Tedxgreatpacificgarbagepatch - Dr. sylvia earle - The ocean is connected to everything

(Applause and cheers) I'm Sylvia Earle. I'm an ocean person. I once lived in Los Angeles, back in the seventies. Los Angeles is a city that, at the time, lived up to its reputation by planting plastic trees down the mid-section of the highway. Till some of the smart citizens of the city got out their axes and cut them down! (Laughter) So... We have a problem. And we have to cut down the plastic. I am here to tell you that there are some good uses for plastic. I've dived a thousand meters under the sea in a plastic bubble. A little submersible called "Deep Rover". There are some good ways that we can use plastic, and that was one of them. It enabled me, among other things, to explore parts of the planet that people had never seen before. It enabled me to see the residue from our society that people hadn't seen in that situation before. I even found myself sometimes carefully sneaking up on what I thought was some really strange critter out there, and it turned out to be a disgusting piece of plastic – a thousand meters under the ocean. So, plastics are not inherently bad. It truly is what we do with them, or what we don't do with them that counts. I really want to thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, Dianna Cohen, and Daniella Dimitrova Russo, and the Plastic Pollution Coalition, for getting us all together and aiming for solutions to a plastic pollution issue. The solution is really right here in this room. And to those of you who are tuning in from wherever it is you are, from Russia, from Bulgaria, from Israel, UK, Ghana, from the UAE, from India, Uruguay, all over the United States, all over the planet... With humor, with hope, with art, and with ingenuity: Today we have heard the voices of people, seen the actions of people who care. Of people, and that includes every one of you, who're making a difference. Last summer, I attended the 80th birthday party of Ed Wilson. It was held in New York. He dazzled the audience with his remarks, but one in particular was when Ed Wilson said: "We're letting nature slip through our fingers." It's happening. It's happening on our watch. It's happening quickly. But the real problem, since nature is resilient, one way or the other, life will go on. The real problem is that nature may let us slip through her fingers. We have a chance to get it right, though we don't have a lot of time. Geologists will tell you that the history of Earth can be divided into various ages that mark the state of the world at various times, starting four and a half billion years ago. But I'd like to suggest, there're basically just three ages that are relevant, particularly to the event that we are celebrating here today. There's a preplastic-o-zoic. (Laughter) That would be all time preceding, up to the early part of the 20th century, when – kachoom! – plastics appeared and have exploded ever since. Then, there's the plastic-o-zoic. That's the time from that point until now, and some indefinite time in the future. And then, there is the postplastic-o-zoic. That's a time that may never come. It may never come, depending on how truly durable the synthetic materials that have pervaded the planet during and since the 20th century, just how durable they actually prove to be. It may be that there are only two divisions. The preplastic-o-zoic and the plastic-o-zoic, given what we now know about the incredible stability, durability, and longevity of the molecules that make up the plastic materials that now perversely lace civilization together. Just imagine a world without plastics. I can, because my grandparents, my parents, and even I came along before there were plastics! And there was life. (Laughter) People prospered. They did all the sorts of things that we still do in the absence of plastic. What a concept! Hard as it may seem to think of a time before the convenience of having water delivered in bottles that will bounce, but not break. The convenience of having endocrine disruptors and various other toxins delivered with no special effort right to your lips in liquids in plastic containers. (Sighs) Those liquids already are suffused with these wondrously active chemicals that can change, that do change your life. Maybe your sex. (Laughter) Imagine. How is it possible for people to have survived when foods did not come in cans lined with plastic, or when cans, and boxes, and bananas, and eggs, and peanuts, and coconuts, and cereals, and flour, and candybars, and chewing gum, and juice, and jam, and jelly, and sugar, and shirts, and shoes were delivered without plastic! How was that possible? Does anybody remember that time? Am I the only one on the planet who still remembers that time? I can imagine such a time, because I was there. I probably won't live long enough to see my species, kind of wise up and see a time when plastics can be used in ways that will benefit, but not undermine our future. Maybe Charlotte Weir will come and see that time. Maybe my grandchildren will. We can certainly start the process, like, right now. We can turn away from some of the really stupid things that we're doing to the land, the air, the ocean, to wildlife. And to ourselves. Through how we deal with the plastics that pervade our lives. With knowing comes caring. And with caring, there is, as Ed Begley assured us today, there's hope. There's plenty of reason for hope. Sincerely, I hope that I shall someday see a beach, a wave, that's plastic-free. An ocean that in summer wears no nest of nets, no fishing snares of plastic. No synthetic stuff left behind, thrown or blown or left to shine for those of thousand years ahead to wonder: "What were they thinking?" Instead, all of us can decide, right now, to start today, and not allow the person there, within your skin, to slide through life and not begin new ways to deal with plastics! (Laughs) Mirror, mirror, in my hand – hm! There it is. Whose job is it to clear the land, the sea, the beach, the shining sand of heaps and piles of plastic? And strings and straws and caps and cups, nets and lines, bags and wraps? Who put them there? I don't know. No return address for that so-and-so. Who trashed the sea, who tossed the bag? But left in place, they're there to gag a bird, a fish, a whale, a turtle. Maybe to degrade to bits like a nurdle. So, mirror, mirror in my hand, whose job is it to take a stand? I hope that we shall someday see a beach, a wave, that's plastic-free. And hey, it's possible. And as the citizens of Crapola Islands say: (Laughter) "Honestly, I don't see any downside to this." (Applause and cheers)