TED Community » Teal Furnholm

More About Me

I'm passionate about

Expanding people's awareness of the fragile intricate beauty of Earth. Switching the world over to thorium and renewable energy sources before it's too late.

An idea worth spreading

Some people have been called radicals in their attempts to further human rights and equality. EC Stanton and SB Anthony were radical to suggest that women were equal to men, or Jefferson, that all people are created equal. Well call me a radical but lets consider this possiblity: all creatures are created equal... are endowed with certain inalienable rights... Aren't the same arguments used to keep pets and livestock the same as those once used to keep slaves? Do we not continue to discover how little difference in emotion and thought there is between animals and humans? Perhaps it is time to SERIOUSLY reassess the uses to which we put animals. Is it ethical to use primates in laboratory experiments confined in cages. Do we have the right to keep social animals like dogs who are left alone for the majority of the day while their owners are occupied with their busy lives? Perhaps in the exploration of non-human rights, we might come to new realizations of how we treat eachother.

Talk to me about

Eddefy, LFTRs, Anything related to science (from the scale of strings to "branes" and anything inbetween), saving the world, putting the US in forefront of both technological and social advancement.

People don't know that I'm good at

Optimizing systems (efficiency) and creativity/innovation. I'd love to be a muse and come up with new ideas or solutions to problems all day (and I can).

My TED Story

- Liquid fluoride thorium reactors (LFTRs) are the answer to the world's energy problem. As the good nuclear, it is the silver bullet for energy. This technology could provide nearly free environmentally friendly energy if managed by the public rather than for-profit companies…
- Get rid of the House of Representatives! We have technology, instant information access, so let us represent ourselves…
- Dark matter is everted matter: matter passed through a black hole to the other “side” of our universe’s ‘brane’…
- Mandatory meditation in schools – for health of body and mind…
… read more at http://tealfurnholm.wordpress.com/

Comments

• TEDCred score: +0.30 TEDCred reflects your contribution to the TED community.

• A comment on Talk: Sugata Mitra: Build a School in the Cloud

  Feb 28 2013: As we all learn from and teach each other, we can map all of human knowledge and eventually create an education AI that comes from the collective human mind. This is why I am pursuing my start-up - EdDefy.com - a free online interface empowering Global collaboration, tracking and visualization of self-organized learning. Everybody has something to teach and something to learn.
  
  SOLE, its time for education to evolve.
• +1

  A reply on Talk: Garth Lenz: The true cost of oil

  Feb 19 2012: There is no need to quibble over details, and as bad as the Alberta tar-sands are, they too are just a symptom of a bigger problem. Fossil Fuel$$$Corruption->->Politics
  
  1. Between a growing population and the dependence of the average worker on existing fossil fuel - based infrastructure, prices will only go up.
  2. Energy industry and political leaders are aware that we now have the technology to produce energy that is cheap, available to everyone, and does not produce greenhouse gasses.
  3. It is in their best interest to stave off these technologies while a). they make as much money as they can from fossil fuels; and b) in the mean time find a way to corner the market on these new technologies.
  
  PLEASE, when you next speak to the public or politicians, let them know about Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors. Tell EVERYONE.
  SAFE, proven, cheap, widely available energy (see TED TALK: Kirk Sorensen) that would solve the climate change issues, end the despoiling of the earth, stop the stupid fighting over oil...
  
  The people in charge are rich mostly from fossil fuel money, we can't count on them to do the right thing... only a mass movement of people embracing this technology will make it happen.
  
  And dont let your government bog it down in delay (20 years at the moment for USA), delay is not necessary, it only extends the time they can continue to profit from fossil fuels.
  
  Cheap abundant clean energy is THE FULCRUM for GLOBAL positive change.
• +1

  A comment on Talk: Clay Shirky: Why SOPA is a bad idea

  Jan 21 2012: Perhaps I may interject a voice of the middleground. Everything I own I have bought, but not everything I have seen or heard, I own. I recently saw a music video (on YouTube) someone posted on facebook, this made me look up more of their songs, which I also liked. I went to iTunes and bought several of their songs that I would never have heard of (and thus bought) otherwise.
  
  I think that trying to regulate morals into people has never and will never work. It only empowers one group over another, fostering tyrany (Google Milgram if you dont believe me).
  
  Which is a better scenerio, a cop busting someone for drugs because of anti-drug laws and then court and laywers and one more person burdening taxpayers....etc, OR a person just saying NO? If the media industry wants us to change, they must change our minds and hearts, not our laws.
  
  Also, making more things illegal just makes more outlaws.

• A reply on Conversation: How to Kindle a Child's Hope in an Adult's Heart?

  Dec 22 2011: Thank you for your comments! I am glad there are caring people like you to guide future generations. What was it do you think that got you to see past the veil and sparked your fire initially? What might you say to spark a fire in others and get them to have hope?

• A reply on Conversation: How to Kindle a Child's Hope in an Adult's Heart?

