Optimal Functioning - positive psychology & physical health » TED Talks

TED Talks – Make filthy water drinkable by Michael Pritchard

Hans Rippel — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 19:21:18 +0000

Too much of the world lacks access to clean drinking water. Engineer Michael Pritchard did something about it — inventing the portable Lifesaver filter, which can make the most revolting water drinkable in seconds. It can filter up to 6000 liters of water completely free of all viruses, bacteria, and heavy metals.

This makes it very well suited for saving lives in poor countries and providing clean water for disaster stricken areas. Plus it is a nice portable way to get some fresh clean water when camping, hiking, or for outdoor sports like long distance running and biking.

“For $20 billion everyone can have access to safe drinking water. So the 3.5 billion people that suffer every year… and the 2 million kids that die every year will live.” -Michael Pritchard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXepkIWPhFQ

You can read more about the Lifesaver and order it over at www.lifesaversystems.com

At the same time it is no match to the reversed osmosis (RO) filtration system’s ability to filter out anything larger than 0.1nm. How’s that possible you might ask, well RO filtering systems use a membrane as one of the steps in the filtration process. This “hyperfiltration” is more suitable for home usage for two reasons: (1) It produces the cleanest water (2) the convenience of not having to pump manually to get water clean.

TED Talks – Formula for Changing Math Education by Arthur Benjamin

Hans Rippel — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 18:44:58 +0000

We should teach more statistics & probability and earlier while we should teach less calculus and later.

Arthur Benjamin is a mathematician and in his pithy TED Talk, Formula for Changing Math Education (2009), he calls for this re-emphasis of math education. He argues that we as a society would greatly benefit from a better understanding of statistics and probabilities which would help us make better decisions about risks, rewards, randomness, and understanding and evaluating data in our everyday lives.

Take for example, few of us would use calculus on a daily bases but most of us are faced with making decisions about car insurance plans, student loans, mortgage rates, credit card interest rates, payment plan options, interpreting polls, planning our income investments and expenses, making decisions about bank loans and interest rates, stock market investments, interpreting results from scientific studies, analyzing trends, predicting the future, gambling, and so forth. This is just a short list I came up in the three minutes I watched Arthur’s presentation and I think it is fairly obvious that some of these are be very serious decisions that can have long lasting effects on our lives. They can mean the difference between unmanageable dept and a financially healthy lifestyle. And since education is supposed to prepare us for making the best possible decisions about our own lives, I think it only makes sense to include more of such important foundations for sound reasoning such as those that come with understanding statistics and probabilities.

I don’t know about the education you had but mine has not covered statistics or probabilities in any applicable way to the everyday life, nor do I know of any that does (please let me know if you do). The closest it got was in college and that was more geared towards understanding and conducting research, which isn’t necessarily everyday stuff. I think statistics and probabilities are one of the big missing ingredients of both primary and secondary education systems and should be a required educational component. And teaching these shouldn’t be too difficult since the very same reasons that make it so relevant can also make it easy and fun to teach to children.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhMKmovNjvc

Here is Arthur Benjamin’s other TED Talk appearance but this time as a Mathemagician titled Lightning calculation and other “Mathemagic”

Reference:

Benjamin, A. (Speaker). (2009, February). Arthur Benjamin’s formula for changing math education [Video]. TED Conferences. Retrieved April 13, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhMKmovNjvc

Benjamin, A. (Speaker). (2010, February). Lightning calculation and other “Mathemagic” [Video]. TED Conferences. Retrieved April 13, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4vqr3_ROIk

TED Talks – Sam Harris on How Science can Answer Moral Questions

Hans Rippel — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:19:09 +0000

Sam Harris talks about the relationship between science, human values and how the seperation between the two is an illusion. There are truths to be known about how human communities flourish and how morality relates to these truths. Moral values are also a certain kind of fact that talk about the well-being of conscious creatures. In other words Sam Harris is saying that science is not only descriptive (by helping us get what we value) but can also be prescriptive (by telling us what we should value).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj9oB4zpHww

Reference:

Harris, S. (Speaker). (2010, February). Sam Harris: Science can answer moral questions [Video]. TED Conferences. Retrieved March 26, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj9oB4zpHww

TEDMED – Your health depends on where you live – by Bill Davenhall

Hans Rippel — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 10:42:51 +0000

Our health depends in part on environmental impacts. As Bill Davenhall shared at TEDMED, there are trends of specific health risks associated with specific locations. We need to know more about where we live and what impact it may have on our health.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEtE-jOMQf8

To know more about location based differences, we would need multilayered maps covering both environmental factors and compare them with health problems. This could reveal potential risk factors on a large scale. A little along the same lines as Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks by Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, where they extensively elaborate on the various kinds of influences social networks have on us. Something similar for environmental impacts or even a combination of the two would likely provide very helpful and applicable information for both individuals, professionals, and policy makers.

