Conferenza

Arriving amid Aspen's Summits for Socrates

Arriving in Aspen, one feels immediately healthier in the freshness of the thin air at 8,000 feet.

Following a short shuttle to the Aspen Meadows, the foundational home of the Aspen Institute, one also immediately feels smarter and better connected.

This isn't simply good fortune, or happenstance, but the product of careful planning and decades of cultural and political cultivation. And certainly good fortunes and serendipity play a role as well.

I have just arrived in Aspen to participate in the extraordinary experience known as the Socrates Seminars.

And I can't help but feel exuberant here amid the bright early chill of this lush green meadows surrounded by rocky peaks caressed by the dawn sun.

Among the Bauhaus style lodgings and seminar rooms, scores of participants from across the country will spend the next three days in one of five seminars each morning, spend the afternoons recreating - rafting, horseriding, hiking or listening to world-class orchestral notes at the popular Music Tent - and engrossed in evening conversations.

The event is really an intellectual phantasmagoria - a rapid romp of the mind [and body, for those who normally dwell at sea level] and soul through a selection of classical and contemporary topics with peers from the professional world.

This is the twelfth year of the program, which has always held its original seminars in this time frame, around the Independence Day holiday, and in recent years has accelerated its offerings with a Presidents' weekend winter edition, and others during the year.

All told, more than 1,200 individual participants have attended Socrates Seminars - including some 400 in 15 seminars during 2007 alone under the leadership of Executive Director Mark Chichester in his first full year at that role.

While the tradition of the Institute goes back to 1945, when Chicago businessman Walter Paepcke visited the declining town of Aspen, Co., and was stricken with the notion it could be rejuvenated as a cultural and intellectual retreat. He then thrust it in that direction, founding the institute in 1950, later following up with the Aspen Music Festival and the Aspen International Design Competition.

Socrates itself, though, is the inspired brainchild of Gary and Laura Lauder.

Noting a lack of early and mid-career participation in Aspen Institute and inspired by the growing changes brought by technology and the emerging commercialization of the Internet, the Lauders persuaded the Institute to launch Socrates now a dozen years ago.

Today, returning to the program for most perennial participants feels like a combination of a homecoming, a university reunion, a bootcamp and a weekend college 'cram' study session preparing for exams.

Each year brings a few stalwart multi-year participants like Peter Hirshberg, one of a cast of leading digerati who is generally recognized as attending the most seminars from the outset, and dozens of 'newbies' often with extraordinary experiences and qualifications, including 15 scholarship-awardees this year.

Yes, it is also partly an indulgence. Yet it is an indulgence that frequently changes the course of careers and refines objectives of present and future leaders of our country.

Both Barack Obama and John McCain have spoken at events surrounding Socrates in recent years.

And this years seminars are all timely: "Media and Conflicting Values", "Ethnic Conflict and International Security", "The intersection of Foreign Aid with Security, Morality and Business", "Humanity, Power, Leadership", and "Sexuality, Power and Culture."

The Socrates folks have me in the last of these - and the first day's reading (more on this) is an eye-opening and broad foundation ranging from celibacy to cultural profligacy, where victims are not hard to discover, nor are the egregious violence brought on them easy to forget.

The discussions are often intense, and always private - yet this year I've been welcomed to blog from the seminars.

I can hardly wait.

There's no way to start off, than a quick cold dip in the pool of the Aspen Meadows Health Center, so I'm off now for there. Back soon.

TED2008 - RSW returns to the TEDstage!

Richard Saul Wurman has just been invited to the stage for a conversation with Chris Anderson...a remarkable TED moment. Surrounded by a Sputnik satellite, Guttenberg Bible and other artifacts from Jay Walker's library, RSW, or Ricky as he's known to many long-time TEDsters, began with some tears, then described how marvelous it was to take the stage as part of a session dubbed "is Beauty Truth?"

