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Do you remember these
glow-in-the-dark little stars
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which you had on the ceiling
when you were a boy or a girl?
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Yes?
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It is light.
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It is pure light.
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I think I've been staring
at them way too long
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when I was a five-year-old,
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you know?
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It's so beautiful.
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No energy bill,
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no maintenance;
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it is there.
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So two years ago,
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we went back to the lab,
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making it more durable,
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more light emitting,
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with the experts.
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And at the same time,
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we got a request from this guy --
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Van Gogh.
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The famous Van Gogh Foundation,
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who wanted to celebrate
his 125th anniversary in the Netherlands.
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And they came to me and asked,
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"Can you make a place
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where he feels more alive again
in the Netherlands?"
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And I liked that question a lot,
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so in way,
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we sort of started to connect
these two different worlds.
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This is how my brain works,
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by the way.
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Oh, I would love to keep on
doing this for an hour.
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(Laughter)
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And this is the result that we made:
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a bicycle path which charges
at daytime via the sun,
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and glows at night,
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up to eight hours.
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(Applause)
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Thank you.
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Hinting towards a future
which should be energy friendly,
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and linking up the local grounds
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as Van Gogh literally walked
and lived there in 1883.
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And you can go there every night for free,
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no ticket needed.
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People experience the beauty
of cycling through the starry night,
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thinking about green energy, safety --
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I want to create places
where people feel connected again.
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And it was somehow great to make
these projects happen
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with the industry,
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with the infrastructure companies,
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you know?
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So when the [.... ....] start to call --
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how much for 10 kilometers?
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(Laughter)
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Yeah, really,
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that's a weird call you're going to get,
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but it's fascinating
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that this is not just some sort of one-off,
nice-to-have special,
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I think this kind of creative thinking,
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these kinds of connections,
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if the new economy --
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World Economic Forum,
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the think tank in Geneva,
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made an interview with a lot
of smart people all around the world,
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asking what are the top 10 skills
you and I need to become successful.
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And what is interesting
[about] what you see here --
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it's not about money,
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or being really good in C++,
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although these are great skills to have,
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I have to admit.
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But look at number three:
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creativity.
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Number two:
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critical thinking.
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Number one:
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problem-solving --
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complex problem-solving.
-
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All the things that robots
or a computer is really bad at.
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And this makes me very optimistic,
-
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very hopeful for the new world,
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that as we will live
in this hyper-technological world,
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are human skills --
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our desire for empathy,
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our desire for curiosity,
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our desire for beauty --
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will be more appreciated again,
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and we will live in a world
where creativity is our true capital.
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And a process like that --
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a creative process like that,
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I don't know how it works for you,
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but in my brain it always
starts with a question:
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why?
-
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Why does a jellyfish emit light?
-
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Or a firefly?
-
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Or why do be accept pollution?
-
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This is from my room
in Beijing three years ago.
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Left image is a good day --
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Saturday.
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I can see the cars, the people, the birds,
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life is OK in a dense urban city.
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And on the right image --
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holy moly.
-
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Pollution.
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Complete layers.
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I couldn't even see
the other side of the city.
-
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And this image made me really sad.
-
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This is not the bright future
we envision here at TED,
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this is the horror.
-
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We live five to six years shorter,
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children have lung cancer
when they're six years old.
-
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And so in a weird, beautiful way,
-
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I at that moment became
inspired by [raging] smog.
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And the governments all around the world
are fighting their war on smog,
-
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but I wanted to make something
within the now,
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and so we decided to build
the largest smog vacuum cleaner
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in the world.
-
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So it sucks up polluted air,
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cleans it,
-
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and then releases it.
-
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And we built the first one.
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So it sucks up 30,000
cubic meters per hour,
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cleans it on the nano level,
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2.5 [... ...] particles,
-
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using very litle electricity,
-
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and then releasing the clean air
-
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so we have parks,
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playgrounds which 55 to 75 percent
more clean than the rest of the city.
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(Applause)
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Yes!
