[Music]
[Applause]
nice to be here
thank you all for having me and let’s
get one thing clear at upfront I am NOT
a scientist I am NOT a botanist I’m not
a zoologist I’m not a biologist I am a
writer and as a writer I’m nosy I tend
to sit in coffee shops and listen to
what everybody else is saying and then I
take it home and I write it down
and I steal all you good stuff and you
got good stuff I don’t have good stuff
because I’m sitting at home behind the
laptop every day I don’t have an
exciting life except when I travel so my
idea is that arts are gonna save the
world writers painters musicians those
people are gonna help you people you
scientists to save the world and I do
have proof about a year ago actually a
couple years ago I moved from Roxboro
North Carolina which is a little town
that gets the most snow of any place in
the area to Durham and when I moved
there my townhome was surrounded by
trees about six months after I moved
there
this is what I saw every day and there
was one day when I was walking by with
my dog and I thought wow there’s a lot
of trees gone in that 50 acres and when
my grandson was in the car with me about
a week later he pointed and said Wow
Nana look at all the tractors look at
the bulldozers I said there’s no trees
he says you know what I read a book that
talked about Beasley the bird who lived
in the tree and his millions of friends
and how they all disappeared when the
tree got taken out and I thought yep
that’s how this kid learns about science
and you know what you asked him to do
something with you he wants to build a
volcano mind you he’s five wants to
build a volcano because he wants to play
science he wants to do stuff that has
something to do with getting your hands
into it and learning about it
so my idea my life’s work has been to
let people know what other people are
thinking and doing but I don’t think
that’s a nothing more I think I have to
let them know about the world and about
what’s happening to the world because
we’re growing too fast we’re taking out
50 acres of trees and every one of those
trees has a million lives that rely on
that tree
so my work now has a lot of
environmental aspects to it and it comes
from traveling and it comes from being
nosey and a councillor sitting and
listening to everybody else’s
conversations and seeing what everybody
else is doing in the world so let me
tell you some stories a couple of years
ago I was in Thailand and I went there
because my mother loved elephants she
had all these tchotchkes anybody know
what a tchotchke is it’s those totally
useless things that everybody gives you
and you have them all over your house
and all they’re good for is gathering
dust but my mother loved these elephants
because she knew their social structure
she knew that they were part of a family
the one I went to Thailand I visited an
elephant sanctuary in her memory and
while I was there I was standing on the
platform you walk in it’s a huge nine
hundred thousand acre place with
approximately there was twenty four
elephants there at that time lots of ox
dogs cats anything that needed to be
rescued was there when I was standing on
the platform meeting the group of
elephants for the first time there was
one old elephant that came up and just
kind of connect
did with me I – I come to find out who
was flying into one I was we were
feeding them they eat most of the day I
mean if you kept feeding an elephant
they would keep on eating
so we’re feeding them I had my rings on
little did I think it’s a hundred
degrees it’s Thailand its moist
you know it’s beyond moist it’s like my
body is raining and this elephant wants
the food so I’m giving him the food and
he takes some of this rotten squash
that’s kind of going through my fingers
and he takes off my ring which my sister
had given to me and it’s about nine feet
to the ground the elephant’s about eight
feet tall I was a little bit above him
he dropped it on the ground and one of
the mahouts who’s a trainer for the
elephants was next to me and he’s
jabbering away I said my ring is on the
ground and he’s like don’t know what
you’re saying lady I speak Thai you’re
English you know but don’t have a clue
my ring is on the ground the elephant
looks at me looks at them mahute my ring
please can you get my ring on the
elephant looks at them how it’s like
dude seriously picks the ring up with
his trunk brings it back up and drops it
at my feet
I’m like Alvin smarter than you
seriously elephant smarter than you are
that elephant even though he was a male
became Sophie in my novel the morning
parade sophie was a very abused elephant
and I used her to tell the story of what
was going on in these elephants lives
there’s a lot more to elephants lives
that I learned as a result of this visit
and when I came back home I put a lot of
that information into the novel since
then I have had people who used to send
me I’m on Facebook sorry
they used to send me these videos of
elephants with a paintbrush or I just
went to Thailand or Vietnam or Africa or
wherever and they’re on the back of an
elephant or doing something silly that
elephants don’t do sorry elephants don’t
know how to paint they are putting
crushes which are boxes and they’re
crushed until they behave themselves and
