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"Listening - to loved ones, strangers, faraway places - is an act of generosity and a source of discovery. In this episode, TED speakers describe how we change when we listen deeply."

"They're actually hearing the wave that traveled through the rock all the way to the Earth's surface," says William Ellsworth, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. "When a fault slips suddenly underground, it radiates two different kinds of seismic waves."

"Reporter Larry Massett tells us about a man who offers a tongue-in-cheek Language Removal Service. It advertises a "laboratory that is the only one of its kind in the world - facilities include our state-of-the-art vocal observation chamber and a special storage facility for our archives, including the world-famous Raymond Chronic Static Language library." What you get after the language is gone are breaths, sighs and mouth sounds . The service is a joke - but when applied to famous voices, it's still possible to determine who you're listening to."

"Some of the toughest stuff in nature is spider silk - as strong, ounce for ounce, as nylon. And a silk web makes a great trap for prey, as well as a nice place for a spider to live. But scientists have learned that spiders can do something else quite extraordinary with their webs: They can "tune" them, like musical instruments."

"For over 30 years, Basinski has worked with tape loops - capturing, slicing and warping the world around us on reel-to-reels. He makes field recordings from nature and shortwave radio signals, then literally cuts them up into short loops. His almost obsessively analog-focused work is often melancholic and strained, but always beautiful. But it is The Disintegration Loops, a project he finished the morning of September 11 while living in New York, for which he's best known."