1 00:00:28,240 --> 00:00:32,569 I've been spending my summers in the marine biological laboratory 2 00:00:32,593 --> 00:00:34,583 in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. 3 00:00:35,131 --> 00:00:39,293 And there, what I've been doing is essentially renting a boat. 4 00:00:39,317 --> 00:00:41,917 What I would like to do is ask you 5 00:00:41,941 --> 00:00:44,171 to come on a boat ride with me tonight. 6 00:00:46,036 --> 00:00:50,929 So, we ride off from Eel Pond into Vineyard Sound, 7 00:00:50,953 --> 00:00:53,464 right off the coast of Martha's Vineyard, 8 00:00:53,488 --> 00:00:56,825 equipped with a drone to identify potential spots 9 00:00:56,849 --> 00:00:59,326 from which to peer into the Atlantic. 10 00:00:59,350 --> 00:01:02,629 Earlier, I was going to say into the depths of the Atlantic, 11 00:01:02,653 --> 00:01:05,832 but we don't have to go too deep to reach the unknown. 12 00:01:06,511 --> 00:01:09,082 Here, barely two miles away 13 00:01:09,106 --> 00:01:13,652 from what is arguably the greatest marine biology lab in the world, 14 00:01:13,676 --> 00:01:16,897 we lower a simple plankton net into the water 15 00:01:16,921 --> 00:01:18,742 and bring up to the surface 16 00:01:18,766 --> 00:01:22,166 things that humanity rarely pays any attention to, 17 00:01:22,190 --> 00:01:24,722 and oftentimes has never seen before. 18 00:01:25,460 --> 00:01:28,404 Here's one of the organisms that we caught in our net. 19 00:01:28,428 --> 00:01:29,687 This is a jellyfish. 20 00:01:30,081 --> 00:01:31,393 But look closely, 21 00:01:31,417 --> 00:01:34,408 and living inside of this animal is another organism 22 00:01:34,432 --> 00:01:37,137 that is very likely entirely new to science. 23 00:01:37,161 --> 00:01:38,839 A complete new species. 24 00:01:39,317 --> 00:01:42,020 Or how about this other transparent beauty 25 00:01:42,044 --> 00:01:43,584 with a beating heart, 26 00:01:43,608 --> 00:01:47,036 asexually growing on top of its head, 27 00:01:47,060 --> 00:01:50,246 progeny that will move on to reproduce sexually. 28 00:01:50,747 --> 00:01:52,234 Let me say that again: 29 00:01:52,258 --> 00:01:55,944 this animal is growing asexually on top of its head, 30 00:01:55,968 --> 00:02:00,455 progeny that is going to reproduce sexually in the next generation. 31 00:02:01,160 --> 00:02:02,478 A weird jellyfish? 32 00:02:02,996 --> 00:02:04,306 Not quite. 33 00:02:04,330 --> 00:02:05,612 This is an ascidian. 34 00:02:05,972 --> 00:02:07,256 This is a group of animals 35 00:02:07,280 --> 00:02:11,027 that now we know we share extensive genomic ancestry with, 36 00:02:11,051 --> 00:02:15,774 and it is perhaps the closest invertebrate species to our own. 37 00:02:16,576 --> 00:02:17,945 Meet your cousin, 38 00:02:17,969 --> 00:02:19,399 Thalia democratica. 39 00:02:19,423 --> 00:02:21,381 (Laughter) 40 00:02:21,405 --> 00:02:25,395 I'm pretty sure you didn't save a spot at your last family reunion 41 00:02:25,419 --> 00:02:26,851 for Thalia, 42 00:02:26,875 --> 00:02:28,527 but let me tell you, 43 00:02:28,551 --> 00:02:31,879 these animals are profoundly related to us 44 00:02:31,903 --> 00:02:34,935 in ways that we're just beginning to understand. 45 00:02:36,364 --> 00:02:40,489 So, next time you hear anybody derisively telling you 46 00:02:40,513 --> 00:02:44,410 that this type of research is a simple fishing expedition, 47 00:02:44,434 --> 00:02:47,434 I hope that you'll remember the trip that we just took. 48 00:02:47,875 --> 00:02:51,715 Today, many of the biological sciences only see value 49 00:02:51,739 --> 00:02:54,288 in studying deeper what we already know -- 50 00:02:54,312 --> 00:02:56,822 in mapping already-discovered continents. 