RSW's return was particularly poignant as he and TED curator Chris Anderson had participated in some bitter feuding over the conference for more than half a decade after Anderson acquired it from its creator - a feud RSW announced had recently and finally ended - and also because Anderson has announced he's pulling TED out of Monterey next year, determining the ever-growing audience to have outgrown the facility here.

"It is true we've had an acrimonious relationship the last four to five years, and we don't now, and that's beautiful" Richard Saul Wurman said.

RSW has often described the TED conference, which he began in 1984, as "the ultimate dinner party" he always had wanted to have... and while he and three others in the audience were there at that first TED, it has created a huge following and inspired both a year-long community of attendees and a slew of TED "Wannabe" conferences.

Richard said he had realized much of the period of acrimony resulted from misunderstanding, and he only recently came to learn how may attendees had come to believe that TED had changed their lives (for the better!). Many had attested to Richard that TED had given them license to engage in wondrous new undertakings in their lives.

In the meantime, RSW had launched a one-time rival, called eG, the entertainment gathering, in the Los Angeles area. MIT's Michael Hawley revived in a second edition of eG last December, and now promises to make it an annual event.

The TED conference is now doing some collaboration with eG, and is expected to distribute some of the eG presentations as part of its "TEDtalks" offering of past conference presentations.

Adobe - Illustrator and Photoshop and Acrobat were all announced from this stage, as was (Sun Microsystems Inc.'s) Java (programming language), even before it had a name, RSW recalled.

"This is the best conference that every happened, and the clones are nothing... well the clones, they are interesting, too, and they give people license to do other things..." he said.

Anderson and Wurman embraced, and said they were collaborating to create the 25th anniversary conference next year, which will be staged at a larger theater in Long Beach, California, under the theme "The Great Unveiling".

"The picture has already been taken," said Chris, at Wednesday night's opening gala, when your co-respondent commented this was a picture that needed to be made! Nonetheless, they were willing to mug again, and RSW could be heard praising the excellence of what he'd witnessed at the opening sessions - welcome words not only to Chris Anderson, but to all tedsters, young and old.

TED2008: TEDprizes to stream Live amid BIG Questions...

Our hosts at TED, which is taking place at its traditional home of Monterey, California, for what may be its last time here, have announced as excerpted below they will be streaming live Thursday the winners of the TED prizes for 2008 as they outline the wishes they want the TED community to help fulfill.

Quick note to the TED Community at large:

There's a huge sense of anticipation in Monterey and Aspen as TED2008 opens today. With 50 main speakers and another 50 shorter talks and performances, there's a real feast in store. For those of you who can't be here, here's how you can enjoy TED from afar.

First and foremost, we are opening up one complete session of TED free to the world, streamed live over the web. It's the dramatic session tomorrow evening when three remarkable individuals each unveil their TED Prize wish. ("One wish to change the world. No restrictions. Think big. Be creative.")

I invite you to join a global audience as Dave Eggers, Neil Turok and Karen Armstrong share their inspiring visions, followed by the uplifting music of Vusi Mahlasela.

You can see the live video feed here on Thursday, starting at 5.15pm US Pacific Time and lasting a couple of hours. You'll probably need a broadband connection to see the video properly. There's a button below the video to select a full-screen view.

Meanwhile you can keep up with the conference by checking in on the official TED blog, plus the brilliant blogs maintained by Ethan Zuckerman and our very own Bruno Giussani. We may have a few tasty surprises for you during the week.

You can also see a rapidly-growing gallery of pictures from the conference here. And Portfolio magazine has an impressive curtain-raiser on the conference here.

Best wishes from the all-abuzz TED Team.

TED2008 asks the BIG Questions?

The extravaganza which is TED began with a blast of Hamlet, out of the darkness on stage as delivered by Michael Stuhlbarg, a Tony award nominee actor of Shakespeare in the Park. Not just ANY soliloquy, of course... "To be or not to be."

This year's conference is about questions. BIG questions.

Chris Anderson, TED curator extraordinaire, then asks the audience to take a moment of silence to shift into the spirit of curiosity and intrigue and wit and soul-searching that is TED.

