WEBVTT

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I've been spending my summers

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in the Marine Biological Laboratory in 
Woods Hole, Massachusetts

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And there, what I've been doing is
essentially renting a boat.

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What I would like to ask you to do

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is to come on a boat ride with me tonight.

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So, we ride off from Eel Pond into
the Vineyard South,

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right off the coast of Martha's Vineyard,

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equipped with a drone to
identify potential spots

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from which to peer into the Atlantic.

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Earlier I was going to say

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into the depths of the Atlantic,

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but we don't have to go too deep
to reach the unknown.

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Here, barely two miles away,

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from what is arguably the greatest
marine biology lab in the world,

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we lower a simple plankton net
into the water

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and bring up into the surface things
that humanity rarely pays attention to

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and oftentimes, have never seen before.

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Here is one of the organisms
that we caught in our net,

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this is a jellyfish.

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But look closely, living inside this
animal is another organism

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that is very likely entirely 
new to science.

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A complete new species.

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Or how about this other 
transparent beauty?

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With a beating heart, 
asexually growing,

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on top of its head,

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progeny that will move on to
reproduce sexually.

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Now let me say that again,

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this animal is growing asexually,

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on top of its head,

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progeny that is going to reproduce
sexually in the next generation.

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A weird jellyfish, not quite,

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this is an ascidian,
this is a group of animals

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that now we know we share 
extensive genomic ancestry with,

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and it is perhaps the closest 
invertebrate species to our own.