Like so many people in the United States, we were shocked by George Zimmerman’s acquittal this weekend in the shooting of teenager Trayvon Martin, above. And, like so many others, we can’t stop reading about it, to try to understand the complexities of this verdict -- wrapped around issues of race, gender, gun ownership and violence. Below, furt...

TED playlists are collections of talks around a topic, built for you in a thoughtful sequence to illuminate ideas in context. This weekend, three new playlists are available: "Ancient clues," "Planes, trains and automobiles" and "Are we alone in the universe?" Ancient clues Five fascinating talks by archaeologists and evolutionary biologists...

Yes, you can have a successful divorce, says relationship therapist Esther Perel. The first step? Writing goodbye letters to each other. Our culture views divorce as a failure, and even more so when it is precipitated by an infidelity. Longevity is seen as the ultimate indicator of marital achievement, but plenty of people who stayed “till deat...

African American writer Rich Benjamin spent two years living in -- and writing about -- America's whitest neighborhoods. The response to his book (and TED Talk) was honest, raw -- and sometimes misunderstood his purpose. Here, he responds to the response. In 2007, I embarked on a two-year, 27,000-mile trip. My destination? The fastest-growing a...

Our world is constantly changing, and it is bold ideas that push this forward. Our speakers in this session are all big thinkers who are working to reshape the ways we see, think about, and interact with the world, from the mind behind some of your favorite fonts to an urban planner transforming New York City’s landscape. Here are the speaker...

Ready for a Sunday binge of talks that will make your head spin? In this new playlist, twelve speakers take on our biggest issues: shifting global powers, the value of democracy, climate change, the nature of time, the future evolution of the human race. Some of these talks bring good news and some bring potential bad news -- and all of them...

TED, THNKR, SoulPancake, The Switch and Henry Review have all been nominated for The Webby’s People’s Voice Award in the category Online Film & Video Variety. Last week, both Kid President and Candace issued rousing calls on YouTube, asking for their fans’ help in catching up to us in the vote -- which closes April 30. We adore SoulPan...

Do you have a 5-year plan? A 10-year plan? Even if you’ve mapped out your life 20 years into the future, chances are that multidisciplinary artist Raghava KK has you beat. Giving a laugh-inducing talk at the TEDxSummit in Doha, Raghava explained that he and his wife, Nedra, have drawn up a life plan that covers the next two centuries. “Ou...

In 2013, psychologist Christopher Ryan (TED Talk: Are we designed to be sexual omnivores?) came to TED to talk about sex. Particularly, to challenge our current attitudes toward monogamy and pair-bonding as outdated and not useful. The co-author of the book Sex at Dawn made a cogent case that if we take a more nuanced view of sex and relationshi...

Photo: James Duncan Davidson Bryan Stevenson spends most of his time in jails and prisons and on death row. He's a lawyer, and the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative. So he's found it very energizing at TED, and wanted to start by pointing out that there is a distinct identity here. Things said here have a power that maybe they do...

Insight from the interwebs the weeks of July 22 and 29: A poignant, funny, slightly heartbreaking story of a woman who doesn't realize for many years that she has anosmia, no sense of smell. [The Millions] How do you get credible, nongovernment information about daily life out of North Korea? [Al Jazeera] How Geoff Dyer went from consistently...

Throughout Zak Ebrahim’s childhood, his father -- El-Sayed Nosair -- planned terrorist attacks on a dozen New York City landmarks, including tunnels, synagogues and the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York. On November 5, 1990, when Ebrahim was 7 years old, his father shot and killed Rabbi Meir Kahane, the then-leader of the Jewi...

As we assembled TED2013's lineup of speakers from around the world, talked with the TED brain trust, and listened to online conversations, one theme emerged: What is the future of work? Technology and new business practices are, in many ways, putting an end to the classic "good job," the kind that millions of people once moved to Detroit and cit...

A Sudanese high jumper towers over Rio de Janeiro, arching over a 25-story building in the Flamengo district. A triathlete plows through the waters of Botafogo Bay, mid-stroke, her wingspan as wide as a city bus, while a giant diver shows us the soles of his feet as he leaps from the stone jetty in Barra da Tijuca. Meanwhile, a truck disguis...

Compiled from past TED book lists, here's a curated selection of fiction and non-fiction titles to check out now. Minority Leader: How to Lead from the Outside and Make Change by Stacey Abrams (TED talk: 3 questions to ask yourself about everything you do) I work in government affairs, and the last thing I enjoy reading for pleasure are books ...

