So, where to begin..

I'm a first time TEDster - so i came to the first annual TEDglobal event with no preconceptions.

And the first day was certainly full of surprises. Juan Enriquez talk on his upcoming book "The Untied States" was the last thing i was expecting from a noted scientist and geneticist.

He asked the question "How many stars will be on the Stars and Stripes in 50 years?"

His talk was full of facts that were hard to ignore: "No U.S. president has ever been buried beneath the same flag he was born under."

Up until this point, we've always added stars -but Enriquez argues that that may not always be the case. In fact it's likely we'll go the other way.

As examples he talks about forces that multiplied the nations of Africa, pulled apart the former former Yugoslavia and are stretching the United Kingdom.

He sees the polarization of the recent US election as the tip of the iceberg:
"carried on currents of culture, race, ethnicity, language, politics, demographics, mass communication, and wealth disparities, just to name a few. "

Basically -Enriquez challenged the audience to pay attention to changing demographics, history, and the potential the the people that are at this point the most disenfranchised are likely to evolve into a significant voting block.

While the whole day had a series of eye opening talks - the other that i'll never forget is Alison Jackson's talk and work.

As a documentary filmmaker, Jackson's use of the documentary style to forge images of famous people was both disturbing and engaging. While most of her targets are British, she had a number of pictures of George Bush, and one in particular that showed secretly captured pictures of Osama Bin Laden   
meeting with Saddam Hussein. Now, it's fake. But they looked real. And while Jackson talks about her work as a critical view of celebrity and fame, i couldn't help but think about the fact that her images are a staggering condemnation of mainstream media and those of us who consume it without any critical thinking.

Here's what she says: "My aim is to explore the blurred boundaries between reality and the imaginary – the gap and confusion between the two. I recreate scenes of our greatest fears which we think are documentary but are fiction. I use look-alikes of celebrities and public figures to create a seemingly real documentary scenario which is in fact a fiction. "

The other speakers on day one included: RICHARD DAWKINS, STEVENLEVITT, HANS ULRICHOBRIST, DAVID DEUTSCH

Dinner was at Kebble College which looks so much like a dinning hall out of Harry Potter that it's just plain weird. But the 300 or so other attendees and the days conversation made for a remarkable dinner conversation that continued into the evening at a Yahoo sponosored party at the IQ club.

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