Minutes later, third generation paleoanthropoligist Louise Leakey is telling us "we're the only walking upright Ape that exists in the world today." Does that not seem to raise a big question? Well, consider this: many if not most species on the planet co-exist with many other related species, and in fact through three generations of research her family, as it happens, has demonstrated that there were multiple species of hominids at any one time, long ago in history.

Indeed, in 2001 Leaky and her mother, Meave, found a previously unknown hominid, 3.5 million year old Kenyan-thropus platyops at Lake Turkana in East Africa. This was found not far from where her grandparents, Louise and Mary Leaky discovered the bones of Homo habilis, one of at least three species who co-existed as recently as 90 generations ago - or roughly 1.8 million years.

That 2001 find, Leaky said, included "one of the most very special things you can do with your mother," as she showed the two of them brushing off the bones in making their discovery.

As much of the first session, there was plenty to entertain, shock and awe - including the actual human brain Harvard Neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor shared from the stage, complete with spinal cord.

Near the end of the first session, "Who are we?" Anderson introduced astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, who made a presentation recorded a couple of hours previously from his home in Cambridge, England.

"We believe that life arose spontaneously on Earth," so it is naturally possible if not likely that it has arisen elsewhere in the universe. "Life appeared on earth within half a billion years of it being possible."

"We don't happen to have been visited by aliens...," he added, discounting observers of UFOs and the like as quacks. However, in answering Anderson, in a matter of seven minutes using his onscreen editing system,

"I think it quite likely we are the only civilization within several light years, otherwise we would have heard radio waves..."

But no one, including the marvelous and wide-ranging images of perennial TEDster and anthropologist Wade Davis or the nearly unfathonable graphics and factoids of artist Chris Jordan {we use 2 million plastic bottles every five minutes - do we?} could prepare anyone for the closing of Jill Bolte Taylor, as she described how she had been overtaken by a stroke on the morning of December 10, 1996.

The scientist described how she'd awakened with a throbbing sensation behind her eye akin in sharpness to eating a big bite of really cold ice cream, and that only after she'd worked out on an exercise machine and taken a shower did she realize the stroke was spreading.

At that moment, she had the actual forethought of mind [literally] to not only realize she was undergoing the stroke, at her home, but to ponder how rare it must be for a brain scientist to actually go through a stroke herself!

Then, no sooner had she thought that thought than "it crosses my mind that I'm a busy woman. I don't have time for a stroke."

She manages to reach a co-worker, after feeling an arm become paralyzed, and as she's being shifted from one Boston hospital to Mass General, she feels as a balloon letting out air that her energy was lifting from her body, and her spirit surrender.

"In that moment I knew that I was no longer the choreographer of my life," she said.

In vivid language, Taylor describes how she felt her spirit "like a great whale gliding through a sea of silent euphoria," surrendering to the notion either her physicians would save her, or not, and yet wondering if she would ever be able to fit that enormous feeling of euphoria back into her body.

Then, she enraptures the hall with the realization that she was indeed still alive, and the realization that though she could not at that time walk, read, speak properly or recall anything of her life, she would come to realize that since she was still alive, and could feel this nirvana, then logically others could do so.

Bolte Tayllor had described how the left brain is responsible for action and memory, while the right brain was the processor of the "here and now." Within her stroke-disabled body, she described feeling only a world of peaceful compassion in which she envisioned living people could control and dismiss left-brain calculations, to step to the right of their controlling left brain hemisphere to embrace a positive, humane world.

She described this particular stroke of insight into how we could lead our lives as what motivated her to recover...a process which took the work of eight long years to complete.

"Who are we? We are the light force power of the universe," she said, lauding the cognitive ability, humanity and manual dexterity she attributed to "50 trillion molecular geniuses" at work.

Little doubt, that was one of the grandest, most intense and most powerful beginnings of any TED conference, and, as Jill Bolte Taylor said of her own revelation, certainly worthy of TED's focus on "Ideas worth spreading."