Reference:

Davenhall, B. (Speaker). (2009, October). Your health depends on where you live [Video]. TEDMED Conferences. Retrieved January 25, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEtE-jOMQf8

TEDMED – Anthony Atala on Growing New Organs

Hans Rippel — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:11:57 +0000

Mind-blowing advances in bio-engineering and medicine presented by Anthony Atala at TEDMED. Repairing, reconstructing, and growing functioning organs with your own cell. The future of solving organ damage and organ donor shortages is arriving.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQP3HrU8fdM

It’s great how much headway science has made in this area. The technological side of science is advancing just like electronic gadgets have. This is what we need to help people once they have acute problems beyond what the body is able to repair given a healthy lifestyle. On the other hand, for prevention we need to implement healthy eating habits and an overall healthy lifestyle. Unfortunately these cheaper and more cost effective methods of lifestyle changes find much more resistance. Cultural norms of what we eat, the difficulty of changing habits, and powerful interest groups have made simple changes to combat obesity, smoking, and unhealthy eating habits less successful.

Presentation Highlights – keep in mind that some of these technologies took over 700 researchers over 20 years to develop.

The first organ transplant was conducted in 1954. Unfortunately, in the last decade patients waiting for transplants has doubled while donors have stayed about the same.

“Every 30 seconds, a patient dies from diseases that could be treated with tissue replacement” or tissue regeneration.

“First use of natural biomaterial in humans for tissue regeneration, 1996.”

Our bodies can regenerate but only for limited distances. The maximum distance for regeneration is about 1 cm, unlike salamanders who can grow back entire limbs. Ideally smart balm materials that regenerate your tissue are the goal and right now the challenge is to increase the distances they can regenerate beyond the 1 cm. For injuries on larger scales and larger organs you need to get a small sample of cells from the injured or diseased organ. Let those cells multiply in a conducive lab environment. Once enough cells are available it is possible to use scaffolds that are coated with those cells to recreate the original organs or parts of it. The scaffolds with the cells on them are then placed under optimal conditions of 37 degrees Celsius and 95% oxygen. Once the cells have grown onto the scaffold it can be implanted. The scaffolds are designed so that they will attract new tissue cells that will replace the scaffold, which will disintegrate after a while. This method has been successfully used with muscles, carotid arteries, and heart valves. And interestingly they had to exercise them while growing them in the lab.

The first engineered organ was the bladder. And it took only 6-8 weeks to grow until it was ready to be implanted in a patient. Among the solid organs that have been created are ears and fingers. The most complex organs to engineer are those that are highly vascularized such as the heart, the liver, and the kidneys.

One strategy used is to print organs. This has been done with a heart chamber that was printed with a regular printer that instead of ink prints cells one layer at a time. Another strategy is to use de-cellularized organs. Take donor organs, take out all the cells, which takes about two weeks and what is left is the structure of the organ that is made up of collagen. This method even keeps the vascular tree intact. And then this skeleton structure will be infused with the organ recipients own cells. This way organs will not be rejected. At the moment this is only experimental but liver functions have already been reproduced in experiments. At the moment these kidneys are small and the work ahead is to increase them to regular size. Kidneys with livers, and hearts are by far the most complex organs inpart because they are highly vascularized.

Reference:

Atala, A. (Speaker). (2009, October). Anthony Atala on Growing New Organs [Video]. TEDMED Conferences. Retrieved January 21, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQP3HrU8fdM

TEDMED – where medicine & healthcare intersect

Hans Rippel — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:14:19 +0000

TEDMED focuses on the intersection of medicine and healthcare. It was created by Marc Hodosh (President) in partnership with TED founder Richard Saul Wurman. “TEDMED celebrates conversations that demonstrate the intersection and connections between all things medical and healthcare related: from personal health to public health, devices to design and Hollywood to the hospital.”

