Billions of dollars are poured into global development every year, but results are lacking, says economist Karthik Muralidharan. Diving into an example with public education, he outlines how smarter resource allocation and evidence-based interventions, like learning software that dynamically responds to students and teaches at the level that's r...

Money for international development rarely makes it to the people it intends to help, says Faisal Saeed Al Mutar, the founder of Ideas Beyond Borders. Highlighting the inefficiencies of the current system, he proposes a new model for aid that functions like business investments, empowering local entrepreneurs with money to build their communitie...

Human growth has strained the earth's resources, but as Johan Rockström reminds us, our advances also give us the science to recognize this and change behavior. His research has found nine "planetary boundaries" that can guide us in protecting our planet's many overlapping ecosystems.

In Kenya, a smartphone app called iCow tracks the health of cattle for thousands of farmers, at times doubling productivity. In this talk, Sarah Cairns-Smith discusses how a range of mobile apps are transforming local economies in Sub-Saharan Africa.

What keeps us happy and healthy as we go through life? If you think it's fame and money, you're not alone – but, according to psychiatrist Robert Waldinger, you're mistaken. As the director of a 75-year-old study on adult development, Waldinger has unprecedented access to data on true happiness and satisfaction. In this talk, he shares three imp...

Melinda French Gates is cochair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where she puts into practice the idea that every life has equal value.

Neuroscientist and pediatrician Kimberly Noble is leading the Baby's First Years study: the first-ever randomized study of how family income changes children's cognitive, emotional and brain development. She and a team of economists and policy experts are working together to find out: Can we help kids in poverty simply by giving families more mo...

Fascinating, insightful talks on what it means to be human and live a good life.

For the past 70 years, scientists in Britain have been studying thousands of children through their lives to find out why some end up happy and healthy while others struggle. It's the longest-running study of human development in the world, and it's produced some of the best-studied people on the planet while changing the way we live, learn and ...

Parents, take a deep breath: how your kids turn out isn't fully on you. Of course, parenting plays an important role in shaping who children become, but psychologist Yuko Munakata offers an alternative, research-backed reality that highlights how it's just one of many factors that influence the chaotic complexity of childhood development. A reth...

Economist Dilip Ratha was the first to analyze the global significance of remittances -- money sent from foreign workers to their families back home.

What makes a great school system? To find out, Andreas Schleicher administers a test to compare student performance around the world.

Cat Laine has made it her mission to find solutions to the problems that face the world’s poor, by merging innovation and the entrepreneurial spirit.

Kevin Etter argues there's another way companies can support charitable organizations, apart from donating their money or goods. In this impassioned talk, Etter urges us all to expand our definition of "corporate donations" to include a company's' most valuable assets – its employees.

Mario Paluzzi presents us with a logistical puzzle: How can we deliver packages to the three-quarters of the global population who don't have a street address? In this what-if talk, he proposes a bold new system of pinpointing addresses not to people's homes, but to their mobile phones. It's a glimpse of the future of global package delivery.

Tomorrow is the annual Brain Clash — a decathlon of mental challenges, trivia competitions, and puzzles. Amir needs a smart and capable teammate and must choose between three people; all of different ages and talents. So, who should Amir choose for the contest? Shannon Odell breaks down the idea of "smart" and explores how our brain development ...

Student Ludwick Marishane invented a water-less bathing lotion and was named the 2011 Global Student Entrepreneur of the Year Award -- all because he didn't feel like taking baths.

The African continent holds more water than much of the world -- yet most people can't access the rich reserves just below their feet. Kala Fleming and her team in Kenya are creating a system-level solution: "digital aquifers." By putting sensors in wells, monitoring the data from the cloud and opening up business opportunity around it, they're ...

Most economists agree that GDP, the most widely used measure of a country's success and growth, is a poor indicator of the overall wellbeing of a nation. Doug Beal created an alternative index that measures not just wealth but wellbeing. The new gauge takes into account such factors as income equality, sustainability and education. Beal shares i...

Low-status neighborhoods in the US are often stuck between stagnating assistance from the government and gentrification at the hands of real estate developers. The result is that the brightest minds are convinced that "success" means leaving town. Urban revitalizer Majora Carter has a solution: What if we treated these communities like strugglin...

As a journalist reporting on China, Sheryl WuDunn saw the everyday oppression of women around the world. She and Nick Kristof wrote "Half the Sky," chronicling women's stories of horror and, especially, hope.

Enrique Peñalosa is the mayor of Bogotá, Colombia. He advocates for sustainability and mobility in the cities of the future.

Most people presume that world hunger is caused by a lack of food. But Esther Ndichu, Humanitarian Supply Chain Director at UPS, argues that the real issue is logistics. She points out that farmers often struggle to get goods to market and that food often rots just miles from the neediest people. She explains that by fixing "the last mile" hunge...

A collection of studies and photography series that showcase the intrigue, beauty and diversity of human life.

Marc Koska wants to improve health care in the developing world by re-designing dangerous medical tools -- and offering education to practitioners in under-funded clinics.

When wildfires rage in California, incarcerated people are often on the front lines fighting the flames. TED Fellow Royal Ramey was one of them. He shares the story of how doing public service in prison inspired him to cofound the Forestry and Fire Recruitment Program, a nonprofit helping formerly incarcerated people become wildland firefighters...

The human voice is capable of incredible variety and range. As we age, our bodies undergo two major changes which explore that range. So how exactly does our voice box work, and what causes these shifts in speech? Shaylin A. Schundler describes how and why our voices change when we get older. [TED-Ed Animation by Andrew Foerster & Nick Counter]

Poor countries need support in order to advance, but there are limits to how much aid can be gifted. How can developed nations encourage long-term help on a grand scale? Financial economist Paul O'Connell proposes a radical approach: enlist private investors to take on the challenge of high-impact causes in developing countries, such as expandin...

International aid groups make the same mistakes over and over again. David Damberger analyzes his own engineering failure in India -- and calls for his friends in the development sector to publicly admit, scrutinize and learn from their missteps.

An exploration of what we can do to save the world with the massive amounts of data collected every day.