WEBVTT

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I was walking my mountain the other day,

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and I was feeling really at home with the forest.

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And I was so grateful to it

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for showing me that forests are built on relationships

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which form networks,

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like these beautiful river networks.

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And I thought,

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"Wow, forests are just like human families."

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And I was so taken by the beauty of this idea

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that I fell and I crashed down on the ground,

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and I hit my head on this new stump.

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And I was so angry!

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Then, I was so heartbroken

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because there was a whole family of trees cut down.

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Thing is, where I'm from in Western Canada,

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there's clearcuts like this hidden everywhere,

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and it wasn't until Google Earth starting sending images,

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like this,

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that we realized the whole world

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was wiping its noses on our old-growth forests.

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Did you know

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that deforestation like this around the world

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causes more greenhouse gas emissions

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than all the trains, planes and automobiles combined?

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Yeah, I'm really upset about this,

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but I'm also really hopeful

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because I've also discovered in my research

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that forest networks are organized

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in the same way as our own neural networks

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and our social networks.

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And I believe that if we can learn to integrate these into a whole

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that we can change this dangerous pathway of global warming

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because I believe we are wired for healing.

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So, here's the science:

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The most ancient of these networks

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is this below-ground fungal network, or mushroom network.

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And it evolved over a billion years ago

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to allow organisms to migrate from the ocean onto the land.

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And eventually, they got together with plants

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in this symbiosis.

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And this allowed plants to photosynthesize,

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pulling CO2, which is our biggest greenhouse gas,

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out of the atmosphere and giving off oxygen,

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which allows us to breathe

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and actually allowed humans to eventually evolve.

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Now, we call this symbiosis a mycorrhiza,

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myco for fungus, rrhiza for root.

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So, the fungus and root get together,

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and they trade for mutual benefit.

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Now, all trees in all forests all over the world

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depend on these mycorrhizas for their very survival.

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They can't live without them.

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And the way it works

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is that a seed falls on the forest floor,

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it germinates,

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it sends a root down into the soil,

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and it starts sending out chemical signals

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to the fungi to grow towards the root.

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And the fungus communicates back

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with its own signals,

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and it says to the root,

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'You need to grow towards me and branch and soften.'

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And so by this communication,

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they grow together into this magical symbiosis.

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And the way that symbiosis works

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is the plant takes its hard-earned carbon from photosynthesis

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and brings it to the fungus

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because the fungus can't photosynthesize.

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And the fungus takes nutrients and water it gathers from the soil,

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where plant roots can't grow,

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and they give it to the plant.

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And so they're both benefiting in this cooperation.

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Now, as the fungus grows through the soil,

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it starts linking plant and plant

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and tree and tree together

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until the whole forest is linked together.

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Did you know that a single tree

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can be literally linked up to hundreds of other trees

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as far as the eye can see?

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And as you're walking through the forest,

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what you see, the trees, the roots, the mushrooms,

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are just the tip of the iceberg.

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Under a single footstep,

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there are 300 miles of fungal cells

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stacked end on end moving stuff around.

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And if you could look down into the ground,

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it would be like this super highway

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with cars going everywhere.

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Now, all networks are made of nodes and links.

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In forests, those nodes would be trees

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and the links fungi.

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It's kind of like in your Facebook network,

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where nodes would be friends

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and links would be your friendships.

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Now, we all know that some of those nodes,

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or friends,

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are busier than others,

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like that friend who is always sending out group messages.

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Well, it's the same in forests,

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and these nodes in forests,

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we call them hubs,

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they're the big trees in the forests

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with roots going everywhere.

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Now, we also have learned

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that the systems organized around these hubs,

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these big old trees,

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so in forests, that's where the regeneration occurs.

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In your Facebook network,

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that might be how parties are organized,

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around that hub that's always sending out the group messages.

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We call those hubs in forests mother trees;

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they're the big old trees in the forest.

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And they fix the carbon in their leaves,

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and they send it down through their massive trunks

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and into the networks all around them

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that are linked up to all the other trees

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and seedlings, the young ones,

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and they start sending that carbon everywhere.

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The more those seedlings are stressed out,

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maybe from drought or shade,

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the more the mother tree sends to them.

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It's kind of like in your families,

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where if you're kind of stressed out,

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mom and dad kick in and help you out a bit more, right?

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Well, it's the same in forests.

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The other thing that we've recently discovered

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is that mother trees will preferentially send

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more signals to her own kids, her own children.

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And then, this way she helps them do better,

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and then they survive more,

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and then they can pass their genes on to future generations.

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So, how natural selection works.

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Now, the way these forests are organized

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makes them both resilient and vulnerable.

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They're resilient because there's many mother trees,

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and there's many fungal species linking them together.

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And that network is really hard to break.

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It's pretty darn tough.

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But of course,

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we humans have figured out how to do that.

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And what we do is we take out the mother trees.

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And maybe taking one out won't make much difference

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but when you take more and more and more

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and clearcut and more and more and more

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that it can cause the system to collapse and fall down,

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like dominoes.

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And we can cross tipping points

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and cause more forest death and more global warming,

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and we're doing that.

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So what we do,

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our choices we make,

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can lead us towards global heatlh or global sickness.

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We do have choices.

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And I'm going to leave you with four ideas

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that I think are worth spreading.

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First one:

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To love the forest

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you have to go spend time in it.

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Go be in the forest, connect with it.

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And then you'll fight hard enough to protect them.

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Second:

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Learn how they work.

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Learn how those networks link things together

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in organized forests.

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And to do that,

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you gotta go out there take risks, make mistakes.

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Third:

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Protect forests.

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They need you to do that

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because they can't do it themselves.

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They're stuck in one spot.

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They can't run away from humans,

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and they can't run away from global warming.

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They need you.

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And finally,

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and most importantly,

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use your own very clever, brilliant,

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neural and social networks to create amazing messages,

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and spread the word that forests are worth saving

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because you're worth saving,

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and I believe that together

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we're all wired for healing.