I almost never post TED talks here because a) they’re already so ubiquitous online and b) I think the whole TED thing has become a bit smug and elitist. (TED well deserved the takedown Benjamin Bratton recently delivered so eloquently on their own stage, I thought.)

Even if I do enjoy some of the talks individually—I’m a sucker for dolphin intelligence stuff—the whole TED gestalt makes me uneasy, AND YET I can still whole-heartedly recommend this talk by my pal Dr. Christopher Ryan, co-author of the fascinating NY Times best-seller, Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships.

I especially liked his conclusion. In a sense Ryan’s urging for a sort of “sexual literacy” mirrors the message of Bill Nye’s advocacy of scientific literacy. The more you know, the better off all society will be. The planet’s becoming too small of a place for ignorance to flourish.
 

 
Below, a 2011 interview I conducted with Christopher Ryan:

In Sex at Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality renegade researchers Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethá debunk almost everything we “think we know” about sex and show how our promiscuous past haunts our current struggles regarding monogamy, sexual orientation, and family dynamics. Weaving together convergent, often overlooked evidence from anthropology, archeology, primatology, anatomy, and psychosexuality, Sex at Dawn shows how far from human nature sexual monogamy really is and unapologetically upends unwarranted assumptions and unfounded conclusions while offering a revolutionary understanding of why we live and love as we do.