Mark Lovett

Are We Still Human If Robots Help Raise Our Babies? – Sarah Blaffer Hrdy at TED2025

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We were all babies at one point in time, and as we couldn’t care for ourselves, that responsibility fell to one or more adults. Typically our parents, but in some cases other relatives. In any event, our upbringing was a matter of human-to-human contact. But what about in the future? With AI and robotics advancing rapidly, will non-humans begin playing a role in raising future generations?

In her brief talk at TED2025, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy reminds us of the process that’s been in place for many thousands of years, and poses this exact question. As an anthropologist and primatologist, as well as a Professor Emerita, Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Davis, Sarah has unique insights on this issue.

Artificial intelligence is going to change the nature of human work. But will it change human nature?

An interesting point that Sarah brings up is that neuroscientists have detected activity in brain regions associated with social understanding in young babies when interacting with people, demonstrating early social wiring in their brains. Which had me wondering whether that would still be true with a robot.

Soon, robots will be programmed to provide a wider range of services, ranging from bottle-feeding to keeping babies safe, warm, cleaned, and even educated.

To be honest, this is one talk that I feel should have been five minutes longer. It felt as if the question was posed, some background offered, but little attention paid to the answer. For me, this highlighted the fallacy of “less is more”. In this case, less was definitely less, to the point that the message fell short.

Transcript

I guess you’ve already figured out, like it or not, artificial intelligence is going to change the nature of human work. But will it change human nature? That’s going to depend on what we do with it.

Right away, the mother and the grandmother in me wants to know, “Ooh, hey, can we program robots to help us care for our sleep-depriving, time-consuming babies?” That’s before the evolutionary anthropologist in me cautions, “Whoa. Shouldn’t we first ask why such costly, costly, slow-maturing babies evolved in the first place?”

For that, we need to go back, oh, six million years, to when humans last shared a common ancestor with other apes. Babies back then, like this common chimpanzee baby today, would have to be held in skin-to-skin contact, never out of touch, not for a minute of the day or night for months after birth, nursed for years.

It just seemed natural to assume that among the bipedal apes in the line leading to the genus Homo, babies could similarly expect single-mindedly dedicated maternal care.

Until, that is, anthropologists figured out how hard it would have been for bipedal apes with only stone-age tools to survive and escape extinction in the face of climate change and other Pleistocene perils.

To stay fed and manage to still rear their helpless, helpless, slow-maturing babies, mothers needed help. Unless male and female group members other than the mother, allomothers, had helped to care for and provision babies, there is no way we humans could have evolved.

Fortunately for us, as brains were getting bigger and distinctively human prefrontal cortices were taking shape, our ancestors were increasingly sharing food and sharing care of children. Neural circuits crucial for mutual understanding co-evolved right along with shared care.

Fast forward to the ever-faster changing modern world. Mothers still labor to help support their families, as mothers always have. But many no longer live in mutually supportive communities, with kin far away and even with dads helping more, allomothers were in short supply.

Good daycare, even if available, unaffordable. No wonder parents everywhere use devices to keep their babies monitored and entertained. Already, 40% of US two-year-olds have their own tablets. Soon, robots will be programmed to provide a wider range of services, ranging from bottle-feeding to keeping babies safe, warm, cleaned, and even educated.

But given the role of engagement with others in the emergence of mutual understanding, is this a good idea? Think back to our hunter-gatherer ancestors. Still living and rearing children as people in this iconic photograph, taken about half a century ago among African foragers. Babies then, to stay safe, still needed to be held by somebody.

But that somebody did not have to be their mother. Right after birth, others might reach for the baby. This mother who has just given birth allows others to gather around. She’s passed her baby to her own mother to massage its scalp. If one of these allomothers happens to be nursing, the baby’s first sweet taste of milk will come from her.

Soon, babies will be monitoring nearby others, deciding who responds, figuring out how best to engage and appeal to them. By six months, the sharp little milk teeth are peeking through their gums, their appeals might be rewarded with kiss-fed treats, maybe honey-sweetened saliva or premasticated meat.

And babies soon are learning to reciprocate, starting to share. Babies everywhere will just spontaneously offer food to somebody else, anybody, really. Active agents in their own survival, babies are flexible about who or what they attach or consider as family.

Something to keep in mind if robots are programmed to respond even more rapidly and reliably than preoccupied parents do. And as they get older, they will spontaneously point to things, or hold something out, as if saying, “What do you think of this? What should I think of this?”

Eager to engage with other minds and learn what they’re thinking. They care. They care very much who notices them do something nice, like a toddler rushing to pick up something someone has dropped and hand it back. They care not just with what others think, but with what others think about them, their reputations.

As developmental psychologists were learning just how “other-regarding” human babies are, neuroscientists using new baby-friendly technologies made a surprising discovery. With a soft, wired cap slipped on the baby’s head, neural activity was detected in the medial prefrontal cortex, long before most neuroscientists even assumed it was active yet. As babies process eye gaze, actions, deciding who to trust, emulate, and love.

Little humans process their physical world in much the same way other apes do. Nothing much different there. It’s in these social realms where they really differ. Inter-subjective sensibilities starting to emerge early in life, right along with targeted social smiles.

Brain circuitry that evolved to help babies elicit care and survive, prepared our ancestors to mature into adults able to communicate and cooperate in new ways, whether constructing shelters or processing and sharing food, or eventually, one day, collaborating with widely dispersed others in order to send robots to Mars.

Tens of thousands of years from now, assuming Homo sapiens aiensis is still around, whether on this planet or some other, I have no doubt that they will be bipedal, symbol-generating apes, technologically proficient in ways we can’t even dream of yet.

But will they still be human in the way we think of humans today? Interested in the thoughts and emotions of others, eligible for mutual understanding? That’s going to depend on how, by whom, or what they are reared.

Thank you.

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Mark Lovett

Why Climate Action Is Unstoppable and Climate Realism Is a Myth – Al Gore at TED Countdown 2025

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The narrative of planet earth, and of humanity itself, is being written by many authors. Some positive, others negative. And sometimes, extremely negative.

At the top of that list is climate change. A narrative the didn’t exist before the industrial revolution, but it’s now causing widespread death and destruction, today, through the end of the century, and beyond.

Former Vice President Al Gore knows this well, and continues to be a voice of reason, as well as hope, during these turbulent times. I wish I could share his enthusiasm, and I do hope that we take his advice and take action, but at the moment I don’t believe we’ll do enough, soon enough.

Which means that future generations will suffer. This outcome has become far worse do to the current administration’s intent on causing as much death and destruction as possible in the decades to come. Their climate change policy is nothing short of barbaric.

But I digress, as this article is highlighting Al Gore’s recent talk at the 2025 TED Countdown Summit on June 16, 2025. As we all know, a narrative thread that’s designed to slow progress on addressing the climate crisis involves a nonstop stream of lies and misinformation disseminated by the fossil fuel industry. In their latest PR con job, they’ve introduced the phrase “climate realism”.

