We’re keeping the ocean wild — and you can join us | Sylvia A. Earle

0:03You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Today is World Ocean Day, recognized by the UN as a day dedicated to raising awareness about the crucial role oceans play in our lives and to mobilizing a worldwide movement for its protection. There's arguably no one better to mark this day than with ocean scientist and deep sea diver Sylvia Earle. She has spent more than 7 ,000 hours underwater. Yes, you heard that number right. She's witnessed the ocean at its most breathtaking and has watched it change in ways most of us will never see firsthand.

0:42I was told 50 years ago to be afraid of those little sharks. Now I'm afraid because I don't see sharks when I go diving. We've eliminated more than half of them since I began diving. Sylvia, who's known in the ocean and diving communities as Her Deepness, is a marine biologist, National Geographic explorer at large, and founder of Mission Blue, the organization behind a global network of ocean-protected areas called Hope Spots. In 2009, she was awarded the TED Prize and used her wish to call for a global movement to protect the ocean's blue heart. 17 years later, she returned to the TED stage to take stock of what's been lost, what's been saved, and why it's still imperative to protect the oceans.

1:27We can stop trashing the ocean. We can stop industrial fishing. We must never allow mining the deep seas to sweep away the security the living deep ocean provides to all of us. Armed with greater knowledge than has ever existed before, we are the luckiest people ever to have arrived on Earth. we not only can choose the future we want, we must. And I feel so lucky I got to sit down with Sylvia in Vancouver after her talk to hear how she first fell in love with the deep sea, how she's using technology in her fight to save the oceans, and the advice she'd give anyone who wants to help. Just as I was about to lift off the bottom, I saw what I thought at first was like a big bag full of trash.

2:17And I turned and looked and then I saw it had eyes. That's all coming up right after a short break.

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5:11And now, our TED Talk and conversation of the day. So, in 2009, I stood here as a TED Prize recipient, given a chance to make a wish big enough to change the world. So, what was that wish? I wish you would use all means at your disposal. Films, expeditions, the web, new submarines. A campaign to ignite public support for a global network of marine protected areas. Hope spots. Large enough to save and restore the ocean. The blue heart of the planet. So, why did I make that wish? How much of the ocean should be protected? It's our life support system. We need to treat all of it with respect. Part of the reason for my wish was because of what I've seen, what I've explored, what I've come to know in a lifetime of diving in to see things in ways that most people will never get to see, to use systems that make it possible to stay underwater for days, weeks at a time, to explore places that most people will never get to see, and to be a witness to the change that's currently taking place.

6:39I've had the chance to use more than 30 different kinds of submarines, sometimes sharing the view with government officials, such as the Minister of the Environment from Ecuador. He was a little apprehensive. But he warmed up to the idea thanks to a mola mola who kind of whispered in his ear, I've also witnessed how we're trashing the ocean more than just what we're putting into the ocean what we're taking out how we are stripping the ocean of the wild creatures that maintain earth as a habitable planet when I voiced concerns when I served as a chief scientist of NOAA in 1990 I was called the Sturgeon General and I was told not to worry But in a few decades, with billions of dollars in subsidies, we have de-wilded the ocean, taking these wild animals to markets globally.

7:45Industrial fishing, it's simply too efficient, and the markets are too demanding. Wild animals, they don't stand a chance. Nothing in their history enables them to escape the mechanized killing. the fleets that move like cities across the high seas, taking and marketing wildlife. We almost succeeded in exterminating the great whales. But now we know we need whales. We need squid. We need the menhaden, the tuna, the shrimp, the sharks, ocean wildlife. We need them alive. this is the carbon cycle in action this is how the living planet works elements of the universe are moving from one creature to another keeping earth's chemistry within safe operating space i was told 50 years ago to be afraid of i saw sharks now i'm afraid because i don't see sharks when I go diving.

8:53We've eliminated more than half of them since I began diving. In 2009, I wished for expeditions, films, the web, new submarines that inspire action. In the same week that Google launched the first 10 hope spots on Google Earth. In 2010, at a TED at Sea expedition to the Galapagos Islands, we gathered together about 100 big thinkers to figure out what can we do to change this trajectory of decline. On the spot, a commitment was made to protect the high seas, starting in the Sargasso Sea. Sargasso Sea Hope Spot, the open ocean home for turtles and whales and sharks and thousands of other sea creatures.

