My first encounter with the ocean was on the Jersey Shore when I was three years old and I got knocked over by a wave.
SYLVIA EARLEWe have been far too aggressive about extracting ocean wildlife, not appreciating that there are limits and even points of no return.
More Sylvia Earle Quotes
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I would love to slip into the skin of a fish and know what it’s like to be one. They have senses that I can only dream about.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Large areas of the Gulf have escaped being scraped by trawls, crushed by more than 40,000 miles of pipelines, or displaced by one of 50,000 oil and gas wells drilled since the middle of the 20th century. Some places have been deliberately protected.
SYLVIA EARLE -
There is a terribly terrestrial mindset about what we need to do to take care of the planet.
SYLVIA EARLE -
In terms of personal choices, let’s all think more carefully about where we get our protein from.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Bottom trawling is a ghastly process that brings untold damage to sea beds that support ocean life.
SYLVIA EARLE -
The sudden release of five million barrels of oil, enormous quantities of methane and two million gallons of toxic dispersants into an already greatly stressed Gulf of Mexico will permanently alter the nature of the area.
SYLVIA EARLE -
If you peer beneath the bits and pieces of the moss, you’ll see toads, small insects, a whole host of life that prospers in that miniature environment.
SYLVIA EARLE -
My mother was known as the ‘bird lady’ of the neighborhood.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Ten percent of the big fish still remain. There are still some blue whales. There are still some krill in Antarctica.
SYLVIA EARLE -
They have curiosity. ‘Who, what, where, why, when, and how!’ They never stop asking questions, and I never stop asking questions, just like a five year old.
SYLVIA EARLE -
There’s something missing about how we’re informing the youngsters coming along about what matters in the world. We teach them the numbers and the letters, but we fail to communicate the importance of our connection to the living world.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Take away the ice and snow, increase the temperature by even a little, and the realm that makes their lives possible literally melts away.
SYLVIA EARLE -
We wouldn’t be able to survive. We would have a hard time surviving if we were transported to the time when dinosaurs were around.
SYLVIA EARLE -
I’m not against extracting a modest amount of wildlife out of the ocean for human consumption, but I am really concerned about the large-scale industrial fishing that engages in destructive practices like trawling and longlining.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Every fish fertilizes the water in a way that generates the plankton that ultimately leads back into the food chain, but also yields oxygen, grabs carbon – it’s a part of what makes the ocean function and what makes the planet function.
SYLVIA EARLE