Is it realistic to ignore the 1 to 2 billion climate refugees that the climate scientists are warning us will cross international borders and have to move inside their own nations by 2050 because of the climate crisis?

And over the next half century, according to Deloitte, it would cost the economy $178 trillion if we don’t act. But if we do act, we can add to the global economy by $43 trillion.

Granted, climate change is a complex subject, and there’s no single answer. But without question the answer involves a dedication to mitigating the use of fossil fuels whenever and wherever possible. In his talk Al Gore features some of the progress that’s been made, but also talks about what still needs to happen.

I believe that we as human beings have the capacity to recognize that our survival is at stake and that we need to move faster even though the big polluters have the political and economic power to try to block us.

And the interesting thing to realize, is that doing so is not only beneficial to the health of humanity, it’s financially beneficial. Win-Win. But the need for profit at any cost continues to threaten everyone on this planet. Our story is now being written by some very bad actors, and it’s a story I wish had a happier ending.

A lot of people are suffering. But do we want to vastly increase the number of people that have to go through that hardship and suffering instead of dealing with the cause of the crisis and solving the climate crisis?

Transcript

Thank you very much for the warm welcome.

It’s been 10 years since the Paris agreement, and every single nation in the world, 195 nations agreed to try to get to net zero by mid-century. And let me deal with the elephant in the room, one nation, only one has begun the process of withdrawing, and the Trump administration has also:

  • Cancelled executive orders on climate and energy
  • Withdrawn from international climate organizations
  • The have declared a so-called “energy emergency,” in order to promote fossil fuels
  • Phased our government support for clean energy

But bear this in mind. During the first Trump four-year term, investments in the energy transition doubled. We have seen solar capacity more than double, electric vehicle sales have doubled, wind energy went up by almost 50% during his first term.

And we are seeing that 60% during his first four years of new energy came from renewable energy and coal investments went down almost 20%. So, there’s good news and there’s bad news. A lot has happened in the last ten years.

But I want to ask this question. The fossil fuel industry wants to ignore the amazing good news and they are labeling the commitments that the world made at the Paris negotiations as a fantasy, and they’re calling for an abandonment of the efforts to reduce fossil fuel burning. And they’re now advocating a new approach that they call, “Climate Realism.”

Well, climate realism, according to them, we should abandon the efforts to deal with the principal cause of the climate crisis, 80% of it comes from burning fossil fuels, and we should focus on adaptation as well, almost exclusively. Well, we need adaptation. A lot of people are suffering. But do we want to vastly increase the number of people that have to go through that hardship and suffering instead of dealing with the cause of the crisis and solving the climate crisis?

They, according to climate realism, historically, the energy transitions have taken place very slowly. So we have no right as human beings to even imagine that we could go faster in the future than what history has told us was the reality in the past, even though human civilization is at stake.

For the so-called climate realists, the goal of solving the climate crisis is way less important than other goals such as, especially, increasing energy access to developing countries, which is, obviously, important, we’ll deal with that, but they want to do it, obviously, by burning more fossil fuels.

According to climate realism, it’s just not practical to stop using the sky as an open sewer for the emissions from burning fossil fuels and the other emissions, Instead, we should just continue using the sky as an open sewer. So, where climate realism is concerned, I have some questions.

Is it realistic to ignore the 1 to 2 billion climate refugees that the climate scientists are warning us will cross international borders and have to move inside their own nations by 2050 because of the climate crisis? You know, the temperatures keep going up. Ten hottest years were the last 10. Last year, 2024 was the hottest year in all of history.

Yesterday in parts of the Persian Gulf, 52.6 degrees, and for those of us who use Fahrenheit, 126.7 degrees. A few days ago in Pakistan, 50.5 degrees, that’s 122.9 in Fahrenheit. And they’re telling us that as the temperatures go up and the humidity goes up, the few areas in the world today that are labeled physiologically unlivable for human beings are due to expand quite dramatically by 2070 unless we act to cover all of these vast, heavily populated areas.

Is it realistic to ignore this crisis? Look at what a few million climate refugees have done to promote authoritarianism and ultra nationalism. How can we handle 1 to 2 billion in the next 25 years? Already here in Kenya, there are 800,000 refugees. 300,000 of them in in this place, where of course the USAID cuts are now cutting the food aid 70%. Is that what they mean by adaptation?

We have to also ask if it’s realistic to ignore the devastating damage predicted to the global economy. Whole regions of the world are becoming uninsurable. We see this in my country where people are having their insurance canceled, they can’t get it renewed. We have seen predictions that we could lose $25 trillion in the next 25 years just from the loss of the value of global housing properties.

And over the next half century, according to Deloitte, it would cost the economy $178 trillion if we don’t act. But if we do act, we can add to the global economy by $43 trillion. You know, I had a teacher said we face the same choice in life over and over again, the choice between the hard right and the easy wrong. It seems hard to choose correctly, but it would turn out to be even harder to take what looks like the easy wrong.

Is it realistic to ignore the fact that right now Greenland is losing 30 million tonnes of ice every single hour? In Antarctica, decade by decade, the ice melting has accelerated. We’ve seen the doubling of the pace of sea level rise in the last 20 years and the predictions are that it’s going to continue dramatically.

Is it realistic to ignore the rapidly increasing climate crisis, extreme events that are occurring, practically every night on the television news? It’s like a nature hike through the Book of Revelation. We lost 3.5 trillion dollars just in the last decade.

And you know, the fact that these scientists were absolutely correct decades ago when they predicted these exact consequences, should cause us to pay a little more attention to what they’re predicting is in store for us in the years ahead if we do not act. The drought last year and continuing at some level in the Amazon, the worst drought in the history of the Brazilian Amazon, 90% of the Amazon River in Colombia went dry.

This is the third year in a row that we’ve had these massive fires in Canada. When I left Tennessee to fly over here, we were breathing in Nashville, Tennessee, smoke from the Canadian wildfires. And they’re still getting worse today. The wildfires have doubled over the last 20 years in frequency and they’re due to increase even more.

Is it realistic to ignore the massive health impacts of the climate crisis? You know, the University of, well, the World Health Organization has long told us it is the most serious health threat facing humanity. Just last week the University of Manchester released a new study warning that three species of fungi in the next 15 years, because of increasing temperatures and increasing precipitation, will pose a significant risk of infection to millions of people. The fact that the fungi are being pushed into the range where they can threaten humans, that is not a fiction.

The particulate air pollution from the burning of fossil fuels kills almost 9 million people a year, costs almost $3 trillion per year from the burning of fossil fuels for both energy and petrochemicals. Let me show you an example from my country. Cancer Alley is the stretch that runs from New Orleans to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. All these red plumes are particulate pollution that people are breathing in.

The green areas by the way are are majority minority, mostly African-American areas. In the middle of Cancer Alley, Reserve, Louisiana has the highest cancer rate in the United States, 50 times the national average, and they want to put even more petrochemical facilities there.

Is it realistic to totally ignore the acidification of the world’s oceans? 30% more acid than before the industrial revolution and 93% of all the heat is being absorbed in the oceans. That’s why the coral reefs are in such danger. 84% in danger right now, we’ve seen massive die offs.

