05.06.10
Coral reef ecologist Jeremy Jackson lays out the skinny on how we really screwed the ocean blue. I have been thinking about this issue a lot in recent months and was especially disturbed after watching the documentary ‘The Cove’ about the Japanese slaughter of dolphins and their unrepentant defense of the slaughter on the world stage. The end result of the documentary was really that the Japanese might be forecasting that the oceans are being totally over fished and when the reserves begin to dry up, their economy which is supported primarily by the fishing industry will be in peril. But what is more important really, an economy based upon a made up thing called money or the ocean ecosystem, a real and tangible thing that supports planet Earth without which we cannot survive.
I think this particular TED talk has a little more brevity this week considering the massive oil spill being dealt with right now. We know so very little about our ocean and it is an entirely different and amazing part of our planet. Yet without having even full understanding of it, we are already destroying it. I hope the recent natural disasters we are experiencing, combined with what looks like the collapse of our economic system will be enough to push a critical mass of consciousness that we are all here together occupying space on a singular planet and if we don’t take care of both it and ourselves, we are totally screwed. Call me an idealist I guess but I think we are beginning to find ourselves standing at the precipice asking ‘Can we change?’ Answering yes to that question is the only means of survival.
written by Christopher | tags: Ecosystem, Jeremy Jackson, Ocean, Over Fishing, TED