EG'07 - Grand Finale

The final session of eg '07 has just wrapped up with a knockout final section, Keys to Happiness, which drew the audience to its feet repeatedly. Norman Corwin, the 97-year-old writer, essayist, journalism teacher and radio producer who just signed a three-year contract as writer in residence at USC, exited with a standing ovation after reciting a classic tribute to returning soldiers, comedy writer Bruce Vilanch also brought the crowd to its feet after many peels of laughter over his monologue rift, and comic actor Jonathan Winters, 82, drew the audience to its feet both at the start and end of his performance.

Nathaniel Kahn concluded the gathering with a short documentary on pianist Leon Fleisher and his struggle to return to overcome a debilitating condition in his write hand to train himself to play at concert level again with both hands. And, of course, Michael successfully prevailed upon Fleisher to play an exquisitely wonderful closing piece.

"The greatest joys in life are meant to be shared," said Fleisher, in discussion with Michael Hawley, adding that being a soloist is by definition a solitary undertaking.

As usual, we'll post more following the conference, including pictures and our three points abstract, following the conference.

Jonathan Harris shows his latest work.

EG'07 - the Master - RSW

{Photograph: Richard Saul Wurman prepares for a professional photo session against the travertine backdrop of the Getty Center.}

A wondrous stroke of eg - entertainment gathering was having Richard Saul Wurman take the stage at the outset of the third and final day. Following what he described as the "Trash Talk" of Chris Jordan, who has turned monumental photographic compilations of post-consumer detritus into scale-evocative artwork, RSW began with praise for the speakers, volunteers and Michael Hawley's premier event in the role of producer.

As some participants have noted over the last two days, this year's eg really has lived up to what RSW had for years said was his objective with TED - to treat it as a huge dinner party to which he would like to invite people of great genius to share discovery and discussion. This has been, as he called it, "a celebration of conversation," without grandiosity or technical hindrance. "They have not made a computer that nods," he said, referring to the importance of face-to-face interaction.

Wurman concluded by introducing another phenomenal new project that grew from his interest in the growing mega-cities about which comparable data is not available or well understood, much less accessible in a usable and useful manner. The project, 19 cities in the world which will have 20 million people in the 21st century, can be seen here. As is classic with projects Wurman has developed, the graphics are clear, and I recommend bookmarking the website to watch its progress.

Perhaps the one most difficult task which has been a challenge on the second, and now the third, days of eg is clock management. To his credit, Hawley has been kind to speakers running overtime, though gourmet chefs serving Monday's dinner did force some readjustments. Only a small handful of occasions did he mount the stage and start taking slow, small, polite steps towards the speaker to urge a speedy conclusion. Ironically one of these 'offenders' was RSW himself, who beseeched Michael to ignore the talk-ending tactics Richard had suggested for a couple minutes so Richard could finish with a romp through his latest project.

EG '07 Rob Glaser promotes Progressives

Rob Glaser made it out of a snowstorm to provide Monday's kickoff presentation, on an education project he's developed on branding of political progressives in America.

He shared several of the clips, provided in earlier links, and the following data from the best testing results, using the PC / Mac commercial in Indianapolis.

EG'07 contretemps and nuggets

Many of the most poignant moments at the eg style of conference are what happens in the betwixt and between - realizing commonalities or contrasts often sparked by some comment, reference, gold nugget that's been uttered on stage.

This morning, for example, I began with a discussion on Libertarian solutions to cutting bureaucracy, and perhaps improving education, over morning coffee with Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Harvey Allison of Attractor, IDEO's Doug Solomon and Krisztina "Z" Holly, who runs the USC Stevens Institute for Innovation. One focus of discussion was Bezos' comment that the learning/feedback loop in education is long, and can impact a generation, though education overall is probably improving by more than schools are credited. He notes it took the Romans 80 years to realize linking acquaducts with lead was not a healthy innovation. While that may have been relatively fast, an education experiment that took as long to determine to have failed might be intolerable. Allison noted perceptible changes in schools are spread rapidly.