That’s why a lot of the fish are at risk. 40 to 60 percent of all the fish species face an extremely high risk, as the rivers and estuaries, where they have spawning and in their embryonic stages, continue to heat up. And 50 percent of all living species that we share this planet with are at risk of extinction.

Is it realistic to ignore that? My faith tradition tells me that Noah was commanded to save the species of this earth. I think we have a moral obligation as well. Is it realistic to ignore the predictions of a fresh water scarcity crisis? Already 40% are are facing water scarcities.

In the mountain glaciers here in the Himalayas, one quarter of the world’s population depends on that meltwater, but depending on whether or not we act, 80% of all those glaciers will disappear in this century.

We can act. Now this just happened in Switzerland. A 600-year-old city was completely destroyed by a glacial avalanche. Now they’re adapting.

Is this realistic? To put white sheets over the remaining parts of the glacier? Well, God bless them, I hope it works. But these are the kinds of extreme measures that people are being pushed to in order to avoid reducing the burning of fossil fuels. Because the fossil fuel industry and their petrostate and financial allies have control over policy.

In lots of cities, particularly in places like India, the water wells are going dry. In Bengaluru, 4 million people now have to buy expensive water trucked in because their wells have gone dry.

What about the food crisis that scientists are predicting? Is it realistic to ignore that as well in order to avoid doing anything to reduce fossil fuel emissions?

Now, why also, do these so-called climate realists ignore all the good news about the miraculous decline in the cost of the alternatives to fossil fuel? Is it possibly because their business models are threatened ff there is a cheaper, cleaner alternative that creates many more jobs? Might not be good for them the way they calculate it. But the rest of us have a stake in this.

This could be why they’ve been consistently wrong in their predictions in the past. For example, Exxon Mobil in the year of the Paris agreement had a prediction about solar capacity in 2040, 840 gigawatts. Well, this year we’ve already tripled the number that they predicted for 15 years from now. In OPEC the same year predicted electric vehicle sales would barely increase.

Well, they were wrong. Here’s what it is actual sales to date right now. Same year, OPEC predicted that it was just unrealistic to think that solar power would ever be able to compete in cost with the burning of fossil fuels, but now it is by far the cheapest source of electricity in all of history.

Now, you know, a lot of other people have been surprised by how quickly these costs have come down. University of Oxford studied 3,000 past projections and the average predicted decline was 2.6% a year, the reality was 15% per year. And when you compound the number like that, it makes quite a difference.

Here are all the past projections from the International Energy Agency of what solar energy was likely to do. Their projections year by year. And here is the reality of what has actually happened. Uh, it really is quite extraordinary. My goodness. Nobody could have imagined that it would be this incredible, but it is, and it’s right before us, and they still want to ignore it.

Since 2015, the world has installed twice as much solar as all fossil fuels combined. Solar is the breakout winner in fuel sources. Electric vehicles have increased 34 times over since the time of the Paris agreement. Vehicle sales in China, 52% are already EVs and within five years the prediction is 82% of all car sales will be electric vehicles.

Also by the way, China in April installed 45 gigawatts of new solar capacity in one month. That’s the equivalent of 45 brand new giant nuclear reactors in in one month. It’s actually incredible what is happening and the cost of all of these clean energy technologies has come down quite dramatically, particularly solar and even more dramatic is utility-scale batteries, 87% down. That’s making a huge difference as well.

But I have to say this, there’s one thing that the so-called climate realists are right about. In spite of this progress, we are still moving too slowly to meet the goals of the Paris agreement. We have got to accelerate it. We have the ability to do so, but the single biggest reason we have not been able to move faster is the ferocious opposition to virtually every policy proposal to try to speed up this transition and reduce the emissions from the burning of fossil fuels.

And the fossil fuel industry has used a lot of bright, shiny objects to divert the public’s attention and deceive them into thinking there are solutions other than reducing fossil fuel use. For example, carbon capture and storage and direct air capture and the recycling of plastics. And, you know, they’re much better at capturing politicians than they are at capturing emissions.

They’re employing their captive politicians and policymakers to help confuse the public. Here’s an example. Tony Blair, speaking for his foundation, his foundation gets massive funding from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Azerbaijan, etc. He said, “Oh, well, the center of the battle has to be carbon capture and direct air capture.”

Well, he really should know better. You know, Upton Sinclair wrote in my country, years ago, “It’s difficult to get a man to understand something if his income depends on him not understanding it.” The income goes to the foundation, as I understand it.

But here is carbon capture. These are the ones operational. These are the ones that have applied for permits. These are the ones that have had the big public announcements. Oh, boy, look, we’re going for carbon capture.

We don’t have to reduce the burning of fossil fuel. We’ll capture it all as it goes out the smokestack. It is a fraud. It is a deception imposed on the people in order to try to change policy and to make the policy what they want.

And because they’ve captured the politicians, they have been able to force the taxpayers in countries around the world to subsidize fossil fuels, to actually subsidize the destruction of humanity’s future. What would happen if we got rid of those subsidies?

Well, the International Monetary Fund said that we would get $4.4 trillion in savings, which happens to be just about the exact amount we need to finance the transition to renewable energy. That’s where a lot of the money can come from. We’d also save a lot of lives and we we’d also reduce emissions by a third in five years and we’d reduce income inequality.

So, is it realistic to ignore this urgent need to reform the world’s financial infrastructure so that we can properly invest in the climate crisis? Most of the financing comes from private sources, but developing countries are not getting their share of it. We need to reform the policies that are leading to this because 100% of the increased emissions expected are going to come from the developing countries.

We’re about to see massive reductions in emissions. It’s really it may have already started especially in China with all their renewables, but the developing countries, that’s where the emissions increases are due to take place. And yet they only receive less than 19% of the world’s financing for clean energy, but almost 50% of the money flooding in for more fossil fuels. The single U.S. state of Florida has more solar panels than the entire continent of Africa.

That is a disgrace because Africa has 60% of the world’s prime solar resources, yet only 1.6% of the financing for renewable energy. But look at what’s happening with the investments for fossil fuels in Africa. There’s a dash for gas, there all of these new facilities. There are three times as many fossil fuel pipelines under construction and proposed for construction to begin in Africa as in all of North America.

Uh and you take those LNG terminals, the cost of one of them, there are 71 in in the works, 31 already existing, $25 billion. That’s the exact amount that would provide universal energy access to all of Africa. So maybe we could spend that money a little bit better. But instead of financing actual energy access to renewable energy, they want access to the resources to export it from Africa instead of giving access for Africans.

You know the potential for solar and wind in in Africa is 400 times larger than the potential energy from fossil fuels. Every single country in Africa could have 100% energy access using less than 1% of its land. Most including the country we’re in, less than one .1%. of their land.

What else are they ignoring? Well, they’re ignoring that with solar and wind, you don’t face the fuel supply chain risk, that you don’t face price volatility for fuel. Look at what’s happening energy oil and gas soaring because of the war in the Middle East. In fact, they don’t have an annual fuel cost at all.

