S4. E19: Carl Safina: Becoming Wild
Beings who've succeeded on earth for millions of years, don’t seek, and should not require, our approval. They belong as well as we do. We do ourselves no favors by asking whether their existence is worth our while. We are hardly in a position to judge, hurdling and lurching along as we are with no goal, no plan except: bigger, faster, more.
If we had the courage to be honest about it, we would have to admit that whales and birds and apes and all the rest live fully up to everything of which they are capable. And we, regrettably, fall short of doing that. For them, to be is enough. For us in the isolating alienation of our title retreat from Life, nothing is enough. It is strange how dissatisfied we insist on being, when there is so much of the world to know and love.
- Carl Safina, Becoming Wild
Carl Safina grew up raising pigeons on a rooftop in Brooklyn and hasn’t stopped interacting with the wild since. He is an ecologist and author who writes extensively about our human relationship with the natural world and what we can do to make it better.
First step: we need to care.
Carl’s books make us care. He advocates for every living creature out there, and is always graciously pointing out why animals matter, not only why they matter to us, but why they matter to themselves - something I’m pretty certain that most humans don’t think about often enough.
In his most recent book Becoming Wild, How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty and Achieve Peace, Carl travels around the planet, exploring the cultures of chimpanzees in Uganda, sperm whales in the Caribbean, and Scarlet macaws in Peru. He shows us how other species teach and learn, and what life looks like in their animal societies, which is often as astonishing as it is spectacularly beautiful.
His writing has won several awards, including a MacArthur Genius Prize, Pew and Guggenheim fellowships, and the John Burrows, James Beard, and George Rabb metals.
He is the first Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University and the founding president of the not for profit, Safina Center. He also hosted the PBS series, Saving the Ocean.
After many months and many conversations on Zoom, it was an incredible gift to be able to hang out and hear Carl’s stories in person, on Long Island. I hope that you love them as much as I do.
Visit Carl Safina’s Website
Read Carl’s Books
Learn More About The Safina Center
Listen to Carl’s TED Talk
Follow Carl on Twitter
Like Carl on Facebook
Follow Carl on Instagram
Like The Safina Center on Twitter
Like The Safina Center on Facebook
Follow The Safina Center on Instagram
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