“Life on this earth first emerged from the sea. As the polar ice melts and sea level rises, we humans find ourselves facing the prospect that once again we may quite literally become ocean.” FirstsHumansMayEarthLevelsSeaOceanIceSea Level Rise Author:John Luther Adams
“There comes, even to kings, the time of great weariness. Then the gold of the throne is brass, the silk of the palace becomes drab. The gems in the diadem and upon the fingers of the women sparkle drearily like the ice of white seas; the speech of men is as the empty rattle of a jester's bell and the feel comes of things unreal; even the sun is copper in the sky and the breath of the green ocean is no longer fresh.” MenFeelsWhiteSunSeaSkyKingsSpeechOceanEmptyGoldBreathsGreenFingersIceBellsThronesPalacesUnrealSilkGemsWearinessSparkleBrassCopperJester Book:Kull: Exile of Atlantis Source: Kull: Exile of Atlantis
“Jump blind and you might find yourself on the rim of a raging volcano, or smack in the middle of a battlefield during a savage war, or on a swiftly tilting ice floe in a tempest-tossed sea.” WarMightSeaMiddleBlindRageIceFinding YourselfSavagesBattlefieldsTempestSmackVolcanoesRims Author:Stephen R. Lawhead
“If the literature we are reading does not wake us, why then do we read it? A literary work must be an ice-axe to break the sea frozen inside us.” IfsDoeReadingLiteratureBreakSeaIceFrozenLiterary Works Author:Franz Kafka
“Sandy was particularly destructive because it was prevented from moving back out to sea by a "blocking pattern" associated with the jet stream. There's debate about this, but one recent study suggested that melting sea ice in the Arctic may lead to such blocking.” MayMovingStudySeaClimate ChangePatternsDebateBlockIceStreamsDestructiveJetMeltingArcticSandyMoving Back Author:Nicholas D. Kristof
“I went into the house. I put on Jimi Hendrix's 'Red House' at full volume, filled the glass to the brim with rum, without ice, and went back to the terrace. To gaze at the night and the dark sea and the night.” NightHouseDarkSeaRedFilledGlassesIceVolumeHendrixRumTerrace Author:Pedro
“Up and down! Up and down! From the base of the wave to the billow's crown; And amidst the flashing and feathery foam The Stormy Petrel finds a home,-- A home, if such a place may be, For her who lives on the wide, wide sea, On the craggy ice, in the frozen air, And only seeketh her rocky lair To warm her young and to teach them spring At once o'er the waves on their stormy wing!” IfsMayHomeYoungTeachAirSeaSpringWingsWaveWarmWideIceCrownsFrozenUp And DownStormyFoam Author:Bryan Procter
“Much of the attention on oceans has portrayed oceans as a villain. Warm water strengthened Hurricane Katrina that pounded Louisiana. Rising sea level will flood islands and coastal areas. Or, we're talking about new opportunities like a new shipping lane in the Arctic because of melting sea ice. These may be the obvious problems, but they're probably not the biggest ones.” MayProblemOpportunityWaterLevelsAttentionTalkingSeaOceanAreasObviousWarmIceIslandsRisingVillainFloodHurricanesMeltingLanesLouisianaArcticKatrinaNew OpportunityShippingHurricane KatrinaCoastal Author:Mark Powell
“From wherever the emissions come, they have the same effect: They trap much more heat from the sun, melt the ice, raise the sea level, cause stronger storms, floods, drought, bigger fires, generate millions of climate refugees, destabilize political systems, threaten the growing of food crops and cause a number of other catastrophic consequences which, taken together, threaten the basis for the future of human civilization on the Earth.” HumansEarthTogetherPoliticalCausesLevelsNumbersMillionsSunTakenFireGrowingSeaEffectsCivilizationConsequenceBasesBiggerStrongerRaisesClimateStormIceHeatFloodTrapsRefugeeCropsEmissionsPolitical SystemsDroughtHuman Civilization Author:Al Gore
“The responsibility of the scientist or journalist is to convey the context. If you're talking about the Arctic Sea ice, you have to embrace the reality that there's a huge number of other things that influence that on a year-to-year basis.” IfsYearsRealityNumbersResponsibilityTalkingSeaInfluenceHugeScientistBasesEmbraceIceJournalistArcticHuge Numbers Author:Andrew Revkin
“When I wrote a long story about the retreat of sea ice, I made clear it could go the other way for a while, and that doesn't mean we don't know that a warmer world will have less sea ice. It just means there's a lot of variability and people can pay too much attention to the big swings in one direction or the other.” PeopleKnowsWorldWayMeanLongMadeStoriesBigsPayAttentionClearToo MuchSeaIceSwingsRetreatOne DirectionLong StoryVariability Author:Andrew Revkin
“What's your story? It's all in the telling. Stories are compasses and architecture; we navigate by them, and to be without a story is to be lost in the vastness of world that spreads in all directions like arctic tundra or sea ice. To love someone is to put yourself in their place, we say, which is to put yourself in their story, or figure out how to tell yourself their story. Which means that a place is a story, and stories are geography, and empathy is first of all an act of imagination, a storyteller's art, and then a way of traveling from here to there.” WorldWayFirstsMeanArtStoriesLostImaginationSeaFiguresEmpathySpreadArchitectureIceStorytellerCompassLove SomeoneGeographyNavigateTelling StoriesVastnessArctic Author:Rebecca Solnit
