Can you name any ideas, strong or otherwise, just any one, that would actually stand up to the kinds of misinformation and bad faith arguments that are common on the Internet though? If TED was, instead of being intellectual entertainment for the wealthy, but instead tried to portray itself as a serious scientific conference where papers are presented, it would stoop to "fighting with pigs", as it were, and open itself up to all sorts of stupid arguments. Like viruses don't cause disease, level of conversation, backed by faith-based arguments.

TED isn't a scientific conference with papers, and it doesn't pretend to be. It's there to drum up interest from the wealthy in the speakers and their projects. If you present there and Bill Gates hears your moving speech on, say, a better cure for malaria, he, and others with that kind of wealth, are liable to invest. But if your speech makes it sound like you're unsure and don't know what you're doing and are just fumbling around, hedging your bets, then you and project might end up langushing in obscurity. (Which, imo, a properly scientific presentation would consist of, because there are no guarantees, just probable possibilities vs improbable impossibilities.)

"If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”

-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

TED sells yearning for the sea, and not how much wood to gather in order to build the ship. There are other, better forums for that. What you're looking for wouldn't fit neatly into their format.

Still, if you're wealthy and see a TED talk, and then want to invest in the person in the basis of a good TED talk, I'll just close with a link to Elizabeth Holmes' convincing talk. I encourage you (or a hired scientist) to do your due diligence on a particular idea.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ho8geEtCYjw