Theme: The Incredible Unknown

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."

Inspired by the famous quote associated with astronomer and UChicago alumnus Carl Sagan, TEDxUChicago 2015: The Incredible Unknown will showcase speakers who dared to venture beyond the ordinary to reveal findings and discover solutions to unanswered questions.

The conference sold out on February 25th, and was emceed by Mary Dixon, News Anchor and Co-Host of Chicago's WXRT Morning Show.

915 E 60th Street
Chicago, Illinois, 60637
United States

Shubha Vedula & Sharif Jamaldin

Shubha Vedula and Sharif Jamaldin are an acoustic duet that loves covering anything from pop tunes to jazz standards with their own unique spin. Shubha is a first-year at the University of Chicago on a pre-dental track with a sociology major, but is also an accomplished vocal soloist. She was a semifinalist on American Idol 2013, has opened for both Train and Lindsey Stirling, and has been singing for over 10 years. She likes to write music and sing, and she also plays piano and guitar. Sharif is also a first-year at the University, and loves playing Americana music of any kind. He plays guitar and banjo, and loves playing many styles ranging from roots bluegrass to bebop to Chicago blues. He also loves to build and work on guitars, and aspires to pursue an apprenticeship in the art of lutherie during his lifetime. He is self-taught, but wishes to expand his musical knowledge and pursue a more academic approach of the subject during his time in school.

Daniel Casasanto

Daniel Casasanto is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Chicago and Director of the Experience and Cognition Laboratory. He studies how the diversity of human experience is reflected in our brains and minds: how people with different physical and social experiences come to think, feel, and act differently, in fundamental ways. To study cognitive diversity across cultures, his lab conducts research on five continents, using methods that range from watching children at play to brain imaging and neuro-stimulation. Casasanto is a founding editor of Language and Cognition, an interdisciplinary journal from Cambridge University Press. He is also the Scientific Director of The Think Tank: a mobile neuroscience lab and education station designed to forge new pathways to careers in science for disadvantaged students.

Dionna Griffin-Irons

Dionna Griffin-Irons is a writer, an alumna of The Second City Detroit, and the current Director of Outreach & Diversity at the legendary comedy theatre, The Second City. She is a champion of empowering students, actors, women, inmates, and professionals to own their “voice” and give themselves permission to play and be heard wherever they are. In her current role, she mentors, cultivates and produces new voices in comedy and improv. For 15+ years, she has used her stage experience and life lessons from a women’s minimum prison camp as the catalyst for her diversity and inclusion work. As one inmate reminded her, "We're all the same, only different." She has taught 200+ workshops at colleges (including the University of Chicago Law School), women’s shelters, South Side Chicago public schools, and corporate boardrooms, and worked with the United States Embassy to introduce improv workshops in Norway and Latvia as a tool for social change.

Hadar Lazar

Hadar Lazar likes stories. As a third-year physics major at the University of Chicago, Hadar conducts particle physics research at both UChicago and Princeton in an attempt to trace the elusive plot of our universe. She further enjoys diving into stories through other media, including performing in University Theater and writing. She is also committed to helping provide a platform for other people's art as an editor of student magazine Sliced Bread and the host of its literary podcast, The Bread Beat. Hadar's interest in both art and science stems from a belief that reasoning or meaning can be unveiled by investigating what sometimes presents itself as chaos.

Jason Li

Jason Li is a first-year at the University of Chicago and an entrepreneur from California. Jason developed a strong passion for environmental impact and entrepreneurship. After learning about the e-waste crisis, he wanted not only to do his part, but to turn ‘"going green" into a rewarding effort, rather than a burdensome task. With an initial loan of $2,000 from his father and $43,000 dollars won from various competitions, Jason decided to address the e-waste crisis and founded iReTron.com, a social enterprise that buys back, refurbishes, resells, and donates used electronics. As a successful 15 year old entrepreneur, Jason eventually found his way to ABC’s show, Shark Tank. Leaving with an investment of $100,000 from Mark Cuban and Barbara Corcoran, Jason grew his company to earn more than two million dollars in 2014. After coming to Chicago, Jason found a new passion in education and is currently working on building a new start-up, UProspie.com.

Ji Su Kang

Ji Su Kang is a fourth-year in the college at the University of Chicago majoring in the interdisciplinary program History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Science and Medicine (HIPS), and minoring in both Human Rights and Music. Ji Su is a member of the Rockefeller Chapel Choir and the Vocal Studies program, as well as President of Motet Choir. She also volunteers at the non-profit organization ENoK (Emancipate North Koreans), teaching English to North Korean refugees preparing for post-secondary education. In her free time, Ji Su works as a translator and interpreter for Korean immigrants and various non-profit organizations. Ji Su’s life as a 1.5 generation immigrant has made her passionate about empowering young, lower-class immigrants. She wishes to become a spokesperson for their great strength and limitless potential.

