– English Lyrics

Lyrics & Translation

[English]

So, it's an honor to be amongst all of

you. Thank you so much for coming here

tonight, making it a very special

evening. Um, if you heard the uh steps

of a woman, a ghost in heels out back,

that was me pacing like a Chihuahua.

Um, I need to get one thing out of the

way very quickly. I actually was a

ballet dancer about 500 pizzas ago. And

uh yeah, and we just need to kind of

I'll just go ahead and do it. EVERYONE'S

>> so power of the liinal escaping digital

claustrophobia. Today I'm going to take

you through three quick chapters.

Collision, when different worlds combine

and new possibilities are created.

Compression, when these possibilities

are squeezed out of our daily lives, and

release. How do we design these back

into the real world and into our lives?

About eight or nine years ago, social

roboticist Heather Knight

and I, as well as a huge group of wild,

brilliant, muppety people, came together

and started working on a thing called

robot ballets. Not just because robots

should dance with humans, but because

when they did, something remarkable and

beautiful happened. artists showed up,

engineers, roboticists, world-class

athletes, writers, philosophers,

legal minds, and policy makers.

People who normally wouldn't share a

room came together and braided instincts

and knowledge sets and vernaculars and

language styles.

And we looked back on everything and we

realized that the robots were not the

point.

The collision was not a place but a

condition. A threshold where different

worlds come together just long enough

that something new can form and emerge.

A temporary or shared vernacular amongst

people and practitioners of every

background

because crosspollination doesn't happen

in strategy meetings. It happens around

things that invite attention, curiosity,

and presence.

Uh if you'll bear with me for a moment,

uh please pay attention to this lovely

video and uh you'll see a little bit of

crosspollination in the wild.

Turn around. You can actually

These people do not share disciplines

but they are sharing attention and

that's where I think a lot of the magic

happens. This wasn't a performance. It

was not a product or demo. It was just a

condition for connection

and I think a lot of people are really

starving for that right now. And that's

where connection begins.

For about 400 years, we've optimized for

connection. We've optimized for speed,

scale, and efficiency. But we've

forgotten to design for encounter.

People don't feel disconnected. They

feel compressed.

We live inside of feeds and silos and

algorithmic mirrors. And when we stop

encountering difference and diversity,

cross-pollination collapses. Someone

once told me, "Expression is a want to

have, not a need to have." I think that

that principle and that concept quietly

breaks society

because expression is how we signal

safety. It's how we recognize each other

and it's where connection begins.

Expression isn't a novelty nor is it

decoration. It is infrastructure,

social, emotional, and very, very human.

People don't lack identities. They have

extremely rich identities. We've built

these entire worlds online, and yet

we're somehow disconnected.

We've built identities the sizes of

cities, but we try to store them in

studio apartments. And where identity

can't breathe, cross-pollination

collapses. So the question isn't how do

we build better platforms and systems.

It's where does identity go to live?

What happens when our identities and our

digital identities can leave the screen

and enter into the real world into the

physical realm? Move onto bodies and

objects and surfaces. What happens when

these things become like signals and not

content like feathers that can talk? We

already know this intuitively. Children

talk to their toys. They create

relationships with things. They project

huge amounts of value onto abstract

objects by adult minds. And then

somewhere along our journey, somewhere

along the way, they are told and we are

told that these things have no value.

And that that value, if it does exist,

that meaning belongs in our head and on

screens. And I fundamentally disagree

with that. We already know that objects

throughout history carry so much culture

and so much meaning. And there's tons

and tons of proof around that. Hats,

totems, clothing, etc.

And so,

how do you design things that invite

interaction, permission,

and stories?

Objects that tell stories before our

words do. So, we know objects carry a

ton of meaning. So, the big question is,

how do we design consciously? How do we

put stories into objects so they can do

the talking before us? So our feathers

can do the talking. What you're going to

see is not a product demo. It's a

glimpse into what happens when you

design consciously and create conscious

objects that tell stories and that help

us leave the digital world and move that

identity into the physical lives that we

have.

