I listen to color
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0:01 - 0:04Well, I was born with a rare visual condition
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0:04 - 0:08called achromatopsia, which is total color blindness,
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0:08 - 0:10so I've never seen color,
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0:10 - 0:12and I don't know what color looks like,
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0:12 - 0:15because I come from a grayscale world.
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0:15 - 0:18To me, the sky is always gray,
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0:18 - 0:20flowers are always gray,
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0:20 - 0:22and television is still in black and white.
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0:22 - 0:24But, since the age of 21,
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0:24 - 0:28instead of seeing color, I can hear color.
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0:28 - 0:31In 2003, I started a project
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0:31 - 0:34with computer scientist Adam Montandon,
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0:34 - 0:37and the result, with further collaborations
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0:37 - 0:40with Peter Kese from Slovenia
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0:40 - 0:42and Matias Lizana from Barcelona,
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0:42 - 0:44is this electronic eye.
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0:44 - 0:47It's a color sensor that detects
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0:47 - 0:50the color frequency in front of me — (Frequency sounds) —
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0:50 - 0:53and sends this frequency to a chip installed
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0:53 - 0:56at the back of my head, and I hear the color in front of me
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0:56 - 0:59through the bone, through bone conduction.
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0:59 - 1:02(Frequency sounds) So, for example, if I have, like —
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1:06 - 1:09This is the sound of purple. (Frequency sounds)
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1:09 - 1:16For example, this is the sound of grass. (Frequency sounds)
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1:16 - 1:18This is red, like TED. (Frequency sounds)
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1:18 - 1:23This is the sound of a dirty sock. (Laughter)
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1:23 - 1:24Which is like yellow, this one.
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1:24 - 1:29So I've been hearing color all the time for eight years,
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1:29 - 1:31since 2004, so I find it completely normal now
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1:31 - 1:34to hear color all the time.
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1:34 - 1:38At the start, though, I had to memorize the names you give
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1:38 - 1:40for each color, so I had to memorize the notes,
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1:40 - 1:42but after some time, all this information
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1:42 - 1:44became a perception.
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1:44 - 1:46I didn't have to think about the notes.
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1:46 - 1:49And after some time, this perception became a feeling.
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1:49 - 1:51I started to have favorite colors,
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1:51 - 1:53and I started to dream in colors.
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1:53 - 1:57So, when I started to dream in color is when I felt
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1:57 - 2:00that the software and my brain had united,
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2:00 - 2:03because in my dreams, it was my brain creating
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2:03 - 2:05electronic sounds. It wasn't the software,
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2:05 - 2:09so that's when I started to feel like a cyborg.
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2:09 - 2:12It's when I started to feel that the cybernetic device
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2:12 - 2:14was no longer a device.
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2:14 - 2:16It had become a part of my body,
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2:16 - 2:19an extension of my senses,
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2:19 - 2:21and after some time, it even became a part
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2:21 - 2:25of my official image.
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2:25 - 2:27This is my passport from 2004.
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2:27 - 2:30You're not allowed to appear on U.K. passports
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2:30 - 2:33with electronic equipment, but I insisted
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2:33 - 2:35to the passport office that what they were seeing
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2:35 - 2:38was actually a new part of my body,
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2:38 - 2:41an extension of my brain, and they finally accepted me
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2:41 - 2:44to appear with the passport photo.
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2:44 - 2:47So, life has changed dramatically since I hear color,
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2:47 - 2:50because color is almost everywhere,
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2:50 - 2:53so the biggest change for example is
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2:53 - 2:57going to an art gallery, I can listen to a Picasso,
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2:57 - 3:00for example. So it's like I'm going to a concert hall,
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3:00 - 3:03because I can listen to the paintings.
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3:03 - 3:05And supermarkets, I find this is very shocking,
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3:05 - 3:08it's very, very attractive to walk along a supermarket.
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3:08 - 3:09It's like going to a nightclub.
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3:09 - 3:13It's full of different melodies. (Laughter) Yeah.
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3:13 - 3:15Especially the aisle with cleaning products.
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3:15 - 3:18It's just fabulous. (Laughter)
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3:18 - 3:21Also, the way I dress has changed.
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3:21 - 3:23Before, I used to dress in a way that it looked good.
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3:23 - 3:28Now I dress in a way that it sounds good. (Laughter)
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3:28 - 3:33(Applause)
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3:33 - 3:35So today I'm dressed in C major,
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3:35 - 3:38so it's quite a happy chord. (Laughter)
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3:38 - 3:40If I had to go to a funeral, though,
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3:40 - 3:43I would dress in B minor, which would be
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3:43 - 3:52turquoise, purple and orange. (Laughter)
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3:52 - 3:56Also, food, the way I look at food has changed,
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3:56 - 3:59because now I can display the food on a plate,
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3:59 - 4:02so I can eat my favorite song. (Laughter)
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4:02 - 4:04So depending on how I display it,
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4:04 - 4:06I can hear and I can compose music with food.
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4:06 - 4:09So imagine a restaurant where we can have, like,
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4:09 - 4:12Lady Gaga salads as starters. (Laughter) I mean,
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4:12 - 4:15this would get teenagers to eat their vegetables, probably.
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4:15 - 4:19And also, some Rachmaninov piano concertos
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4:19 - 4:22as main dishes, and some Bjork or Madonna desserts,
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4:22 - 4:25that would be a very exciting restaurant
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4:25 - 4:28where you can actually eat songs.
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4:28 - 4:32Also, the way I perceive beauty has changed,
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4:32 - 4:37because when I look at someone, I hear their face,
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4:37 - 4:42so someone might look very beautiful but sound terrible.