So we should be moving in this direction, not least because it creates three times as many jobs for each dollar spent as compared to a dollar spent on fossil fuels. Why do they also ignore the fact that methane is as bad as coal when the leaks are factored in and the leaks are ubiquitous. And right now in the European Union, the fossil fuel lobbyists are arguing as hard as they can to stop legislation to try to deal with methane leaks because they think it’ll cause them some money.

So, what’s really behind this preposterous theory call they call climate realism? Could it be that they’re kind of panicking a little bit about the loss of their markets? According to the IEA, all of the fossil fuels are projected to peak within the next few years. We’ve seen since the Paris agreement a complete turnaround in where the majority of investment is going, and emissions may have already peaked in several of these sectors and this is according to the climate trace precise measurements of peaking and a lot of these sectors are ones that need even more attention.

Agriculture, steel, etc. But last year, if you look at all the new electricity installed worldwide, 93% of it was renewable, mostly solar. So, the IEA has told us long since. We have all the technologies we need and proven deployment models to reduce emissions 50% in this decade. And clear line of sight to the other 50%.

A friend of mine in Tennessee said, “If God wanted us to have unlimited free energy, he’d have put a giant fusion reactor in the sky.” Well, if you look at how long it took to install a gigawatt of solar 20 years ago, a full year, now it’s down to 15 hours and it’s on the way down still.

So, here’s what I believe that the climate, so-called climate realists are most wrong about. They don’t believe that we the people who live on this planet, have the capacity to make the changes necessary to save our future.

The greatest president in my country’s history, Abraham Lincoln, said at a time of dire crisis, “The occasion is piled high with difficulty. We must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, we must think anew.”

I believe that we as human beings have the capacity to recognize that our survival is at stake and that we need to move faster even though the big polluters have the political and economic power to try to block us.

We’ve got everything we need. The people are demanding change. The one thing that they tell us might be in short supply is political will, but always remember, political will is itself a renewable resource. Let’s get out there and renew it.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Key Themes:

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Can the great barrier reef be saved from climate change? Theresa Fyffe gives us some insights at TED 2025

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I often write about the storytelling side of climate change, as this modern day phenomenon will shape billions of stories in the coming decades. Some of the effects can be seen and felt above ground — fiercer storms, more intense fires, increased temperatures, droughts, etc. — but a very different sort of damage is occurring out of sight, below the surface of our oceans.

Coral reefs are one such example that have been given a great deal of attention, as they are under assault in much of the world, and no spot has achieved more notice than the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. In her talk at TED 2025, Theresa Fyffe talks about the work being done to reverse this trend.

As you can imagine, the full story is quite complicated, and Theresa could speak for hours on the topic. But in ten minutes she give able to give us an overview of the situation. She doesn’t tell the entire story, but does tell us enough to get us up to date, and hopefully to inspire us to dive further into what’s happening on the reef. Check out her TED Talk: A new lifeline for the world’s coral reefs.

Coral reefs are the most biodiverse ecosystem on our entire blue planet, home to more than a quarter of all marine life.

Key Points of Concern:

  • Coral reefs affect the livelihoods of over one billion people
  • They’re also anchoring the economies of over 100 nations
  • Rising ocean temperatures can cause coral bleaching
  • Already we have lost half of the world’s coral reefs
  • By 2050 90% of coral could be lost

As the Executive Director Impact of the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, Theresa has a front-row seat to the innovative processes that are now being deployed to rebuild damaged reefs. Review the section from 4:09 to 4:56. In just 93 words & 47 seconds, she changes the tone of the talk, pivoting from problem to solution, and setting the stage for the balance of her story. She doesn’t go into depth, or use complex jargon that the audience won’t understand.

When Theresa introduces Uncle Bob, a Wopabara man from the Great Barrier Reef, her talk shifts from technology to human — it’s the story block I refer to as Someone Else’s Story — and we learn about the impact this innovation can have if deployed. To be honest, I would have enjoyed hearing more about Uncle Bob. By adding a minute, I would have developed a deeper connection to the topic.

So I’m asking you — don’t look away. Change your perspective and join us in the fight to sustain not just coral reefs, but the livelihoods, the cultures and the futures they safeguard. This isn’t game over. It’s game on.

Transcript

When I say Great Barrier Reef, what do you see? If you grew up in the 2000s, I’m guessing it might be Nemo and his best friend, Dory.

Or perhaps it’s this. It’s the best part of my job. Taking people underwater to witness such a wonder and so much life. Coral reefs are the most biodiverse ecosystem on our entire blue planet, home to more than a quarter of all marine life.

They are food, livelihoods and coastal protection for more than one billion people. They anchor the economies of over 100 nations and hold deep cultural significance for saltwater First Nations peoples, who see coral reefs as their family and the creators of life.

But increasingly, when I say Great Barrier Reef, people think of this. Or even worse, this. Sadly, our reef, my reef, has become the poster child for climate change. And here’s why.

Coral polyps, the tiny animals that build reefs, are incredibly sensitive to warming oceans. When stressed by heat, they expel the algae that nourish them, exposing their skeletons and turning them white, a phenomenon called coral bleaching.

Now a bleached coral isn’t dead, but it is sick and starving. And if temperatures stay too high for too long, it dies. Coral reefs are the absolute lifeblood of a thriving ocean. We thought them too big and too important to fail.

Already we have lost half of the world’s coral reefs. In 2024, the global extent of coral bleaching reached 53 countries and every ocean on Earth. By 2050, 90 percent of corals could be lost, and with coral reefs thought to be one of the most vulnerable ecosystems to climate change, we could witness their extinction in our lifetime.

Because of this, many people have already given up. They see the problem as just too big and the progress too slow. But I haven’t given up. And I’m here to tell you why you shouldn’t give up either. Prior to working at the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, I worked in medical research, and the parallels are surprisingly striking.

While many cancers have no cure, a cancer diagnosis is no longer a death sentence due to the expanding toolkit of treatments. This is how we must think of coral reefs. Yes, we need the cure. The solutions to climate change itself.

But right now, corals also need treatments to buy them time. Enter reef restoration. Reef restoration has been around since about the 1970s, mainly through coral gardening. It’s pretty simple. You take small pieces of coral, you grow them in an underwater nursery, and when big enough, you replant them in a reef.

While an important part of the reef restoration toolkit, this approach is slow, expensive and very difficult to scale. As a result, it is thought that less than 200,000 corals are planted across the world’s oceans each year, with many of these corals not surviving. We needed a breakthrough.

Over the past five years, 350 Australian scientists and engineers have been working on just that: technology to make reef restoration faster, cheaper and smarter. We’ve made more advancements in the last five years than the previous 50.

Using an automated process, we can now produce millions of baby corals, not just thousands. We can naturally increase the heat tolerance of these corals so they are better adapted to warming oceans. And we have developed ceramic cradles for mass deployment, eliminating the need for divers to replant each piece of coral by hand.

