No matter how far inland we live, a single kind of blue-green algae in the ocean (Prochlorococcus) produces the oxygen in one of every five breaths we take. The World Is Blue: How Our Fate and the Ocean’s Are One is full of similar facts, illustrating the oceans’ critical importance to human survival and making their protection a very personal matter indeed.

Author Sylvia Earle is one of the world’s most renowned marine scientists, and her efforts to make ocean health personal are provoked by the
No matter how far inland we live, a single kind of blue-green algae in the ocean (Prochlorococcus) produces the oxygen in one of every five breaths we take. The World Is Blue: How Our Fate and the Ocean’s Are One is full of similar facts, illustrating the oceans’ critical importance to human survival and making their protection a very personal matter indeed.

Author Sylvia Earle is one of the world’s most renowned marine scientists, and her efforts to make ocean health personal are provoked by the rapid decline in marine ecosystems that she’s witnessed over the past decades: 90 percent of once-common fish stocks are now depleted to the point of commercial extinction; 50 percent of the planet’s coral reefs have been destroyed; and offshore drilling, mining and pollution have destroyed immeasurable ocean habitat. That’s the bad news, Earle says, but there’s still hope: She explains several key strategies for restoring the seas, like expanding protected reserves, reforming fishing practices and improving ocean research.

This wealth of marine science is woven with stories from Earle’s decades of exploration that inspire a deep appreciation for the underwater world. An important read on the necessity of treating our oceans with respect, sooner rather than later.
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I almost feel bad not giving it 5 stars as I am a marine scientist myself, and I have grown up loving Earle and all the work she has done for ocean conservation. But I’d rather recommend watching her documentary “Mission Blue”. It’s pretty much the exact same thing as this book, but a little more engaging as you get to see with your own eyes what’s really going on.
This book is still good for everybody to read, although it does get a bit dry and slow at times. She covers a lot, A LOT, of crucial
I almost feel bad not giving it 5 stars as I am a marine scientist myself, and I have grown up loving Earle and all the work she has done for ocean conservation. But I’d rather recommend watching her documentary “Mission Blue”. It’s pretty much the exact same thing as this book, but a little more engaging as you get to see with your own eyes what’s really going on.
This book is still good for everybody to read, although it does get a bit dry and slow at times. She covers a lot, A LOT, of crucial and relevant issues about the oceans and what we can do to change the way things are going. She does explain things quite well. Some concepts I had learned about throughout my college career and never really got it, but once Earle explained it it was like “..ooooh!”. All in all, it can get pretty overwhelming reading about everything that’s going wrong…there is so much we are destroying, are we ever going to be able to turn this around? It’s quite shocking to realize how little we know about the oceans, yet the belief is still that it is so vast and resilient we can’t do anything to it.
Earle remains optimistic though and the take-home message is this: the ocean is the reason we are all alive, and we are killing it.
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