 My next marvelous task is to bring you Juliette Eilperin who has, who is a environmental and science and politics reporter at the Washington Post where I used to work and she's one of our stars and she's also the author of Demon Fish, Travels Through the Hidden World of Sharks, which is an amazingly interesting book especially when you start reading all the stuff about her jumping off boats into a sea full of things with big teeth. Juliette tell me what sharks have to do with resilience. A lot, so basically what I found what was interesting about writing this book is I find myself having to make the case for sharks and their continued existence and so when you look at it you can start with you know basically you're not gonna make the warm and fuzzy argument they're not penguins they abandon their young in the case of certain species they in fact even eat their siblings in utero so it's like you can't you can't save them cuz you love because they're lovable and then you look at it and you know there certainly is a rational argument you can make for the role that they play in ecosystems and people just their eyes glaze over so I think one of the most effective and to me one of the most surprising arguments that I discovered in the course of reporting the book is the idea that their ability as killers and as the top predators in the sea actually provide engineering clues and solutions for human beings and so essentially when I went through it and kind of tried to talk to people about what are the you know the practical implications that you can get through this field of biomimicrate what you really see is that you know we can look at how they detect electrical currents and is there a way we could model car batteries on that could we look at their armored skin teeth and could we cover our ships with it to allow them to resist barnacles and move faster and so they're all these different ways where you can essentially look at how they have already adapted to the environment and while again sharks are a fantastic example there's just there's a team now working on a robot modeled on a jellyfish there people trying to make better helicopters based on how whales you know move and so really kind of your possibilities are endless and so that's that's how sharks can help her help us be resilient okay and in demon fish you talk about a journal article called quote a review of a last mo branch reproductive behavior with a case study on the nurse shark and you say it's one of the most fascinating things you've ever read which raises two questions first you get out much and second what does shark sex tell us about resilience well that's really interesting alright so right I mean basically let's be honest it's shark-borne it's fascinating you know it's it's it's basically an incredibly detailed description of shark mating and and particularly by a couple of folks including Jeff Carrier the lead author because nurse sharks are easier one of the things that's really difficult about learning about sharks is how elusive they are but nurse sharks in many ways are the most accessible they're the ones when a lot of people say you know I went snorkeling and I saw this shark and it freaked me out and it was lying on the bottom doing nothing that's a nurse shark and so when looking at how sharks have how sharks reproduction can provide clues to resilience I think there are a lot of different ways but one is frankly just how they have so many different ways that they engage in reproduction I mean both I mean and in fact the way that of course is often the most terrifying to males I'll be honest is that we have learned within the last few years that female sharks of multiple species can reproduce on their own so they have really cracked that night virgin birth exactly virgin birth the first one was called the Jesus shark even though it was a female and so what they've noticed is and this has happened because of Zeus that essentially we've kept sharks that did not reach reproductive age in captivity and lo and behold they can still have babies and so I think that that would be one of the you know again potentially terrifying but also inspiring ways to look at how sharks reproduction can show you that they are just I mean it's incredible how resilient they are under you know the worst of circumstances so resilience involves first we get rid of all the males just means that there aren't ones around you figure out what to do that's all we're saying right in demonfish you describe the island of Palmyra as such a shark paradise that everything else with the slightest vulnerability is quote eaten within seconds and quote so why are we talking about sharks and resilience what about all those other poor fish it's a good point what and they have many fascinating coping mechanisms of their own which are also things that we explore and of course sometimes you're looking at also is this question and I think you know obviously you know as that video just showed one of things that I think people are getting a better sense of is how to kind of pull back and look at a broader lens that you know yes and you do want to look at an individual creature and how it operates and see what it means for us as individuals but when you're really talking about resilience a lot of what you're talking about is how on the broadest level can you know ecosystems societies cities whatever you're using kind of your broad networks how did they respond to pressures and rebound and of course when you look at it in that broad lens for example sharks are very good for coral reefs even though some little critters would rather that they didn't exist so sharks are the cops on the beat absolutely the cops on the beat and what one thing that I love about about sharks in this way that you know that again it's a little I try and to play up other things aside from the murder aspect of sharks because that has its downside and so what I love is that they operate through fear as well the way police officers do and so they're great examples of how you can have seagrass beds that aren't overfed by certain certain you know creatures because essentially they're just freaked out that the sharks might come and so I like that that's the benevolent I think police you know police policing mechanism and wolves have done this and wolves are one of the you