10 talks on being creative

Radio host Julie Burstein has found the perfect analogy for creativity—raku pottery. A Japanese art form in which molded clay is heated for 15 minutes and then dropped in sawdust which bursts into flames, what makes this pottery so beautiful is its imperfections and cracks. Burstein interviewed hundred of artists, writers, musicians and filmmakers for her book, Spark: How Creativity Works, and heard many of them describe their process in similar terms — that the best parts of their work came from embracing challenges, misfortunes and the things they simply couldn’t control. As Burstein explains in this talk given at TED2012, “I realized that creativity grows out of everyday experiences more often than you would think.” In this talk, Burstein identifies four lessons that creative people should embrace: To hear how Burstein learned these lessons from filmmaker Mira Nair, writer Richard Ford, sculptor Richard Serra and photographer Joel Meyerowitz, listen to her wonderful talk.

The Greatest Ever Economic Change 13 September 2012 The Greatest Ever Economic Change Professor Douglas McWilliams Introduction I am very grateful to Gresham College for allowing me to borrow the title of Mercers School Memorial Professor of Commerce for three years. Summary What I would like to do this evening is set the background for the eighteen talks that comprise my main lecture series. My major aim tonight is to justify the title that the economic development of two thirds of the world is the world’s greatest ever economic event and I will compare it with two other major events – the industrial revolution and the so-called discovery of the Americas. I see the series of lectures as a wakeup call to those of us in the West who have not fully appreciated the scale of the challenge to us that is posed by the emerging economies from the East. Background I seem to have been living with the development of the Asian economy from some of my earliest memories. Japan Let me digress for a short time just to deal with Japan.