-
Do you remember these
glow-in-the-dark little stars
-
which you had on the ceiling
when you were a boy or a girl?
-
Yes?
-
It is light.
-
It is pure light.
-
I think I've been staring
at them way too long
-
when I was a five-year-old, you know?
-
It's so beautiful.
-
No energy bill,
-
no maintenance;
-
it is there.
-
So two years ago,
-
we went back to the lab,
-
making it more durable,
-
more light-emitting,
-
with the experts.
-
And at the same time,
-
we got a request from this guy --
-
Van Gogh --
-
the famous Van Gogh Foundation,
-
who wanted to celebrate
his 125th anniversary in the Netherlands.
-
And they came to me and asked,
-
"Can you make a place
-
where he feels more alive again
in the Netherlands?"
-
And I liked that question a lot,
-
so in way,
-
we sort of started to connect
these two different worlds.
-
This is how my brain works,
-
by the way.
-
Oh, I would love to keep on
doing this for an hour,
-
but OK --
-
(Laughter)
-
And this is the result that we made:
-
a bicycle path which charges
at daytime via the sun,
-
and glows at night,
-
up to eight hours.
-
(Applause)
-
Thank you.
-
Hinting towards a future
which should be energy friendly,
-
and linking up the local grounds
-
as Van Gogh literally walked
and lived there in 1883.
-
And you can go there every night for free,
-
no ticket needed.
-
People experience the beauty
of cycling through the starry night,
-
thinking about green energy, safety --
-
I want to create places
where people feel connected again.
-
And it was somehow great to make
to make these projects happen
-
with the industry,
-
with the infrastructure companies.
-
[So when these .... ....]
which started to call --
-
how much for 10 kilometers?
-
Yeah, really,
-
that's a weird call you're going to get,
-
but it's fascinating
-
that this is not just some
sort of one-off, nice-to-have special.
-
I think this kind of creative thinking,
-
these kinds of connections --
-
it's the new economy.
-
World Economic Forum,
-
the think tank in Geneva,
-
made an interview with a lot
of smart people all around the world,
-
asking what are the top 10 skills
you and I need to become successful.
-
Now what is interesting,
-
what you see here --
-
it's not about money,
-
or being really good in C++,
-
although these are great skills to have,
-
I have to admit.
-
But look at number three:
-
creativity.
-
Number two:
-
critical thinking.
-
Number one:
-
problem-solving --
-
complex problem-solving.
-
All the things that robots
or a computer is really bad at.
-
And this makes me very optimistic,
-
very hopeful for the new world,
-
that as we will live
in this [hypertechnological] world,
-
our human skills --
-
our desire for empathy,
-
our desire for curiosity,
-
our desire for beauty --
-
will be more appreciated again,
-
and we will live in a world
where creativity is our true capital.
-
And a process like that --
-
a creative process like that,
-
I don't know how it works for you,
-
but in my brain it always
starts with a question:
-
why?
-
Why does a jellyfish emit light?
-
Or a firefly?
-
Or why do be accept pollution?
-
This is from my room
in Beijing three years ago.
-
Left image is a good day --
-
Saturday.
-
I can see the cars
and the people, the birds,
-
life is OK in a dense urban city.
-
And on the right image --
-
holy moly.
-
Pollution.
-
Complete layers.
-
I couldn't even see
the other side of the city.
-
And this image made me really sad.
-
This is not the bright future
we envision here at TED;
-
this is the horror.
-
[We live five- to six-years shorter;]
-
children have lung cancer
when they're six years old.
-
And so in a weird, beautiful way,
-
I, at that moment, became
inspired by Beijing smog.
-
And the governments all around the world
are fighting their war on smog,
-
but I wanted to make something
within the now,
-
and so we decided to build
the largest smog vacuum cleaner
-
in the world.
-
So it sucks up polluted air,
-
cleans it,
-
and then releases it.
-
And we built the first one.
-
So it sucks up 30,000
cubic meters per hour,
-
cleans it on the nano level,
-
the PM2.5, PM10 particles,
-
using very litle electricity,
-
and then releasing the clean air
-
so we have parks,
-
playgrounds which are 55 to 75 percent
more clean than the rest of the city.