do what that person wants them to do
they don’t know anything about dancing
when you see an elephant going like this
that’s anxiety folks that’s not dancing
to the music a lot of stuff I learned
and these people who were sending me
these videos now know that’s not right
and they’re passing that word on to
somebody else I’m not taking
responsibility for you know changes in
the belief system about what elephants
do whatever just saying my novel did
that my art did that
so these guys I think a dolphin’s is my
spirit animals and I just love their
faces I love their brains I love the
fact that they have fun they’re sexually
active these guys I love so I went to
Hawaii a few years ago I do a lot of
traveling and I was on the beach on the
big island which is the big island is
Hawaii watching a a whale that was
breaching over and over and over I don’t
know if you know anything about whales
but their flukes are like fingerprints
every one of them is different so I
could tell that this particular whale
had breached and breached and breached
so many times something was going on my
husband and my friend were out in the
water I had to stay on the beach
long story but anyways they were out in
the water and they had found a pod of
spinner dolphins just like these guys
and they were swimming with them so I
was paying attention to them but in the
meantime this whale over here was giving
me one hell of a show finally the whale
disappeared and they were still out with
the pod of dolphins and all of a sudden
I saw this huge shadow come under them
and up to me on the beach and I’m like
okay I’m all by myself who do I tell
that something’s coming up the whale had
given birth pushed the calf up for the
first breath of air right in front of me
I’m all by myself
they made it into the silver dolphin my
novel about dolphins who are caught in
tuna industry nets and drowned about the
families of dolphins about how they
rescue human beings and then now
bringing it closer to home these are red
wolves and the red wolf population in
North Carolina is at about 24 maybe
somewhere between 24 and 30 in the late
70s early 80s these guys were almost
extinct they had been connecting with
coyotes and creating inter species I
think that’s the word for it I told you
I’m not a scientist and practically
disappeared so what happened was a bunch
of activists took the ones who were
still pure red wolves out of the wild
into safe places zoos and so forth we’ve
got one of them right here in Durham
just had a group of four pups in last
spring I think it was and they started
breeding them so that they would stay
alive basically not go extinct and
eventually they put them back into the
alligator river net nature preserve
which is out on the Outer Banks these
guys are almost extinct and they might
be extinct if we don’t raise our voices
so I’m taking responsibility for doing
another book and it’s called the art of
rivers and these guys they’re going to
be my heroes in that one this story that
little grandson of mine we went to the
museum of life and Science in Durham
right after the pups were born and rise
stood at the fence
and red wolves are notoriously shy they
will not come near people or other
beings unless they absolutely have to so
dad the by the way red wolves they mate
for life there are a few species that do
that so it’s pretty cool to watch them
dad was up in the woods if you have not
been to the museum elastance I needed to
go it’s pretty cool and the pups were
down in a den under a group of tree
roots with momma in there and Rhys was
very upset because he couldn’t see the
pups they were on a camera and he’s like
well how do I know the camera is really
in there five year old now this is where
I throw in a few statistics enough with
the stories that green that you see is
plants and the brown is animals and
basically that’s the level of extinction
so in the 1900s Age of industrialism how
many animals went extinct a whole bunch
we’re talking thousands and when you
look at that kind of a statistic you
think wow look at that brown basically
column there that’s a lot of our earth
that has died that’s not coming back
we’re not talking dinosaurs that got
killed by the Ice Age we’re talking
about animals and plants that we’re
killing we’re talking about animals that
could exist if we took care of them or
if we stopped being so shall I say cruel
those dolphins get caught up in
fishermen’s nets those dolphins is
starting to become extinct in China the
South Asian dolphin there’s less than
2,000 of them the Yangtze and by the way
there’s dolphins in rivers and lakes and
oceans the Yangtze River Dolphin I
haven’t seen one in a long long time
scientists are figuring this is the
first cetacean that has gone extinct
here’s the dolphin population over time
you can see there was about 16,000 in
about 1800 figure that’s right about
when the whaling industry went into
effect and that fell off very rapidly
and it’s continuing to do so here’s the
estimated population of Asian elephants
now you can look at each one of these
countries and figure out how
industrialized they are how much growth
they’ve had in that country and
according to that growth where are the
elephants look at Thailand Thailand has