So what changes there is not the

technology. What changes is the risk for

interaction, the risk for cross

cross-pollination.

Expression does the work first. The

feathers do the talking.

And our expression is both an identity

but also invites permission and

curiosity and interaction.

Two of my favorite humans, colleagues

and collaborators and friends, Orurid

Gal and Robert Leonard refer to this as

positive social friction points. Two

humans, two strangers, a cigarette and a

lighter.

5 seconds of cooperation and a human

moment. And that moment can lead to so

much and so many outcomes. I'll leave

you guys with these thoughts. Um

cross-pollination is not accidental. It

is very much so designed into the spaces

we gather, the objects we carry, and the

surfaces around us. Expression is by no

means decoration. It's the

infrastructure that lets identity

breathe. Looking back, the robot was

never the point. The expressive

wearables were never the point.

the collisions were.

And the future doesn't need smarter

machines. It needs braver ways of

meeting. Thank you.

Key Vocabulary

Vocabulary	Meanings
honor /ˈɒnər/ B2	noun - high respect or esteem
pacing /ˈpeɪsɪŋ/ B2	verb - to walk back and forth in a small area due to anxiety
collision /kəˈlɪʒən/ B2	noun - an instance of moving objects striking one another
compression /kəmˈprɛʃən/ C1	noun - the action of reducing size or space
remarkable /rɪˈmɑːkəbl/ B2	adjective - worthy of attention; striking
threshold /ˈθrɛʃhoʊld/ C1	noun - a point of entering or beginning
vernaculars /vərˈnækjələr/ C2	noun - the language or dialect spoken by ordinary people
crosspollination /ˌkrɔːsˌpɒləˈneɪʃən/ C2	noun - the exchange of ideas between different groups
curiosity /ˌkjʊəriˈɒsəti/ B2	noun - a strong desire to know or learn
starving /ˈstɑːrvɪŋ/ B1	adjective - suffering from a lack of something needed
optimized /ˈɒptɪmaɪzd/ C1	verb - to make the best or most effective use of
algorithmic /ˌælɡəˈrɪðmɪk/ C2	adjective - related to calculations or rules for solving problems
infrastructure /ˈɪnfrəˌstrʌktʃər/ C1	noun - the basic physical and organizational structures
intuitively /ɪnˈtuːɪtɪvli/ C2	adjective - using or based on what one feels to be true
consciously /ˈkɒnʃəsli/ C1	adjective - in a deliberate and intentional way

Key Grammar Structures

• If you heard the uh steps of a woman, a ghost in heels out back, that was me pacing like a Chihuahua.

  ➔ Second Conditional (Hypothetical past/present)

  ➔ Uses 'if + past tense' to talk about a hypothetical situation. Here, 'heard' refers to a specific moment.

• People who normally wouldn't share a room came together and braided instincts.

  ➔ Relative Clause (Defining)

  ➔ The clause 'who normally wouldn't share a room' defines which 'People' the speaker is referring to.

• The collision was not a place but a condition.

  ➔ Correlative Conjunctions (Not... but...)

  ➔ Used to emphasize a contrast between two nouns, negating the first and affirming the second.

• We've optimized for speed, scale, and efficiency.

  ➔ Present Perfect

  ➔ Indicates an action that started in the past and has relevance to the present.

• Someone once told me, 'Expression is a want to have, not a need to have.'

  ➔ Reported Speech (Indirect to Direct quote)

  ➔ Uses quotation marks to present someone else's exact words.

• What happens when our identities can leave the screen and enter into the real world?

  ➔ Embedded Question / Clause as Subject

  ➔ The clause 'What happens...' acts as the subject of the inquiry about the future.

• They project huge amounts of value onto abstract objects by adult minds.

  ➔ Passive Voice (implied by context)

  ➔ Though active in structure, it describes the reception of meaning on objects by minds.

• The future doesn't need smarter machines. It needs braver ways of meeting.

  ➔ Comparative Adjectives

  ➔ Uses '-er' suffix to establish a comparison between current and ideal requirements.