Thomas Thwaites: How I built a toaster -- from scratch

http://www.ted.com It takes an entire civilization to build a toaster. Designer Thomas Thwaites found out the hard way, by attempting to build one from scratch: mining ore for steel, deriving plastic from oil ... it's frankly amazing he got as far as he got. A parable of our interconnected society, for designers and consumers alike.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at http://www.ted.com/translate.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Thomas
• Thwaites
• TEDTalks
• TED
• talks
• toaster
• design
• manufacture
• chemistry
• engineering
• consumers
• technology
• invention

[Mornys]

"If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe." -- Carl Sagan

Surely applies to toasters too.

[rehabwales]

@1010011010is29a I think you may have missed the point. I don't think this was about getting back to basics. It was about how we take things for granted and his intention was to show us how everything we have is the result of many years of accumulated knowledge. That we are the sum of the history of technology.

[ConnecticutEmporium]

@immak4u write the DNA strand and then create it then clone it in a jar

[peteq1972]

£1,187.54 ? lol, so up to 25 quid for a toaster is a damn good deal!

[owden18]

if u microwave the iron u ned to macke a microwave!



[czyivn2]

@majob Individual acheivement is all well and good, but good luck inventing a toaster before iron or electricity has been invented. Everything is dependent on what came before. That's the point he was trying to make.

[TakeshiAndTheKid]

This is a great argument against the anti-society attitude of the libertarians and margaret thatchers of the world. I notice people saying that this is obviously biased and not the way you'd build a toaster if you absolutely had to from scratch, but that's rather missing the point as it's still a relatively simple device compared to everything else. A Computer Mouse was another good example.

[majob]

Many things may come from combined knowledge, but new knowledge always comes from the individual, not a group, just one person. One person created the toaster. One person created the lightbulb. One person developed the farming methods that allowed us to stop our nomadic lifestyle. To believe that, EVERYONE had a role in this development is a tad bit shortsighted.

[valeo626]

My goal in life is to give every individual the ability to create their own infrastructure. The trick is self-propagating machinery and home agriculture

[dirty1smelly1turban]

@CalvinJGreen its possible not only through the price system and free market, through almost any economic system. the ussr wasnt a free market and they had toasters! post-scarcity economics could also create toasters, so dont limit it to that definition. in fact a post-scarcity economy would produce toasters even BETTER than a price system economy

[leviksu]

centralized production -> you're doing it right.

I, Pencil

[immak4u]

if only we could make women from scratch...