TED Prize wish Protect our oceans Sylvia Earle
fifty years ago when I began exploring
the ocean no one not Jacque Perrin not
Jacques Cousteau or Rachel Carson
imagined that we could do anything to
harm the ocean by what we put into it or
what we took out of it it seemed at that
time to be a sea of Eden but now we know
and we are now facing Paradise Lost I
want to share with you my personal view
of changes in the sea that affect all of
us
and to consider why it matters that in
50 years we’ve lost actually we’ve taken
we’ve eaten more than 90% of the big
fish in the sea why you should care that
nearly half of the coral reefs had
disappeared why a mysterious depletion
of oxygen in large areas of the Pacific
should concern not only the creatures
that are dying but it really should
concern you it does concern you as well
I’m haunted by the thought of what ray
Anderson calls tomorrow’s child asking
why we didn’t do something on our watch
to save sharks and bluefin tuna and
squids and coral reefs and the living
ocean while there still was time well
now is that time I hope for your help to
explore and protect the wild ocean in
ways that will restore the health and in
so doing secure hope for humankind
health to the ocean means health for us
and I hope Jill Tartars wish to engage
Earthlings includes dolphins and whales
and other sea creatures and this quest
to look for intelligent life elsewhere
in the universe and I hope Jill that
someday that we’ll find evidence that
there is intelligent life among humans
on this planet
huh did I say that I guess I did for me
as a scientist it all began in 1953 when
I first tried scuba it’s when I first
got to know fish swimming in something
other than lemon slices and butter I
actually loved diving at night you see a
lot of fish then you don’t see in the
daytime
diving day and night was really easy for
me in 1970 when I led a team of
aquanauts living underwater for weeks at
a time at the same time that astronauts
were putting their footprints on the
moon
in 1979 I had a chance to put my
footprints on the ocean floor well using
this personal submersible called Jim six
miles offshore and twelve hundred and
fifty feet down it’s one of my favorite
bathing suits but since then I’ve used
about 30 kinds of submarines and I’d
even started three companies and the
nonprofit foundation called deep search
to design and build systems to access
the deep sea I led a five-year National
Geographic expedition the sustainable
seas expeditions using these little subs
they’re so simple to drive that even a
scientist can do it and I’m living proof
astronauts and aquanauts alike really
appreciate the importance of air food
water temperature all the things you
need to stay alive in space or under the
sea
I heard astronaut Joe Allen explained
how he had to learn everything he could
about his life-support system and then
do everything he could to take care of
his life-support system and then he
pointed to this and he said life-support
system we need to learn everything we
can about it and do everything we can to
take care of it
the poet Auden said thousands have lived
without love none without water 97% of
Earth’s water is ocean no blue no green
if you think the ocean is an important
imagine earth without it Mars comes to
mind no ocean no life-support system I
gave a talk not so long ago at the World
Bank and I showed this amazing image of
Earth and I said there it is the World
Bank that’s where all the assets are ha
ha we’ve been drawing them down much
faster than the natural systems can
replenish them Tim Wirth’s says the
economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of
the environment with every drop of water
you drink every breath you take you’re
connected to the sea no matter where on
earth you live most of the oxygen in the
atmosphere is generated by the sea over
time most of the planet’s organic carbon
has been absorbed and stored there
mostly by microbes the ocean drives
climate and weather stabilizes
temperature shapes Earth’s chemistry
water from the sea forms clouds that
return to the land and the sea is rain
sleet and snow and provides home for
about 97% of life in the world maybe in
the universe no water no life no blue no
green yet we have this idea we humans
that the earth all of it the oceans the
skies are so vast so resilient it
doesn’t matter what we do to it that may
have been true 10,000 years ago and
maybe even a thousand years ago but in
the last hundred especially the last 50
we’ve drawn down the assets the air of
the water the wildlife that make our
lives possible new technologies are
helping us to understand the nature of
nature the nature of what’s happening
showing us our impact on the earth I
mean first you have to know that you’ve
got a problem and fortunately in our
time we’ve learned more about the
problems than in all preceding history
and with knowing comes caring with
caring there’s hope that we can find an
enduring place for ourselves within the
natural systems that support us but
first
we have to know three years ago I met
John Hanke who’s the head of Google
Earth and I told him how much I love
being able to hold the world in my hands
and go exploring vicariously but I asked
him when are you going to finish it he
did a great job with Al and the dirt
what about the water since then I had
the great pleasure of working with the
Googlers with do-er marine with the
National Geographic with dozens of the
best institutions and scientists around
the world ones that we could enlist to
put the ocean in Google Earth and as of
just this week last Monday Google Earth
is now whole consider this starting
right here at the convention center we
can find the nearby aquarium we can look
at where we’re sitting and then cruise
up the coast to the big aquarium the
ocean and California’s four national
marine sanctuaries and a new network
state marine reserves that are beginning
to protect and restore some of the
assets we can flit over to Hawaii and
see the real Hawaiian Islands not just
the little bit that pokes through the
surface but also what’s below to see
wait a minute we can go slash zoom right
there ah under the ocean and see what
the whale see we can go explore the
other side of the Hawaiian Islands we
can go actually and swim around on
Google Earth and visit with humpback
whales these are gentle giants that I’ve
had the pleasure of meeting face-to-face
many times underwater there’s nothing
quite like being personally inspected by
a whale
we can pick up and fly to the deepest
place seven miles down the Mariana
Trench where only two people have ever
been imagine that it’s only seven miles
but only two people have been there
forty-nine years ago one-way trips are
easy we need new deep diving submarines
how about some X prizes for ocean
Explorer
raishin hmm we need to see deep trenches
