A Quote by Edith Widder

It's a little-appreciated fact that most of the animals in our ocean make light. — © Edith Widder
It's a little-appreciated fact that most of the animals in our ocean make light.
It's a little-appreciated fact that most of the animals in our ocean make light. I've spent most of my career studying this phenomenon called bioluminescence. I study it because I think understanding it is critical to understanding life in the ocean where most bioluminescence occurs.
If I go out in the open ocean environment, virtually anywhere in the world, and I drag a net from 3,000 feet to the surface, most of the animals - in fact, in many places, 80 to 90 percent of the animals that I bring up in that net - make light. This makes for some pretty spectacular light shows.
There's a lot of animals in the open ocean - most of them that make light. And we have a pretty good idea, for most of them, why. They use it for finding food, for attracting mates, for defending against predators. But when you get down to the bottom of the ocean, that's where things get really strange.
Finding animals that make light in the ocean is easy. Just drag a net through the water anywhere in the upper 3000 feet, and as many as 80-90% of the animals you catch can make light. The biomimetic lure that I developed imitates one of these - a common deep sea jellyfish called Atolla.
The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. From it we have learned most of what we know. Recently, we have waded a little out to sea, enough to dampen our toes or, at most, wet our ankles. The water seems inviting. The ocean calls.
I really don't know why it is that all of us are so committed to the sea, except I think it is because in addition to the fact that the sea changes and the light changes, and ships change, it is because we all came from the sea. And it is an interesting biological fact that all of us have, in our veins the exact same percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and, therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweat, in our tears. We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch it we are going back from whence we came.
Socially inferior animals are the ones that make the most strenuous, resourceful efforts to get to know their keepers. They prove to be the ones most faithful to them…it is a fact commonly known in the trade.
It was like being at the bottom of an ocean, she said. There was no light and a whole ocean crushing down on you. But most people had gotten so used to it they thought it normal, they forgot even that there was a world above.
Now everything was changed. She walked about with cautious, anxious steps, staring constantly at the ground, on the lookout for things that crept and crawled. Bushes were dangerous, and so were sea grass and rain water. There were little animals everywhere. They could turn up between the covers of a book, flattened and dead, for the fact is that creeping animals, tattered animals, and dead animals are with us all our lives, from beginning to end. Grandmother tried to discuss this with her, to no avail. Irrational terror is so hard to deal with.
Kind thoughts increase the flow of vital energy into your body and mind. Do kind acts now. Do not procrastinate. Kindness is like a healing balm. It soothes suffering... Little drops of water make the mighty ocean. Even so, little acts of kindness make an ocean of goodwill.
Ever since we crawled out of that primordial slime, that's been our unifying cry: "More light." Sunlight. Torchlight. Candlight. Neon. Incandescent. Lights that banish the darkness from our caves, to illuminate our roads, the insides of our refrigerators. Big floods for the night games at Soldier's field. Little tiny flashlight for those books we read under the covers when we're supposed to be asleep. Light is more than watts and footcandles. Light is metaphor... Light is knowledge. Light is life. Light is light.
Beneath the ocean surface, bad things are happening. Increasing CO2 makes ocean water more acid, and that threatens to dissolve the shells of some ocean animals. Ouch, how'd you like to have your shell dissolve?
I saw also that there was an ocean of darkness and death, but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness.
Little drops of water, little grains of sand, Make the mighty ocean, and the pleasant land. So the little minutes, humble though they be, Make the mighty ages of eternity.
Water - the ocean - is our most natural environment. We are born naked from the miniature ocean of the mother's womb.
I wish people were more like animals. Animals don't try to change you or make you fit in. They just enjoy the pleasure of your company. Animals aren't conditional about friendships. Animals like you just the way you are. They listen to your problems, they comfort you when you're sad, and all they ask in return is a little kindness.
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