There are millions of prodigiously gifted musicians of disability around the world, and Charles Hazlewood is determined to give them a platform. Watch the debut performance of the British Paraorchestra.

Kenya's minibuses -- known as "matatus" -- offer a convenient, affordable and colorful way for people to get around. But they also pose safety risks and accessibility issues for many of their passengers, especially women. Bringing a...

Hector Ruiz, the executive chair of AMD, wants to give Internet access to everyone. In this talk, he shares his extraordinary life story and describes AMD's 50x15 initiative that calls for connecting 50 percent of the world by 2015.

Vaccine-autism claims, "Frankenfood" bans, the herbal cure craze: All point to the public's growing fear (and, often, outright denial) of science and reason, says Michael Specter. He warns the trend spells disaster for human progress.

In a short, funny, data-packed talk at TED U, Catherine Mohr walks through all the geeky decisions she made when building a green new house -- looking at real energy numbers, not hype. What choices matter most? Not the ones you think.

Many of those with severe speech disorders use a computerized device to communicate. Yet they choose between only a few voice options. That's why Stephen Hawking has an American accent, and why many people end up with the same voice,...

In this episode of Crash Course History of Science, we travel to the Americas to ask the question, "When are we?" and get some answers. We'll look at the Maya, Inca, and Olmec civilizations and how they recorded their science.

As oil and gas companies continue to make record profits off of the same forces driving climate chaos, war and soaring energy bills, it's become clear that boom times for the fossil fuel industry are bad times for the rest of us, says...

In which John looks at what it even means to live in a global age, as we've been talking about Europe's role in the gobal community for 47 episodes now. But, pedantry aside, the world is more connected than ever, and that has had effects...

Does collecting more data lead to better decision-making? Competitive, data-savvy companies like Amazon, Google and Netflix have learned that data analysis alone doesn't always produce optimum results. In this talk, data scientist...

Of all the mundane yet astonishing marvels of human ingenuity, knowing what it takes to heat a room to a comfortable temperature is TED Fellow Kathy Hannun's favorite. She takes us on a journey across the planet and under the sea to...

A new healing gel helped mice regrow brain tissue after a stroke, and scientists suspect someone out there is producing a bunch of ozone-destroying CFCs in defiance of an international agreement!

Computer models are helping scientists on the hunt for small black holes and new data is giving us a better understanding of the universe’s largest explosions.

This week, Emily Graslie is teaching you about human ancestry and geneaology, how we got to be the species we are, and why that matters in our zoomed out look at Big History.

Mike Gil spies on fish: using novel multi-camera systems and computer vision technology, the TED Fellow and his colleagues explore how coral reef fish behave, socialize and affect their ecosystems. Learn more about how fish of different...

Throughout Earth's history, climate has varied greatly. For hundreds of millions of years, the planet had no polar ice caps. Without this ice, the sea level was 70 meters higher. At the other extreme, about 700 million years ago, Earth...

You might have stumbled onto those videos of people cutting sand for 10 minutes or of machines doing a repetitive task and felt an odd sense of satisfaction while watching them. Today, we look at the psychology behind those "oddly...

In five billion years, the Sun's going to evolve into a red giant. That's bad news for Earth, but exciting for some of the worlds a little farther out.

Scientists are looking to end how we categorize living fossils, and in doing so, give the phrase new life.

In this video Paul Andersen describes the defining characteristics of members in the domain archaebacteria. He starts with a brief description of the phylogeny of this group. He then describes the major characteristics on an archaea,...

In the multitude of metaverses that exist there are infinite possibilities for inclusivity and creativity. Inviting us to craft our own digital universes, Minecraft's game director Agnes Larsson shares how the experience of building and...

Plastic is an incredible substance for the economy -- and the worst substance possible for the environment, says entrepreneur Andrew Forrest. In a conversation meant to spark debate, Forrest and head of TED Chris Anderson discuss an...

When a piece of cryptography is described as having "256-bit security", what exactly does that mean? Just how big is the number 2^256?

We're losing animal and plant species at such a swift, unprecedented rate that it's nearly impossible to keep up. Computational biologist Tanya Berger-Wolf demonstrates how harnessing the power of artificial intelligence and one of the...