Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC
-
0:28 - 0:33I've been spending my summers
in the marine biological laboratory -
0:33 - 0:35in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.
-
0:35 - 0:39And there, what I've been doing
is essentially renting a boat. -
0:39 - 0:42What I would like to do is ask you
-
0:42 - 0:44to come on a boat ride with me tonight.
-
0:46 - 0:51So, we ride off from Eel Pond
into Vineyard Sound, -
0:51 - 0:53right off the coast of Martha's Vineyard,
-
0:53 - 0:57equipped with a drone
to identify potential spots -
0:57 - 0:59from which to peer into the Atlantic.
-
0:59 - 1:03Earlier, I was going to say
into the depths of the Atlantic, -
1:03 - 1:06but we don't have to go too deep
to reach the unknown. -
1:07 - 1:09Here, barely two miles away
-
1:09 - 1:14from what is arguably the greatest
marine biology lab in the world, -
1:14 - 1:17we lower a simple
plankton net into the water -
1:17 - 1:19and bring up to the surface
-
1:19 - 1:22things that humanity rarely
pays any attention to, -
1:22 - 1:25and oftentimes has never seen before.
-
1:25 - 1:28Here's one of the organisms
that we caught in our net. -
1:28 - 1:30This is a jellyfish.
-
1:30 - 1:31But look closely,
-
1:31 - 1:34and living inside of this animal
is another organism -
1:34 - 1:37that is very likely
entirely new to science. -
1:37 - 1:39A complete new species.
-
1:39 - 1:42Or how about this other transparent beauty
-
1:42 - 1:44with a beating heart,
-
1:44 - 1:47asexually growing on top of its head,
-
1:47 - 1:50progeny that will move on
to reproduce sexually. -
1:51 - 1:52Let me say that again:
-
1:52 - 1:56this animal is growing asexually
on top of its head, -
1:56 - 2:00progeny that is going to reproduce
sexually in the next generation. -
2:01 - 2:02A weird jellyfish?
-
2:03 - 2:04Not quite.
-
2:04 - 2:06This is an ascidian.
-
2:06 - 2:07This is a group of animals
-
2:07 - 2:11that now we know we share
extensive genomic ancestry with, -
2:11 - 2:16and it is perhaps the closest
invertebrate species to our own. -
2:17 - 2:18Meet your cousin,
-
2:18 - 2:19Thalia democratica.
-
2:19 - 2:21(Laughter)
-
2:21 - 2:25I'm pretty sure you didn't save a spot
at your last family reunion -
2:25 - 2:27for Thalia,
-
2:27 - 2:29but let me tell you,
-
2:29 - 2:32these animals are profoundly related to us
-
2:32 - 2:35in ways that we're just
beginning to understand. -
2:36 - 2:40So, next time you hear anybody
derisively telling you -
2:41 - 2:44that this type of research
is a simple fishing expedition, -
2:44 - 2:47I hope that you'll remember
the trip that we just took. -
2:48 - 2:52Today, many of the biological
sciences only see value -
2:52 - 2:54in studying deeper what we already know --
-
2:54 - 2:57in mapping already-discovered continents.
-
2:57 - 3:01But some of us are much more
interested in the unknown. -
3:01 - 3:05We want to discover
completely new continents, -
3:05 - 3:08and gaze at magnificent
vistas of ignorance. -
3:09 - 3:13We crave the experience
of being completely baffled -
3:13 - 3:15by something we've never seen before.
-
3:15 - 3:16And yes, I agree
-
3:16 - 3:20there's a lot of little ego satisfaction
in being able to say, -
3:20 - 3:23"Hey, I was the first one
to discover that." -
3:23 - 3:26But this is not
a self-aggrandizing enterprise, -
3:26 - 3:29because in this type
of discovery research, -
3:29 - 3:33if you don't feel like a complete
idiot most of the time, -
3:33 - 3:35you're just not sciencing hard enough.
-
3:35 - 3:37(Laughter)
-
3:38 - 3:44So every summer I bring onto the deck
of this little boat of ours -
3:44 - 3:50more and more things
that we know very little about. -
3:52 - 3:56I would like tonight
to tell you a story about life -
3:56 - 3:59that rarely gets told
in an environment like this. -
4:01 - 4:08From the vantage point of our 21st-century
biological laboratories, -
4:09 - 4:13we have begun to illuminate
many mysteries of life with knowledge. -
4:13 - 4:17We sense that after centuries
of scientific research, -
4:17 - 4:19we're beginning to make
significant inroads -
4:19 - 4:23into understanding some of the most
fundamental principles of life. -
4:24 - 4:29Our collective optimism is reflected
by the growth of biotechnology -
4:29 - 4:30across the globe,
-
4:31 - 4:35striving to utilize scientific knowledge
to cure human diseases. -
4:37 - 4:42Things like cancer, aging,
degenerative diseases; -
4:42 - 4:46these are but some
of the undesirables we wish to tame. -
4:47 - 4:49I often wonder:
-
4:49 - 4:52Why is it that we are having
so much trouble -
4:52 - 4:54trying to solve the problem of cancer?