9:44Another commitment was made to create a film, Mission Blue and another one, Sea of Hope. Oceans 5 and Ocean Elders were launched. Funds were created and secured to help protect the Galapagos Islands. Five years later, with climate a top priority, Tidit Sea 2 sailed to the South Pacific. Champions were enlisted to help with the protection of the top of the world, the high seas, in the Arctic, and to stop the trade in wildlife like polar bears for rugs and for trophies. Others were enlisted to bring about full protection for krill and other wildlife in the waters around the Antarctic continent, along with other great ideas to try to protect the ocean's blue heart.

10:42Sometimes I'm asked, so what's the best place to go diving? And I say, almost anywhere 50 years ago. So much has changed. These are coral reefs. They have top priority for protection. You can't put them back once they're gone. We can help restore some of the damage that we've inflicted. But there's nothing like a place that is still intact after the long history that preceded humankind. There is hope because around the world, people are doing what they can to restore what has happened to the coral reefs. There are Mission Blue champions in 29 hope spots that are growing and planting corals to help restore the damage.

11:33there is reason for hope in the Nusopania hope spot you can actually see the progression from a damaged reef after some time of care and then restoration to what looks pretty good as compared to where it started i'm working with champions who are helping to inspire protection for wild rivers and pathways in the sea, for manatees, turtles, fish, and whales. Today, there are 169 hope spots in 116 countries. Mangroves are being restored in 15 hope spots. Seagrasses in 12. Turtles are being monitored in 26 places, 30 for sharks and rays. All of these places are creating awareness and enhanced protection.

12:29I wish I could tell you about all of them because the stories are really cause for hope. But let me just share a few. Chile's coast and Shoreline All Shores were among Mission Blue's first hope spots. They're now a part of Chile's commitment to protect more than half of their ocean area. When I first went there, we found one, Hernandez Fur Seal, just one. It was thought that they were really gone. That was a cause for hope. We found one. But today, with protection, there are more than 100 ,000 of these creatures.

13:10In the shadow of New York City, the Shinnecock Bay Hope Spot is a place where people and nature thrive. for thousands of years. But 20th century markets for seafood beyond the bay upended the system. More recently, the bay has been known for brown tides and the loss of seagrasses and oysters and clams that once filtered the water and fed people locally. Dr. Ellen Pickett, a scientist at Stony Brook University, set out with her colleagues to do something about it. They figured it would take 53 million clams to restore health, to filter the water, eliminate those brown tides. They also calculated it would take 53 million dollars at a dollar per clam.

14:03They didn't have 53 million dollars, but they bought as many mom and dad clams as they could, and they planted them, but the clams do the rest. Seagrasses began to grow again once the clams were back. the water became clearer. Creatures that live and need the seagrasses began to return. And now we can see that the place is delivering on the promise of hope. In French Polynesia, at the Tarturo Hope Spot, Richard and Mary Bailey are pioneering science-based tourism with a conservation twist. They have fiercely protected the sea turtle nests. They've really taken the action to try to restore a place that was losing the wildlife that the ocean needs to have a secure planet.

14:58And it's working. Just a few years ago, there were only a very few turtles. Now, there are hundreds with protection. Protection works. So, with the technical society, the Baileys are engaging tourists and scientists, kids and CEOs in a business plan that couples tourism, revenue that is generated, with exploration, research and conservation. It's a blue-green nature-positive model that generates income and jobs in a healthy ocean. A new class of submersibles is being built that will take scientists, visitors, and curious kids into French Polynesia's twilight zone to explore a part of a vital global system of animals that migrate up and down in the water column every day, every night.

15:56Mission Blue is partnering with the Polynesian voyagers, with Ninoa Thompson and those who travel across the Pacific in traditional voyaging canoes, like the Hokulea, following ancient pathways depicted to on traditional maps, like an octopus. The head of the octopuses in French Polynesia, but the arms extend to islands across the Pacific, to hope spots that have been established in recent years. A three-year expedition is currently, right now, underway to connect people across the Pacific with ancient values of ocean care and respect. With the subs, for the first time, they can go see who lives under the canoe.

16:46This is, after all, the low where sunlight shines, where it's cold, it's dark, it's high pressure, but it's where most of life on Earth actually exists. The merger of new technology and ancient wisdom. My wish was inspired by the keen desire to build a safety net of hope spots large enough to really understand and protect the ocean that protects all of us. At the time, 99 % of the ocean was open for exploitation. Today, 97 % is still open for exploitation. It's time to seriously scale up. Hope Spots are helping. Townsville AI is visualizing Hope Spots with global data on temperature, chemistry, fishing pressure, whale migration routes, land-based information to better understand the problems in the context of the whole world.