I’m very excited about a TED conference solely dedicated to health, medicine, and similar topics.

TEDMED on the web:

TED Talks – Csikszentmihalyi on Creativity, Fulfillment, & Flow

Hans Rippel — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:34:48 +0000

In his presentation at TED, psychologist Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi, shares what creativity, fulfillment, and flow are as well as their relationship to each other. He starts off with a brief personal history and transitions that to what is known of flow experiences and their importance to both creativity and fulfillment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXIeFJCqsPs

Speech summary:

Csikszentmihalyi starts off by sharing his personal memories of the grave impact World War 2 had on Europeans and how that experience has lead him to pursue the answer to “What makes live worth living?” A talk by Jung first introduced him to psychology, the field he has ever since devoted his professional career to.

He then points out that the happiness levels in the U.S. since 1956 have been relatively unchanged while material affluence, in particular income, has doubled (inflation adjusted).

So he asked himself “When in everyday life do we feel happy?” His studies have looked at creative artists such as artists and scientists to understand what made their pursuit to them meaningful and worthwhile.

The findings revealed that these individuals experienced moments of ecstasy during their work as if they were stepping into an alternative reality. Much of what we know about great civilizations is about their organized ways of achieving out of the ordinary mental states (ecstasy). These states do not leave enough resources to the nervous system to allocate attention to the monitoring of one’s own body. In other words one is consumed temporarily by an activity where one moment flows to the next without an awareness of the actual process as if we are one with the activity. This state Csikszentmihalyi refers to as flow.

How Does It Feel to be in Flow

Seven characteristics of flow that all people share, regardless of their differences such as culture or education. The list is reproduced from one of Csikszentmihalyi’s slides.

Completely involved in what we are doing – focused, concentrated.

A sense of ecstasy – of being outside everyday reality.

Great inner clarity – knowing what needs to be done, and how well we are doing.

Knowing that the activity is doable – that our skills are adequate to the task.

A sense of serenity – no worries about oneself, and a feeling of growing beyond the boundaries of the ego.

Timelessness – thoroughly focused on the present, hours seem to pass by in minutes.

Intrinsic motivation – whatever produces flow becomes its own reward.

The slide below display the balance between seven states that make the state or more accurately the process of flow possible.

References:

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (Speaker). (2004, February). Creativity, fulfillment and flow [Video]. Ted Conferences. Retrieved November 18, 2008, from http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_on_flow.html

TED Talks – Martin Seligman on Positive Psychology

Hans Rippel — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 18:36:57 +0000

In his appearance at TED Talks, psychologist Martin Seligman presented a compact introduction to what positive psychology is and why it matters. If you are already familiar with the field, you will find it a real treat to have your memory refreshed by the man who is considered to be the father of this organized re-balancing of psychology.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FBxfd7DL3E

Speech summary:

The state of psychology

(1) the good:

15 disorders are now treatable & 2 curable
We have an established science of mental illnesses that can: measure illnesses, classify them, understand their causality, discover their causes, create and evaluate treatments for them.
Psychology can make us less miserable.

(2) the bad:

Psychology has become a victimology, preoccupied with addressing pathology
Normal people and high talents have been forgotten
To make people happier has been left largely unaddressed

Positive Psychology’s Aims:

establish an equal concern of strengths and weaknesses
building on what is best and repairing what is worst
making lives of “normal” people fulfilling and nurturing high talent

Contributions of Positive Psychology

Positive psychology measurements for free at www.authentichappiness.org
A classification of Character Strengths and Virtues (DSM opposite)
Causation of positive states (for example extremely happy people differ in one way: they are very social and have both romantic and otherwise fulfilling relationships)
Identifying and manualizing interventions
Establishing efficacy & effectiveness of interventions

Three “Happy” Lives

The Pleasant Life (positive affect): To have as many pleasures (positive emotions) as possible and savoring them. These are raw feels, we are aware of them happening but the draw backs are that about 50% is heritable and we easily habituate (get used) to pleasurable feelings.
The Good Life (engagement): To experience flow. These are the times when we don’t feel anything, when time stops, and we are immersed in an activity with intense concentration. Identifying and using one’s strengths in all areas such as work, love, and play will lead to more absorption and therefore flow.
The Meaningful Life (meaning): Knowing what one’s strengths are and using them in the service of something larger than oneself.

