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 EARLENearly all of the major kinds of life, divisions of life, phyla of animals, occur in the sea. Only about half of them can make it to land or freshwater.
More Sylvia Earle Quotes
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For heaven’s sake, when you see the enemy attacking, you pick up the pitchfork, and you enlist everybody you see.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Health to the ocean means health for us.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Nothing has prepared sharks, squid, krill and other sea creatures for industrial-scale extraction that destroys entire ecosystems while targeting a few species.
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You don’t stand around arguing about who’s responsible, or who’s going to pay.
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If somebody dumps something noxious in my back yard, the dumper is the last one I would call on to repair the damage.
SYLVIA EARLE -
We did not want, from garbage and nuclear wastes to sludge from sewage to entire ships that had reached the end of their useful life.
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The most important thing for people to know about the governance of the Arctic is that we have a chance now to act to maintain the integrity of the system or to lose it.
SYLVIA EARLE -
I love music of all kinds, but there’s no greater music than the sound of my grandchildren laughing; my kids, too.
SYLVIA EARLE -
I have lots of heroes: anyone and everyone who does whatever they can to leave the natural world better than they found it.
SYLVIA EARLE -
On a sea floor that looks like a sandy mud bottom, that at first glance might appear to be sand and mud, when you look closely and sit there as I do for a while and just wait, all sorts of creatures show themselves, with little heads popping out of the sand. It is a metropolis.
SYLVIA EARLE -
I’ve always said, ‘Underwater or on top, men and women are compatible.’
SYLVIA EARLE -
When I write a scientific treatise, I might reach 100 people. When the ‘National Geographic’ covers a project, it communicates about plants and fish and underwater technology to more than 10 million people.
SYLVIA EARLE -
To lose it means that we will dismember the vital systems that make the Arctic work. It’s not just a cost to the people who live there. It’s a cost to all people everywhere.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Nearly all of the major kinds of life, divisions of life, phyla of animals, occur in the sea. Only about half of them can make it to land or freshwater.
SYLVIA EARLE -
Our insatiable appetite for fossil fuels and the corporate mandate to maximize shareholder value encourages drilling without taking into account the costs to the ocean, even without major spills.
SYLVIA EARLE