It’s Halloween — and the only thing scarier than Ebola this week is Ebola paranoia. Should you panic in bowling alleys? How justified is your fear of hospitals? Are mandatory quarantines even legal in the U.S., anyway? 3 ideas behind the news. Source: "Thomas Eric Duncan and Craig Spencer: Race, nationality and rhetoric of Ebola patients," Slat...

At TED2014, we challenged attendees to vote on 10 potential drivers of change in the next 30 years, via that enormously sophisticated piece of technology: the sticky note. As we could likely have predicted, there wasn't much consensus among those in Vancouver, but the range of opinions was vast and intriguing. And what do you think? Take the...

Ben Saunders spent 10 weeks walking from the north coast of Russia to the North Pole, and around to the north coast of Canada. For a full 72 days in 2004, Saunders was the only human being within a span of 5.4 million square miles, surviving an average temperature of -35C in conditions described by NASA as “the worst since records began.” S...

Amsterdam, Bangalore, Doha, Johannesburg, London, Nairobi, New York, São Paulo, Seoul, Shanghai, Sydney, Tokyo, Tunis and Vancouver. TED headed to 14 cities on six continents for the 2013 Talent Search, looking to bring you fresh perspectives for TED2013. Despite the fact that the 293 speakers who participated in the search came from wildly ...

There's no doubt that the speakers we invite to TEDWomen each year have amazing stories to tell. And many of them are published authors (or about to be!) whose work is worth exploring beyond their brief moments in the TED spotlight. So, if you're looking for some inspiring, instructive and provocative books to add to your summer reading list...

When it comes to equality across race, class and gender: "None of us has time to sleep -- we need to be woke as hell," says Mia Birdsong, host of Session 3 of TEDWomen 2016. In an emotional, pointed session, seven speakers and one performer explored the painful realities of the present and offered hopeful views of the future. "I'm not pas...

Eddie Huang might be the TED Fellows' first working chef. Then again, he might be a few other things too. Huang “defies description,” according to a feature last week in The New York Times. The profile captures his refusal to be categorized in any manner – be it by his Taiwanese heritage, by his deep love of hip-hop or by his status as a tri...

Liu Bolin (TED Talk: The invisible man)  takes the artist statement to another level -- by actually disappearing into what he wants to say. Bolin makes some rather bold statements about consumerism, mass culture -- even the Chinese government -- rather quietly, by creating and wearing suits that allow him to blend seamlessly into the background ...

Over the past week, we’ve noticed a lot of fascinating TED-related news items. Here, some highlights. Jeff Bezos, the co-founder of Amazon (watch his TED Talk), made waves on Monday when it was announced that he will buy The Washington Post for $250 million. “The paper’s duty will remain to its readers and not to the private interests of its ow...

Beyond policy reform, what can ordinary people do to combat systemic racism? Diversity advocate Vernā Myers thinks it starts with confronting our own acknowledged and subconscious prejudices. In your work, you encourage people to talk to young black men, to get out of one's comfort zone. Who are you speaking to in particular? Who is your audien...

Every runner has a story. Five years ago, I would never have imagined using the word “marathoner” to describe myself; I could barely run around the block, much less 26.2 miles. But one autumn Sunday, I woke up to the sounds of cheering and live music; the New York City Marathon was passing right outside my apartment building, and, for the...

We’re all scrambling for practical solutions for the uncertain future of work. But there’s a mental shift we need to make, too. We live in a winner-take-all world. As kids, we grow up competing for attention in our families, for grades and friends at school and for triumph in sports and debates. Later, as we enter the world of work, we learn ho...

Kicking off the TED conference would be a daunting prospect for most, but Jennifer Granholm has tackled both nastier challenges and less friendly audiences in her time. After all, she is the former governor of Michigan, a state that, as the blurb to her book A Governor's Story: The Fight for Jobs and America's Economic Future puts it, was "s...

Making small tweaks to your meetings -- even changing the seating! -- can actually help set the stage for bigger shifts in our communities and companies, says social psychologist Dolly Chugh. Many organizations and companies today track diversity in sex, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and religion, among other factors. For some of ...

If you head to Google.com today, you might notice something interesting underneath the search bar: an invitation to watch a series of animations called #WhoWeAre. A collaboration between StoryCorps and Upworthy, with support from Steven Spielberg’s Righteous Persons Foundation and Delta Airlines, #WhoWeAre is designed to encourage people a...