The unexpected wonders of my son's short life | James G. Robinson | Your Body on Tech
TED Talks Daily
TED
4.1 • 12.1K Ratings
🗓️ 28 June 2026
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When James G. Robinson's son Nadav was born with a rare heart defect, he feared the worst. What he didn't anticipate were the moments of unexpected wonder. In this profound talk, Robinson traces five years of impossible medical odds, a genetic discovery so strange it felt like fate ... and how grateful he is to have experienced it all. His story is a vivid reminder of what it means to be human — an inexplicable gift, however fleeting.
And stick around after his talk for a deep dive conversation with our guest host for the week, author and podcaster Manoush Zomorodi, into the ideas he shared on stage and beyond.
This is the last episode in a seven-part series airing this week on TED Talks Daily, where Manoush — and the seven speakers she curated for TED2026 — explore how you can live a healthier life in our high-tech era.
To hear more from Manoush, listen to TED Radio Hour wherever you get your podcasts. Check out her new book, Body Electric, to learn more about the hidden health costs of the digital age.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You are listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas and conversations to spark your curiosity every day. |
| 0:11.2 | Hello, I am Manusse Zamoroti. I'm a journalist, an author, a two-time TED speaker, and you may know my voice because I host the TED Radio Hour podcast over on NPR. |
| 0:22.1 | This week, I've been taking over for Elise Hugh with a special series of talks and conversations |
| 0:27.2 | all about how we can live a healthier life in our high-tech era. |
| 0:31.9 | That topic is a personal obsession of mine, and I had the honor of guest curating a session at the recent |
| 0:38.4 | TED-2020 conference all about tech, the human body, and what is keeping us human in this |
| 0:45.3 | digital age. Today, my final speaker from the session, and now in this series, James G. Robinson. |
| 0:54.2 | So I have known James ever since our boys were in kindergarten together. |
| 0:59.2 | I quickly learned that he and his wife, Tali, also had toddler twins, |
| 1:04.2 | and that one of those twins, a boy named Nadav, was very sick. |
| 1:09.6 | But we lived our lives. We took the kids to school. We talked about our jobs. |
| 1:15.1 | James was until recently the director of data products at the New York Times. Our boys had |
| 1:19.9 | sleepovers. But then a few years later, James and his family took a trip that went very wrong. |
| 1:27.3 | And Nadav's health took a turn for the |
| 1:29.4 | worse. You'll hear the story in a moment, but I just want to take a sec to explain why it was really |
| 1:35.8 | important to me to include a talk in this series about something that could never be quantified, |
| 1:43.3 | analyzed, or optimized. |
| 1:45.8 | And that's the love a parent has for their child. |
| 1:49.5 | Humans are imperfect, and James would have it no other way. |
| 1:55.3 | You'll hear more and you will hear why in his talk and our conversation. |
| 2:00.5 | Coming up right after the break. |
| 2:12.9 | And now our TED Talk and Conversation of the Day. |
... |
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