TED Talks Daily

In 2009, journalist and screenwriter Drew Philp bought a ruined house in Detroit for $500. In the years that followed, as he gutted the interior and removed the heaps of garbage crowding the rooms, he didn't just learn how to repair a house -- he learned how to build a community. In a tribute to the city he loves, Philp tells us about "radical neighborliness" and makes the case that we have "the power to create the world anew together and to do it ourselves when our governments refuse."

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Irina Kareva translates biology into mathematics and vice versa. She writes mathematical models that describe the dynamics of cancer, with the goal of developing new drugs that target tumors. "The power and beauty of mathematical modeling lies in the fact that it makes you formalize, in a very rigorous way, what we think we know," Kareva says. "It can help guide us to where we should keep looking, and where there may be a dead end." It all comes down to asking the right question and translating it to the right equation, and back.

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How can we make AI that people actually want to interact with? Raphael Arar suggests we start by making art. He shares interactive projects that help AI explore complex ideas like nostalgia, intuition and conversation -- all working towards the goal of making our future technology just as much human as it is artificial.

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Why are pencils shaped like hexagons, and how did they get their iconic yellow color? Pencil shop owner Caroline Weaver takes us inside the fascinating history of the pencil.

Stairs don't just get you from point A to point B. Architect David Rockwell explains how they shape your movement -- and your feelings.

"Down down, baby, down down the roller coaster..." Hip-hop owes a lot of the queens of double dutch. Ethnomusicologist Kyra Gaunt takes us on a tour of the fascinating history of the jump rope.

The hoodie is a lot more than just a comfy sweatshirt. Design curator Paola Antonelli takes us through its history.

The progress bar makes waiting more exciting... and mitigates our fear of death. Journalist Daniel Engber explores how it came into existence.

How the simple button changed the world, according to fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi.

The hyperlink is the LEGO block of the internet. Here's the bizarre history of how it came to be, as told by user experience master Margaret Gould Stewart.