Imagine winning a multi-million dollar lottery tomorrow. If you're like many of us, you'd be ecstatic, unable to believe your good luck. But would that joy still be there a few years later? Raj Raghunathan describes a phenomenon called...

Daniel Lismore's closet is probably a bit different than yours -- his clothes are constructed out of materials ranging from beer cans and plastic crystals to diamonds, royal silks and 2,000-year-old Roman rings. In this striking talk,...

Being happy makes you smile, but that might just work the other way around, too.

Composting is a way to turn scraps of food you aren't going to eat anymore into healthy soil for your garden! But how does food turn in to dirt?! Mister Brown and Squeaks take a trip to SoilCycle, a place that makes compost in...

In the 20th century we added an unprecedented number of years to our lifespans, but is the quality of life as good? Surprisingly, yes! Psychologist Laura Carstensen shows research that demonstrates that as people get older they become...

When you think about it, your eyebrows are a little strange! But they're also really important! From protecting your eyes to helping others know how you feel, those little bits of hair in the middle of your face have some big jobs!

Laughter, love, and happiness are some of the best aspects of being human, and we've looked into the science behind it more than a few times. Here are a few videos that we hope will make you happy!

Knock knock! Who’s there? It’s Jessi and Squeaks exploring the science of why we laugh!

Designer Jessi Arrington packed nothing for TEDActive but 7 pairs of undies, buying the rest of her clothes in thrift stores around LA. It's a meditation on conscious consumption -- wrapped in a rainbow of color and creativity.

The Origin of Quantum Mechanics (feat. Neil Turok)

You may have experienced this before: When you repeat the same word over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, the words suddenly sound foreign and lose all meaning, but why?

How can technology help improve our quality of life? How can we navigate the world without using the sense of vision? Inventor and IBM Fellow Chieko Asakawa, who's been blind since the age of fourteen, is working on answering these...

Humans generally have a good idea of whether something will make us happy or unhappy, but it turns out we’re not great at knowing exactly how much.

Choosing to marry and share your life with someone is one of the most important decisions you can make in life. But with divorce rates approaching fifty percent in some parts of the world, it's clear we could use some help picking a...

Scientists have found that Valentine's Day can have a negative impact on relationships and the holiday-related obligation to be lovey-dovey may have something to do with it.

Paul Andersen introduces the concept of ethology and contrasts kinesis and taxis. He explains the importance of courtship rituals in fruit flies. He finally shows you how to use a choice chamber to study behavior in pill bugs.

Too often, people feel checked out of politics — even at the level of their own city. But urban activist Alessandra Orofino thinks that can change, using a mix of tech and old-fashioned human connection. Sharing examples from her...

Transhumanism is a scientific philosophy that says technology will solve all our human biological constraints and that immortality is right around the corner (well not RIGHT around the corner, but WAYYY closer). They envision a world of...

This is episode 9 of our animated series "Think Like A Coder." This 10-episode narrative follows a girl, Ethic, and her robot companion, Hedge, as they attempt to save the world. The two embark on a quest to collect three artifacts and...

Like any committed relationship, the relationship between a business and its customers needs nurturing. And that shouldn’t come as a surprise! We need customers to run a successful business, and naturally they’re going to have certain...

Mr. Andersen describes atomic structure and tours the periodic table.

Ever not felt completely like yourself? There's a good reason for that. Because a large part of you isn't actually you. Our bodies are home to ten times as many microbes as human cells. We are walking ecosystems, each of us home to...

Wael Ghonim is the Google executive who helped jumpstart Egypt's democratic revolution ... with a Facebook page memorializing a victim of the regime's violence. Speaking at TEDxCairo, he tells the inside story of the past two months,...

How can simple sound waves cause so much emotion? I went from my comfy chair to the streets of Austin to investigate how it might be written into our neuroscience and evolution. Modern neuroscience says our brains may be wired to pick...