Exercise your mind with new, exciting ideas

Written by Sandra Hudson

Iowa City is a community with a culture of sharing new and exciting ideas.

A year ago, Alicia Brown-Matthes shared with me a Web site that focuses on “Ideas Worth Spreading.” I now share it with you: www.TED.com.

Each morning I exercise my mind with “Inspiring talks by some of our world’s greatest thinkers and doers.” The videos, about 18 minutes in length, bring me cutting-edge ideas in “t”echnology, “e”ntertainment, “d”esign, and also the arts, business, culture, global issues and science. You’ll find more than 180 short presentations on the Web site. Among my favorites are:

•  Roy Gould and Curtis Wong discussing the World Wide Telescope. It will be online this spring. You will be able to manipulate images from the best telescopes in the world, and create for yourself a comprehensive and holistic view of the universe. The project is in celebration of the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s first view of the night sky through a telescope.

•  Aviation designer Paul MacCready shows his solar powered aircraft. The Helios wings are flexible solar panels that span 247 feet. It reached an altitude of 96,863 feet on its maiden flight, putting it on top of 98 percent of the world’s atmosphere. Helios is designed so it can hover 10 miles above the earth, day and night for six months at a time. (The Helios discussion begins at 15 minutes, 20 seconds into Paul MacCready’s presentation.)

•  David Gallo’s film, “Underwater Astonishments,” shows both deep-water bio-luminous sea life, and also some remarkable camouflage abilities of some shallow-water sea life.

•  Environmental architect William McDonough talks about his contract with the Chinese Government to build 12 environmental cities in 12 years. The cities will house and provide work opportunities, including farming, for 400 million people. These are “Cradle to Cradle” green field cities. (The plans are shown 16 minutes, 47 seconds into the presentation.)

•  Biologist E.O. Wilson discusses his online “Encyclopedia for Life.”

•  War analyst Thomas P.M. Barnett outlines a strategy, “The Pentagon’s New Map for War and Peace.” This is a complex proposal, which really exercised my mind. I had to watch it three times before the details sunk in.

TED conferences are expensive ($6,000) and there is always a long waiting list (more than 400), but the Web site is free and you can watch the TED talks again and again. So click on, give your mind a workout, and then share some of your new knowledge with a friend.

Think of it as doing your fair share in enriching Iowa City’s culture of sharing new and exciting ideas.

Sandra Hudson is involved in arts and culture events in the Iowa City area and statewide. She retired to Iowa City in 1998. She can be reached at Sandra.L.Hudson@att.net.