And in the Earth are neighbouring tracts, vineyards and ploughed lands, and date-palms, like and unlike, which are watered with one water. And we have made some of them to excel others in fruit. Lo! herein verily are portents for people who have sense.
He sendeth down water from the sky, so that valleys flow according to their measure, and the flood beareth (on its surface) swelling foam – from that which they smelt in the fire in order to make ornaments and tools riseth a foam like unto it – thus Allah coineth (the similitude of) the true and the false. Then, as for the foam, it passeth away as scum upon the banks, while, as for that which is of use to mankind, it remaineth in the earth. Thus Allah coineth the similitudes. Koran 13:2-4&17
And the earth have We spread out, and placed therein firm hills, and caused each seemly thing to grow therein. Koran 15:19
Nature vibrates with rhythms, climatic and diastrophic, those finding stratigraphic expression ranging in period from the rapid oscillation of surface waters, recorded in ripple-mark, to those long-deferred stirrings of the deep imprisoned titans which have divided earth history into periods and eras. The flight of time is measured by the weaving of composite rhythms – day and night, calm and storm, summer and winter, birth and death such as these are sensed in the brief life of man. But the career of the earth recedes into a remoteness against which these lesser cycles are as unavailing for the measurement of that abyss of time as would be for human history the beating of an insect’s wing. We must seek out, then, the nature of those longer rhythms whose very existence was unknown until man by the light of science sought to understand the earth. The larger of these must be measured in terms of the smaller, and the smaller must be measured in terms of years. Joseph Barrell, ‘Rhythm and the Measurement of Geologic Time’, Bulletin of Geological Society of America 28:74, 1917
New England – home to the most colourful forest in America stretching across six states from Maine in the north to Connecticut in the South. Every year millions of people flock here to witness one of the planet’s greatest spectacles. Earth’s Greatest Spectacles I: New England, BBC 2016
The Islands of Svalbard: within a few weeks frozen wastelands burst into life … from perpetual darkness to perpetual light, from frozen ice world to land of vibrant life … One of the planet’s most extreme changes. Earth’s Greatest Spectacles II: Svalbard
The Svalbard winter – A night that last for months. ibid.
Polar bear … is quite comfortable even at minus forty. ibid.
When the moon rises it can stay up for a week. ibid.
Magic colours in the Arctic Sky: Aurora Borealis – the northern lights. ibid.
Beautiful but brutal: vast glaciers flow from lonely peaks. ibid.
The Kalahari basin: two and half million square kilometres of flat sand and scrub – this desert stretches across southern Africa. But at its heart lies a river – a river that never reaches the sea. And once a year it floods. For over five months water is spread across a vast area of the Kalahari. Earth’s Greatest Spectacles: Okavango
You may have heard of the Earth Liberation Front: the Attorney General himself says it’s a domestic terrorist organisation; the FBI says it is one of the most dangerous groups in the country. The ELF has claimed responsibility for more than two-dozen acts of eco-terrorism. If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front, news, 2011
This thing is complex … no-one got hurt. ibid. Daniel
I protested constantly … I wrote hundreds of protest letters. ibid.
There is this new kind of protest … people would call it sabotage or monkeywrenching. ibid.
In the months after the Ranger Station fires there was a split within the environmental movement. ibid.
Six of Daniel’s co-defendants have appeared in court to accept plea-deals; in exchange for reduced sentences they’ve agreed to testify in the government’s case against the remaining defendants. ibid.
In 1999 tens of thousands of people converged on Seattle to protest the WTO and its effect on the environment and labour … The police responded with force to clear the streets. ibid.
Planet Earth was designed and manufactured by a Mr God. Now Mr God is a hard man to track down. He gives his address as everywhere and nowhere, omnipresent in space and time, although we discovered he actually operates out of this lock-up in Croydon. Spitting Image s8e6, That’s Life mock, ITV 1990
According to some experts, in fifty years time the Earth could look like this – exactly the same. Spitting Image s11e5, David Dimbleby, ITV 1991
We have succeeded in disrupting the balance that is so essential to life on Earth. Home, 2009
The Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia stretches over 350,000 kilometres and is home to 1,500 species of fish, 4,000 species of molluscs and 400 species of coral. The equilibrium of every ocean depends on these corals. ibid.
Half of humankind tills the soil, over three-quarters of them by hand. ibid.
Water shortages could affect nearly two billion people before 2025. ibid.
In the last century half of the world’s marshes were drained. ibid.
One human being in six now lives in a precarious, unhealthy, overpopulated environment. ibid.
5,000 people a day die because of dirty drinking water. 1 billion people have no access to safe drinking water. ibid.
I’m just back from Hokkaido, the northern island. Rich and hurried Japanese take the plane. Others take the ferry. Waiting, immobility, snatches of sleep: curiously, it all makes me think of some past or future war: night trains, air raids, fall-out shelters, small fragments of war enshrined in everyday life. Sans Soleil, 1983
After circling the globe only banality still interests me. ibid.
We rewrite memory much as history is rewritten. ibid.
There are some places on Earth that simply take your breath away: lush tropical forests, spectacular islands, soaring mountain ranges or frozen polar worlds. And for the people who call these extraordinary places home, survival requires skill, ingenuity and bravery. Some natural wonders are simply the most extreme places on the planet to live. Earth’s Natural Wonders I: Surviving the Extreme, BBC 2018
The Himalayas: the [yak] herders are preparing for their big descent … It’s time for a leap of faith. ibid.
The Canadian Arctic: an extraordinary natural wonder … frozen solid for over half the year … Unbelievably, people live here. ibid.
The Amazon basin: home to the largest rain forest on Earth. Over 380 billion trees covering around a third of South America’s entire land mass. A unique natural wonder home to a dizzying array of plants, animals and insects … Large areas of this rain forest are being destroyed by fire. ibid.
Australia, and in Queensland, a natural wonder five times the size of Britain part of the outbacks, a huge unbroken expanse of wilderness … rounding up all the animals for market is a mammoth task. ibid.
A million square miles across northern Russia … In winter it’s a permanently frozen wilderness … but in summer this landscape is completely transformed. ibid.
In some of Earth’s natural wonders learning to live with wild animals is the only way to survive … animals make the difference between life and death. (Earth & Nature) Earth’s Natural Wonders II: Surviving With Animals
Australia … along its rugged [northern] coastline runs a remarkable eco-system … home to one of the most aggressive of all predators: the saltwalter crocodile, measure up to six metres in length and weighing as much as a ton … Their descendants still use traditional skills to collect crog eggs, risking their lives in the process. ibid.
Yamal Peninsula, stretching over 400 miles into the Arctic Circle … They have no way to survive here without the reindeer … ibid.
High in the ancient sandstone mountains of Ethiopia a mother faces a treacherous climb to give her new baby the best chance in Life. Earth’s Natural Wonders III: Surviving Against the Odds
The dozens of indigenous groups who still inhabit the rainforest. One of these is the Kamayura, a community of just over 500 people. Theirs is a world dominated by spirits. ibid.
Laos is littered with around 80 million unexploded bombs dropped by the Americans during the Vietnam war over 40 years ago. ibid.