Ted Talk Summary

Dugan, Regina. "Regina Dugan: From Mach-20 Glider to Hummingbird Drone." www.ted.com. TEDGlobal, 1 Feb. 2012. Web. 5 Nov. 2014. <https://www.ted.com/talks/regina_dugan_from_mach_20_glider_to_humming_bird_drone#t-130397>

The aim of the video is for the speaker to be able to motivate the audience to challenge themselves and have no restraints when imagining the possibilities of what they can do, and how they should not fear failure. She starts this off by asking the audience questions like "What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?", and then once she gets the audience to scour their minds and think of the possibilities, she tries to shift the focus to them simply not having to fear failure because failure is a natural part of life. She then goes on throughout the video providing several examples of times when someone said something was impossible or highly unlikely and then being proved wrong very soon after, including how flight was thought to have been impossible for several million years only to be discredited two months later by the Wright brothers. She also tries to emphasize how failure should not be a deterrent because 6 of the 8 Atlas rockets ended in explosions, but the 2 missions that were successful were incredibly helpful in providing information and were building blocks for the space program we have now. She continues to provide examples of similar events, as well as other thoughts that are currently thought of as difficult to achieve, and fairly successfully manages to convince the audience of her aims.