51 00:02:57,299 --> 00:03:00,637 But some of us are much more interested in the unknown. 52 00:03:01,049 --> 00:03:04,993 We want to discover completely new continents, 53 00:03:05,017 --> 00:03:08,418 and gaze at magnificent vistas of ignorance. 54 00:03:08,874 --> 00:03:12,970 We crave the experience of being completely baffled 55 00:03:12,994 --> 00:03:15,168 by something we've never seen before. 56 00:03:15,192 --> 00:03:16,462 And yes, I agree 57 00:03:16,486 --> 00:03:20,286 there's a lot of little ego satisfaction in being able to say, 58 00:03:20,310 --> 00:03:22,785 "Hey, I was the first one to discover that." 59 00:03:23,302 --> 00:03:26,207 But this is not a self-aggrandizing enterprise, 60 00:03:26,231 --> 00:03:28,931 because in this type of discovery research, 61 00:03:28,955 --> 00:03:32,573 if you don't feel like a complete idiot most of the time, 62 00:03:32,597 --> 00:03:34,878 you're just not sciencing hard enough. 63 00:03:34,902 --> 00:03:36,936 (Laughter) 64 00:03:38,214 --> 00:03:44,197 So every summer I bring onto the deck of this little boat of ours 65 00:03:44,221 --> 00:03:49,895 more and more things that we know very little about. 66 00:03:51,816 --> 00:03:56,004 I would like tonight to tell you a story about life 67 00:03:56,028 --> 00:03:59,368 that rarely gets told in an environment like this. 68 00:04:00,615 --> 00:04:07,511 From the vantage point of our 21st-century biological laboratories, 69 00:04:08,774 --> 00:04:12,691 we have begun to illuminate many mysteries of life with knowledge. 70 00:04:13,369 --> 00:04:17,006 We sense that after centuries of scientific research, 71 00:04:17,030 --> 00:04:19,137 we're beginning to make significant inroads 72 00:04:19,161 --> 00:04:23,027 into understanding some of the most fundamental principles of life. 73 00:04:23,723 --> 00:04:28,724 Our collective optimism is reflected by the growth of biotechnology 74 00:04:28,748 --> 00:04:30,022 across the globe, 75 00:04:30,826 --> 00:04:35,474 striving to utilize scientific knowledge to cure human diseases. 76 00:04:37,085 --> 00:04:41,923 Things like cancer, aging, degenerative diseases; 77 00:04:41,947 --> 00:04:46,279 these are but some of the undesirables we wish to tame. 78 00:04:47,217 --> 00:04:48,661 I often wonder: 79 00:04:48,685 --> 00:04:51,846 Why is it that we are having so much trouble 80 00:04:51,870 --> 00:04:54,032 trying to solve the problem of cancer? 81 00:04:54,496 --> 00:04:57,750 Is it that we're trying to solve the problem of cancer, 82 00:04:57,774 --> 00:05:00,068 and not trying to understand life? 83 00:05:01,057 --> 00:05:04,245 Life on this planet shares a common origin, 84 00:05:04,269 --> 00:05:09,322 and I can summarize 3.5 billion years of the history of life on this planet 85 00:05:09,346 --> 00:05:10,826 in a single slide. 86 00:05:10,850 --> 00:05:16,857 What you see here are representatives of all known species in our planet. 87 00:05:17,421 --> 00:05:20,832 In this immensity of life and biodiversity, 88 00:05:20,856 --> 00:05:24,023 we occupy a rather unremarkable position. 89 00:05:24,047 --> 00:05:25,063 (Laughter) 90 00:05:25,087 --> 00:05:26,310 Homo sapiens. 91 00:05:27,116 --> 00:05:28,721 The last of our kind. 92 00:05:29,670 --> 00:05:32,781 And though I don't really want to disparage at all 93 00:05:32,805 --> 00:05:34,776 the accomplishments of our species, 94 00:05:34,800 --> 00:05:39,786 as much as we wish it to be so and often pretend that it is, 95 00:05:39,810 --> 00:05:42,686 we are not the measure of all things. 