  Dec 22 2011: That is a great quote by Einstein. I take it to heart!

• A reply on Conversation: How to Kindle a Child's Hope in an Adult's Heart?

  Dec 22 2011: Point 4 is exactly what I am trying to address, it is a social problem. I am not sure what you mean on points 5 and 6. Also not sure how morals enter into it, but I agree with your statement "adults with kindness and loving attitudes....children".
  
  It seems many TED talkers have figured out how to have a joyous inner child. Their eyes are open to the wonders of the world. That is why I posed the question on TED. I have observed (with the eye of a scientist, not idly) that most of the people in the midwest where I come from seem on average rather 'blah' about their existence, really only actively concerned about their family and making ends meet. It is the grand american rut, we need to get out of as a society. I am looking for the right thing to say/do to re-awaken their drive to discover, ease their brows. What would you say to someone in a rut in their life? Or maybe the question is really, how to get people into a mindset to have an interest in the things talked about on TED?

• A reply on Conversation: How to Kindle a Child's Hope in an Adult's Heart?

  Dec 22 2011: Part of my thought came from how there are so many "save the children" organizations, but then once the children stop being cute, people seem to stop caring. Possibly because they themselves dont feel cared for, or possibly because they feel that adults that have bad things happen to them deserve it, that they should be able to care for themselves. If the latter, I thought to myself, it isnt right! Not everyone has good parenting to teach them how to succeed, and not everyone is blessed with a childhood free of spirit-crushing tragedy, abuse, or neglect. Adults actually seem to need more care, for all the burdens of the past and future that they have to carry. I want to reinvigorate the brused and bitter souls of the American populus, remove the sourness that leads to apathy and selfishness.
  
  Also, there was an eye-opening study at my university. They put open bins of soda around campus with a box attached to put a dollar/can, completely on the honor's system. EVERYONE PAID! The ones that didnt put a dollar in immediately, came back later. We have become so mistrusting of eachother, it is fear that destroys a civilization.
  
  Children are trusting, they are quick to find the joy of the moment. I only wish that adults, setting aside the fear and fatigue that holds them hostage, could find the child within and, not self conscious or fearing ridicule, learn to play once again. Maybe with a hopeful outlook towards life, we can make the next leap in social/cultural/spiritual evolution.

• A reply on Conversation: How to Kindle a Child's Hope in an Adult's Heart?

  Dec 20 2011: Thanks for your comment! I guess that half the battle is getting people out the front door (so that they will go and experience nature).

• A comment on Conversation: What defines ethical treatment? Justice?

  Dec 13 2011: Please forgive me if I come off sounding a snoody know-it-all, I am not trying to be, just trying to be helpful.
  
  It seems that you continue to feel entitled to respect as a reaction to percieved scrutiny, as though your worth lie in what you had to suffer (earining money or having to ask for help from others-neither easy). Too often we get bent out of shape by what WE think others think about us. People do not give respect for the hardships that others suffer, for they themselves are suffering hardships too. Person A gives respect to person B who reduce person A's own suffering: in short, an act of kindness.
  
  And in the case of the disabled, asking for help and showing gratitude to that person gives them a sense, if brief, that they have done some good in the world. Do not SUFFER being helped, enjoy the opportunity to give others a moral boost, it is an act of kindness. Too often we are stuck working meaningless unfulfilling jobs doing busy work, frustrated in our inertia.
  
  Actualizing our moral potential: lead by example, do unto others as you'd have them do to you... be kind!

• A comment on Conversation: How does one not acquiesce to suffering?

  Dec 13 2011: You seem to have sparked many peoples' interest, so hopefully I will not be too redundant.
  
  It isdespair that causes you to acquiesce. Being submerged in the vast ocean of human tears, shed by the millions of neglected and suffering people around you, it is easy to feel as though you will drown that you will never find the shore. Feeling that you are too small to face against the titans of social/political/environmental injustice (which leads to hardship). Knowing you mayhave to fight all your life, it is easier to relent than fight, it is easier to despair. Maybe it is a difference in parenting (east vs west), my parents always said I could do ANYTHING when I grow up. Perhaps, that naieve but inspiring sentiment is not told to enough children in Affrica.
  
  Be aware that happiness does not rest on the condition that you are free from hardship. I have known manypeople with seemingly charmed lives that still could find reasons to complain because inside (where happiness starts) they were miserable. Like flowers raised indoors, when exposed a harsh breeze, they break and wilt. People in underprivelaged countries, having been exposed to the cruel winds all their lives, they weather the storm. Hard life or easy life, happiness starts within.
  
  So how to prevent aquiescing? Face the titans, fight injustice/cruelty/greed, knowing that in your life time you may not win, but as long as you keep fighting, you will never lose. Know in your heart that you are NOT ALONE, and when you stand with others who will work with you, you need not despair. Find the happiness in the little ways you change things/help people, and in the knowledge you are doing what's right. Even if it is only in a small way, YOU MATTER.