Philosophy

We have the unusual paradox of being both highly individualistic, yet in essence social. We exist in what I describe as a collective survival exercise.

Biologist and systems theorist known for work on evolution and social cooperation

Soup kitchens are good, but they don't prevent homelessness. You can go to volunteer at a soup kitchen every day of the year, and you'll still have homeless people. We wanted to tackle root causes and tackle them globally.

Co-Founder of Atlassian & Technology Entrepreneur

The world is so impossibly complex, beautiful and fragile and this gives us so many questions that we should ask. Curiosity is powerful, and that is the heart of TED.

Curator of TED Talks & Author of "The Long Tail

A refugee, we might say, is a person fleeing life-threatening conditions. In daily parlance and for journalist purposes this is roughly the meaning of refugeehood. Predictably, in legal and political circles, among those officials who formulate refugee policies for states and international agencies, the meaning is considerably more circumscribed.

The 'Silicon Valley' mindset is one where you race ahead and build technology, and if people adopt it and use it, you scale. Success in this mindset is measured in terms of numbers of users, revenue and valuation. How do these measures illustrate social good though?

CEO and Chairwoman of Mozilla Foundation and Mozilla Corporation

Understanding superhumans is to understand human potential. We have this immense potential which isn't always fulfilled individually, or as a species. I wanted to grab that by the scruff of the neck and write something positive about the best we can be.

I remember one day though, conversing with a primatologist and saying, 'oh, animals are just like us… we're not that special…' and he said, 'well, when did chimps build their own large hadron collider?' – I was gob smacked. That one comment made me realise how absurd it is to claim we aren't that different from other animals because, clearly, we're amazingly different.

When you're starting out, your ambition shouldn't be defined by someone else's success criteria. That's something I struggled with, and still do.

Founder of Moz, SEO software company and industry thought leader

It can be understood as the undermining of the human will. It starts with distraction in the moment where our ability to focus is fragmented – but then it runs deeper into how it distracts us into living according to certain habits, values and norms.

I'm a school drop-out that is now teaching professors and doctors around the world; all because of a naïve woman's wish for her child to live.

Extreme athlete known for ice exposure & breathing technique methods

We come from mammals, we are mammals… we're just mammals that wear clothes. We're destimulated – we don't feel the cold, the heat, everything in our environment – even though our physiology is built for it. We've allowed them to lose this fitness, to lose their conditioning – and so our hearts compensate.

Extreme athlete known for ice exposure & breathing technique methods

Nobody knows how far we can go as humans and so I listened only to myself and my body and pushed it to go beyond perceived limitations, and guess what – outside that boundary is a whole new life where you really start to live.

Ultramarathon Runner, Navy SEAL, & Motivational Speaker

To overcome extreme obstacles, to do the impossible, you have to create another human being inside yourself. I had to create an image of how I wanted to look, how I wanted to act, how I wanted to believe, how hard I wanted to push. I trained that image in my mind, and then I had to become an artist to create it.

Ultramarathon Runner, Navy SEAL, & Motivational Speaker

Very few people know how the bottom feels, but I do. It's like quicksand. It grabs you, sucks you under and won't let go. When life is like that it's easy to drift and continue to make the same comfortable choices that are killing you, over and over again.

Ultramarathon Runner, Navy SEAL, & Motivational Speaker

We have made money, capital, materialism and consumption into our God, it's a disease – you could call it affluenza. It is perhaps because of this context that humanity has lost its way, and the consideration of human rights has been subordinated to the interests of a handful of powerful people who sit at the top of the pyramid.

Environmental activist & former Executive Director of Greenpeace International

Technology should be leveraged to enhance the physical and human experience, not replace it.

Founder and CEO of Farfetch, luxury fashion e-commerce platform