Minutes later, RealNetworks founder Rob Glaser kicked off session 3 "Media Biz" with the first public discussion of the results of his "progressive education branding project" undertaken with the Center for American Progress. The project created eight 30-second television spots and test marketed them. The spots include two that are take-offs of Apple Inc's PC/Mac advertisements.

"Aren't YOU a Progressive?", the ads ask in closing. Turns out, in at least one sample, progressive self-identification increases by 67% in these recent tests. The Youtube versions, linked above, were posted a few weeks ago.

No doubt the debate will continue in discussions outside the auditorium, as the contrast of the Progressive record of achievement along and the Libertarian critique make good fodder.

During Monday morning's "Media Biz" and "Nerd Alert" sessions, presenters frequently cited earlier presentations, as Jamy Ian Swiss had done Sunday evening.

Among the most oft-cited was Emily Levine, a perennial favorite "humorist philosopher" of RSW's TED conferences. Levine recounted how she had dealt with diagnosis of apoptosis of her prostate, and with a combination of gravity and humor led the audience through her evolution from comic writer to comic philosopher to "comic oracle", or "Emily 3.0". Apoptosis, it seems, leads to enlargement of the head and extremities. Levine concluded the entire country may be suffering from the malady - starting with the head of state.

Some other observations:

- "99% of medicine that we practice today was developed in my lifetime." - Keith Black, neurosurgeon who has conducted more than 5,000 brain surgeries over two decades.

- Working for the government I was reminded there was a situation the government could actually put me to death - treason, noted Keith Schwab, a Cornell physicist who expressed with a certain nervousness that his work was being supported by an employer who was "now threatening to kill me" if he were to misbehave...

- "There's only three things I've ever been afraid of - electricity, heights and women," - the words of a high wire power line repairman, in a video short interstitial.

- There are 10 times as many stars in the planetary system as there are grains of sand on Earth's beaches. - Paul Horowitz, Harvard professor of physics.

- "We live in a world governed by chance and probabilities," quantum physicist Brian Greene.

- "The web community is a big community. It's not the repository of all knowledge. It's the repository of discovery," Adam Savage, co-star of Mythbusters.

EG'07 feeling in your feet, building Cathedrals with 2 fingers

Michael Hawley has already delivered, as promised, a number of the "magical moments" connecting of synapses and themes between presenters long devised by Richard Saul Wurman as the genesis of the so-called "TED moment".

As Donald Jackson, HRH's Royal Calligrapher, lead 500+ attendees in the packed auditorium in scripting a stylized letter "A" with one hand in the air in front of us, he told us it was important to feel the motion in our feet.

A session later, magician Jamy Ian Swiss expressed appreciation for Jackson's remarks in telling the audience the trick to good magic could also include what happens in your feet. Swiss then proceeded to explain one of his card tricks - "I have a surprise for you," which he said takes most of his students six months or more to learn. He compared it with romantic comedy, and focused on the moment of 'Aristotelian catharsis' which he described as critical to the success of an entertaining trick.

In a different sort of catharsis... Hawley offered a screening of Michael Lawrence's elegant work in progress, the Bach Project. A collaboration among a number of terrific musical artists in homage to the great composer, the film includes music and interviews with some of the most successful contemporary artists, such as Bobby McFerrin. "Bach with two notes, one with the right hand, the other with the left, he can build a Cathedral, said Joáo Carlos Martins, the Brazilian pianist and conductor.

What more suitable metaphor for an event taking place within architect Richard Meier's $1.2 billion travertine-coated Getty Center stone edifice perched on a hilltop above Los Angeles.

PopTech - the live feed

Note that PopTech is being webcast live... the list of speakers is here, and the schedule's here.

And, while we will be providing some thematic reports on themes across several of the speakers as well as updates on Pop!Tech's evolving community, several bloggers are providing live updates, including the typically wonderful, copious notes of Ethan Zuckerman.