But in a race against time, the key to dramatically scaling our impact is to deploy this technology in a highly targeted way. We will focus our restoration solution on the reefs that are the most connected to other reefs via the ocean’s natural currents.

By seeding these highly connected reefs with more heat-tolerant corals, their subsequent and stronger offspring will be spread far and wide. By using this precision approach across the Pacific, restoring as little as three percent of coral reefs can drive the recovery of 50 percent of the entire ecosystem. This would be restoration on an unprecedented scale. And we’re making it local. Thank you.

Packaging these technologies into portable coral micro-nurseries for coastal communities to own and operate. The productivity of one single micronursery is expected to exceed that of all global coral gardening efforts combined today.

By 2031, we will be planting 1.2 million heat-tolerant surviving corals per year, about 30 times more than planted across the Pacific today. By 2040, it is our ambition to increase the global scale of reef restoration by 120 times. But we know — Thank you.

We know that the technology on its own isn’t enough. To have real impact, this technology needs to be in the hands of those on the front line, those that know the oceans best.

Meet Uncle Bob, a Woppaburra man from the Great Barrier Reef. His people have been caring for their sea country for millennia. Now when Bob talks to me of his country, he says, “Country is sick, country is crying.”

But with this technology, his community is empowered to be the first responders to heal their sea country by blending this modern innovation with their ancient knowledge. For many coral reefs, unfortunately, it is already too late. But for the half of the world’s reefs, including our Great Barrier Reef, that call the Pacific home, there is still time.

These corals haven’t given up. They are still resilient. They can regenerate. So if the corals haven’t given up, how can we? Now hope without a plan, it’s nothing more than a wish. But thanks to the generosity of the TED community, we have a plan. A lifeline for coral reefs.

So I’m asking you — don’t look away. Change your perspective and join us in the fight to sustain not just coral reefs, but the livelihoods, the cultures and the futures they safeguard. This isn’t game over. It’s game on.

Thank you.

Back to you…

If you have a complex topic that you want to talk about, whether it’s a scientific story or not, think about how Theresa was able to craft a narrative that was both brief and informative. That explained the problem and solution. That ended on a hopeful note, but in this case, with a call to action too. After someone hears your story, what do you want them to think, to feel, and to do? Have you enlightened them? Inspired them? Given them food for thought?

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Shahram Izadi: The Next Computer? Your Glasses @ TED 2025

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Now that the 2025 version of the TED Conference has concluded, I’ll be posting a series of articles that will highlight some of the best talks. And their new tagline, “Ideas Change Everything”, inspired me to come up with a similar phrase, which is, “Personal Stories Change Everything”, so watch these talks through a lens of improving your own storytelling prowess.

In this talk from Shahram Izadi, titled, The Next Computer? Your Glasses, we get a glimpse into a future technology that brings the power of AI into our daily lives by way of eye-ware. Adopting the metaphor of seeing the world anew, this demo exceeded my expectations, and it had me wondering how our view of the world might change in the coming years.

Shahram Izadi is a British-Iranian computer scientist known for his contributions in extended reality, augmented reality, computer vision, human-computer interaction and artificial intelligence. ~ Wikipedia

Are you ready for this technology upgrade? And what if everyone were wearing these glasses? If the purpose is simply to provide information, it wouldn’t seem to be problem, but what if these glasses came with face recognition capability? Maybe there will be security protocols in place to prevent that, but anyone with the technological prowess could (I imagine) bypass such limitations.

It’s interesting to ponder how all our experiences, and thus our personal stories, could be transformed by the wave of AI technology that is soon coming our way. Our smartphones are becoming AI aware already. So they can perform tasks for us, which is cool, but every interaction will be tracked by the applications we’re using. Are you okay with that? I’m on the fence at the moment.

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Transcript

Shahram Izadi: For our entire lives, we’ve been living for a computing revolution. Many of you here in this room have contributed to it, with leaps forward in compute, connectivity, mobile technologies, and now AI. For my part, I’ve dedicated my entire career to augmented reality, fusing the real world with computing experiences.

I started this journey about 25 years ago for my PhD. It might sound groundbreaking, but check out these early prototypes. The technology was really primitive back then, but the potential felt limitless when we were experimenting in that university lab.

What I didn’t know at that time was that many of the fundamental innovations for my work would come from AI researchers in a different lab. While I was helping computers see the world, these AI researchers were helping computers reason about the world.

Since then, large language models and multimodal reasoning have enabled richer language and image understanding. These models are now fast enough for live conversations where the AI can act on your behalf and, most importantly, with your permission.

And augmented reality and virtual reality has moved computing from the rectangular screen to the 360 immersive display to now even the world itself becoming the display. We now refer to this broad collection of experiences as extended reality or XR.

Until now, these innovations have occurred separately and in silos. Well here comes act two of the computing revolution. AI and XR are converging, unlocking radical new ways to interact with technology on your terms.

Computers will become more lightweight and personal. They will share your vantage point, understand your real-world context and have a natural interface that’s both simple and conversational.

Countless people and companies are innovating in this space, including many on the TED stage this week. We’re excited to contribute to this momentum with Android XR. It’s an operating system we’re building with Samsung that brings XR hardware together with Gemini, our AI assistant, to augment human intelligence.

It can support a broad range of devices, from headsets to glasses to form factors we haven’t even dreamed of yet. OK, let me show you where we’re heading by inviting my colleague Nishtha to the stage. Welcome, Nishtha.

(Applause)

Nishtha Bhatia: Hi.

SI: These ordinary-looking glasses are packed full of technology. A miniaturized camera and microphones give the AI the ability to see and hear the world. Speakers let you listen to the AI and play music or even take calls. And these glasses also have a tiny, high-resolution in-lens display that’s full color that I’m holding in my hand. It’s very, very small.

These glasses work with your phone streaming back and forth, allowing the glasses to be very lightweight and access all your phone apps. And if you’re wondering, I’m actually wearing the glasses too. They’re actually helping me see all of you in the audience because they have prescription lenses inside them. But they’re also displaying my speaker notes for me as well.

(Laughter)

For this demo, you’ll see what Nishtha is seeing on the screen behind her. And this is the very first time we’re showing these glasses in public. So this is going to be a live demo of conceptual hardware, early software. What could go wrong? Nishtha, best of luck. No pressure.

NB: Amazing. Alright, let’s just make sure that these glasses are shown on the screen behind us. OK.

[Glasses screen off]

Awesome.

(Applause)

NB: Now I’m going to launch Gemini.

Gemini: Hello there.

NB: Hi, Gemini. Can you start us off with something fun and creative, and write a haiku for what I’m seeing right now?

G: Sure. Faces all aglow. Eager minds await the words. Sparks of thought ignite.

SI: Some anxious but happy faces as well, yeah. As you can see, the AI sees what Nishtha sees, hears what she hears and is responding in real time. But that’s just table stakes. I think everyone in this audience has seen demos like this before. Let’s actually step it up a notch with something we call Memory. For a rolling contextual window, the AI remembers what you see without having to be told what to keep track of.