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4:42 - 4:44(Laughter) And it might happen the opposite,
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4:44 - 4:46the other way around. So I really enjoy creating, like,
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4:46 - 4:48sound portraits of people.
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4:48 - 4:51Instead of drawing someone's face, like drawing the shape,
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4:51 - 4:54I point at them with the eye and I write down
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4:54 - 4:57the different notes I hear, and then I create sound portraits.
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4:57 - 4:59Here's some faces.
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4:59 - 5:13(Musical chords)
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5:13 - 5:17Yeah, Nicole Kidman sounds good. (Laughter)
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5:17 - 5:20Some people, I would never relate, but they sound similar.
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5:20 - 5:22Prince Charles has some similarities with Nicole Kidman.
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5:22 - 5:25They have similar sound of eyes.
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5:25 - 5:27So you relate people that you wouldn't relate,
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5:27 - 5:30and you can actually also create concerts
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5:30 - 5:33by looking at the audience faces.
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5:33 - 5:36So I connect the eye, and then I play the audience's faces.
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5:36 - 5:37The good thing about this is,
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5:37 - 5:40if the concert doesn't sound good, it's their fault.
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5:40 - 5:43It's not my fault, because — (Laughter)
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5:43 - 5:47And so another thing that happens is that
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5:47 - 5:50I started having this secondary effect
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5:50 - 5:53that normal sounds started to become color.
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5:53 - 5:57I heard a telephone tone, and it felt green
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5:57 - 5:59because it sounded just like the color green.
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5:59 - 6:03The BBC beeps, they sound turquoise,
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6:03 - 6:06and listening to Mozart became a yellow experience,
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6:06 - 6:10so I started to paint music and paint people's voices,
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6:10 - 6:12because people's voices have frequencies
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6:12 - 6:14that I relate to color.
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6:14 - 6:19And here's some music translated into color.
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6:19 - 6:24For example, Mozart, "Queen of the Night," looks like this.
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6:24 - 6:26(Music) Very yellow and very colorful,
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6:26 - 6:28because there's many different frequencies.
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6:28 - 6:31(Music)
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6:32 - 6:34And this is a completely different song.
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6:34 - 6:38(Music) It's Justin Bieber's "Baby." (Laughter)
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6:38 - 6:40(Music)
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6:40 - 6:44It is very pink and very yellow.
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6:44 - 6:51So, also voices, I can transform speeches into color,
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6:51 - 6:54for example, these are two very well-known speeches.
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6:54 - 6:58One of them is Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream,"
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6:58 - 7:00and the other one is Hitler.
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7:00 - 7:03And I like to exhibit these paintings in the exhibition halls
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7:03 - 7:06without labels, and then I ask people,
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7:06 - 7:07"Which one do you prefer?"
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7:07 - 7:10And most people change their preference
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7:10 - 7:13when I tell them that the one on the left is Hitler
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7:13 - 7:16and the one on the right is Martin Luther King.
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7:16 - 7:22So I got to a point when I was able to perceive 360 colors,
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7:22 - 7:23just like human vision.
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7:23 - 7:27I was able to differentiate all the degrees of the color wheel.
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7:27 - 7:29But then, I just thought that
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7:29 - 7:32this human vision wasn't good enough.
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7:32 - 7:34There's many, many more colors around us
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7:34 - 7:36that we cannot perceive,
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7:36 - 7:38but that electronic eyes can perceive.
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7:38 - 7:42So I decided to continue extending my color senses,
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7:42 - 7:46and I added infrared and I added ultraviolet
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7:46 - 7:49to the color-to-sound scale, so now I can hear colors
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7:49 - 7:51that the human eye cannot perceive.
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7:51 - 7:55For example, perceiving infrared is good because you can
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7:55 - 7:59actually detect if there's movement detectors in a room.
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7:59 - 8:02I can hear if someone points at me with a remote control.
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8:02 - 8:06And the good thing about perceiving ultraviolet is that
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8:06 - 8:10you can hear if it's a good day or a bad day to sunbathe,
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8:10 - 8:13because ultraviolet is a dangerous color,
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8:13 - 8:17a color that can actually kill us, so I think we should all have this wish
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8:17 - 8:20to perceive things that we cannot perceive.
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8:20 - 8:21That's why, two years ago,
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8:21 - 8:23I created the Cyborg Foundation,
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8:23 - 8:25which is a foundation that tries to help people
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8:25 - 8:28become a cyborg, tries to encourage people
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8:28 - 8:30to extend their senses
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8:30 - 8:33by using technology as part of the body.
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8:33 - 8:36We should all think that knowledge comes from our senses,
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8:36 - 8:38so if we extend our senses,
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8:38 - 8:42we will consequently extend our knowledge.
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8:42 - 8:44I think life will be much more exciting
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8:44 - 8:48when we stop creating applications for mobile phones
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8:48 - 8:51and we start creating applications for our own body.
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8:51 - 8:53I think this will be a big, big change
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8:53 - 8:55that we will see during this century.
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8:55 - 8:59So I do encourage you all to think about which senses
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8:59 - 9:00you'd like to extend.
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9:00 - 9:03I would encourage you to become a cyborg.
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9:03 - 9:08You won't be alone. Thank you. (Applause)
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9:08 - 9:15(Applause)
- Title:
- I listen to color
- Speaker:
- Neil Harbisson
- Description:
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Artist Neil Harbisson was born completely color blind, but these days a device attached to his head turns color into audible frequencies. Instead of seeing a world in grayscale, Harbisson can <em>hear</em> a symphony of color -- and yes, even listen to faces and paintings.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 09:35
Thu-Huong Ha edited English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Thu-Huong Ha approved English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Thu-Huong Ha edited English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Thu-Huong Ha edited English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Morton Bast accepted English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for I listen to color | ||
Joseph Geni added a translation |