96 00:05:43,411 --> 00:05:46,898 We are, however, the measurers of many things. 97 00:05:47,411 --> 00:05:51,157 We relentlessly quantify, analyze and compare, 98 00:05:51,181 --> 00:05:54,961 and some of this is absolutely invaluable and indeed necessary. 99 00:05:55,761 --> 00:06:02,148 But this emphasis today on forcing biological research to specialize 100 00:06:02,172 --> 00:06:04,720 and to produce practical outcomes 101 00:06:04,744 --> 00:06:08,298 is actually restricting our ability to interrogate life 102 00:06:08,322 --> 00:06:12,405 to unacceptably narrow confines and unsatisfying depths. 103 00:06:13,107 --> 00:06:18,148 We are measuring an astonishingly narrow sliver of life, 104 00:06:18,172 --> 00:06:21,948 and hoping that those numbers will save all of our lives. 105 00:06:22,525 --> 00:06:23,918 How narrow do you ask? 106 00:06:23,942 --> 00:06:25,546 Well, let me give you a number. 107 00:06:25,570 --> 00:06:30,089 The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently estimated 108 00:06:30,113 --> 00:06:34,040 that about 95 percent of our oceans remain unexplored. 109 00:06:34,774 --> 00:06:36,486 Now let that sink in for a second. 110 00:06:37,130 --> 00:06:40,977 95 percent of our oceans remain unexplored. 111 00:06:41,812 --> 00:06:43,977 I think it's very safe to say 112 00:06:44,001 --> 00:06:48,830 that we don't even know how much about life we do not know. 113 00:06:49,910 --> 00:06:52,835 So, it's not surprising that every week in my field 114 00:06:52,859 --> 00:06:56,070 we begin to see the addition of more and more new species 115 00:06:56,094 --> 00:06:58,353 to this amazing tree of life. 116 00:06:58,377 --> 00:06:59,774 This one for example -- 117 00:06:59,798 --> 00:07:01,704 discovered earlier this summer, 118 00:07:01,728 --> 00:07:02,941 new to science, 119 00:07:02,965 --> 00:07:06,257 and now occupying its lonely branch in our family tree. 120 00:07:07,073 --> 00:07:08,224 What is even more tragic 121 00:07:08,248 --> 00:07:11,883 is that we know about a bunch of other species of animals out there, 122 00:07:11,907 --> 00:07:15,468 but their biology remains sorely under-studied. 123 00:07:15,492 --> 00:07:17,826 I'm sure some of you have heard about the fact 124 00:07:17,850 --> 00:07:22,046 that a starfish can actually regenerate its arm after it's lost. 125 00:07:22,070 --> 00:07:23,512 But some of you might not know 126 00:07:23,536 --> 00:07:27,885 that the arm itself can actually regenerate a complete starfish. 127 00:07:28,859 --> 00:07:32,907 And there are animals out there that do truly astounding things. 128 00:07:33,561 --> 00:07:35,271 I'm almost willing to bet 129 00:07:35,295 --> 00:07:40,009 that many of you have never heard of the flatworm, Schmidtea mediterranea. 130 00:07:41,023 --> 00:07:43,122 This little guy right here 131 00:07:43,146 --> 00:07:46,220 does things that essentially just blow my mind. 132 00:07:46,731 --> 00:07:50,735 You can grab one of these animals and cut it into 18 different fragments, 133 00:07:50,759 --> 00:07:54,521 and each and every one of those fragments will go on to regenerate 134 00:07:54,545 --> 00:07:55,863 a complete animal 135 00:07:55,887 --> 00:07:57,521 in under two weeks. 136 00:07:58,294 --> 00:08:02,531 18 heads, 18 bodies, 18 mysteries. 