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 EARLEEvery 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.
More Sylvia Earle Quotes
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Places change over time with or without oil spills, but humans are responsible for the Deepwater Horizon gusher – and humans, as well as the corals, fish and other creatures, are suffering the consequences.
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A lumberman will look at a forest and see so many board feet of lumber. I see a living city.
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Everyone has power. But it doesn’t help if you don’t use it.
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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.
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All through college, I had frequently been the only girl in a science class – which wasn’t such a bad deal.
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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.
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As if the ocean somehow doesn’t matter or is so big, so vast that it can take care of itself, or that there is nothing that we could possibly do that we could harm the ocean.
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With every drop of water you drink, every breath you take, you’re connected to the sea.
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America gains most when individuals have great freedom to pursue personal goals without undue government interference.
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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.
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Just as we have the power to harm the ocean, we have the power to put in place policies and modify our own behavior in ways that would be an insurance policy for the future of the sea, for the creatures there, and for us, protecting special critical areas in the ocean.
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Some experts look at global warming, increased world temperature, as the critical tipping point that is causing a crash in coral reef health around the world.
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The end of commercial fishing is predicted long before the middle of the 21st century.
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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.
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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