Best quotes so far from MIT EmergeTech

"It isn't the birthright of Americans to have a high standard of living, clean water, and good healthcare." 

Segway inventor Dean Kamen (pictured above) commenting on the fact that Americans are taking for granted the great gifts that it has so far earned and that, with all the engineers being turned out by the higher education systems of other countries (compared to here where sports management takes priority over engineering), is demonstrably not willing to earn any more.  Said Kamen, "our children will wake up tomorrow and realize that it's too late [to catch back up]." 

Running a close second was a quote from MIT Media Labs director Nicholas Negroponte during his discussion of the Labs' One Laptop Per Child project:

One person said "impossible."   Impossible?  "Impossible" at MIT is a code word for "Do it."

[Editor's Note: David's photographs of the two-day MIT conference can been seen in these galleries: Day One and Day Two.]