Beau Lotto

Neuroscientist, Entrepreneur & World-Renowned Expert in the Science of Perception

Beau Lotto

Neuroscientist, Entrepreneur & World-Renowned Expert in the Science of Perception

Add to List Availability & Fees

Biography

The only way to thrive in a rapidly changing world is to change with it. We know that. But the biggest barrier is in our heads. Neuroscientist and entrepreneur Beau Lotto shows why adapting – moving from A to B – means first moving from A to not-A. We need to let go of the assumptions and beliefs that keep us from seeing the world differently.

A world-renowned expert in the science of perception, Beau reveals why trading certainty for doubt increases our capacity to adapt, lead, innovate, and thrive in the darkness of “I don’t know.” A professor with deep academic credentials and critical scholarly works on the subject, Beau is also founder and CEO of two companies – Lab of Misfits, the world’s first neuro-design studio, and Ripple, which holds several highly influential patents in Augmented Reality (AR).

A three-time mainstage TED speaker with over 9,000,000 views, Beau has spoken around the world, delivering totally unique, visually stunning, interactive, and fun presentations that help people act differently in the face of change. His message is an ideal conference kick-off –providing powerful, positive, creative context that sets a tone for the content and collaboration that follow. Beau’s latest book is Deviate: The Science of Seeing Differently.

Born in Seattle, Beau Lotto earned his bachelor's degree at the University of California, Berkeley in 1991. He then moved to Scotland, where he earned his PhD in Neuroscience from University Medical School, Edinburgh in 1994. He remained in Edinburgh for his first postdoctoral fellowship (with Professor David Price), and then moved to Duke University for his second fellowship, where he was mentored by Professor Dale Purves. Beau was a professor at University College London for 20 years, and is now a professor at University of London, as well as a visiting scholar at New York University. He has mentored over 30 undergraduate, masters, and PhD students, as well as postdoctoral fellows.

In 2001, Beau Lotto founded the Lab of Misfits Studio, the world’s only neuroperception creative studio that is also a real neuroscience lab. The Lab’s goal is to foster adaptability and creativity. Their unique process of experiential experiments unites neuroscience expertise and measurement with digital technology and immersive design. They study humans “in the wild” - in theaters, public spaces, even across entire cities - using a combination of digital, virtual, and physical techniques and neuroscientific methodologies. By unveiling the essential truths that drive human decisions, their work deepens connections and creates innovations. Pragmatically, their insights are scientifically unique and quantified, commercially valuable to the stakeholders, and emotional and actionable to public audiences.

They have since created public experiences around the world, including London’s Science Museum, Hayward Gallery on London’s South Bank, and a public art installation in London’s famous Silicon Roundabout. Their past clients include Cirque du Soleil, L’Oreal, Asurion, Microsoft, Edelman, The UAE’s Crown Prince’s Court, and others. Lab of Misfits currently powers the neuroscience offering at Burson Cohn & Wolfe, one of the world's largest public relations and communications firms.

Beau and his Lab have published over 70 peer-reviewed articles across multiple disciplines, including augmented and virtual reality (indeed, their involvement in the EU consortium of labs defined “presence” in the VR space), human perception, physiology, molecular and cellular development, animal (including human) behavior, digital music, graph theory, complex systems theory, computational evolution, artificial intelligence, architecture, theatre and design. His science lab received funding from a wide range of institutions including the Wellcome Trust, the Leverhulme Trust, and other scientific research funders.

Beau is also CEO and founder of Ripple Inc, which holds five highly influential patents in Augmented Reality (AR) with two further patents pending. Using its technology and exclusive patented IP, the Lab creates digital platforms and custom, proprietary digital interactions that layer the world with immersive digital content. Examples include the GPS-based AR apps Traces, Acoustigram, and W_nder, all of which focus on location-tied storytelling, adding a layer of meaning to the world that has hitherto been impossible.

In addition to TED, Beau has spoken at the G8, Google’s Zeitgeist, Wired, World Economic Forum, Cannes Lions Creativity Festival, Burning Man, and the Oslo Freedom Forum, among many others. He has contributed to television, radio and podcast programs by the BBC, National Geographic, HBO, Wharton on Business Radio, and PBS. He is a frequent keynote speaker at major corporations including J&J, Warner Music, Universal, Viacom, Sainsburys, Microsoft, Google, Apple, and the UAE’s Crown Court, where he speaks about the fundamental barriers to thriving in uncertainty and how to overcome them.