lost 2/3 of its elephant population in
the last decade two-thirds here’s how
many animals are left in the wild and at
the bottom of that is Rothschilds
giraffe and Rothschilds giraffe only
exists in one portion of Kenya and
they’re very tiny population is
endangered of becoming extinct and there
are several elephant species that are
also in danger of becoming extinct
okay guys this is reality this is what
happens what happens in Thailand Vietnam
India parts of Africa is that the land
and the water resources are pretty
minimal and human beings and animals are
fighting for it so what happens to the
human beings is their figure and I need
to do something to make sure that my
family has room to grow to make sure
that I am going to be safe and to that I
have money to put food on the table that
money to put food on the table often
comes from this from taking the ivory
tusks off an elephant cutting them off
while the elephant is still alive this
particular massacre was in Burma I
believe and the the elephants left
babies which is pretty typical they
don’t kill the babies they sometimes
take them but sometimes the babies leave
and the rest of the herd takes them and
the babies need the socialization of the
herd they fall in in Africa I just spoke
about water resources there’s no water
resources in Africa so what happens is
they build huge wells that go down
hundreds of feet and they’re big enough
probably less than half of the size of
this stage big enough so that a baby
elephant falls down them on a regular
basis there are several sanctuaries in
Africa one of which is run by Dame
Daphne Sheldrick whose husband was part
of one of the national reserves when he
was alive years and years ago she now
has all of the baby elephants the
orphans and it’s very difficult to keep
these babies alive because they have a
very specific formula that they can eat
and often they think that they’re okay
they think they’re healthy and all of a
sudden the next day they’re gone but one
of the reasons she gets all of her
orphans is because of this and
because the babies wander off they get
stuck in wells or they get captured and
then they have to be taken to a place
that gives them some kind of sanctuary
now let’s talk about red wolves for a
second this is their historical range if
you can see it’s pretty much the east
coast now it’s pretty much Alligator
River National Refuge in Manteo North
Carolina quite a difference from this
and quite a difference from the hundreds
that were on land during the early part
of our country – now now we have to deal
with people who think it’s pretty cool
to shoot a wolf either the wolf is
bothering their farm I understand that
or the wolf has bothered something that
that belongs to them or they just feel
like shooting a wolf for the pelt
the problem is shoot one you shoot in
half of a pair which will not mate with
somebody else thus you’re pretty much
killing that that wolf’s ability to
survive to produce any kind of progeny
so my point in all of this is I’ve told
you some stories I’ve given you some
statistics I’ve talked to you about
animals why do we need to keep them what
is it about a red wolf that is good for
our environment we know that they mate
for life so they can teach us something
about relationships we also know that
the red wolf keeps down the rodent
population everything is balanced and in
my Buddhist perspective everything is
everything which means we need all the
pieces of the puzzle we need those
wolves to take down the population of
rats otherwise we’re going to be seeing
rats in the cornfield it’s much more so
than usual we need the the elephant
population to show us family look family
structure
elephants know how to take care of their
not only their babies but everybody
else’s they know what to do
when danger comes they know how to find
water I mean it’s it’s stuff that we
could learn from and the Dolphins do you
know why the Dolphins are dying pretty
much in the ocean not just because of
getting caught in nets but also because
our noises are making them change their
swimming patterns you know so all of
this growth isn’t necessarily helping us
these animals help us now I have a
question for you I told you some stories
told you about the books that are right
whose Sophie
how many elephants died in 1819
I just made my point I want to challenge
all of the artists the writers the
photographer’s and musicians the
painters to chronicle what’s going on in
this earth to tell the stories the
individual stories of these animals you
just can’t give us statistics and expect
us to care you’ve got to take us into
this story you’ve got to tell us that
story about me dropping my ring and
having that one elephant pick it up and
drop it in front of me because that
story told you more about that elephants
genius than I could in any other way
what would we do without Rachel Carson’s
book the Silent Spring she told us all
about what we were doing to the rivers
the oceans what will we do without
Marvin Gaye what’s going on what would
we do without the music that we heard
earlier today we need the Arts and I’m
here to say artists are going to save
the world thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
nice to be here
