops where it does.

So those are the areas of cancer research that she is focusing on. They're just hypotheses now... but sometimes, a hypothesis can turn out to be right.

Keep an eye on this little lady. She just might be the up and coming generation's Louis Pasteur, or Jonas Salk.

-Hagrid