TED Community » Nicola Stratford

More About Me

I'm passionate about

Peace, kindness, honour, equal rights, civil rights, disability rights, science vs religion, art, music, literature, freedom, anti-slavery, anti-exploitation, beauty, egalitarianism, libertarianism

Comments

• TEDCred score: +0.20 TEDCred reflects your contribution to the TED community.

• A reply on Conversation: What project would you propose to change the world?

  Jun 11 2012: How far, and up how many hills and down how many dales are you proposing people in wheelchairs to push themselves, or have others push them? Some of us, too, don't need wheelchairs but cannot walk long distances. Others in wheelchairs are unable to move the chairs themselves and so would be dependent on others for a push, thus reducing their independence. I'm not poo-pooing your idea but I am trying to point out that many, many, many people need automobiles of some description. It would nice if such machines used other forms of fuel, granted, but we do need them or something filling the same niche with at least as much or greater ease and comfort.
  
  In all initiatives, the needs of the most vulnerable (babies, children, the elderly and people with disability) should be considered first, with the needs of all others being secondary, given the latter's ability to adapt, move, manipulate equipment and space with greater facility than can the former.

• A reply on Conversation: What project would you propose to change the world?

  Jun 10 2012: You will need to provide an alterative to some of us who cannot walk, or bike, or skateboard et al. because of disability.

• A comment on Conversation: What project would you propose to change the world?

  Jun 10 2012: I recall an episode of The West Wing, in which C J Craig is offered the chance to manage a foundation of X billion dollars and she's asked what her first project would be. I believe she said something about paved roads throughout Africa. I've often wondered about that idea and imagined the consequences, for good and ill, that would result. It would certainly alter the world as we know it along many dimensions - economic, explorative, political, environmental and so on.

• A comment on Conversation: Post your top 5 N-grams here!

  Oct 3 2011: And this last - rape, convictions, feminism. Is it showing more rapes reported during the height of feminism, more perpertrated? Why fewer convictions during that time? Ah, the risks of this tool around assumptions of causation.
  
  http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=rape%2Cconvictions%2Cfeminism&year_start=1900&year_end=2008&corpus=0&smoothing=3

• A comment on Conversation: Post your top 5 N-grams here!

  Oct 3 2011: Another that begs for explanation. Bigotry, politics: http://ngrams.googlelabs.com/ngrams/graph?content=bigotry%2Cdemocracy&year_start=1600&year_end=2008&corpus=0&smoothing=3
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  A comment on Conversation: Post your top 5 N-grams here!

  Oct 3 2011: Tried poverty, kindness with a range 1700 to 2000. Very interesting graph shape. Any historians who can explain it?
  
  http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=poverty%2Ckindness&year_start=1700&year_end=2000&corpus=0&smoothing=3

• A comment on Talk: Julian Treasure: The 4 ways sound affects us

  Oct 16 2009: Thank heavens for someone adding science to the intuitive response I have to open-plan office space. I recall another stat from somewhere, to the effect that in open-plan offices, we are interrupted up to 50 times a day, with the consequent negative impact on productivity that results as we try to find our focus again. Add the two factors together -- sound assault and interruptions -- and it's no wonder everyone is working horrendously long hours. We could probably get our day's work done in six hours if we were left alone to do it and didn't have to endure constant racket. Now, wouldn't that make for great work-life balance!
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  A comment on Talk: Eric Sanderson pictures New York -- before the City

  Oct 12 2009: I'd love to see this technology applied to all urban areas, with a view to our finding ways for restoration that would serve both us and other species. Surely this kind of vision is what modern environmentalism, conservation and politics should be about. So very many problems we face could be addressed by an ethos of our being part of the landscape and ecology, rather than separate from and overlord of it.

• A comment on Talk: Beau Lotto: Optical illusions show how we see

  Oct 8 2009: Left me wanting much more about implications, consequences et al; this desire is both a good and a bad thing! :-)
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  A comment on Talk: Golan Levin makes art that looks back at you

  Sep 11 2009: It's wonderful to have someone recognise that computers and art are not mutually exclusive. I am an artist who uses digital technology, although mine is static rather than interactive (so far!). My art is not "computer-generated", contrary to popular opinion and nomenclature; my art is "artist-generated" using the computer. It's as offensive to say "computer-generated" to me as it would be to say "paint-brush generated" to someone working on canvas. As Golan Levin states, time for a new vocabulary.