Richard Bilton uncovers a struggle at the heart of US diplomacy between the ideals of freedom and spreading democracy, and the ruthless demands of American security and narrow self-interest. He examines what the WikiLeaks cables reveal about America's conflicted dealings with Egypt's deposed dictator Hosni Mubarak, and shows how US diplomats in Cairo missed warning signs that revolution in Egypt was coming. And he details the moral tension in US diplomacy brought about by America's controversial War on Terror. Using the cables, Richard uncovers the moral compromises made by America's diplomats over the repatriation of Guantanamo Bay prisoners, and he shows the secret US efforts to block investigations into alleged CIA rendition and abuse.
Friday, August 31, 2012
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Who`s Afraid Of A Black Hole? - BBC Documentary
Broadcast 2009. Black Holes are one of the most destructive forces in the universe, capable of tearing a planet apart and swallowing an entire star. Yet scientists now believe they could hold the key to answering the ultimate question - what was there before the Big Bang? The trouble is that researching them is next to impossible. Black holes are by definition invisible and there's no scientific theory able to explain them. Despite these obvious obstacles, Horizon meets the astronomers attempting to image a black hole for the very first time and the theoretical physicists getting ever closer to unlocking their mysteries. It's a story that takes us into the heart of a black hole and to the very edge of what we think we know about the universe.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Daniel Wolpert - The real reason for brains
Consider your hand. You use it to lift things, to balance yourself, to give and take, to sense the world. It has a range of interacting degrees of freedom, and it interacts with many different objects under a variety of environmental conditions. And for most of us, it all just works. At his lab in the Engineering department at Cambridge, Daniel Wolpert and his team are studying why, looking to understand the computations underlying the brain's sensorimotor control of the body.
As he says, "I believe that to understand movement is to understand the whole brain. And therefore it’s important to remember when you are studying memory, cognition, sensory processing, they’re there for a reason, and that reason is action.” Movement is the only way we have of interacting with the world, whether foraging for food or attracting a waiter's attention. Indeed, all communication, including speech, sign language, gestures and writing, is mediated via the motor system. Taking this viewpoint, and using computational and robotic techniques as well as virtual reality systems, Wolpert and his team research the purpose of the human brain and the way it determines future actions.
"A recurrent theme in Wolpert’s research is that “The more we know about how the body acts, the more we know about how the brain thinks.”"
Monday, August 27, 2012
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Monday, August 20, 2012
Martin Hanczyc - The line between life and non-life
When TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada heard about the devastating effects of the BP Oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, he quit his dream job and moved to New Orleans to develop a more efficient way to soak up the oil. He designed a highly maneuverable, flexible boat capable of cleaning large tracts quickly. But rather than turn a profit, he has opted to open-source the design.
TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada aims to harness the forces of nature as he invents innovative remedies for man-made problems like oil spills and radioactive leaks.Full bio »
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Cesar Hadara - A novel idea for cleaning up oil spills
When TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada heard about the devastating effects of the BP Oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, he quit his dream job and moved to New Orleans to develop a more efficient way to soak up the oil. He designed a highly maneuverable, flexible boat capable of cleaning large tracts quickly. But rather than turn a profit, he has opted to open-source the design.
TED Senior Fellow Cesar Harada aims to harness the forces of nature as he invents innovative remedies for man-made problems like oil spills and radioactive leaks.Full bio »
Murray Gell-Man on beauty and Truth in physics
Armed with a sense of humor and laypeople's terms, Nobel winner Murray Gell-Mann drops some knowledge on TEDsters about particle physics, asking questions like, Are elegant equations more likely to be right than inelegant ones?
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe. Full bio »
Saturday, August 18, 2012
Friday, August 17, 2012
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Monday, August 13, 2012
Friday, August 10, 2012
Monday, August 6, 2012
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Friday, August 3, 2012
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Top