-
(Applause)
-
Yes!
-
And every month of so,
-
it opens like a spaceship --
-
like a Marilyn Monroe with the --
-
well, you know what,
-
anyway.
-
(Laughter)
-
So this ...
-
this is the stuff we are capturing.
-
This is Beijing smog.
-
This is in our lungs right now.
-
If you live next to a highway,
-
it's the same at 17 cigarettes per day.
-
Are we insane?
-
When did we say yes to that?
-
And we had buckets
of this disgusting material
-
in our studio,
-
and on a Monday morning
we were discussing.
-
We were like, "Shit,
what should we do with it?
-
Should we throw it away?"
-
Like, like, "help!"
-
And then we realized --
-
no, no, no, no, no,
-
waste should not exist.
-
Waste for one should be
food for the other.
-
So here, maybe show it around.
-
Do not put this in your coffee.
-
And we realized that 42 percent
is made out of carbon,
-
and carbon of course,
-
under high pressure,
-
you get ...
-
diamonds,
-
yes.
-
So inspired by that,
-
we compress it for 30 minutes --
-
(Compression sound)
-
and making smog-free rings.
-
And so by sharing a ring,
-
you donate 1,000 cubic meters of clean air
-
to the city where the tower is in.
-
(Applause)
-
I have one here --
-
(Applause)
-
A little floating cube.
-
I will give one to you.
-
I'm not going to propose,
-
don't worry.
-
(Laughter)
-
Are we good?
-
Yeah, we're good.
-
You can show it around.
-
And we put this online --
-
Kickstarter campaign,
-
crowdfunding.
-
And people started to preorder it,
-
but more importantly,
-
they started to prepay it.
-
So the finance we made
with the jewellery
-
helped us to realize,
-
to build the first tower.
-
And that's powerful --
-
so the ways [....],
-
was the enabler.
-
Also the feedback from community --
-
this is a wedding couple from India,
-
when he proposed to her
with the smog-free ring
-
as a sign of true beauty,
-
as a sign of hope.
-
And she said yes.
-
(Laughter)
-
I love this image so much
for a lot of different reasons.
-
(Laughter)
-
And right now the project
is touring through China.
-
Actually, we have the support
of China's [central] government.
-
So the first goal is to create
local, clean-air parks,
-
and that works already quite well --
-
55, 75 percent more clean.
-
And at the same time,
-
we team up with the NGO's,
-
with the governors,
-
with the students,
-
with the tech people,
-
to say, "Hey, what do we need to do
-
to make a whole city smog-free?"
-
It's about the dream of clean air.
-
We do workshops;
-
new ideas pop up.
-
These are smog-free bicycles,
-
which --
-
I'm Dutch, yes?
-
I have this bicycle DNA
inside of me somewhere.
-
And so it sucks up polluted air,
-
it cleans it and releases it
-
in the fight against the car,
-
in the celebration of the bicycle.
-
And so right now we're working
on a sort of "package deal" so to speak,
-
where we say,
-
"smog-free towers, smof-free rings,"
-
we go to the mayors
or the governors of this world,
-
and say, "we can guarantee
a short-term reduction of pollution
-
between 20 to 40 percent,
-
please sign here right now."
-
Yes?
-
(Applause)
-
So it's all about connecting
new technology with creative thinking.
-
And if you start thinking about that,
-
there is so much you can imagine,
-
so much more you can do.
-
We worked on dance floors
-
which produce electricity
when you dance on it.
-
We did a design for that --
-
2008.
-
So it moves eight or nine millimeters,
-
produces 25 watts.
-
The electricity that we generated,
-
it is used for the lighting
or the DJ booth.
-
So some of the sustainability
is about doing more,
-
not about doing less,
-
but also on a larger scale,
-
the Netherlands --
-
where I'm from --
-
we live below sea level.
-
So because of these beauties,
-
the [off... .... ],
-
32 kilometer,
-
built by hand in 1932,
-
we live with the water,
-
we fight with the water,
-
we try to find harmony,
-
but sometimes we forget.
-
And therefore we made [... ....],
-
a combination of leads and lenses,
-
which show how high the water would be,
-
global change,
-
if we stop.