Life Satisfaction = Positive Affect + Engagement + Meaning

Meaning is the strongest contributor to life satisfaction, engagement is second, and positive affect only marginally. Random, placebo controlled, long term researches indicate that there are interventions that can lastingly change our life satisfaction.

References:

Seligman, M. E. P. (Speaker). (2004, February). What positive psychology can help you become [Video]. Ted Conferences. Retrieved November 18, 2008, from http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/martin_seligman_on_the_state_of_psychology.html

TED Talks – Petsko, the Coming Neurological Epidemic

Hans Rippel — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 19:19:44 +0000

In his presentation, biochemist Gregory Petsk talks about the aging world population and the expected epidemic of neurological diseases. In particular he focuses on individuals above the age of 65 who have an exponentially greater risk of being afflicted.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9o8rd3Hx1NI

Speech summary:

As our life expectancy increases there is the danger of a global epidemic of neurological disease that we will have to face.

Fun fact: The average life expectancy is increasing by 5 hours every day.

The affliction rates of neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s increase exponentially for individuals above the age of 65. And worst of all we do not have cures or methods of prevention.

Alzheimer’s disease is the result of a protein that miss-folds. [Nothing is mentioned about why it miss folds.] Petsko and others are trying to design drugs that as he puts it “act as molecular scotch tape” to hold up the protein in their proper shape and prevent it from miss-folding. There is evidence that suggests that other neurological diseases form through similar mechanisms of miss-folding of proteins. On the flip side people with neurological diseases have a very low incidence of all cancers, which is not yet clear why.

Government funding is virtually not existent for this field of research and at the moment it is funded by private philanthropists.

Factors that contribute to the prevention of Parkinson’s disease are:

Caffeine – drink a latte [Petsko did not go into the difference between caffeine and coffee nor did he mention the possible down sides of drinking a latte that researches might have found. He has also neglected to mention the frequency and quantity or if the latte he referred to should come with sugar and/or milk or neither. A lot of research has been done about caffeine and coffee and the trend I see is that while there is research showing benefits of caffeine or coffee, there are also research that link it to negative results. I think what is really lacking here is a clearer holistic approach.]
Head injuries – try to avoid them because they increase your chances to develop Parkinson’s disease (for example wear a helmet when you side a bike)
The avian flue – again avoiding it would be the way to go here :)

Reducing the risks for Alzheimer’s disease

Omega 3 – eat more fish [The question is if this applies mainly to people whose diet does not provide them with enough omega-3 or is the more the better? As far as I know a balanced plant based diet can provide more than the needed omega-3 as well.]
Keep your blood pressure low – It is the biggest single risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease.
Stay mentally stimulated

References:

Petsko, G. (Speaker). (2008, February). The coming neurological epidemic [Video]. Ted Conferences. Retrieved December 3, 2008, from http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/gregory_petsko_on_the_coming_neurological_epidemic.html

TED – Where Great Minds Come to Inspire

Hans Rippel — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 04:51:10 +0000

TED is a yearly conference where great thinkers and doers share through inspirational presentations their thoughts, experience, and knowledge. The central philosophy is summed up by their slogan: Ideas worth spreading. It is a real treat to have free access to over 340 presentations and I would urge everyone to take advantage of this invaluable resource, it is something worthy of each of our time.

Presentation topics include: Arts, Business, Culture, Design, Development, Entertainment, Global Issues, Science, Technology, and more.

Among the past speakers, to mention a few, are: Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Steven Hawkins, Sergey Brin & Larry Page (co-founders of Google), Malcolm Gladwell, Richard Dawkins, Steven Pinker, Ray Kurzweil, Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia), Brian Green, Daniel Goleman, Will Wright (designer of Sims & Spore), Martin Seligman, and Philip Zimbardo.

Here’s an official trailer of what TED is all about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m8YaW6JBZQ

Since TED’s humble beginning, it has grown into a kind of online movement with a large group of loyal followers who share and discuss a variety of topics centered around the insightful presentations.

You can watch all videos at their official website at www.ted.com, at their YouTube channel, or by subscribing via iTunes (HD version).

By the way if you were wondering, TED is an acronym for technology, entertainment, and design.