NB: So you guys may have noticed I snuck a peek back at the shelf a moment ago.
I wasn’t paying attention, but let’s see if Gemini was. Hey, did you happen to catch the title of the white book that was on the shelf behind me?

G: The white book is “Atomic Habits” by James Clear.

NB: That is absolutely right. So let’s try something harder. I keep losing my hotel key card. Do you know where I last left the card?

G: The hotel key card is to the right of the music record.

NB: Great.

SI: For someone as forgetful as me, that’s a killer app. OK, this AI is inherently multimodal. So it’s using visual data and natural language to digest complex queries in real time while remembering your past context. Nishtha, let’s see some more.

NB: Yeah, let’s bring this book back. So I don’t really have time to read it right now. But I wonder if Gemini might be able to help me summarize what’s going on. Like, I don’t know. What does this diagram mean? It looks complex.

G: This diagram is labeled “The Habit Line” and illustrates the process of habit formation. It shows how automaticity increases with repetitions until a habit is formed.

NB: OK.

SI: Now imagine being able to communicate and understand any language. The AI can shift its output to speak different languages with dialects and accents that feel human and natural.

NB: Yeah, let’s go to this sign over here. Can you translate this to English for me?

G: The sign states: “Private property, no trespassing.”

SI: OK, let’s prove this is a live demo. Does anyone in the audience have a suggestion for a different language to translate to?

Audience: Farsi.

SI: Farsi. We tried Farsi, it failed last time, but let’s try it again.

NB: Do you want to try Farsi?

SI: Because I do speak Farsi. It’s my mother tongue, so thank you.

NB: Gemini, let’s just give this a shot. Can you translate this sign to Farsi for us?

G: (Speaking Farsi)

SI: Great, awesome. It speaks Farsi.

NB: That’s amazing. So, as Shahram mentioned, you all may have seen translation demos like this before, but what’s new now is that in addition to just saying things in a different language, I can also speak to Gemini in another language. I know Hindi, so let’s give this a shot.

(Speaks Hindi)

G: (Speaks Hindi)

NB: So Gemini said you all look focused and excited, and it has a better accent than I do.

(Laughter)

SI: Alright, now let’s see how the AI can connect the physical world with your digital content and take action.

NB: Yeah, let’s get some music going in here. OK, Gemini, why don’t you play us a track from this record?

GB: Sure, here’s “Bad Dreams” by Teddy Swims.

(Music)

SI: Perfect. In a few seconds, the AI recognized the album, looked up the tracklist and took action using the phone apps. OK, Nishtha, it does look like the demo gods are with us. Maybe with you more than me. Let’s do one last demo I know you’re keen to give.

NB: Yes, this is my first time in Vancouver, and I love going on walks. So why don’t you navigate me to a park nearby with views of the ocean?

G: OK, I am starting navigation to Lighthouse Park, which has magnificent views of the Pacific Ocean. Is there anything else I can assist you with?

NB: Honestly, with these directions and a 3D map, I should be all set, and hopefully I won’t look like a tourist. Thank you all.

(Applause)

SI: Thank you, Nishtha, that was awesome. OK, we’ve seen glasses. Now let’s turn our attention to the other side of the spectrum: headsets. You’ve seen these types of devices before, but when we first brought AI to a headset, it completely caught me by surprise.

For this demo, we’re going to use the Project Moohan headset that Samsung is launching later this year. Compared to glasses, headsets give you an infinite display for getting work done or immersing yourself in a movie, or maybe a TED Talk at some point. Let me bring up my colleague Max to show us even more. Hey, Max.

Max Spear: Hello.

(Applause)

SI: And the same thing is going to go here. You’ll see exactly what Max is seeing behind on the screen. Go for it, Max.

MS: Let’s do it. You’ll notice we start grounded in the real world. And I’m going to control the entire system with my eyes, hands and voice. But where things get really interesting is when we invite Gemini in as this conversational companion that can come with us anywhere.

G: Hello.

MS: Hey, Gemini, can you bring up my trip planner for me, please?

G: Of course. Opening up your trip planner.

MS: Cool, but I left these windows really disorganized. Can you help with that?

G: Of course I can help with that.

SI: No clicks, no keyboards. It’s just a conversation. And the AI is taking action. OK, some more audience participation. Someone shout out a name of a place you want to visit.

Audience: Melbourne.
Audience: Cape Town.

SI: Let’s go to Cape Town.

Max: OK, sounds fun. Can you please take me to Cape Town?

G: Certainly. Let me help with organizing the windows.

SI (Laughs)

MS: Awesome. And can you also take me to Cape Town?

(Laughter)

G: I can certainly do that. Let me take you to Cape Town.

MS: And we’re very organized as we go there, perfect.

SI: As you can see, the AI is taking Max’s requests, figuring out how best to answer it, opening up the Maps app. And from there, he can actually explore anywhere in the world in this 3D view.

MS: OK, this is pretty incredible. Viewing the world from this angle, I can even zoom in to city levels. But what’s really interesting is having an AI here who can see what I see. Can you tell me more about the significance of this place?

G: I can indeed provide information about Table Mountain. Table Mountain holds a profound significance, deeply rooted in both its natural splendor and its rich cultural history. It has long been a spiritual and cultural symbol for the Indigenous Khoekhoe and San people.

MS: OK, very good, Gemini. I’ll come back to this later. It also does look like a table, that’s handy.

SI: OK, Max, let’s bring this closer to home. How about exploring winter sports, seeing that we’re in Vancouver.

MS: OK, let’s get some inspiration for Shahram. Can you please show me 360 videos of this?

[Powder snowboarding]

G: Sure, here are some 360-degree powder snowboarding videos.

MS: OK, I’m kind of new to snowboarding, so hopefully this video will help me learn. Although this looks already way more intense than I think I’m ready for. What was the name of that trick?

G: That’s a backside 540 with a grab.

SI: The AI knows exactly what Max is looking at, even in rich video content, and can answer any question in real-time. Max, are you sure this is Whistler?

MS: You know, Shahram, I actually have no idea. I’ve never been here before, but let’s find out. What run do you think this is?

G: It’s probably one of the ungroomed runs in summit bowl or the top section of West Ridge on Mount Bachelor, as they are close to the summit and face north towards Three Sisters and Broken Top, the prominent mountains visible in the background.

MS: OK, Mount Bachelor, Oregon, got it.

SI: OK, let’s have a little bit of fun now. Let’s have AI narrate this video. Somebody in the audience, shout out a fun narration style like, nature documentary or something like that.

Audience: Morgan Freeman.

SI: We can’t do actors, but we’ll get to that at some point. Any other suggestions?

Audience: Movie trailer.
Audience: Horror movie.

SI: Horror movie. That’s going to be — it might be gory, but let’s go for it.

MS: Slightly dark, but let’s do it. Can you please describe what you’re seeing as if you’re an overly enthusiastic character in a horror movie?

G: Oh, darling, this is simply marvelous. A desolate mountain scape. How delightfully ominous. Prepare for a chilling dance with the unknown. Where every gust of wind whispers tales of icy terror and lurking shadows.