17:55Now we know. Planting trees, planting corals, and clams, it helps. We can stop trashing the ocean. We can stop industrial fishing. We must never allow mining the deep seas to sweep away the security the living deep ocean provides to all of us. Armed with greater knowledge than has ever existed before, we are the luckiest people ever to have arrived on Earth. We can choose the future we want. We can. Dinosaurs could not. Truly, we have a choice. We can find an enduring place for ourselves within the natural living systems that make possible our existence. Systems that sustain us. Hope spots are helping.

18:47And you can, too. Hope is contagious. Hope is an idea worth spreading. Thank you.

19:01That was Sylvia Earle. And stick around. When we come back, I sit down with her deepness for a talk about falling in love with the ocean, what the deep ocean actually looks like and what gives her hope after seven decades of fighting for it. Plus, she'll tell you the story about that trash bag with eyes.

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21:28Sylvia, thank you for sitting down with us. Thank you for having me here. Take us back. What made you first interested in the ocean? Well, why isn't everyone? It's the dominant feature of our planet. Without it, we wouldn't be here. Yeah, yeah. And for those who don't know, you were the first human at the time to go 381 meters down into the ocean, doing what was essentially the underwater equivalent of a moonwalk. Except I was all by myself. Right. So yeah, there's no team. Except for all the life in the sea around. And then you gained your nickname, Her Deepness, from this experience. What does the bottom of the ocean look like?

22:09What is it like to experience? You know, the bottom of the ocean is a destination for many submarines who want to go exploring. But the ocean is not the bottom, and it's not just the top. It's all that water in between. That is truly the ocean. It's most of the world. Land, whether it's islands or continents, it occupies only 3 % of the biosphere where creatures live, that includes us. But the ocean, it's three-dimensional. That's where 97 % of Earth's water is. And it's also where most of Earth's life is. Right. Can you describe what it was like for you to be that deep in the ocean? It was just exhilarating to see all of those incredible creatures who had never seen a primate before.

23:03Yeah. And for me to see them in their own realm. A lot of ocean exploration, not only in the past, but even now, is accomplished by dragging a net and bringing it to the surface and looking at dead animals. Right. Dead plants, whatever it is. But to be there, they're not afraid, and I do not feel fear of them. It's just magic. You said that without oceans, there would be no rivers, no rainforests, no cities, no us. That's right. Why is the deep sea so important to the planet? Can you unpack that for us? Well, all of the living world, land and sea, we need nature. And some people say nature doesn't need us.

23:51And there is some truth to that because when you think about the history of the planet, four and a half billion years, and we are newcomers. Our history goes back maybe 300 ,000 years. When you go in the ocean, you're swimming in the history of life on Earth. The creatures who were there in the earliest days, I mean, at least they're more or less unchanged. I mean, some of the microbes, they continue to shape the world. And we're just beginning to discover how important they are. When you think about just one, we didn't know Prochlorococcus existed until 1986. And now we know it generates about 20 % of the oxygen that we breathe, as well as supplying oxygen to life in the sea.

24:43A lot of your career has focused on the deep sea, which few people get the same experience of seeing or trying to understand. And I'm curious how you get people to care about a place and care about protecting a place that very few actually get to visit. Well, not too many people get to go up as astronauts either. True. But what astronauts report back to us is life-changing. And the images that they have brought back, this is Earth. It's this little blue miracle in the universe that's also miraculous, but it's not very friendly to the likes of us. This is it. This is our home. But astronauts can only see the surface.

25:29and there are ways with satellites to kind of glimpse what's down a little bit below. But you have to actually get into the ocean. And those of us who've been privileged to, at this stage in the 21st century, be able to go where few have gone before, it's an obligation almost. You want to have people know who is living there, what's going on. I mean, if people don't know, they can't care. You can know and not care. But knowing is the key, which is why I'm talking to you right now. You mentioned your willingness to sit down with us, to get on stage and give a TED Talk. This is all part of awareness, getting people to know and care.

26:21What role does culture like film and television have to play in this kind of storytelling? When you think about it, communication. Most of our history was lived without books. That's a big thought. No libraries. Part of the reason that we are kind of special in all of the life on earth, we learn things, We share what we learn and pass it on from one generation to the next. So when I think about the children of the 21st century, we're the luckiest. Whether you're a child or whether you've been around for a number of decades, we are the most fortunate because of the accumulation of knowledge, language, music, numbers.

27:09So when you think how fortunate we are, we also have the best chance we'll ever have to secure an enduring future for us within the natural systems that keep us alive. We have not been doing a good job of respecting just that. What keeps us alive? And what are we doing that pushes the boundaries? What are the factors that keeps Earth exceptional in a universe that is beautiful, but I wouldn't want to try living on Mars? Thank you. In the face of global climate change, why do local conservation efforts still matter? Or even maybe larger scale marine protected areas, MPAs, which you call hope spots, why do they still matter?