thank you all for having me and let’s
get one thing clear at upfront I am NOT
a scientist I am NOT a botanist I’m not
a zoologist I’m not a biologist I am a
writer and as a writer I’m nosy I tend
to sit in coffee shops and listen to
what everybody else is saying and then I
take it home and I write it down
and I steal all you good stuff and you
got good stuff I don’t have good stuff
because I’m sitting at home behind the
laptop every day I don’t have an
exciting life except when I travel so my
idea is that arts are gonna save the
world writers painters musicians those
people are gonna help you people you
scientists to save the world and I do
have proof about a year ago actually a
couple years ago I moved from Roxboro
North Carolina which is a little town
that gets the most snow of any place in
the area to Durham and when I moved
there my townhome was surrounded by
trees about six months after I moved
there
this is what I saw every day and there
was one day when I was walking by with
my dog and I thought wow there’s a lot
of trees gone in that 50 acres and when
my grandson was in the car with me about
a week later he pointed and said Wow
Nana look at all the tractors look at
the bulldozers I said there’s no trees
he says you know what I read a book that
talked about Beasley the bird who lived
in the tree and his millions of friends
and how they all disappeared when the
tree got taken out and I thought yep
that’s how this kid learns about science
and you know what you asked him to do
something with you he wants to build a
volcano mind you he’s five wants to
build a volcano because he wants to play
science he wants to do stuff that has
something to do with getting your hands
into it and learning about it
so my idea my life’s work has been to
let people know what other people are
thinking and doing but I don’t think
that’s a nothing more I think I have to
let them know about the world and about
what’s happening to the world because
we’re growing too fast we’re taking out
50 acres of trees and every one of those
trees has a million lives that rely on
that tree
so my work now has a lot of
environmental aspects to it and it comes
from traveling and it comes from being
nosey and a councillor sitting and
listening to everybody else’s
conversations and seeing what everybody
else is doing in the world so let me
tell you some stories a couple of years
ago I was in Thailand and I went there
because my mother loved elephants she
had all these tchotchkes anybody know
what a tchotchke is it’s those totally
useless things that everybody gives you
and you have them all over your house
and all they’re good for is gathering
dust but my mother loved these elephants
because she knew their social structure
she knew that they were part of a family
the one I went to Thailand I visited an
elephant sanctuary in her memory and
while I was there I was standing on the
platform you walk in it’s a huge nine
hundred thousand acre place with
approximately there was twenty four
elephants there at that time lots of ox
dogs cats anything that needed to be
rescued was there when I was standing on
the platform meeting the group of
elephants for the first time there was
one old elephant that came up and just
kind of connect
did with me I – I come to find out who
was flying into one I was we were
feeding them they eat most of the day I
mean if you kept feeding an elephant
they would keep on eating
so we’re feeding them I had my rings on
little did I think it’s a hundred
degrees it’s Thailand its moist
you know it’s beyond moist it’s like my
body is raining and this elephant wants
the food so I’m giving him the food and
he takes some of this rotten squash
that’s kind of going through my fingers
and he takes off my ring which my sister
had given to me and it’s about nine feet
to the ground the elephant’s about eight
feet tall I was a little bit above him
he dropped it on the ground and one of
the mahouts who’s a trainer for the
elephants was next to me and he’s
jabbering away I said my ring is on the
ground and he’s like don’t know what
you’re saying lady I speak Thai you’re
English you know but don’t have a clue
my ring is on the ground the elephant
looks at me looks at them mahute my ring
please can you get my ring on the
elephant looks at them how it’s like
dude seriously picks the ring up with
his trunk brings it back up and drops it
at my feet
I’m like Alvin smarter than you
seriously elephant smarter than you are
that elephant even though he was a male
became Sophie in my novel the morning
parade sophie was a very abused elephant
and I used her to tell the story of what
was going on in these elephants lives
there’s a lot more to elephants lives
that I learned as a result of this visit
and when I came back home I put a lot of
that information into the novel since
then I have had people who used to send
me I’m on Facebook sorry
they used to send me these videos of
elephants with a paintbrush or I just
went to Thailand or Vietnam or Africa or
wherever and they’re on the back of an
elephant or doing something silly that
elephants don’t do sorry elephants don’t
know how to paint they are putting
crushes which are boxes and they’re
crushed until they behave themselves and