-
4:54 - 4:58Is it that we're trying to solve
the problem of cancer, -
4:58 - 5:00and not trying to understand life?
-
5:01 - 5:04Life on this planet
shares a common origin, -
5:04 - 5:09and I can summarize 3.5 billion years
of the history of life on this planet -
5:09 - 5:11in a single slide.
-
5:11 - 5:17What you see here are representatives
of all known species in our planet. -
5:17 - 5:21In this immensity of life
and biodiversity, -
5:21 - 5:24we occupy a rather unremarkable position.
-
5:24 - 5:25(Laughter)
-
5:25 - 5:26Homo sapiens.
-
5:27 - 5:29The last of our kind.
-
5:30 - 5:33And though I don't really want
to disparage at all -
5:33 - 5:35the accomplishments of our species,
-
5:35 - 5:40as much as we wish it to be so
and often pretend that it is, -
5:40 - 5:43we are not the measure of all things.
-
5:43 - 5:47We are, however,
the measurers of many things. -
5:47 - 5:51We relentlessly quantify,
analyze and compare, -
5:51 - 5:55and some of this is absolutely invaluable
and indeed necessary. -
5:56 - 6:02But this emphasis today on forcing
biological research to specialize -
6:02 - 6:05and to produce practical outcomes
-
6:05 - 6:08is actually restricting our ability
to interrogate life -
6:08 - 6:12to unacceptably narrow confines
and unsatisfying depths. -
6:13 - 6:18We are measuring an astonishingly
narrow sliver of life, -
6:18 - 6:22and hoping that those numbers
will save all of our lives. -
6:23 - 6:24How narrow do you ask?
-
6:24 - 6:26Well, let me give you a number.
-
6:26 - 6:30The National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration recently estimated -
6:30 - 6:34that about 95 percent of our oceans
remain unexplored. -
6:35 - 6:36Now let that sink in for a second.
-
6:37 - 6:4195 percent of our oceans
remain unexplored. -
6:42 - 6:44I think it's very safe to say
-
6:44 - 6:49that we don't even know
how much about life we do not know. -
6:50 - 6:53So, it's not surprising
that every week in my field -
6:53 - 6:56we begin to see the addition
of more and more new species -
6:56 - 6:58to this amazing tree of life.
-
6:58 - 7:00This one for example --
-
7:00 - 7:02discovered earlier this summer,
-
7:02 - 7:03new to science,
-
7:03 - 7:06and now occupying its lonely branch
in our family tree. -
7:07 - 7:08What is even more tragic
-
7:08 - 7:12is that we know about a bunch
of other species of animals out there, -
7:12 - 7:15but their biology remains
sorely under-studied. -
7:15 - 7:18I'm sure some of you
have heard about the fact -
7:18 - 7:22that a starfish can actually
regenerate its arm after it's lost. -
7:22 - 7:24But some of you might not know
-
7:24 - 7:28that the arm itself can actually
regenerate a complete starfish. -
7:29 - 7:33And there are animals out there
that do truly astounding things. -
7:34 - 7:35I'm almost willing to bet
-
7:35 - 7:40that many of you have never heard
of the flatworm, Schmidtea mediterranea. -
7:41 - 7:43This little guy right here
-
7:43 - 7:46does things that essentially
just blow my mind. -
7:47 - 7:51You can grab one of these animals
and cut it into 18 different fragments, -
7:51 - 7:55and each and every one of those fragments
will go on to regenerate -
7:55 - 7:56a complete animal
-
7:56 - 7:58in under two weeks.
-
7:58 - 8:0318 heads, 18 bodies, 18 mysteries.
-
8:03 - 8:05For the past decade and a half or so,
-
8:05 - 8:09I've been trying to figure out
how these little dudes do what they do, -
8:09 - 8:11and how they pull this magic trick off.