-
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And every month of so,
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it opens like a spaceship --
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like a Marilyn Monroe with the --
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well, you know what,
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anyway.
-
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(Laughter)
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So this ...
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this is the stuff we are capturing.
-
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This is Beijing smog.
-
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This is in our lungs right now.
-
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If you live next to a highway,
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it's the same at 17 cigarettes per day.
-
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Are we insane?
-
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When did we say yes to that?
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And we had buckets
of this disgusting material
-
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in our studio,
-
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and on a Monday morning
we were discussing.
-
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We were like, "Shit,
what should we do with it?
-
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Should we throw it away?"
-
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Like, like, help!
-
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And then we realized --
-
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no, no, no, no, no,
-
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waste should not exist.
-
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Waste for one should be
food for the other.
-
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So here, maybe show it around.
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Do not put this in your coffee.
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And we realized that 42 percent
is made out of carbon,
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and carbon of course,
-
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under high pressure,
-
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you get ...
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diamonds,
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yes.
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So inspired by that,
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we compress it for 30 minutes --
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(Compression sound)
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and making smog-free rings.
-
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And so by sharing a ring,
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you donate 1,000 cubic meters of clean air
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to the city where the tower is in.
-
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(Applause)
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I have one here --
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(Applause)
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A little floating cube.
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I will give one to you.
-
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I'm not going to propose,
-
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don't worry.
-
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(Laughter)
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Are we good?
-
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Yeah, we're good.
-
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You can show it around.
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And we put this online --
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Kickstarter campaign,
-
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crowdfunding.
-
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And people started to preorder it,
-
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but more importantly,
-
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they started to prepay it.
-
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So the finance we made
with the jewellery
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helped us to realize,
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to build the first tower.
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And that's powerful --
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so the ways [....],
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was the enabler.
-
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Also the feedback from community --
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this is a wedding couple from India,
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when he proposed to her
with the smog-free ring
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as a sign of true beauty,
-
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as a sign of hope.
-
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And she said yes.
-
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(Laughter)
-
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I love this image so much
for a lot of different reasons.
-
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(Laughter)
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And right now the project
is touring through China.
-
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Actually, we have the support
of China's [central] government.
-
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So the first goal is to create
local, clean-air parks,
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and that works already quite well --
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55, 75 percent more clean.
-
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And at the same time,
-
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we team up with the NGO's,
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with the governors,
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with the students,
-
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with the tech people,
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to say, "Hey, what do we need to do
-
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to make a whole city smog-free?"
-
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It's about the dream of clean air.
-
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We do workshops;
-
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new ideas pop up.
-
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These are smog-free bicycles,
-
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which --
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I'm Dutch, yes?
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I have this bicycle DNA
inside of me somewhere.
-
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And so it sucks up polluted air,
-
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it cleans it and releases it
-
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in the fight against the car,
-
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in the celebration of the bicycle.
-
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And so right now we're working
on a sort of "package deal" so to speak,
-
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where we say,
-
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"smog-free towers, smof-free rings,"
-
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we go to the mayors
or the governors of this world,
-
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and say, "we can guarantee
a short-term reduction of pollution
-
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between 20 to 40 percent,
-
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please sign here right now."
-
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Yes?
-
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(Applause)
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So it's all about connecting
new technology with creative thinking.
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And if you start thinking about that,
-
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there is so much you can imagine,
-
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so much more you can do.
-
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We worked on dance floors
-
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which produce electricity
when you dance on it.
-
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We did a design for that --
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2008.
-
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So it moves eight or nine millimeters,
-
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produces 25 watts.
-
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The electricity that we generated,
-
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it is used for the lighting
or the DJ booth.
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So some of the sustainability
is about doing more,
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not about doing less,
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but also on a larger scale,
-
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the Netherlands --
-
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where I'm from --
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we live below sea level.
-
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So because of these beauties,
-
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the [off... .... ],
-
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32 kilometer,
-
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built by hand in 1932,
-
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we live with the water,
-
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we fight with the water,
-
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we try to find harmony,
-
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but sometimes we forget.
