TED Talks: Jane Goodall

Jane Goodall is a scientist noted for her study of the great apes, and has been researching this for over 40 years. In her TED talk she speaks about the destruction of habitat, culture and environment. Her first reference to the interconnectivity of these problems involves large international logging corporations that build roads through forests inhabited by natives. These natives then use the road to go from hunter gatherers who only took what they needed, to poachers and vendors of meat. They now kill everything that moves, destroying the food chain and screwing themselves in the long run. They take the meat they get from the clear cutting style of hunting they employ and use the logging trucks to sell it for money in the towns. All the wile the loggers deforest the area, further reducing the productivity of the natives hunting grounds. The loggers move on, leaving the road, and waste behind it, and the navies are left with drastically reduced forestland, and food. She also throws her ape research into her speech, talking about how they have emotions, and intelligence, and that the destruction of the forests also harms our closest cousins, who are also deserving of consideration and empathy.