do what that person wants them to do
they don’t know anything about dancing
when you see an elephant going like this
that’s anxiety folks that’s not dancing
to the music a lot of stuff I learned
and these people who were sending me
these videos now know that’s not right
and they’re passing that word on to
somebody else I’m not taking
responsibility for you know changes in
the belief system about what elephants
do whatever just saying my novel did
that my art did that
so these guys I think a dolphin’s is my
spirit animals and I just love their
faces I love their brains I love the
fact that they have fun they’re sexually
active these guys I love so I went to
Hawaii a few years ago I do a lot of
traveling and I was on the beach on the
big island which is the big island is
Hawaii watching a a whale that was
breaching over and over and over I don’t
know if you know anything about whales
but their flukes are like fingerprints
every one of them is different so I
could tell that this particular whale
had breached and breached and breached
so many times something was going on my
husband and my friend were out in the
water I had to stay on the beach
long story but anyways they were out in
the water and they had found a pod of
spinner dolphins just like these guys
and they were swimming with them so I
was paying attention to them but in the
meantime this whale over here was giving
me one hell of a show finally the whale
disappeared and they were still out with
the pod of dolphins and all of a sudden
I saw this huge shadow come under them
and up to me on the beach and I’m like
okay I’m all by myself who do I tell
that something’s coming up the whale had
given birth pushed the calf up for the
first breath of air right in front of me
I’m all by myself
they made it into the silver dolphin my
novel about dolphins who are caught in
tuna industry nets and drowned about the
families of dolphins about how they
rescue human beings and then now
bringing it closer to home these are red
wolves and the red wolf population in
North Carolina is at about 24 maybe
somewhere between 24 and 30 in the late
70s early 80s these guys were almost
extinct they had been connecting with
coyotes and creating inter species I
think that’s the word for it I told you
I’m not a scientist and practically
disappeared so what happened was a bunch
of activists took the ones who were
still pure red wolves out of the wild
into safe places zoos and so forth we’ve
got one of them right here in Durham
just had a group of four pups in last
spring I think it was and they started
breeding them so that they would stay
alive basically not go extinct and
eventually they put them back into the
alligator river net nature preserve
which is out on the Outer Banks these
guys are almost extinct and they might
be extinct if we don’t raise our voices
so I’m taking responsibility for doing
another book and it’s called the art of
rivers and these guys they’re going to
be my heroes in that one this story that
little grandson of mine we went to the
museum of life and Science in Durham
right after the pups were born and rise
stood at the fence
and red wolves are notoriously shy they
will not come near people or other
beings unless they absolutely have to so
dad the by the way red wolves they mate
for life there are a few species that do
that so it’s pretty cool to watch them
dad was up in the woods if you have not
been to the museum elastance I needed to
go it’s pretty cool and the pups were
down in a den under a group of tree
roots with momma in there and Rhys was
very upset because he couldn’t see the
pups they were on a camera and he’s like
well how do I know the camera is really
in there five year old now this is where
I throw in a few statistics enough with
the stories that green that you see is
plants and the brown is animals and
basically that’s the level of extinction
so in the 1900s Age of industrialism how
many animals went extinct a whole bunch
we’re talking thousands and when you
look at that kind of a statistic you
think wow look at that brown basically
column there that’s a lot of our earth
that has died that’s not coming back
we’re not talking dinosaurs that got
killed by the Ice Age we’re talking
about animals and plants that we’re
killing we’re talking about animals that
could exist if we took care of them or
if we stopped being so shall I say cruel
those dolphins get caught up in
fishermen’s nets those dolphins is
starting to become extinct in China the
South Asian dolphin there’s less than
2,000 of them the Yangtze and by the way
there’s dolphins in rivers and lakes and
oceans the Yangtze River Dolphin I
haven’t seen one in a long long time
scientists are figuring this is the
first cetacean that has gone extinct
here’s the dolphin population over time
you can see there was about 16,000 in
about 1800 figure that’s right about
when the whaling industry went into
effect and that fell off very rapidly
and it’s continuing to do so here’s the
estimated population of Asian elephants
now you can look at each one of these
countries and figure out how
industrialized they are how much growth
they’ve had in that country and
according to that growth where are the
elephants look at Thailand Thailand has
lost 2/3 of its elephant population in