-
8:11 - 8:13But like all good magicians,
-
8:13 - 8:16they're not really releasing
their secrets readily to me. -
8:16 - 8:17(Laughter)
-
8:17 - 8:18So here we are,
-
8:18 - 8:23after 20 years of essentially
studying these animals, -
8:23 - 8:25genome mapping, chin scratching,
-
8:25 - 8:28and thousands of amputations
and thousands of regenerations, -
8:28 - 8:32we still don't fully understand
how these animals do what they do. -
8:33 - 8:36Each planarian an ocean unto itself,
-
8:36 - 8:38full of unknowns.
-
8:39 - 8:41One of the common characteristics
-
8:41 - 8:43of all of these animals
I've been talking to you about -
8:43 - 8:46is that they did not appear
to have received the memo -
8:46 - 8:49that they need to behave
according to the rules -
8:49 - 8:53that we have derived from a handful
of randomly selected animals -
8:53 - 8:56that currently populate the vast majority
-
8:56 - 8:58of biomedical laboratories
across the world. -
8:59 - 9:01Meet our Nobel Prize winners.
-
9:01 - 9:03Seven species, essentially,
-
9:03 - 9:07that have produced for us the brunt
of our understanding -
9:07 - 9:09of biological behavior today.
-
9:10 - 9:12This little guy right here --
-
9:12 - 9:14three Nobel Prizes in 12 years.
-
9:15 - 9:18And yet, after all the attention
they have garnered, -
9:18 - 9:20and all the knowledge they have generated,
-
9:20 - 9:22as well as the lion's share
of the funding, -
9:22 - 9:26here we are standing [before] the same
litany of intractable problems -
9:26 - 9:27and many new challenges.
-
9:28 - 9:30And that's because, unfortunately,
-
9:30 - 9:32these seven animals essentially correspond
-
9:32 - 9:39to 0.0009 percent of all of the species
that inhabit the planet. -
9:41 - 9:43So I'm beginning to suspect
-
9:43 - 9:48that our specialization is beginning
to impede our progress at best, -
9:48 - 9:50and at worst, is leading us astray.
-
9:51 - 9:54That's because life
on this planet and its history -
9:54 - 9:56is the history of rule breakers.
-
9:56 - 9:59Life started on the face of this planet
as single-cell organisms, -
9:59 - 10:02swimming for millions
of years in the ocean, -
10:02 - 10:04until one of those creatures decided,
-
10:04 - 10:06"I'm going to do things differently today;
-
10:06 - 10:09today I would like to invent
something called multicellularity, -
10:09 - 10:10and I'm going to do this."
-
10:10 - 10:13And I'm sure it wasn't a popular
decision at the time -- -
10:13 - 10:14(Laughter)
-
10:14 - 10:16but somehow, it managed to do it.
-
10:16 - 10:18And then, multicellular
organisms began to populate -
10:18 - 10:20all these ancestral oceans,
-
10:20 - 10:21and they thrived.
-
10:21 - 10:23And we have them here today.
-
10:23 - 10:26Land masses began to emerge
from the surface of the oceans, -
10:26 - 10:28and another creature thought,
-
10:28 - 10:31"Hey, that looks like a really nice
piece of real estate. -
10:31 - 10:32I'd like to move there."
-
10:32 - 10:33"Are you crazy?
-
10:33 - 10:36You're going to desiccate out there.
Nothing can live out of water." -
10:36 - 10:38But life found a way,
-
10:38 - 10:40and there are organisms
now that live on land. -
10:40 - 10:42Once on land, they may have
looked up into the sky -
10:42 - 10:45and said, "It would be nice
to go to the clouds, -
10:45 - 10:46I'm going to fly."
-
10:46 - 10:49"You can't break the law of gravity,
there's no way you can fly." -
10:49 - 10:51And yet, nature has invented --
-
10:51 - 10:53multiple and independent times --
-
10:53 - 10:55ways to fly.
-
10:55 - 10:57I love to study these animals
that break the rules, -
10:58 - 11:01because every time they break a rule,
they invent something new -
11:01 - 11:05that made it possible for us
to be able to be here today. -
11:05 - 11:07These animals did not get the memo.
-
11:08 - 11:09They break the rules.
-
11:09 - 11:12So if we're going to study animals
that break the rules, -
11:12 - 11:15shouldn't how we study them
also break the rules? -
11:16 - 11:20I think we need to renew
our spirit of exploration. -
11:20 - 11:23Rather than bring nature
into our laboratories -
11:23 - 11:24and interrogate it there,
-
11:24 - 11:26we need to bring our science
-
11:26 - 11:29into the majestic laboratory
that is nature, -
11:29 - 11:32and there, with our modern
technological armamentarium, -
11:32 - 11:35interrogate every new form
of life we find, -
11:35 - 11:38and any new biological attribute
that we may find. -
11:39 - 11:43We actually need to bring
all of our intelligence -
11:43 - 11:45to becoming stupid again --
-
11:45 - 11:49clueless [before] the immensity
of the unknown. -
11:50 - 11:51Because after all,
-
11:51 - 11:53science is not really about knowledge.