MS: OK, Gemini, that’s great. Return to more positive things another day.

SI: OK, Max, I know there’s one last demo, and you’ve been apparently practicing your farming skills?

MS: Yes, Shahram, I’ve been excited to get back to my rural roots and also embrace one of my favorite things, which is playing games. But it becomes a whole new, next-level experience when you have an AI by your side, both to help keep you company as you play, but also to help you learn how to play these kinds of games in the first place. So, for example, what do you think I should do next here?

G: It looks like this is early in the game in “Stardew Valley.” You need to earn money, so try planting some seeds. First, use your hoe to till the soil, and then plant your seeds. It looks like you have some parsnips. Since it isn’t raining, you’ll also need to water them with your watering can.

MS: Seems like a lot, and maybe robots will do this for us one day, but for now, I’m going to have to return back to my farm later. For one last thing, can you please give a playful two-sentence summary of all the ground we covered today?

G: We soared from organizing a digital realm to traversing snowy mountains, and even found time to farm some virtual parsnips. Quite the adventure today.

MS: Quite the adventure, indeed. Thanks, Gemini.

(Applause)

SI: Fantastic, thank you Max. We’re entering an exciting new phase of the computing revolution. Headsets and glasses are just the beginning. All this points to a single vision of the future, a world where helpful AI will converge with lightweight XR. XR devices will become increasingly more wearable, giving us instant access to information.

While AI is going to become more contextually aware, more conversational, more personalized, working with us on our terms and in our language. We’re no longer augmenting our reality, but rather augmenting our intelligence.

Thank you so much.

My Concluding Thoughts

In my experience, most of the personal stories I’ve encounter live in the analog world. Yes, the internet plays a role from time to time — social media & dating apps, etc. — but it’s more of a sideline.

AI, however, is a different sort of digital beast. One that is increasingly infiltrating every corner of our daily endeavors. And I’m wondering how that will change our perception. If this TED Talk is an indicator of future trends, the shift could be big.

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Carole Cadwalladr: This Is What a Digital Coup Looks Like @ TED 2025

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Having spent my career in the computer industry, I’ve long been fascinated by digital technology. For most of those years, my experience was positive. Every invention, every new plateau of features and performance only increased my wonderment and appreciation. The internet’s potential was so mind-boggling.

And that positive viewpoint continued into the early days of social media, but began to sour as those platforms devolved into the hot mess they are today. (that topic is worthy of a very long article, but I’ll spare you for now)

When artificial intelligence came to my attention around 5 years ago it seemed interesting, but to be honest, I didn’t see how it would benefit me. After all, my passion is helping people tell impactful personal stories — stories based on an experience or an idea — so I didn’t see AI as a meaningful tool. But 2 years ago their potential became more apparent. The way in which they could assimilate information made search engines look like Ford Model Ts.

But my enthusiasm became a bit tarnished as I explored the technology further. Not only were all those LLMs (Large Language Models) being trained on massive amounts of intellectual property that was never paid for, they were also sucking up increasing amounts of personal data. And as many other software programs and apps wove AI into their code, that trend continued to accelerate.

Is the greatest technological invention becoming the greatest threat to humanity?

That’s what I started to wonder, as it seemed to me from recent reports that any sense of morality in the AI space was being pushed aside in an effort to “win” the race for dominance. The icing on the cake came when the Silicon Valley oligarchy bowed down to the oligarchy residing in Washington D.C. 

So I was keenly interested in hearing Carole Cadwalladr‘s take on this situation when she spoke at the 2025 TED Conference. Carole was an important figure in exposing the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica scandal, so she was no stranger to the potential for tech to subvert democracy and cause great harm to society.

The Russian and American presidents are now speaking the same words. They are telling the same lies. We are watching the collapse of the international order in real time, and this is just the start. Coups are like concrete. When they stop moving, they set. It is already later than we think.

Her talk was a chilling reminder of other times in history when the power-elite ignored the rights and needs of the many to satisfy their own maniacal need for wealth and power. When there is no check-and-balance — which is the case in the United States, as the current administration will make no effort to protect citizen’s rights — things always go from bad to worse.

Follow the data. It’s always the data. It’s the crack cocaine of Silicon Valley. You know, the first thing that Elon Musk did was to send his cyber troops into the US Treasury to get access to the data. That is not a coincidence, it’s a hack.

Time will tell how this story will play out, but my big concern is that the personal stories of millions (if not billions) will be adversely affected by some of the ways in which AI is being utilized. With honor and integrity in short supply, this is one topic worth paying close attention to. The next 2-3 years will be most critical.

I’ve worked with a lot of speakers who have important stories to tell on a range of subjects, from the science of climate change to their efforts intended to bring peace to the world or how to improve the education system. As you listen to her story, think about how your expertise could enlighten an audience and inspire them to think differently about an important topic.

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Transcript

I’ve been feeling a lot of panic and fear about this talk, and not just from the normal reasons of public speaking, although that’s there too. But it’s also because I want to say something meaningful, and I’ve been overwhelmed by the enormity of what is happening right now.

And there’s a particular set of circumstances which have also been feeding into my confusion and denial. And that is because the last time that I stood on this stage, it led to a three-year legal battle, culminated in London’s High Court, in which it felt like I was on trial for my life, because I was. My career, my reputation, my finances, even my home was on the line.

All because I came here to warn you that I didn’t think democracy was going to survive the technology that you’re building, however incredible it is. In fact, I was the person who almost didn’t survive. And pretty much everything that I was warning about is now coming true.

I can’t sugarcoat it. It’s a bit of a headfuck.

I have a lot of emotions about coming here, and TED also, I suspect, is feeling them too. But what actually I finally realized yesterday is that the denial and the confusion that I’ve been feeling is maybe what you’re feeling too.

I felt powerless for a really long time. So if that’s what you’re feeling, I get it. But we have to act now. My alarm system is ringing again.

There are things that we can do. In my case, I survived, and you will too. But it’s by learning how to fight back. This is my guide, and it has to start with naming it.

It’s a coup. I know you probably don’t want to hear that, and especially here, but we can’t fight it if we can’t see it, and we can’t see it if we don’t name it.
(Applause)

The Russian and American presidents are now speaking the same words. They are telling the same lies. We are watching the collapse of the international order in real time, and this is just the start. Coups are like concrete. When they stop moving, they set. It is already later than we think.

This image – some of you in this room might know these people. I call it “Tech Bros in Hostage Situations.” It’s a message to you. This is Putin’s playbook. He allows a business elite to make untold riches in exchange for absolute loyalty. Some people are calling this oligarchy, but it’s actually bigger than that. These are global platforms.

It’s broligarchy.

(Laughter and Applause)

There is an alignment of interests that runs from through Silicon Valley to what is now a coming autocracy. It’s a type of power that the world has never seen before.