the undersea mountains and understand
life in the deep sea we can now go to
the Arctic just ten years ago I stood on
the ice at the North Pole an ice-free
Arctic Ocean may happen in this century
that’s bad news for the polar bears it’s
bad news for us too excess carbon
dioxide is not only driving global
warming it’s also changing ocean
chemistry making the sea more acidic
that’s bad news for coral reefs and
oxygen producing plankton also bad news
for us we’re putting hundreds of
millions of tons of plastic and other
trash into the sea millions of tons of
discarded fishing nets gear that
continues to kill were clogging the
ocean poisoning the planet circulatory
system and were taking out hundreds of
millions of tons of wildlife all
carbon-based units barbarically were
killing sharks for shark fin soup
undermining food chains that shape
planetary chemistry and drive the carbon
cycle the nitrogen cycle the oxygen
cycle the water cycle our life support
system incredibly we’re still killing
bluefin tuna truly endangered and much
more valuable alive than dead all of
these parts are part of our life support
system we kill using long lines with
baited hooks every few feet that may
stretch for fifty miles or more
industrial trawlers and draggers are
scraping the seafloor like bulldozers
taking everything in their path using
Google Earth you can witness trawlers in
China the North Sea the Gulf of Mexico
shaking the foundation of our
life-support system leaving plumes of
death in their path the next time you
dine on sushi or sashimi or a swordfish
steak or shrimp cocktail or whatever
wildlife you happen to enjoy from the
ocean think of the real cost
for every pound that goes to market more
than ten pounds even a hundred pounds
may be thrown away is bycatch this is
the consequence of not knowing that
there are limits to what we can take out
of the sea this chart shows a decline in
ocean wildlife from 1900 to 2000 the
highest concentrations are in red in my
lifetime
imagine 90% of the big fish have been
killed most of the turtles sharks tunas
and whales are way down in numbers but
there is good news 10% of the big fish
still remain there’s still some blue
whales there’s still some krill in
Antarctica there are a few oysters in
Chesapeake Bay half the coral reefs are
still in pretty good shape a jeweled
belt around the middle of the planet
there’s still time but not a lot to turn
things around
but business as usual means that in 50
years there may be no coral reefs and no
commercial fishing because the fish will
simply be gone imagine the ocean without
fish imagine what that means to our
life-support system natural systems on
the land are in big trouble too but the
problems are more obvious and some
actions are being taken to protect trees
watersheds and Wildlife and in 1872 with
Yellowstone National Park the United
States began establishing a system of
parks that some say was the best idea
America ever had about 12% of the land
around the world is now protected
safeguarding biodiversity providing a
carbon sink generating oxygen protecting
watersheds and in 1972 this nation began
to establish a counterpart in the sea
national marine sanctuaries it’s another
great idea the good news is that they’re
now more than 4,000 places in the sea
around the world have some kind of
protection and you can find them on
Google Earth the bad news is that you
have to look hard too
find them in the last three years for
example the u.s. protected three hundred
and forty thousand square miles of ocean
his national monuments but it only
increased from 0.6 of one percent to 0.8
of one percent of the ocean protected
globally protected areas do rebound
but it takes a long time to restore
50-year old rock fish or monkfish sharks
or sea bass or 200 year old orange
roughy we don’t consume 200 year old
cows or chickens protected areas provide
hope that the creatures of ed Wilson’s
dream of an encyclopedia of life or the
census of marine life will live not just
as a list a photograph or a paragraph
with scientists around the world I’ve
been looking at the 99 percent of the
ocean that is open to fishing and mining
and drilling and dumping and whatever to
search out hope spots and try to find
ways to give them and us a secure future
such as the Arctic we have one chance
right now to get it right or the
Antarctic where the continent is
protected but the surrounding ocean is
being stripped of its krill whales and
fish Sargasso sees 3 million square
miles of floating forest is being
gathered up to feed cows 97% of the land
and the Galapagos Islands is protected
but the adjacent sea is being ravaged by
fishing it’s true too in Argentina on
the Patagonian shelf now in serious
trouble
the high seas were whales tunas and
dolphins travel the largest least
protected ecosystem on earth filled with
luminous creatures living in dark waters
that average 2 miles deep they flesh and
sparkle and glow with their own living
light there’s still places in the sea as
pristine as I knew as a child the next
10 years may be the most important in
the next 10,000 years the best chance
our species will have to protect what
remains of the natural systems that give
us
life to cope with climate change we need
new ways to generate power we need new
ways better ways to cope with poverty
Wars and disease we need many things to
keep and maintain the world is a better
place but nothing else will matter if we
fail to protect the ocean our fate and
the ocean are one we need to do for the
ocean what Al Gore did for the skies
above a global plan of action with a
World Conservation Union the IUCN is
under way to protect biodiversity to
mitigate and recover from the impacts of
climate change on the high seas and in
coastal areas wherever we can identify
critical places new technologies are
needed to map photograph and explore the
95 percent of the ocean that we have yet
to see the goal is to protect
biodiversity provide stability and
resilience we need deep diving söze new
technologies to explore the ocean we
need maybe an expedition at ed at sea
that could help figure out next steps
and so I suppose you want to know what
my wish is
I wish you would use all means at your
disposal films expeditions the web new
submarines a campaign to ignite public
support for a global network of marine
protected areas hope spots large enough
to save and restore the ocean the blue
heart of the planet how much some say
ten percent some say thirty percent you
decide how much of your heart do you
want to protect whatever it is a
fraction of one percent is not enough my
wish is a big wish but if we can make it
happen it can truly change the world
and help ensure the survival of what
actually is as it turns out my favorite
species that would be us
for the children of today for tomorrow’s
child as never again now is the time
you