-
11:53 - 11:56Science is about ignorance.
-
11:56 - 11:57That's what we do.
-
11:58 - 11:59So if we're serious about this,
-
11:59 - 12:01we are going to have to start
seriously supporting -
12:02 - 12:06those institutions that make it possible
for discovery research to take place. -
12:06 - 12:07Institutions like our own,
-
12:07 - 12:10the Stowers Institute for Medical Research
in Kansas City, Missouri, -
12:10 - 12:14or the National Institute of General
Medical Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, -
12:14 - 12:17and of course,
our gateway to biodiversity, -
12:17 - 12:20the Marine Biological Laboratory
in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. -
12:21 - 12:25I have been very fortunate to be able
to do some of this training myself, -
12:25 - 12:27and it is a pleasure for me
-
12:27 - 12:31to actually grab students
out of the confines of their laboratories -
12:31 - 12:33away from their computers
and their catalogs, -
12:33 - 12:36and throw them into the world
of discovery and exploration. -
12:37 - 12:43It is an immense pleasure,
a real pleasure to actually see -
12:43 - 12:48to see how these bright, young minds'
curiosity spreads its wings -
12:48 - 12:51and flies away when faced
with the unknown. -
12:52 - 12:54This is how we become real scientists.
-
12:55 - 12:59So we need these people
to actually go out there -
12:59 - 13:02and ask the better questions
that will bring us closer -
13:02 - 13:03to the answers that we seek.
-
13:04 - 13:08Once, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote,
-
13:08 - 13:09"If you want to build a ship,
-
13:09 - 13:11don't drum up people to collect wood
-
13:11 - 13:14and don't assign them tasks and work,
-
13:14 - 13:18but rather teach them to long
for the endless immensity of the sea ..." -
13:18 - 13:20As a scientist and a teacher,
-
13:20 - 13:22I like to paraphrase this to read
-
13:22 - 13:25that we scientists need
to teach our students -
13:25 - 13:28to long for the endless
immensity of the sea -
13:28 - 13:29that is our ignorance.
-
13:30 - 13:34We Homo sapiens are the only
species we know of -
13:34 - 13:37that is driven to scientific inquiry.
-
13:37 - 13:39We, like all other species on this planet,
-
13:40 - 13:44are inextricably woven
into the history of life on this planet. -
13:45 - 13:48And I think I'm a little wrong
when I say that life is a mystery, -
13:48 - 13:51because I think that life
is actually an open secret -
13:51 - 13:55that has been beckoning our species
for millennia to understand it. -
13:55 - 13:57So I ask you:
-
13:57 - 14:00Aren't we the best chance
that life has to know itself? -
14:01 - 14:02And if so,
-
14:02 - 14:04what the heck are we waiting for?
-
14:04 - 14:08We need to do things differently.
-
14:08 - 14:11Tonight, I'm going to ask you
to please help us build -
14:11 - 14:16the greatest discovery research vessel
in the history of humankind. -
14:16 - 14:18Call your legislators,
-
14:18 - 14:21ask them to fund basic discovery research,
-
14:21 - 14:24support and give what you can
to institutions such as these -
14:24 - 14:26that are dedicated to discovery research,
-
14:26 - 14:31and hop on board with us
on a grand expedition -
14:31 - 14:34to radically transform
our understanding of life. -
14:34 - 14:36And along the way,
-
14:36 - 14:39change the way we do
biomedical research, forever. -
14:40 - 14:41Thank you.
-
14:41 - 14:47(Applause)
- Title:
- Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC
- Description:
-
Life on this planet is the history of rule breakers – species that didn't get the memo about how they were supposed to behave. So if we are studying rule breakers, then shouldn't how we study them break the rules, too?
This fascinating talk poses the question: is the way science approaches life’s biggest mysteries restricting our ability to solve them?
Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado is a researcher at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Dr. Sánchez Alvarado's current research efforts are aimed at understanding the molecular and cellular basis of animal regeneration.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 14:52
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC | ||
Tammy Lee edited English subtitles for Magnificent Vistas of Ignorance | Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado | TEDxKC |