“Climate has always changed. It always has and always will. Sea level has always changed. Ice sheets come and go. Life always changes. Extinctions of life are normal. Planet Earth is dynamic and evolving. Climate changes are cyclical and random. Through the eyes of a geologist, I would be really concerned if there were no change to Earth over time. In the light of large rapid natural climate changes, just how much do humans really change climate?” IfsHumansLightWould BeEyeEarthNaturalLevelsSeaChangedPlanetsNormalConcernedClimateClimate ChangeIceEvolveSheetsExtinctionRapidsComes And GoesPlanet EarthThrough The EyesGeologist Author:Ian Plimer
“It does seem that the sea ice is returning to 'average' after the record lows of 2007 and 2008. There has been a definite recovery trend since then, so far from being a progression towards ice free summers it seems that it was a temporary dip. The recent observations do make the 2007 projections that the region would be ice free by 2013 look very unrealistic. Given what is happening only the foolish would look many years into the future and predict ice free summers now.” YearsLooksDoeHas BeensSeemsWould BeGivenRecordsSeaSummerLowsHappeningsAverageFoolishRecoveryObservationIceRegionsTemporaryTrendsDefiniteProjectionProgressionDip Author:David Robert Whitehouse
“All the things that we've done as a species have had a limited scope. We're talking about melting the ice caps, raising the level of the seas dramatically, changing the distribution of every other species on Earth, perhaps wiping out one-third or half of them. The changes at work are geologic in scale. The level of change required to deal with it is enormous, too. It will require change in every country. It will require a degree of global cooperation that we haven't seen before.” CountryDoneEarthLevelsDealsHalfTalkingSeaHavensDegreesThirdsSpeciesScalesEnormousIceCooperationDistributionScopeCapsMeltingWiping Out Author:Bill McKibben
“For me the most important issue is climate change because it in some ways trumps every other issue. Everything else we care about falls by the wayside if the Greenland ice shelf falls into the sea. And if suddenly sea levels rise 21 feet, everything we hold near and dear ceases to exist.” IfsWayImportantCareFallLevelsIssuesSeaFeetTrumpClimateClimate ChangeDearCeaseIceShelvesImportant IssuesGreenlandSea Level Rise Author:Moby
“The burning of fossil fuels has altered the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere so rapidly and so abundantly that now, we are driving not just the warming trend, not just the sea level rise that is a consequence of the warming trend that is melting polar ice and alpine ice, but also [ocean acidification].” LevelsSeaAmountOceanConsequenceDrivingIceBurningAtmosphereFuelTrendsCarbonFossilsMeltingAlteredFossil FuelCarbon DioxideAlpineSea Level RiseOcean Acidification Author:Sylvia Earle
“[Derek] Shackleton was a man who - it's probably arrogant to say it - but he was a little bit like me. He undertook incredible dangers and carried on over the sea and over the ice and all the rest of it. He was a remarkable man.” MenLittlesBitsSeaDangerLittle BitIncrediblesLike MeIceRemarkableArrogantShackleton Author:Edmund Hillary
“Every [Alaskan] has witnessed climate change over the past fifty years. Our winters are warmer, our summers are longer, and our Arctic Village shores, once protected by sea ice are eroding.” YearsPastSeaSummerClimateWinterClimate ChangeIceFiftyVillageShoreProtectedOver The PastArcticAlaskans Author:Ray Metcalfe
“Certainly, packets of sea ice, in say the Arctic, which have failed to fully reform in the last couple of years.” YearsLastsSeaCoupleIceReformArctic Author:Bill McKibben
“Ice in the West Antarctic and over Greenland, i.e., ice that's over a rock at the moment, that will raise the level of the sea as it slides into the ocean, putting at risk everyone and everything that lives on the coasts, and that includes an enormous percentage of the world's people.” PeopleWorldMomentsLevelsRiskSeaRocksOceanRaisesWestEnormousIceCoastPercentagesSlidesGreenland Author:Bill McKibben
“We've lost half the summer sea ice in the Arctic. We've wiped out an enormous percentage of the world's coral reefs. We see huge changes in the planet's hydrology already, the cycles of drought and flood both amped up because warm air holds more water vapor than cold. These things are happening with a one-degree increase and going to two degrees won't be twice as bad, the increase in damage won't be linear, it most certainly will be exponential. So it was precisely the wrong moment to elect Trump.” WorldTwoMomentsLostWaterHalfAirSeaPlanetsHugeColdTrumpDegreesSummerHappeningsIncreaseWarmEnormousIceDamageCyclesFloodPercentagesLinearDroughtArcticReefsVaporCoral ReefsHuge Changes Author:Bill McKibben
“The prediction that glaciers will be gone from Glacier National Park has been moved up by 10 years to 2020, the same year it's predicted the Arctic Sea will be ice-free in the summer.” YearsHas BeensGoneSeaSummerMovedIceParksPredictionsArcticNational ParksGlaciers Author:Bill Kurtis