0:00:00.000,0:00:04.000
So, imagine you're standing on a street anywhere in America

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and a Japanese man comes up to you and says,

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"Excuse me, what is the name of this block?"

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And you say, "I'm sorry, well, this is Oak Street, that's Elm Street.

0:00:13.000,0:00:15.000
This is 26th, that's 27th."

0:00:15.000,0:00:17.000
He says, "OK, but what is the name of that block?"

0:00:17.000,0:00:20.000
You say, "Well, blocks don't have names.

0:00:20.000,0:00:22.000
Streets have names; blocks are just the

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unnamed spaces in between streets."

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He leaves, a little confused and disappointed.

0:00:28.000,0:00:31.000
So, now imagine you're standing on a street, anywhere in Japan,

0:00:31.000,0:00:33.000
you turn to a person next to you and say,

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"Excuse me, what is the name of this street?"

0:00:35.000,0:00:39.000
They say, "Oh, well that's Block 17 and this is Block 16."

0:00:39.000,0:00:42.000
And you say, "OK, but what is the name of this street?"

0:00:42.000,0:00:44.000
And they say, "Well, streets don't have names.

0:00:44.000,0:00:46.000
Blocks have names.

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Just look at Google Maps here. There's Block 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19.

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All of these blocks have names,

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and the streets are just the unnamed spaces in between the blocks.

0:00:56.000,0:00:59.000
And you say then, "OK, then how do you know your home address?"

0:00:59.000,0:01:02.000
He said, "Well, easy, this is District Eight.

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There's Block 17, house number one."

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You say, "OK, but walking around the neighborhood,

0:01:07.000,0:01:09.000
I noticed that the house numbers don't go in order."

0:01:09.000,0:01:12.000
He says, "Of course they do. They go in the order in which they were built.

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The first house ever built on a block is house number one.

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The second house ever built is house number two.

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Third is house number three. It's easy. It's obvious."

0:01:20.000,0:01:23.000
So, I love that sometimes we need to

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go to the opposite side of the world

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to realize assumptions we didn't even know we had,

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and realize that the opposite of them may also be true.

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So, for example, there are doctors in China

0:01:32.000,0:01:35.000
who believe that it's their job to keep you healthy.

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So, any month you are healthy you pay them,

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and when you're sick you don't have to pay them because they failed

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at their job. They get rich when you're healthy, not sick.

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(Applause)

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In most music, we think of the "one"

0:01:46.000,0:01:50.000
as the downbeat, the beginning of the musical phrase: one, two, three, four.

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But in West African music, the "one"

0:01:52.000,0:01:54.000
is thought of as the end of the phrase,

0:01:54.000,0:01:56.000
like the period at the end of a sentence.

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So, you can hear it not just in the phrasing, but the way they count off their music:

0:01:58.000,0:02:01.000
two, three, four, one.

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And this map is also accurate.

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(Laughter)

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There's a saying that whatever true thing you can say about India,

0:02:09.000,0:02:11.000
the opposite is also true.

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So, let's never forget, whether at TED, or anywhere else,

0:02:13.000,0:02:16.000
that whatever brilliant ideas you have or hear,

0:02:16.000,0:02:18.000
that the opposite may also be true.

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Domo arigato gozaimashita.