-
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And therefore we made [... ....],
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a combination of leads and lenses,
-
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which show how high the water would be,
-
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global change,
-
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if we stop.
-
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If today we all go home and say,
-
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"Oh, whatever, someone else
will do it for us,"
-
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or we wait or government or whatever,
-
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you know,
-
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we're not going to do that.
-
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It goes wrong.
-
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And we place this in public spaces
all around the world.
-
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Thousands of people showed up.
-
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(Applause)
-
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Thank you.
-
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You're too nice, you're too nice.
-
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That's not good for [design].
-
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So thousands of people showed up,
-
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and some actually were scared.
-
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They left,
-
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they experienced the flood in 1953.
-
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And others were mesmorized.
-
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Can we make floating cities?
-
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Can we generate electricity
from the change in tide?
-
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So I find it so important
to make experiences --
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collective experiences where people
feel connected with vision,
-
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with the future,
-
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and triggering what is possible.
-
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At the same time,
-
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you know these kinds of things,
-
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they're not easy, yes?
-
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It's a struggle.
-
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And what I experienced in my life
-
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is that a lot of people say
they want innovation,
-
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and they want the next
and the new, the future,
-
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but the moment you present a new idea,
-
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there's this weird tendency to reply
to every new idea with two words,
-
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which is ...
-
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No, not "how much?"
-
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It's more annoying.
-
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(Laughter)
-
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What is it, guys?
-
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Or you're really blessed people --
-
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that's really good.
-
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"Yes, but,"
-
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very good.
-
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"Yes, but it's too expensive,
it's too cheap,
-
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it's too fast, it's too slow,
-
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it's too beautiful, it's too ugly,
-
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it cannot be done,
-
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it already exists."
-
Not Synced
I have heard everything about the same
project in the same week.
-
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And I got really, really annoyed.
-
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I got a [bit] gray hair,
-
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started to dress in black
like a true architect --
-
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(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
and one morning I woke up and I said,
-
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"Daan, stop.
-
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This is dragging you down.
-
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You have to do something with this.
-
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You have to use it as an ingredient,
-
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as a component."
-
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And so we decided to build,
-
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to realize the famous "Yes, but" chair.
-
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(Laughter)
-
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And this is an existing chair
by [... ... ],
-
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a Dutch design,
-
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but we gave it a little "update,"
-
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a little "hack" so to speak,
-
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so we placed a little voice
recognition element right here,
-
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and so the moment you sit on that chair,
-
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and you say those two horrible,
creative- destructive, annoying little words,
-
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you get a short,
-
Not Synced
but pretty intense
-
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little shock on the backside
of your bottom.
-
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(Laughter)
-
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(Applause)
-
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And that works --
-
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yeah, that works.
-
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So some clients have left us,
-
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they got really mad.
-
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Fortunately, the good ones have stayed.
-
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And of course we also
apply it to ourselves.
-
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But ladies and gentelmen,
-
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let's not be afraid.
-
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Let's be curious, yes?
-
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And you know,
-
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walking through TED in these days
-
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and hearing the other speakers,
-
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and feeling the energy of the crowds,
-
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I was remembering this quote
of the Canadian author, [Arthur Mcluen],
-
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who once famously said,
-
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"On spacecraft earth,
-
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there are no passengers.
-
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We are all crew."
-
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And I think this so beautiful.
-
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This is so beautiful.
-
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We're not just consumers,
-
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we're makers.
-
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We make decisions,
-
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we make new inventions,
-
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we make new dreams.
-
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And I think if we start implementing
that kind of thinking even more
-
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within today,
-
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there's still a whole new world
to be explored.
-
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All right,
-
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thank you.
-
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(Applause)
-
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Thank you.
Yasushi Aoki
wait or government
# or -> for
Yasushi Aoki
So the waste the activator,
it was the enabler.
->
So the ways that activate
was the enabler.