137 00:08:02,948 --> 00:08:05,344 For the past decade and a half or so, 138 00:08:05,368 --> 00:08:09,078 I've been trying to figure out how these little dudes do what they do, 139 00:08:09,102 --> 00:08:11,301 and how they pull this magic trick off. 140 00:08:11,325 --> 00:08:13,039 But like all good magicians, 141 00:08:13,063 --> 00:08:15,918 they're not really releasing their secrets readily to me. 142 00:08:15,942 --> 00:08:17,148 (Laughter) 143 00:08:17,172 --> 00:08:18,330 So here we are, 144 00:08:18,354 --> 00:08:22,809 after 20 years of essentially studying these animals, 145 00:08:22,833 --> 00:08:25,140 genome mapping, chin scratching, 146 00:08:25,164 --> 00:08:28,383 and thousands of amputations and thousands of regenerations, 147 00:08:28,407 --> 00:08:32,202 we still don't fully understand how these animals do what they do. 148 00:08:32,628 --> 00:08:36,224 Each planarian an ocean unto itself, 149 00:08:36,248 --> 00:08:37,854 full of unknowns. 150 00:08:39,076 --> 00:08:40,760 One of the common characteristics 151 00:08:40,784 --> 00:08:43,396 of all of these animals I've been talking to you about 152 00:08:43,420 --> 00:08:46,183 is that they did not appear to have received the memo 153 00:08:46,207 --> 00:08:48,874 that they need to behave according to the rules 154 00:08:48,898 --> 00:08:53,067 that we have derived from a handful of randomly selected animals 155 00:08:53,091 --> 00:08:55,813 that currently populate the vast majority 156 00:08:55,837 --> 00:08:58,354 of biomedical laboratories across the world. 157 00:08:58,717 --> 00:09:00,947 Meet our Nobel Prize winners. 158 00:09:00,971 --> 00:09:02,973 Seven species, essentially, 159 00:09:02,997 --> 00:09:06,599 that have produced for us the brunt of our understanding 160 00:09:06,623 --> 00:09:09,090 of biological behavior today. 161 00:09:09,772 --> 00:09:11,564 This little guy right here -- 162 00:09:11,588 --> 00:09:14,058 three Nobel Prizes in 12 years. 163 00:09:14,804 --> 00:09:17,560 And yet, after all the attention they have garnered, 164 00:09:17,584 --> 00:09:19,644 and all the knowledge they have generated, 165 00:09:19,668 --> 00:09:21,693 as well as the lion's share of the funding, 166 00:09:21,717 --> 00:09:25,590 here we are standing [before] the same litany of intractable problems 167 00:09:25,614 --> 00:09:27,238 and many new challenges. 168 00:09:27,820 --> 00:09:29,635 And that's because, unfortunately, 169 00:09:29,659 --> 00:09:32,273 these seven animals essentially correspond 170 00:09:32,297 --> 00:09:39,073 to 0.0009 percent of all of the species that inhabit the planet. 171 00:09:40,562 --> 00:09:42,948 So I'm beginning to suspect 172 00:09:42,972 --> 00:09:47,733 that our specialization is beginning to impede our progress at best, 173 00:09:47,757 --> 00:09:50,184 and at worst, is leading us astray. 174 00:09:50,835 --> 00:09:53,909 That's because life on this planet and its history 175 00:09:53,933 --> 00:09:55,650 is the history of rule breakers. 176 00:09:56,033 --> 00:09:59,380 Life started on the face of this planet as single-cell organisms, 177 00:09:59,404 --> 00:10:01,726 swimming for millions of years in the ocean, 178 00:10:01,750 --> 00:10:04,036 until one of those creatures decided, 179 00:10:04,060 --> 00:10:06,119 "I'm going to do things differently today; 180 00:10:06,143 --> 00:10:09,151 today I would like to invent something called multicellularity, 181 00:10:09,175 --> 00:10:10,448 and I'm going to do this." 182 00:10:10,472 --> 00:10:13,124 And I'm sure it wasn't a popular decision at the time -- 183 00:10:13,148 --> 00:10:14,175 (Laughter) 184 00:10:14,199 --> 00:10:15,805 but somehow, it managed to do it. 185 00:10:15,829 --> 00:10:18,395 And then, multicellular organisms began to populate 186 00:10:18,419 --> 00:10:19,795 all these ancestral oceans, 187 00:10:19,819 --> 00:10:21,007 and they thrived. 