SAILING / LIFE #7 - Alas Pacific! Alas Humanity!

I fell in love with the Pacific Ocean in 1947, when my parents took me on an underwater tour of Avalon Harbor in Catalina Island – by “glass-bottomed boat”, of course.  I was awed by the profusion of sea life and my first exposure to the use of diving masks and fins, demonstrated by the boys my age swimming in the harbor. Snorkels had not yet been invented.  

Within a year my personal heroes were Jacques Cousteau and Thor Heyerdahl, whose exploits kicked off my enthusiasm for nautical adventures. And it wasn’t long before I was routinely reading accounts of sea-faring individuals and families who’d “gone sailing” as a chosen lifestyle.  

I’ve long aspired to that lifestyle myself – but never quite made it, because other priorities in my life prevented me from accumulating enough money to do it properly – and I won’t go to sea on a suicide mission.  

The dream survived though – until today. I’ve known since the Fukushima event of 2011 that human life on the planet is at risk because of ocean pollution; but I didn’t realize how rapidly oceans can die. Just today I learned that the Pacific Ocean isn’t just dying – it’s almost dead now. (https://www.naturalnews.com/2017-04-03-massive-academic-cover-up-concealing-a-near-total-collapse-of-ocean-food-chains-mass-death-to-humans-will-follow.html)  

In the normal course of events, ocean sunlight interacts with diatomic algae through photosynthesis, ingesting carbon dioxide and producing most of the oxygen we breathe. The algae are then eaten by plankton that are eaten by a wide variety of slightly bigger creatures – and so on, until the top predators feed on the fish, especially sharks, whales, orcas, sea-lions, manta rays, squid, and their cousins.  

Along the Pacific Northwest coast of the US, where I spent almost 3 decades exploring the beautiful coastal sea life, I’m told the vast numbers of colorful starfish are now gone - disappeared 5 years ago– probably never to return. The evidence indicates that those that didn’t die from the direct effects of radiation have simply starved for lack of plankton.  

But that’s just one category of simple sea life affected. More importantly, all the higher forms listed above are also dying by the thousands – or maybe the millions. And the bodies of marine mammals (primarily cetaceans, seals and sea lions) that have been examined were apparently starving at the time of their deaths.  

If the top ocean predators are dying off for lack of big fish to eat, it follows that the big fish likely don’t have enough little fish to eat. And if the little fish are starving, it means that plankton is scarce – probably because the algae are highly vulnerable to radiation, and are dying off too.  

What happens when 15% of the human animal protein diet (seafood) disappears? I’m guessing mass starvation on an unprecedented scale. And when there are no more ocean algae, there goes 80% to 90% of the world’s free oxygen production and here come mass deaths due to asphyxiation.    

This is not a pretty picture, friends. And it’s not a “conspiracy theory”. It is rather a very simple understanding of the hard facts facing us today.  

In 1971 I began asking myself, “What has to happen for humanity to actually thrive and flourish?” - and I found some satisfying answers. But today I’m posing a different, more urgent, question: What has to happen for humanity to survive here on earth?    

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that US billionaires are openly talking about gettinng off the planet, and colonizing earth orbit,  the moon and Mars. I think they know what’s coming.  They are like rats trying to get off a sinking ship, to use a nautical metaphor. Or, even more aptly, they are parasites trying to outlive the host that they just killed.    

So let’s revisit the question: What conceivable series of events could lead to the survival of our species here on earth? In a first attempt to find an answer to that question, it is abundantly clear that there a few items that have to be on that action list:  
  

1. Our primary institutions must be re-organized so they can be permitted, encouraged, or even required to make ethical decisions, so that
   
    
2. Policy changes will be made (not necessarily by governments) such that military waste of resources can be ended. In the USA today,some 57% of the federal budget is devoted to the military. This is not self defense – this is absurdity...madness.
   
   Think about it. 57% of the total national budget goes into creating munitions and the systems that deliver them to their targets – including some, but probably not all, of the expenses of identifying and locating the targets.  When you fold in the cost of VA medical services and “reconstruction” of conquered regions and ridiculous administrative costs, the numbers are almost astronomical.  And still, this doesn’t count the cost of supporting the police state. This must stop if we are to have any chance to accomplish critical step 3:
   
    
3. One or more of us (probably quite a few more) must devise and deploy a technology capable of restoring the health of the oceans. Failing in this, human life on earth is very likely to become extinct within a generation.
   
   And if you’re thinking you’ll head for Mars as crew aboard a colonial spaceship, consider what that means. Your life will be entirely at the mercy of the psychopaths and sociopaths who will have just destroyed life on earth with no remorse or compassion for their victims. I’m guessing your rewards will be slavery, pain, suffering, and death – not what I’d want to look forward to. 

I don’t know if step 3 above is possible, but I know that, if it is possible, it will require the utmost application of creativity our species has ever required for its survival. Steps 1 and 2 have the potential to maximize human creativity – and we actually know how this can be accomplished. It’s no longer a mystery. If you want to know how this can be done, here is the intellectual starting point.  

When I started this blog, it was my hope to keep it light-hearted by focusing strictly on the technology and excitement of ocean sailing. Alas! The oceans are dying and Humanity is at serious risk. I apologize to those who might be offended by my digression onto this topic. I am heartbroken to think that I might live to see the death of the oceans. If even one billionaire were to get behind the 3-step outline above, maybe the oceans could be revitalized, and Humanity could be saved, I was unable to stay focused on sailing and not call attention to the existence of this vitally important possibility.    

On second thought, I’m not sorry to have done this.  

Happy sailing,
Bob