-
If today we all go home and say,
-
"Oh, whatever, someone else
will do it for us,"
-
or we wait or government or whatever,
-
you know,
-
we're not going to do that.
-
It goes wrong.
-
And we place this in public spaces
all around the world.
-
Thousands of people showed up.
-
(Applause)
-
Thank you.
-
You're too nice, you're too nice.
-
That's not good for [design].
-
So thousands of people showed up,
-
and some actually were scared.
-
They left,
-
they experienced the flood in 1953.
-
And others were mesmorized.
-
Can we make floating cities?
-
Can we generate electricity
from the change in tide?
-
So I find it so important
to make experiences --
-
collective experiences where people
feel connected with vision,
-
with the future,
-
and triggering what is possible.
-
At the same time,
-
you know these kinds of things,
-
they're not easy, yes?
-
It's a struggle.
-
And what I experienced in my life
-
is that a lot of people say
they want innovation,
-
and they want the next
and the new, the future,
-
but the moment you present a new idea,
-
there's this weird tendency
-
to reply to every new idea
starting with two words ...
-
which is ...
-
No, not "how much?"
-
It's more annoying.
-
(Laughter)
-
What is it, guys?
-
Not Synced
Or you're really blessed people --
-
Not Synced
that's really good.
-
Not Synced
"Yes, but,"
-
Not Synced
very good.
-
Not Synced
"Yes, but it's too expensive,
it's too cheap,
-
Not Synced
it's too fast, it's too slow,
-
Not Synced
it's too beautiful, it's too ugly,
-
Not Synced
it cannot be done,
-
Not Synced
it already exists."
-
Not Synced
I have heard everything about the same
project in the same week.
-
Not Synced
And I got really, really annoyed.
-
Not Synced
I got a [bit] gray hair,
-
Not Synced
started to dress in black
like a true architect --
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
and one morning I woke up and I said,
-
Not Synced
"Daan, stop.
-
Not Synced
This is dragging you down.
-
Not Synced
You have to do something with this.
-
Not Synced
You have to use it as an ingredient,
-
Not Synced
as a component."
-
Not Synced
And so we decided to build,
-
Not Synced
to realize the famous "Yes, but" chair.
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
And this is an existing chair
by [... ... ],
-
Not Synced
a Dutch design,
-
Not Synced
but we gave it a little "update,"
-
Not Synced
a little "hack" so to speak,
-
Not Synced
so we placed a little voice
recognition element right here,
-
Not Synced
and so the moment you sit on that chair,
-
Not Synced
and you say those two horrible,
creative- destructive, annoying little words,
-
Not Synced
you get a short,
-
Not Synced
but pretty intense
-
Not Synced
little shock on the backside
of your bottom.
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
(Applause)
-
Not Synced
And that works --
-
Not Synced
yeah, that works.
-
Not Synced
So some clients have left us,
-
Not Synced
they got really mad.
-
Not Synced
Fortunately, the good ones have stayed.
-
Not Synced
And of course we also
apply it to ourselves.
-
Not Synced
But ladies and gentelmen,
-
Not Synced
let's not be afraid.
-
Not Synced
Let's be curious, yes?
-
Not Synced
And you know,
-
Not Synced
walking through TED in these days
-
Not Synced
and hearing the other speakers,
-
Not Synced
and feeling the energy of the crowds,
-
Not Synced
I was remembering this quote
of the Canadian author, [Arthur Mcluen],
-
Not Synced
who once famously said,
-
Not Synced
"On spacecraft earth,
-
Not Synced
there are no passengers.
-
Not Synced
We are all crew."
-
Not Synced
And I think this so beautiful.
-
Not Synced
This is so beautiful.
-
Not Synced
We're not just consumers,
-
Not Synced
we're makers.
-
Not Synced
We make decisions,
-
Not Synced
we make new inventions,
-
Not Synced
we make new dreams.
-
Not Synced
And I think if we start implementing
that kind of thinking even more
-
Not Synced
within today,
-
Not Synced
there's still a whole new world
to be explored.
-
Not Synced
All right,
-
Not Synced
thank you.
-
Not Synced
(Applause)
-
Not Synced
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.