TED

TED is a non­prof­it devot­ed to spread­ing ideas, usu­al­ly in the form of short, pow­er­ful talks. But what does the acronym TED, and its spin-off TEDx, stand for? We explore the phi­los­o­phy, the mean­ing and the spir­it behind the TED con­fer­ences, one let­ter at a time.

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T is for …

tech­nol­o­gy noun tech·nol·o·gy \tek-ˈnä-lə-jē\ : the use of sci­ence in indus­try, engi­neer­ing, etc., to invent use­ful things or to solve prob­lems

“Any suf­fi­cient­ly advanced tech­nol­o­gy is indis­tin­guish­able from mag­ic.”
―Arthur C. Clarke

“Tech­nol­o­gy is the camp­fire around which we tell our sto­ries.”
―Lau­rie Ander­son

“The art chal­lenges the tech­nol­o­gy, and the tech­nol­o­gy inspires the art.”
―John Las­seter

For some­thing name-checked so wide­ly through­out our soci­ety, the pre­cise mean­ing of the word tech­nol­o­gy is not that well-known. Tech­nol­o­gy is so fre­quent­ly placed in con­junc­tion with the word sci­ence that many think of the two as the same. Some equate tech­nol­o­gy pure­ly with gad­getry while oth­ers think some­what hazi­ly of all the things that make the present dif­fer­ent from the past.
[source: www.esa.int]

What tech­no­log­i­cal break­throughs are we explor­ing here in Salem and our greater Ore­gon com­mu­ni­ty? Bring your ideas to TEDxSalem: Tick­ets are avail­able for $50 for gen­er­al admis­sion and $40 for stu­dents at https://tedxsalem2015.eventbrite.com. One tick­et includes a full day of talks, enter­tain­ment, recess activ­i­ties, swag, snacks, lunch and an after-par­ty.