the last decade two-thirds here’s how
many animals are left in the wild and at
the bottom of that is Rothschilds
giraffe and Rothschilds giraffe only
exists in one portion of Kenya and
they’re very tiny population is
endangered of becoming extinct and there
are several elephant species that are
also in danger of becoming extinct
okay guys this is reality this is what
happens what happens in Thailand Vietnam
India parts of Africa is that the land
and the water resources are pretty
minimal and human beings and animals are
fighting for it so what happens to the
human beings is their figure and I need
to do something to make sure that my
family has room to grow to make sure
that I am going to be safe and to that I
have money to put food on the table that
money to put food on the table often
comes from this from taking the ivory
tusks off an elephant cutting them off
while the elephant is still alive this
particular massacre was in Burma I
believe and the the elephants left
babies which is pretty typical they
don’t kill the babies they sometimes
take them but sometimes the babies leave
and the rest of the herd takes them and
the babies need the socialization of the
herd they fall in in Africa I just spoke
about water resources there’s no water
resources in Africa so what happens is
they build huge wells that go down
hundreds of feet and they’re big enough
probably less than half of the size of
this stage big enough so that a baby
elephant falls down them on a regular
basis there are several sanctuaries in
Africa one of which is run by Dame
Daphne Sheldrick whose husband was part
of one of the national reserves when he
was alive years and years ago she now
has all of the baby elephants the
orphans and it’s very difficult to keep
these babies alive because they have a
very specific formula that they can eat
and often they think that they’re okay
they think they’re healthy and all of a
sudden the next day they’re gone but one
of the reasons she gets all of her
orphans is because of this and
because the babies wander off they get
stuck in wells or they get captured and
then they have to be taken to a place
that gives them some kind of sanctuary
now let’s talk about red wolves for a
second this is their historical range if
you can see it’s pretty much the east
coast now it’s pretty much Alligator
River National Refuge in Manteo North
Carolina quite a difference from this
and quite a difference from the hundreds
that were on land during the early part
of our country – now now we have to deal
with people who think it’s pretty cool
to shoot a wolf either the wolf is
bothering their farm I understand that
or the wolf has bothered something that
that belongs to them or they just feel
like shooting a wolf for the pelt
the problem is shoot one you shoot in
half of a pair which will not mate with
somebody else thus you’re pretty much
killing that that wolf’s ability to
survive to produce any kind of progeny
so my point in all of this is I’ve told
you some stories I’ve given you some
statistics I’ve talked to you about
animals why do we need to keep them what
is it about a red wolf that is good for
our environment we know that they mate
for life so they can teach us something
about relationships we also know that
the red wolf keeps down the rodent
population everything is balanced and in
my Buddhist perspective everything is
everything which means we need all the
pieces of the puzzle we need those
wolves to take down the population of
rats otherwise we’re going to be seeing
rats in the cornfield it’s much more so
than usual we need the the elephant
population to show us family look family
structure
elephants know how to take care of their
not only their babies but everybody
else’s they know what to do
when danger comes they know how to find
water I mean it’s it’s stuff that we
could learn from and the Dolphins do you
know why the Dolphins are dying pretty
much in the ocean not just because of
getting caught in nets but also because
our noises are making them change their
swimming patterns you know so all of
this growth isn’t necessarily helping us
these animals help us now I have a
question for you I told you some stories
told you about the books that are right
whose Sophie
how many elephants died in 1819
I just made my point I want to challenge
all of the artists the writers the
photographer’s and musicians the
painters to chronicle what’s going on in
this earth to tell the stories the
individual stories of these animals you
just can’t give us statistics and expect
us to care you’ve got to take us into
this story you’ve got to tell us that
story about me dropping my ring and
having that one elephant pick it up and
drop it in front of me because that
story told you more about that elephants
genius than I could in any other way
what would we do without Rachel Carson’s
book the Silent Spring she told us all
about what we were doing to the rivers
the oceans what will we do without
Marvin Gaye what’s going on what would
we do without the music that we heard
earlier today we need the Arts and I’m
here to say artists are going to save
the world thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
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