Cesar Harada (28) is an French-Japanese inventor and entrepreneur. Cesar invented a ground-breaking sailing technology, a boat that changes shape, “Protei”. Originally developed to clean up the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Protei is an Open Hardware project now developed by an international community of scientists, engineers and designers for many other applications such as nuclear radiation sensing off Japan, plastic sensing in the Pacific garbage patch, red tide studies in Mexico and much more. Cesar is also the general coordinator of the future International Ocean Station. Former Project leader at MIT, Cesar teaches Masters in Design & Environment at Goldsmiths University in London. Cesar graduated in 2009 from the Design Interactions course at the Royal College of Arts in London, his collaborative project Open_Sailing received the Ars Electronica Golden Nica award for the [NEXT IDEA].
A few days ago, I was lucky to be on stage of TEDxMidAtlantic to present Protei, a technology in development I am working on with a bunch of brilliant people (especially Open_Sailing, randomwalks and V2_ folks). Protei would be a Fleet of Oil Collecting Sailing drones. I just made this 7 minutes video that explains how it works (also on youtube if you want to share / embed / rate). I am now working on the collaborative website and the documentation to meet Open Hardware standards - long way to go :) The video of the talk may come up sometimes, meanwhile you have my explanation here :)
The 2010/05/12 I presented the World Environment Action (http://w-e-a.org) at Strathmore University, Nairobi Kenya. We had technical difficulties to start with (no video projector) I had to draw with chalk on the board (memories!) but in the end it was all good. Thanks Everyone!
The simply excellent method of Dennis Hong: 1. Sparkle idea -> database 2. Brainstorm (no criticism, refinement) 3. Education 4. Work smart, work hard, have fun!
Skip the 1/8 at the beginning, until you see a very hairy-beardy guy.
Really interesting talk about what makes us "uniquier" from other animals, on the behavior, psychology and culture aspect as a specie.
I do agree that we have an immense OPPORTUNITY as educated, empowered primates. The talk is addressed at Stanford University students on the day of their graduation : I understand and highly value the encouraging content of the message. Professor Robert Sapolsky explains how privileged and responsible the soon-to-be-graduated audience members should feel, and the immense RESPONSIBILITY they will have in the real world. In a sense it is very good to make young women and men responsible and ambitious, but on the other hand, it does glorifies the audience more than it does give it direction ... and that's the greatest thing about this talk.
I highlighted the words "Opportunity" and "Responsibility" as a simple equation. As a matter of fact, we have the opportunity to be in charge of our lives and others, educated or not, and we all do in different ways BUT the grand ambition that generations feed upon generations is not necessarily healthy : as if we had to force-feed-forward, an ideology of performance and sacrifice...
What's even greater in this talk is that the performance we are encouraged to perform is the heroic figure of the PARADOX BELIEVER, may it be Jesus or this nun working in the death row ... Volunteer martyrs? Are these our moral models? Acting incoherently and negating our animal tit for tap instinct would be the ultimate mark of superior intelligence, what makes us beyond "uniquier", but "uniquierest"? Why do we want to pretend to be better than all other animals? Where does this extravagant arrogance leads humans? What do humans do to the other species? To the earth? What if we were thinking a bit more like animals, maybe we wouldn't destroy our world as much as we do as "super intelligent" specie? Isn't there anything to learn from animals but that we are superior and responsible for everything?
This is why I think this talk is greatly wrong.
This talk tells you "you have immense power, so be responsible and powerful" but it does pose the figure of the paradox believer as the role model, when in the world we have so many NON-PARADOXAL problems that need to be addressed humbly, with common sense and creativity. As a scientist specialized in primate behavior (logic development of social interactions), he could propose an other approach to problem-solving but the paradox that usually leads to immobility or to the dichotomic self-destructive psychologic profile (to cite the drone pilot in Texas). We dont need no more paradox heroes, we need coherent positive models, no more martyrs please.
What makes us different is not what makes us "uniquier" or superior Professor Sapolsky. That's terribly wrong and non scientific.
I am very sorry but we are not "uniquier" or "superior", we are different, and we should concentrate our efforts on observing and studying other species and learn what good they do to themselves and the environment, and try to implement these methods in our own lifes.
I am not claiming we should go back to being monkeys, but I think our attitude toward the world must change so radically we might loose a lot of human ego, as a specie, as individuals. It is another ego we would gain, the ego of being part of this world, truly, among the other animals. This new ego we should desire is what I wish you were exploring professor Sapolsky. And this time, it is not so much about being superiorly intelligent, it is about being good, in a true sense.