know the greatest examples of this and you know we've seen the reintroduction to Yellowstone and you know what's incredible is it basically they brought back wolves and again tons of people out West hate wolves but you know it brings back everything I mean it's incredible how it brings back the ashes and the willows and there's just now science being done about essentially it's bringing back rivers in a way they didn't expect because there's so many cascading effects from being freaked out by something that can eat you so it pays for humans to have competitor predators exactly even though it's a little tough to reconcile in demonfish you talk about how how would the ocean look if it was invested if we were invested in its resilience instead of plundering its depth what would that look like and more to the point how would you do that how would you get to investing in resilience so a couple different things I mean I think that it's so one I think you know you'd basically have an ocean that would look more similar although of course not identical to the way it did centuries before so essentially you would have a number of species rebounding you'd have you'd have more fish in it you would have you know coral reefs and kind of the hard structure the stony structure you know in the seafloor that would come back to some extent so you know that's and one of I think one of the really interesting questions that in fact that raises is that we don't exactly know what the sea looks bad looked like you know before human kind essentially like you can obviously do modeling and you can go to really remote areas like Palmyra and you can say oh look you know this is fascinating you actually have sharks that outnumber you know species lower down on the pyramid which is not something we thought about but part of it is that we have such a skewed baseline it's almost hard for us to imagine what that looks like but there are a few relatively pristine places and then in terms of how you go about doing that essentially you do a combination of things but part of it is frankly putting some places off limits that basically if you're you know if you're really serious about this and you really actually want the oceans to be more resilient part of what you're going to do is say that certain areas cannot be extracted the way they are part of it will be restoration which is going on right now and going on near here in terms of restoring eelgrass beds and you know marshes and a whole set of different you know replanting doing coral nurseries which they're doing so part of it is doing that but it's a combination of basically some activity and some frankly leaving it alone because and also some I would say some exploration to kind of find out what out is it is quote easy as that I mean you know you talk about how no self-respecting wedding in China can possibly occur without shark fin soup because it which doesn't taste like anything and doesn't and and yet you'd have to change vast amounts of culture human culture in order to achieve I mean that's is that can you do that I think it's doable I think it's difficult I mean I don't that I think particularly you know everything that involves restrictions is is hard and I think you know we're having a there's a really interesting debate that's going on right now in the United States connected to what you're mentioning which is that there's been this move to ban for example the sale trade and possession of shark fins which is one of the main reasons why sharks are being targeted there they're kind of dying for a couple reasons but in terms of targeting that's why they're they're being caught across the world and now so you have Hawaii California Oregon Washington all have outlawed it you have initiatives in New York Florida Maryland you know in other states actually even the Landlock State of Illinois seeking to ban shark fins and there's a whole debate are you are you declaring war on someone's culture now I would argue that you know we put huge restrictions on on wild caviar when we realized that sturgeon one of the most ancient fish was disappearing and people didn't say that's an attack on Russian culture you know they said look this species is in huge trouble and we're doing something about it but I think you know it essentially it's a it's a heavy lift but if you convince people that essentially they have a reason to be invested in the ocean in the first place it becomes a little easier well I mean talking about culture it's not just the Chinese right I mean there seems to be this connection between testosterone and hunting these primal demon fish right I mean so what are you gonna do outlaw testosterone no and in fact you know when I was aboard there's a there's a fisherman called Mark the shark who operates off Miami Beach who goes out with celebrities as well as just ordinary people and it completely happened as a coincidence when I was on the boat with him one time Rosie O'Donnell came up on her jet ski and boarded and later and which is something I write about the book and later actually did go out fishing with him and recently he posted these pictures and they were controversy so it's a kind of a machinist that is not necessarily related to testosterone and so but but I absolutely agree I mean I think that that's that's tough and then I think you also have the issue of just regular also regular fishing which you know again we have you know there are plenty of fishermen who think that it's their right to take as much as they can and so this is tough but I think that you know again you can actually talk to people and even ironically there's something that is so in some ways macho about sharks to begin with that there's a way that you could argue for their continued existence even to the people who are most invested in kind of defining themselves by catching I thought one of the most interesting things that you dealt with in in demonfish was the role of human myth about I mean we're not talking about catching cod right I mean we're catching door talking about great big teeth and I mean just the stuff of our dreams right so you say the most effective way to save the shark is to explode our cultural myths about them that they are manly to catch or they make good skin cream or they confer status on those who eat their fins again I mean what's the role