Joel Beckerman

Joel Beckerman is a pioneer of sound and music and its transformative power. He is an award-winning composer, producer, arranger as well as the founder of Man Made Music, a company specializing in Sonic Branding, and the author of The Sonic Boom: How Sound Transforms the Way We Think, Feel, and Buy. Interweaving music, strategy and popular culture, Joel is dedicated to telling compelling stories and impacting our everyday experiences with music and sound. Joel has, with his team, created original scores for over 50 television series and specials, including the Super Bowl on NBC, “Entertainment Tonight,” ESPN Film’s “30 for 30,” and “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations.” His work can be found across most major networks including HBO, FX, NBC and A&E and he has been named one of ASCAP’s “Most Performed” theme composers for the past nine years.

Nura Maznavi

Nura Maznavi is an attorney, writer, and Fulbright Scholar. She has worked with migrant workers in Sri Lanka, on behalf of prisoners in California, and with a national legal advocacy organization leading a program to end racial and religious profiling. Nura is the co-editor of the groundbreaking anthologies Love, InshAllah: The Secret Love Lives of American Muslim Women and Salaam, Love: American Muslim Men on Love, Sex & Intimacy. She is an alumna of VONA/Voices of Our Nations writers' workshop, and lives in Chicago.

Ovetta Sampson

Ovetta Sampson has held many titles. Journalist, author, editor, publisher, programmer, business owner, coach, daughter and friend—these are just some of her salutations. But, by far, her favorite title is Ironman. A self-proclaimed non-athlete, who spent years overweight and obese, in December 2013, Ovetta completed the grueling ultra distance triathlon Ironman Cozumel, a race that consists of a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride and finishes with a marathon. She revamped her diet, lost 100 pounds, and transformed her perception of what it means to be an athlete. She's now helping others find their inner fitness fierceness through Faith Inspired Triathlon Training located on Chicago’s South Side. When she’s not coaching swimming sessions, cycling, running or doing a half-marathon, Ovetta is a Communication Analyst at DePaul University.

Pete Beckman

Pete Beckman is the co-director of the Northwestern University and Argonne National Laboratory Institute of Science and Engineering and is a recognized global expert in high-end computing systems. He designs software and hardware architectures for the world’s largest supercomputers and leads the extreme-computing strategy at Argonne National Laboratory as director of the Argonne's Exascale Technology and Computing Institute. Supercomputers are used to address a wide range of science problems, including understanding the birth of the universe, designing more efficient wind turbines, studying the interplay between blood flow and cerebral aneurysms, and understanding climate change. Pete joined Argonne in 2002, serving first as director of engineering and later as chief architect for the TeraGrid. From 2008 to 2010 he was the director of the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility, where he led the Argonne team working with IBM on the design of Mira, a 10-petaflop Blue Gene/Q.

Sophia Danenberg

Sophia Danenberg didn't go on her first hike until college, but in 2006 she became the first African-American and the first black woman to climb to the summit of Mount Everest. Sophia’s love of the mountains has taken her all over the world, from the Matterhorn in Switzerland, to Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, to Ama Dablam in Nepal and to Aconcagua in Argentina. While at sea level, she leads the international policy analysis program in environment, health and safety (EH&S) at The Boeing Company, advising the corporation on EH&S policy developments and interfacing with global trade associations, governments, the United Nations, OECD, APEC and other intergovernmental organization on behalf of the company and industry. Prior to launching her career, Sophia was a researcher-writer for a travel guide in Thailand and a Fulbright Fellow in environmental economics at Keio University in Tokyo. She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University in environmental sciences and public policy.

Tom Sosnoff

Tom Sosnoff is the founder and co-CEO of dough, Inc., which includes tastytrade, the fastest growing online financial network, and dough, a financial technology content aggregator. Tom is a recognized online brokerage innovator and sought-after financial educator. Tom founded thinkorswim in 1999 (selling it to TD Ameritrade for $600 million in 2009), and tastytrade in 2011. Leveraging over 20 years of experience as a market maker for the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) Tom pursued a vision to educate retail investors in options trading and to build a superior software platform at a brokerage firm that specialized in options. His efforts ultimately changed the way these instruments were traded by individual investors.