Raising a Generation of Thinkers, Inventors & Polymaths

Welcome to The Art of The Impossible, a weekly newsletter where I unearth five pieces of content which I hope will both inspire and embolden you.

PODCAST

This week, I was delighted to interview polymath Stephen Wolfram on the podcast and to ask his thoughts on how he might reimagine education.

You can watch the interview on YouTube here. And apologies for my bad quality camera - any tips on good ones gratefully received!

QUOTE

Britain has produced a range of remarkably gifted multidisciplinary scientists and scholars who are sometimes described as polymaths. The group included, in recent times, Bertrand Russell, A. N. Whitehead, J. B. S. Haldane, J. D. Bernal, and Jacob Bronowski. Russell commented that the development of such gifted individuals required a childhood period in which there was little or no pressure for conformity, a time in which the child could develop and pursue his or her own interests no matter how unusual or bizarre.

—Carl Sagan Carl Sagan, The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence

INTERVIEW

There are so many exciting possibilities now with AI from medical to educational advancements, but how do we ensure no one gets left behind?

CEO of Salesforce AI, Clara Shih, sits down with James Manyika, Google’s SVP of Research, Technology & Society, to talk about AI's evolution, explore current challenges, and unravel what must be done collectively to ensure AI benefits all.

BOOK

Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Think Again illuminates how we can elevate ourselves and others to unexpected heights. We live in a world that’s obsessed with talent. We celebrate gifted students in school, natural athletes in sports, and child prodigies in music. But admiring people who start out with innate advantages leads us to overlook the distances we ourselves can travel. We can all improve at improving. And when opportunity doesn’t knock, there are ways to build a door.

Hidden Potential offers a new framework for raising aspirations and exceeding expectations. Adam Grant weaves together groundbreaking evidence, surprising insights, and vivid storytelling that takes us from the classroom to the boardroom, the playground to the Olympics, and underground to outer space. He shows that progress depends less on how hard you work than how well you learn. Growth is not about the genius you possess – it’s about the character you develop. Grant explores how to build the character skills and motivational structures to realize our own potential, and how to design systems that create opportunities for those who have been underrated and overlooked. This book reveals how anyone can rise to achieve greater things. The true measure of your potential is not the height of the peak you’ve reached, but how far you’ve climbed to get there!

“This brilliant book will shatter your assumptions about what it takes to improve and succeed. I wish I could go back in time and gift it to my younger self. It would’ve helped me find a more joyful path to progress.” –Serena Williams

Buy the book here.

WATCH

Raising a New Generation of Thinkers with Tunde Onakoya at DLD Conference. Tunde - a Nigerian National Chess Master and coach, founded Chess in Slums Africa in 2018 - a non-profit organization utilizes the game of chess as a tool for social intervention; a bridge between disadvantaged kids and their ambitions, a framework to give children in impoverished communities access to tuition-free education, learning resources, and mentorship opportunities.

EVENT

Infectious Generosity with TED’s Chris Anderson at Kindred (LIVE recording of Danielle Newnham Podcast). Get your tickets here.

A live podcast recording consisting of an hour long deep-dive interview with author and Head of TED, Chris Anderson, in conversation with podcaster and author, Danielle Newnham about his new book - Infectious Generosity.

There will be a session of audience Q&A with Chris at the end.

Infectious Generosity

“Generosity is at the heart of being human. It’s how we’ve co-operated, innovated and grown as a civilization. It’s what makes me into we, net takers into net givers, selfishness into selflessness.”

Infectious Generosity is the idea that through the power of the internet, small acts of thoughtfulness spread to change lives at a scale never experienced before. An initiative housed in TED, this is what they believe to be the ultimate idea worth spreading.

Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat Pray love, says “this book was a much-needed gift to my weary and news-battered heart”.

This will be an inspiring and thought-provoking evening, for those who want to be a part of a world-shifting and hopeful movement; a movement that believes the best of humanity is yet to be realised.

About Chris Anderson

Chris Anderson has been Head of ED for 20 years and has taken the company from a small, exclusive conference to a global phenomenon that reaches millions of people through its iconic TED Talks.

A visionary leader, Time magazine named him one of the “100 Most Influential People in the World.”

Get your tickets here and hopefully see some of you there!

Thank you for reading the newsletter and for listening to the podcast, and if you enjoy them, please do share with your network - my goal is to have these stories reach as many as possible so that others can be inspired too.

Danielle