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With roots in the 17th century, traditional Japanese origami mines beauty from rules, limitations and, ultimately, mathematics. But there’s more to origami than just aesthetic value – scientists, engineers and designers have borrowed from the art form for a wide range of practical purposes. As this short from TED-Ed details, this includes a ‘starshade’ proposed by engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, intended to block exoplanet-hunting space telescopes from the glare of distant stars. Featuring appealing and instructive stop-motion visuals from the French animator Charlotte Arene, this short provides a nifty primer on how origami artists are able to fold square pieces of paper into near-infinite forms both beautiful and useful.
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Evolution
How – and how not – to think about the role randomness plays in evolution
60 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
A Japanese religious community makes an unlikely home in the mountains of Colorado
9 minutes
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Physics
The rhythms of a star system inspire a pianist’s transfixing performance
5 minutes
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Bioethics
Is it ethical to have a second child so that your first might live?
10 minutes
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Art
Watch as Japan’s surplus trees are transformed into forest-tinted crayons
4 minutes
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Meaning and the good life
‘Everydayness is the enemy’ – excerpts from the existentialist novel ‘The Moviegoer’
2 minutes
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Biology
A spectacular, close-up look at the starfish with a ‘hands-on’ approach to parenting
5 minutes
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Technology and the self
A filmmaker finds a tactile beauty in the creation of her prosthetic leg
11 minutes
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Knowledge
An Indigenous myth and a geological survey elicit two ways of knowing one place
4 minutes