28:00Well, think about the phrase, the death of a thousand cuts. That's what we have been doing. Mostly, the greatest pain that we have inflicted on the planet has taken place in the last 200 years or so. When 1800, our numbers were only about 1 billion. Now we're eight times that number. We still have half the life that was in the sea when I was a child. It's still there, but we've lost a half. Wow. And we're on a trajectory now to keep going in that direction. So the idea of inspiring people to make commitments, to take whatever place that they care about, It can be a small place like Fish Rock in Western Australia, and it can be really large like the Sargasso Sea, which occupies a fair chunk of the high seas beyond the jurisdiction of countries.

29:01But whatever it is, if you get people to care and take action, knowing leads to caring, leads to doing something. Hope spots are places that started out logical places. Who would not wish to save the Galapagos Islands? The waters around the Galapagos Islands. The waters around Antarctica. That special continent that people came together at the height of the Cold War, nations agreed to protect it, keep it safe. We need to do that all over the world to have safe places, a network of hope leading to action so that we can have a thousand, ten thousand, whatever it takes. The high seas, that's half of the world beyond national jurisdiction.

29:51That's the global commons. Why wouldn't we wish to protect the blue heart of the planet? It keeps us alive. We need to keep the ocean alive. You mentioned in your talk that you're using AI to help gather information about hope spots. It's another part of the 21st century. It's just the logical progression that we now can weave together information that has been here and there in various silos. is we're still the ones who should be making the decisions, and we should be wary of one really important thing. When you think about how much about the ocean do we know? We know more than anyone has ever known before, but the number of people who have actually been in the ocean to witness what's there, and the amount that has been seen by anybody, It's a tiny little piece of our principal life support system.

30:50So we're just beginning to ask the right questions. And as we learn and put it into the database, we can just have an opportunity for the first time to wrap our minds around, this is how the world works. And this is what we've been doing that is causing harm to the systems that make Earth habitable. We have created this, what we call sometimes the sixth extinction. There have been five times in the history of the Earth when things, not because of us, but because of natural phenomenon, Earth has gone through rapid change. And here we are, we are the agents of change, creating the sixth great loss of life on the planet.

31:46So far, we have a planet that kind of works in our favor, but we're pushing the edge, the boundaries of what keeps us safe. Think about changes in temperature, changes in the chemistry of the atmosphere, changes in the chemistry of the ocean. And this is not great news. So next 10 years, maybe the next five years, maybe right now, what are you doing this afternoon? Why not start right now to do whatever you can armed with knowledge that nobody had before? So the work you're doing is a family affair. You have mentioned that your daughter and her husband are helping you tell the story and get into the tech of spring.

32:35They build submarines. They build equipment to explore and understand the ocean. Now, just imagine, think about this. What would we know about the world if aviation had never gotten off the ground? We would know far less. And we're just getting off the ground in the other direction in the 21st century. Yeah, talk a little bit about what you all are doing together. Solving the problems of exploring the ocean and trying to document what's there and then move action to take care of it. Right now, while we're sitting here, tons of ocean wildlife are being extracted from the ocean on a scale that until the middle of the 20th century and since has never been possible before.

33:34Technology cuts both ways. We have the benefits of technology for communication, for all the health advantages that we enjoy. But think of how we use technology to destroy. I mean, think about war. Think of guns that had never been invented, for example. Or if we'd never taken the technology to turn against ourselves. I don't know of another species that so aggressively goes after their own kind. I mean, really to try to exterminate other humans. I mean, the idea that we use the most powerful technology ever developed to wage war. We need to wage peace. We need to take that knowledge, and we do, to go high in the sky, to go deep in the ocean, and to communicate as widely as possible what we now know and use it so that we can secure an enduring place for ourselves.

34:47The great thing that is saving us right now is the resilience of nature. If it didn't exist, we would be long gone. We would have taken enough out of the system so that it would have crashed long ago. This is the secret for our success, to recognize that life is a dynamic process and it's fragile. It seems like we're here forever. Consider dinosaurs probably thought the same thing. but they did not have a choice. We have a choice, and it's now. It doesn't look really good right now if you look at the evidence, but we still have the last best chance we will ever have to really understand where we fit in, make peace with nature, maybe even among ourselves.

35:46If you had to give your average person one small change in their lifestyle that might make the biggest, most meaningful impact for their effort in order to help the ocean, what would it be? There's one piece of equipment that I would suggest. It's called the mirror. Look in it. Ask the question, who am I? What have I got? There's nobody else who's ever lived who's like I am. I have superpower. I am different. And I ask that you identify what that is. What have you got? That's my question. Do you have a way with music? Do you have a way with numbers? Do you have a way with words or with kids? Nobody can do everything that needs to be done, but everybody can take what they've got and do something.