“Once you understand how perception works, you can't help but see yourself in the world in a different way and engage in it in a different way,” says Lotto, who is author of three books: Why We See What We Do, Why We See What We Do Redux, and Deviate: The Science of Seeing Differently. He received the Josef Albers Prize for Disruptive Innovation at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, and was the first Creator in Residence at Viacom.

Speaker Videos

TED: How We Experience Awe – and Why It Matters

Understanding Perception: How We Experience the Meaning We Create

TED: Optical Illusions Show How We See

You Can’t See the World as It Really Is

How Your Brain Deceives You

See Fewer Videos

Speech Topics

Future-Proof: Why the Most Adaptable Win

Stop trying to predict the future. Build the capacity to thrive in any version of it.

Every strategy assumes a future you can see coming. But the defining skill of the next decade isn’t prediction — it’s evolvability: the brain’s own capacity to adapt, recombine, and grow under uncertainty. Beau shows why prediction is a defensive reflex that fails exactly when you need it most, and how people, teams and cultures become genuinely future-proof — not by bracing for change, but by being changed by it.

See uncertainty as opportunity
Recognize the entry states that open or close adaptation
Build a culture that evolves on purpose.

Leading Boldly

Redefine boldness — from certainty and bravado to the courage to be changed.

We’re taught that bold leaders are the most certain ones. Neuroscience says the opposite. Real boldness is a posture of entry: the willingness to consider you might be wrong, to stay open under pressure, to lead people into the unknown without pretending to know. Beau reframes courage as a trainable capacity — and shows how the way a leader enters a room, a decision, or a conflict sets the climate for everyone in it.

Lead from openness rather than defense
Model an evolvability others can borrow
Turn the leader’s nervous system into the team’s advantage.

The Character of a Decision

The quality of a decision doesn’t live in the data. It lives in who you are when you make it.

High-stakes cultures — finance, investment, the C-suite — believe better decisions come from more information and less ambiguity. Up to a point, they’re right. Past it, more data only feeds the illusion of control. Beau shows why, beyond that threshold, the quality of a decision is set by your entry state — your character in the moment — and why character isn’t fixed, but chosen. A talk that turns decision-making from a problem of information into a practice of who you become under uncertainty.

Recognize when more data is hurting you
Separate prediction from judgment
Decide who to be inside uncertainty, on purpose

The Culture You Can’t Build

Stop trying to install a culture. Become the conditions one grows from.

Culture can’t be created — it emerges from how people enter their moments together, and it begins with the character of its leaders. Beau shows why every values-deck and engagement initiative misses (it targets the output, not the cause), why cultures built on efficiency and competition kill the innovation they demand, and how one change in how leaders enter cascades — immediately and durably — into the culture an organization actually wants. The science of culture as a living system.

Stop managing culture and start generating it
See leading-by-example as the mechanism it is
Turn how your people enter into your competitive advantage.

Testimonials

"Beau artfully challenged the perceptions of a large group of very knowledgeable and accomplished leaders. He is eloquent, humorous, and incredibly gifted at reframing people's assumptions about what is true and what is possible, through a neuroscientific lens. Beau is the best speaker I've seen for helping leaders adopt the right mindset for transformation work."

- SVP Global Talent Strategy & Development, Warner Music Group

"Beau lived up to and EXCEEDED everything that Pierre had promised me! Beau was able to engage and entertain our audience in a very important way, and, as Beau will attest, they needed a lot of engagement and energy! We had lots and lots of positive feedback on Beau's talk, and it really started our day off on the right note."

- Program Director, Avixa's TIDE

"What a knockout! The feedback from all the members was fantastic...!"

- Tech UK

"Beau was great to work with – very creative, highly ambitious and with incredible energy. His communications skills are quite something to behold: when dealing with the volunteers from the public for the experiment, he held them in the palm of his hand and infected them with his enthusiasm. Respected by his peers and looked up to by his students he is someone who people like to listen to and learn from. I'd love the chance to work with him again."

- BBC

"The truth to describe his time here as like having a Renaissance man in our midst – Beau blends art, science, curiosity, illusion and music to entertain children, adults and scientists alike."

- London Science Museum

"Dr Lotto's presentation was interactive, educational and entertaining. Dr Lotto was a pleasure to work with. He was responsive to correspondence and a real character on site. I would happily recommend Dr Lotto to anyone interested in having him speak in a public capacity."

- Darwin Healthcare Communications

"I simply adore these talks. Beau Lotto is one of those who studies a specific subject, such as our adaptation to illusions, primarily optical, that can be applied for any subject of human studies."

- TED