ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Stewart Brand - Environmentalist, futurist
Since the counterculture '60s, Stewart Brand has been creating our internet-worked world. Now, with biotech accelerating four times faster than digital technology, Stewart Brand has a bold new plan ...

Why you should listen

With biotech accelerating four times faster than digital technology, the revival of extinct species is becoming possible. Stewart Brand plans to not only bring species back but restore them to the wild.

Brand is already a legend in the tech industry for things he’s created: the Whole Earth Catalog, The WELL, the Global Business Network, the Long Now Foundation, and the notion that “information wants to be free.” Now Brand, a lifelong environmentalist, wants to re-create -- or “de-extinct” -- a few animals that’ve disappeared from the planet.

Granted, resurrecting the woolly mammoth using ancient DNA may sound like mad science. But Brand’s Revive and Restore project has an entirely rational goal: to learn what causes extinctions so we can protect currently endangered species, preserve genetic and biological diversity, repair depleted ecosystems, and essentially “undo harm that humans have caused in the past.”

More profile about the speaker
Stewart Brand | Speaker | TED.com
TED2006

Stewart Brand: What squatter cities can teach us

Stewart Brand fala sobre as favelas.

Filmed:
1,098,442 views

Em todo o mundo vilarejos rurais estão sendo abandonados, já que milhares de pessoas estão se mudando para as cidades para viver em barracos e favelas. Stewart Brand diz que isso é bom. Por quê? Você verá em três minutos.
- Environmentalist, futurist
Since the counterculture '60s, Stewart Brand has been creating our internet-worked world. Now, with biotech accelerating four times faster than digital technology, Stewart Brand has a bold new plan ... Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:26
Basically, there's a major demographic event going on.
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Resumindo, está acontecendo um evento demográfico de grande importância.
00:29
And it may be that passing the 50 percent urban point
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E pode ser que ao passarmos de 50 por cento de população urbana
00:32
is an economic tipping point. So the world now is a map of connectivity.
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haja um ponto de descendência econômica. O mundo hoje é um mapa todo conectado.
00:40
It used to be that Paris and London and New York were the largest cities.
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Antigamente Paris, Londres e Nova York eram as maiores cidades.
00:45
What we have now is the end of the rise of the West. That's over.
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O que temos agora é o fim do crescimento do Ocidente. Isso acabou.
00:51
The aggregate numbers are overwhelming.
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Os números totais são impressionantes.
00:53
So what's really going on? Well, villages of the world are emptying out.
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E o que realmente está acontecendo? Bem, cidades de todo o mundo estão se esvaziando.
01:05
The question is, why?
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A pergunta é: por quê?
01:07
And here's the unromantic truth -- and the city air makes you free,
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E aqui esta a verdade nada romântica -- "e o ar da cidade faz você livre",
01:12
they said in Renaissance Germany. So some people go to places
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diziam na Alemanha do Renascimento. Algumas pessoas vão para lugares
01:15
like Shanghai but most go to the squatter cities where aesthetics rule.
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como Shangai, mas a maioria vai para favelas.
01:21
And these are not really a people oppressed by poverty.
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E estas não são pessoas exatamente reprimidas pela pobreza.
01:23
They're people getting out of poverty as fast as they can.
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São pessoas que tentam sair da pobreza o mais rápido possível.
01:26
They're the dominant builders and to a large extent, the dominant designers.
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São os principais construtores e, em grande medida, os principais designers.
01:30
They have home-brewed infrastructure and vibrant urban life.
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Eles têm infraestrutura caseira e uma vida urbana super movimentada.
01:32
One-sixth of the GDP in India is coming out of Mumbai.
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Um sexto do PIB da Índia vem de Bombaim.
01:37
They are constantly upgrading, and in a few cases, the government helps.
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Eles estão evoluindo constantemente e, em alguns casos, o governo os ajuda.
01:41
Education is the main event that can happen in cities.
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Educação é a principal mudança que ocorre nas cidades.
01:44
What's going on in the street in Mumbai?
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O que acontece nas ruas de Bombaim?
01:46
Al Gore knows. It's basically everything.
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Al Gore sabe. Acontece de tudo. (a economia informal)
01:53
There's no unemployment in squatter cities. Everyone works.
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Não há desemprego nas favelas. Todos trabalham.
02:06
One-sixth of humanity is there. It's soon going to be more than that.
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Um sexto da população mundial está ali. Logo será mais que isso.
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So here's the first punch line:
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Aqui vai a primeira moral da historia:
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cities have defused the population bomb.
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As cidades desarmaram a bomba populacional.
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And here's the second punch line.
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E a segunda moral:
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That's the news from downtown. Here it is in perspective.
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Estas são as novidades da cidade. Um panorama geral.
02:58
Stars have shined down on earth's life for billions of years.
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Durante bilhões de anos as estrelas enviaram seu brilho para Terra.
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Now we're shining right back up.
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Agora nós estamos brilhando de volta.
03:11
Thank you.
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Obrigado.
Translated by Sadon França
Reviewed by Marcelo Lopes

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Stewart Brand - Environmentalist, futurist
Since the counterculture '60s, Stewart Brand has been creating our internet-worked world. Now, with biotech accelerating four times faster than digital technology, Stewart Brand has a bold new plan ...

Why you should listen

With biotech accelerating four times faster than digital technology, the revival of extinct species is becoming possible. Stewart Brand plans to not only bring species back but restore them to the wild.

Brand is already a legend in the tech industry for things he’s created: the Whole Earth Catalog, The WELL, the Global Business Network, the Long Now Foundation, and the notion that “information wants to be free.” Now Brand, a lifelong environmentalist, wants to re-create -- or “de-extinct” -- a few animals that’ve disappeared from the planet.

Granted, resurrecting the woolly mammoth using ancient DNA may sound like mad science. But Brand’s Revive and Restore project has an entirely rational goal: to learn what causes extinctions so we can protect currently endangered species, preserve genetic and biological diversity, repair depleted ecosystems, and essentially “undo harm that humans have caused in the past.”

More profile about the speaker
Stewart Brand | Speaker | TED.com