Follow the data. It’s always the data. It’s the crack cocaine of Silicon Valley. You know, the first thing that Elon Musk did was to send his cyber troops into the US Treasury to get access to the data. That is not a coincidence, it’s a hack. That data is now feeding AIs that are choosing who to sack and who to replace – sorry, eliminate fraud and waste.

(Laughter)

When we broke the Cambridge Analytica story about the harvesting 87 million people’s Facebook data, people freaked out, rightly. This is chicken feed compared to that, but it is the blueprint. It’s always the data.

Protect your private life. Which is why it’s so important you start thinking about your private life. The broligarchy doesn’t want you to have one. This is the old headquarters of the East German secret police. They kept detailed files on almost one in three of their citizens. That is nothing compared to what Google has on every single one of us, and hundreds of other companies. The entire business model of Silicon Valley is surveillance. It harvests our data in order to sell us stuff. We are already living inside the architecture of totalitarianism.

(Applause)

It may not have been deliberate, but we now have to start acting as if we live in East Germany, and Instagram is the Stasi.

Politics is downstream from culture. So I actually learned this from somebody who I think of as one of the great philosophers of our age: Steve Bannon.

(Laughter)

He actually stole it from somebody else. But it’s not politicians who have the power. He knows that. It’s why he’s a podcast bro these days. But culture now is just what’s next on your phone. And that’s AI. Culture is AI now. And forget the killer robots. If you want to know what the first great AI apocalypse is, we’re already living it. It’s total information collapse.

And if you take one thing only away from this talk, it’s:

Politics is technology now. And that’s why everybody in this room, you can’t look away. It’s why your CEOs have been taken captive and are paraded on TV like hostages. But you, you have a choice.

Individuals are stronger than institutions. So Trump, he calls the press the enemies of the people, and he probably doesn’t even know that he’s quoting Stalin. So, what happened to me is a playbook, and it’s now coming for all sorts of other people.

It was actually a friend of this guy who came after me, Nigel Farage, it’s a Brexit funder. I’m not going to go super into the details. But 19, sorry, 19 press freedom organizations called the lawsuit against me a SLAPP. That means it’s a strategic litigation against public participation. A really long-winded way of saying it’s using law as a weapon to shut people up, not just journalists, but other public people too, and it works.

I just want to tell you about one aspect of the litigation which I found terrifying, and that was the data harvesting. There’s this quote, you may know it, Cardinal Richelieu: “If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him.” In my case, the first forensic searches of my phone and laptop yielded 40,000 pieces of data.

This is my messages, my emails, my voice memos, my personal life. And the whole thing about this, the attack which came for me was really personal, because the thing about this litigation isn’t is only one part of the playbook. It was also this sort of massive online campaign of abuse which is just day after day after day after day after day because my most unforgivable crime was reporting while female. It was a digital witch burning.

And I believe that this man came after me personally, not because the Guardian and not Ted, it was because I looked like the weakest link. But he was wrong.

(Applause)

30,000 people rose up to support me. They contributed almost a million pounds to a legal defense fund because they saw a bully trying to crush me, and they would not let it stand. And it always makes me emotional when I think about that. I just heard somebody was saying the camera person, I don’t know where they are, contributed.

This whole talk is actually my gratitude towards everybody who did that. But it’s also why I know about what we have to do next. You know, Trump is suing news organizations and every day they’re settling. These are big corporates with corporate interests. Not everybody can stand up to power, but there are people who are doing it, and we can support them. We have to have each other’s backs right now because we are the cavalry now.

There are facts & we can know them. You know, this is really important to me, but I spoke to a UK libel lawyer before this talk. I want to say that there is an awful lot of facts set down in a High Court judgment. And we’re actually taking the case now to the European Court of Human Rights. We’re testing the UK on its laws around freedom of expression.

So look after facts, you’ll miss them when they’ve gone. This is Wayback Machine, give them money. They’re trying to preserve the internet as it’s being deleted day by day.

(Applause)

History is our best chance of getting out of this. You know, you probably know this phrase, “Do not obey in advance.” That’s Tim Snyder, who’s a historian of authoritarianism. We now are in techno-authoritarianism. We have to learn how to digitally disobey. That can be as simple as the drop-down box: Don’t accept the cookies, don’t give your real name, download Signal, the encrypted messaging app. Don’t bomb Yemen. Don’t add the editor of The Atlantic to your group chats.

(Laughter)

Don’t experiment on children. Ah, don’t experiment on children. You know, social mores change. We don’t send children down coal mines anymore. And in years to come, allowing your child to be data harvested from birth will be considered child abuse. You didn’t know, but now you do. Privacy is power.

And we have more of it than we think. I had this little epiphany yesterday in which I realized actually the moments when I felt most powerless were the moments that I felt I was actually most powerful. It was because my journalism had impact.

We have more power than we think. They want us to feel powerless, that’s the plan. There is so much though that we can learn from people who’ve been through this before. Alexei Navalny, the leader of the Russian opposition, he always talked about a beautiful Russia of the future. He painted a vision. There is a beautiful internet of the future, free from corporate capture and data tracking. We can build it. It is going to take a movement, but we can learn from movements that there have been before us.

This is my colleagues and I on strike in December because my news organization, The Guardian, decided to sell our corner of it, The Observer, the Sunday title. And it was a battle we really didn’t need at this time, and we didn’t actually win. But, you know, you can’t win every battle, but you definitely won’t win if you don’t fight.

So I’m gonna, I want to leave you with this. This is ChatGPT writing a TED Talk in the style of Carole Cadwalladr. And it is creepily plausible. But what it doesn’t know, because AI is actually as dumb as a rock, is that I am going to turn to Sam Altman, who is coming here, a Ted speaker, and say that this does not belong to you. ChatGPT has been trained on my IP, my labor, my personal data.

(Applause)

And I did not consent. You know, The Guardian has effectively got rid of more than 100 journalists. We actually leave the building next week. And shortly afterwards, it signed a syndication deal with OpenAI. Or as I think of it, it married its rapist. But I do not consent. And while we still have copyright laws in my country – government, UK government is trying to tear them up at the moment in order to suck up to Silicon Valley and Trump – but while we have them, use them. Because what is happening to my industry is happening to yours too. And it’s more than theft, it’s a violation. Data rights are human rights.

(Applause)

In 2019, I came here and I called out the gods of Silicon Valley. I was wrong. Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, you are not gods. You are men, and you are careless.

(Standing Ovation)

You think that by allying yourself with an autocrat, you will be protected. That’s not how history works. It’s not even how oligarchy works. This is Mikhail Khodorkovsky. He was an oligarch until he was sent to Siberia to prison for 10 years after Putin tired of him. You are sucking up to a tyrant who is trying to destroy the laws who made your businesses possible. You are collaborators. You are complicit in a regime of fear and cruelty.

But the rest of us, we all here, we have a choice. I chose to come back to Ted because I’m reclaiming my story, my words.

(Applause)

We are not powerless. The 30,000 people who supported me proved that. We are not powerless because we know who we are, and we know what we stand for. And my question to Silicon Valley is: Do you?

Thank you.

(Standing Ovation)

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