188 00:10:21,031 --> 00:10:22,564 And we have them here today. 189 00:10:23,389 --> 00:10:26,386 Land masses began to emerge from the surface of the oceans, 190 00:10:26,410 --> 00:10:27,864 and another creature thought, 191 00:10:27,888 --> 00:10:30,677 "Hey, that looks like a really nice piece of real estate. 192 00:10:30,701 --> 00:10:31,952 I'd like to move there." 193 00:10:31,976 --> 00:10:33,135 "Are you crazy? 194 00:10:33,159 --> 00:10:36,443 You're going to desiccate out there. Nothing can live out of water." 195 00:10:36,467 --> 00:10:37,624 But life found a way, 196 00:10:37,648 --> 00:10:39,971 and there are organisms now that live on land. 197 00:10:39,995 --> 00:10:42,393 Once on land, they may have looked up into the sky 198 00:10:42,417 --> 00:10:44,676 and said, "It would be nice to go to the clouds, 199 00:10:44,700 --> 00:10:45,851 I'm going to fly." 200 00:10:45,875 --> 00:10:48,950 "You can't break the law of gravity, there's no way you can fly." 201 00:10:48,974 --> 00:10:51,259 And yet, nature has invented -- 202 00:10:51,283 --> 00:10:53,290 multiple and independent times -- 203 00:10:53,314 --> 00:10:54,521 ways to fly. 204 00:10:54,968 --> 00:10:57,485 I love to study these animals that break the rules, 205 00:10:57,509 --> 00:11:01,138 because every time they break a rule, they invent something new 206 00:11:01,162 --> 00:11:04,921 that made it possible for us to be able to be here today. 207 00:11:05,224 --> 00:11:07,494 These animals did not get the memo. 208 00:11:07,518 --> 00:11:09,218 They break the rules. 209 00:11:09,242 --> 00:11:12,037 So if we're going to study animals that break the rules, 210 00:11:12,061 --> 00:11:15,056 shouldn't how we study them also break the rules? 211 00:11:16,266 --> 00:11:19,654 I think we need to renew our spirit of exploration. 212 00:11:20,040 --> 00:11:22,524 Rather than bring nature into our laboratories 213 00:11:22,548 --> 00:11:23,863 and interrogate it there, 214 00:11:23,887 --> 00:11:25,593 we need to bring our science 215 00:11:25,617 --> 00:11:28,522 into the majestic laboratory that is nature, 216 00:11:28,546 --> 00:11:32,457 and there, with our modern technological armamentarium, 217 00:11:32,481 --> 00:11:35,307 interrogate every new form of life we find, 218 00:11:35,331 --> 00:11:38,324 and any new biological attribute that we may find. 219 00:11:39,086 --> 00:11:43,240 We actually need to bring all of our intelligence 220 00:11:43,264 --> 00:11:45,356 to becoming stupid again -- 221 00:11:45,380 --> 00:11:49,239 clueless [before] the immensity of the unknown. 222 00:11:49,716 --> 00:11:51,077 Because after all, 223 00:11:51,101 --> 00:11:53,260 science is not really about knowledge. 224 00:11:53,284 --> 00:11:56,025 Science is about ignorance. 225 00:11:56,049 --> 00:11:57,414 That's what we do. 226 00:11:57,622 --> 00:11:59,109 So if we're serious about this, 227 00:11:59,133 --> 00:12:01,485 we are going to have to start seriously supporting 228 00:12:01,509 --> 00:12:05,689 those institutions that make it possible for discovery research to take place. 229 00:12:05,713 --> 00:12:06,959 Institutions like our own, 230 00:12:06,983 --> 00:12:10,232 the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City, Missouri, 231 00:12:10,256 --> 00:12:14,329 or the National Institute of General Medical Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, 232 00:12:14,353 --> 00:12:16,579 and of course, our gateway to biodiversity, 233 00:12:16,603 --> 00:12:19,845 the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. 