"This is the true tragedy of our time: the spiraling decline of our planet’s biodiversity. For life to truly thrive on this planet, there must be biodiversity. Only when billions of different individual organisms make the most of every resource and opportunity they encounter, and millions of species lead lives that interlock so that they sustain each other, can the planet run efficiently. The greater the biodiversity, the more secure will all life be on Earth, including ourselves. Yet the way we humans are now living on Earth is sending biodiversity into a decline.”
I’m Mark Martin with "Martin’s Must Reads" and with this statement, David Attenborough in his book, A Life on Our Planet: My Witness Statement and A Vision for the Future, lays out the current course of humanity on our only home, Earth.
A Life on our Planet is part biography, part history of the exploitation of the earth, part prophecy if our current attitudes and trends remain unchanged, and part solution to stem our fateful direction. Much of what is shared on this subject usually focuses on one aspect: ozone depletion, climate change, ocean acidification, chemical pollution, fertilizer use, freshwater withdrawals, land conversion, biodiversity loss, or air pollution. This book’s blessing is how all these elements are tied together to help the reader understand the overall problem and solutions.
David Attenborough in his book A Life on Our Planet sums up the risk for humanity. “The next few decades represent a final opportunity to build a stable home for ourselves and restore the rich and wonderful world that we inherited from our distant ancestors. Our Future on the planet, the only place as far as we know where life of any kind exists, is at stake.”