36:36And sometimes it's like a little girl walking the beaches in Texas, being disgusted by all the junk on the beach. nobody asked her she just started picking it up and people saw this little kid out there picking up the trash first one and then another there were people out there helping to pick up the trash it seems like a very mundane thing but it makes a difference imagine if everybody stopped throwing the trash in the first place garbage, trash, waste that's a human concept in nature there is no excess. Think of whales cruising the ocean, munching on squid or fish or krill, and they, of course, put nutrients back in the sea.

37:24Well, it's not waste. It's like delicious fertilizer for the flight of planks that capture carbon dioxide and generates oxygen and food. It's a circle that goes round and round and round, and it's really complicated, and we haven't yet wrapped our little minds around how complicated it is, we still think that as the bosses of the world, we can do whatever we like. Everything that's here is here for us to capitalize on its existence and if we can't, then it's not useful. And so we tend to think of it as not important. we have bycatch in fishing that when you drag a net across the seafloor to catch something you want to sell or eat, a lot of other creatures die.

38:18But if we don't have a place to market them, we don't care. We don't think that the forest matters more than planting something that will give us a financial return. We just have this mindset instead of respecting nature. Thank you, nature, you keep us alive. And by that I mean the millions of other creatures, the microbes, the fungi, the animals, the plants, all of the diversity of life. We haven't begun to figure out the role of each and every one of them in creating this magical place we call home. Sylvia Earle, before we wrap, because you know so much about the oceans, would you share a wild or particularly fascinating deep sea fact with us?

39:13Oh my goodness. I suppose what is exciting about exploring the ocean, you never know what you're going to see or who is going to be there. Looking back with amazement at us, we embrace going to space and we are and should be in awe of what we're learning, not just within our own solar system, but the universe beyond. but it's that universe beneath the surface of the ocean. I'll give you one example of offshore from Hawaii in a little one-person submarine coming back from a dive. I'd been out there for about four hours exploring and coming back ready to go back to the surface. The storm was brewing so they were a little bit edgy.

40:06They wanted me to hurry up, come back. But just as I was about to lift off the bottom, I saw what I thought at first was like a big bag full of trash. And I turned and looked, and then I saw it had eyes. At first I thought it was a giant squid. I'd never seen one. Nobody had seen one at that time. But it was an octopus. Oh, wow. Bigger than I am. Incredible. They're just incredible creatures. looking at me. And so I called up to the surface and said, there's an octopus here. Just give me a chance at this stage. I'll hurry back. So we're putting tapes into it. We didn't have the digital cards at that point.

40:53But I turned the camera, and I just filmed and filmed and filmed, and then I realized, I forgot to put the tape in. Oh, no. I didn't have anything except what I had in my head. Wow. But again, I pleaded with it. It was on the surface. I was, please, I've got to stay. So they gave me a little bit more time, even though the waves were getting higher and the wind was blowing harder, but they listened to my appeal. And so I did get a little bit of footage of this amazing red octopus that had never been seen in Hawaiian waters before. And as far as we know, I did not bring back a sample. She lives in peace.

41:33But I saw she had a cluster of eggs that she was holding. They tend to have short lives. I'm not sure that that applies to all octopuses, but probably this one, because after floating around in the ocean, swimming around with this clutch of eggs, the little ones hatch, and she goes on to become part of the ocean. It's the transition. No waste. Just part of how the world works. There was a beginning and an end. And I did get back to the surface. Well, we're so glad that you did because then you could sit down with us. Sylvia Earle, her deepness. Thank you so much for sitting down with me. Oh, thank you for having me here.

42:17Everybody should listen up and dive in.

42:24That was Sylvia Earle at TED 2026 and in conversation with me, Elise Hugh. If you're curious about TED's curation, visit ted.com slash curation guidelines. And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is a podcast from TED. This episode was produced by Lucy Little, edited by Alejandra Salazar, and fact-checked by the TED Research Team. Additional support for this episode from Maren Larson and Maggie Bishop. This episode was mixed by Steve Bone. And the interview was recorded in Vancouver by Dave Palmer and Rich Amies of Field Trip. The TED Talks Daily team includes Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Lucy Little, Emma Taubner, and Tansika Sungmarnivong.

43:05Additional support from Daniela Ballarezzo, Valentina Bohanini, Banban Chang, Brian Green, and Lainey Lott. Learn more at podcasts.ted.com. I am Elise Hu. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feet. Thanks for listening.

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