234 00:12:20,611 --> 00:12:25,431 I have been very fortunate to be able to do some of this training myself, 235 00:12:25,455 --> 00:12:27,286 and it is a pleasure for me 236 00:12:27,310 --> 00:12:30,630 to actually grab students out of the confines of their laboratories 237 00:12:30,654 --> 00:12:32,850 away from their computers and their catalogs, 238 00:12:32,874 --> 00:12:36,474 and throw them into the world of discovery and exploration. 239 00:12:37,440 --> 00:12:42,736 It is an immense pleasure, a real pleasure to actually see 240 00:12:42,760 --> 00:12:48,308 to see how these bright, young minds' curiosity spreads its wings 241 00:12:48,332 --> 00:12:51,486 and flies away when faced with the unknown. 242 00:12:51,899 --> 00:12:54,316 This is how we become real scientists. 243 00:12:55,363 --> 00:12:58,738 So we need these people to actually go out there 244 00:12:58,762 --> 00:13:01,955 and ask the better questions that will bring us closer 245 00:13:01,979 --> 00:13:03,357 to the answers that we seek. 246 00:13:04,438 --> 00:13:07,569 Once, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote, 247 00:13:07,593 --> 00:13:09,394 "If you want to build a ship, 248 00:13:09,418 --> 00:13:11,362 don't drum up people to collect wood 249 00:13:11,386 --> 00:13:13,688 and don't assign them tasks and work, 250 00:13:13,712 --> 00:13:17,806 but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea ..." 251 00:13:18,246 --> 00:13:19,950 As a scientist and a teacher, 252 00:13:19,974 --> 00:13:21,935 I like to paraphrase this to read 253 00:13:21,959 --> 00:13:25,117 that we scientists need to teach our students 254 00:13:25,141 --> 00:13:27,592 to long for the endless immensity of the sea 255 00:13:27,616 --> 00:13:29,053 that is our ignorance. 256 00:13:30,468 --> 00:13:34,333 We Homo sapiens are the only species we know of 257 00:13:34,357 --> 00:13:36,793 that is driven to scientific inquiry. 258 00:13:37,345 --> 00:13:39,479 We, like all other species on this planet, 259 00:13:39,503 --> 00:13:43,994 are inextricably woven into the history of life on this planet. 260 00:13:44,689 --> 00:13:47,856 And I think I'm a little wrong when I say that life is a mystery, 261 00:13:47,880 --> 00:13:50,591 because I think that life is actually an open secret 262 00:13:50,615 --> 00:13:54,599 that has been beckoning our species for millennia to understand it. 263 00:13:55,044 --> 00:13:56,645 So I ask you: 264 00:13:56,669 --> 00:14:00,442 Aren't we the best chance that life has to know itself? 265 00:14:00,753 --> 00:14:01,904 And if so, 266 00:14:01,928 --> 00:14:03,658 what the heck are we waiting for? 267 00:14:04,393 --> 00:14:07,863 We need to do things differently. 268 00:14:07,887 --> 00:14:11,380 Tonight, I'm going to ask you to please help us build 269 00:14:11,404 --> 00:14:15,840 the greatest discovery research vessel in the history of humankind. 270 00:14:16,189 --> 00:14:17,745 Call your legislators, 271 00:14:17,769 --> 00:14:20,583 ask them to fund basic discovery research, 272 00:14:20,607 --> 00:14:23,644 support and give what you can to institutions such as these 273 00:14:23,668 --> 00:14:26,474 that are dedicated to discovery research, 274 00:14:26,498 --> 00:14:30,735 and hop on board with us on a grand expedition 275 00:14:30,759 --> 00:14:34,335 to radically transform our understanding of life. 276 00:14:34,359 --> 00:14:35,795 And along the way, 277 00:14:35,819 --> 00:14:39,460 change the way we do biomedical research, forever. 278 00:14:39,968 --> 00:14:41,169 Thank you. 279 00:14:41,193 --> 00:14:47,472 (Applause)