of fetish or myth or fear or fascination and what does that have to say to resilience yeah I mean it's a huge it's a huge driver and that's what's so interesting that I find it interesting that this predicament for again this lethal predator that's out in the ocean is largely in our heads I mean that is a really you know I find that really interesting but I also think in fact that is what makes it doable that particularly I guess and you know I think part of what you know again Professor Bow was mentioning is that this idea that we're apart from nature is something that I think is really one of the things one gets to that it freaks people out to think that we are connected to sharks in some ways but again even evolutionarily you can argue that the you know the muscles that we use to chew and to talk come from sharks and so I and that again was something that I had no idea when I started reporting out this book so I think when you think about that and you draw those connections and give a sense of how our own resilience in some way stems from the fact that they are so resilient I think that's where you can begin to kind of pierce through those myths and so are you arguing that the first step in resilience is to is inside our own heads absolutely I think I think so and then and then it goes from there but I think that basically if you don't get people to rethink the shark then you're getting nowhere that would be my theory so we start with the sharks and then rethink everything else yeah and then I think you can go from there I mean because if again they're a fantastic place to just you know start because there are few things that are as cool as sharks do we have any questions yeah anybody I can go on about this forever I anybody okay no you say I have somebody Mike wait wait wait wait for the Mike and tell us who you are please George me highest from Phoenix partnership how would you include everything you told us in a curriculum in particular for high school children oh well I mean I could I could be incredibly self-interested and say just to sign my book but I think I mean I actually think that essentially what you really want high schoolers to read about and I think you can really do it at all ages and in fact you know one thing I found interestingly is it seems that fascination with sharks peaks among 11 year old boys so I'm a little worried that if you do high schoolers you might have missed that key moment but that said you know I think essentially you can share with them just the you know the whole complex way in which we are interconnected sharks and also the fact that we have such cutting it's shot science that's coming out right now about them and that to me is really one of the most compelling cases for why this is so important right now that essentially we are learning things with for example the same device that you use in the Nintendo Wii to track how sharks made underwater which is something that again has never been done and is being done by one academic at Montmorain lab in Sarasota and so you really can find these ways and you know frankly one of the great things about sharks is because they're globally distributed they really you know Pete there are ways in which even high schoolers can see sharks can interact with them and things like that this is not something that occurs in one isolated part of the world and therefore is really remote and so that's what I would say I do in fact if people want to go to WWW demonfishbook.com there is a very short video on there and there's also a way to contact me if you wanted to follow up do you have a video of the process of attaching a Wii to a shark you know oh you think this is easy oh this is the part is that's worth reading oh my god let's see who we got somebody who we haven't talked to you how about the guy with the shirt over there my name is Mike Hager thank you for the very interesting presentation I'm wondering given what you say about sharks do you have a comment on how sharks are displayed in aquariums and whether they there should be changes in the way we educate our citizens through those aquariums right well that that's actually a fascinating question and I've both spent time in a number of aquariums you know research meeting with people to research the book but I also have appeared in a number of aquariums so I've been able to see aquariums you know kind of across this country in the course of traveling for the book you know basically first of all I think it's an area where you need a little more research they're actually for two reasons I mean I think that there are plenty of places where there are easy ways to keep kind of lower level sharks like the leopard sharks the nurse sharks that you know epaulette those are you know those are ones that essentially are you know don't have the same needs as say a great white we're the only place it's been kept in captivity successfully in the United States is the Monterey Bay Aquarium which has done which has been controversial but I would argue has done a good job of keeping juvenile white sharks in captivity for short period tagging them and then releasing them into the wild what is interesting and one thing I've pressed people on and there's just research starting now is I basically want to know whether by visiting aquariums are you more inclined to actually care about ocean conservation and while this is something that's kind of accepted as fact I think there actually needs to be more research on it and so I think and there are literally there are a few people who are you know PhD candidates right now who are looking into that and so I think that's important but broadly speaking and so I mean I think it depends on the species I think seeing sharks physically is actually a very important thing and so well I would certainly say if you have the opportunity seeing them in the wild is the period where I think you know you kind of again it was the first time I got in the water is shark 11 year old boys over the boat and throw them in the but I mean I was cage-diving with a great white I was next to a nine-year-old Brazilian girl so now I'm not necessarily saying that all nine nine-year-olds might want to get in a cage with a great white but it can be done I can tell you ones that are you know better to get in the water with at that age and I do think it's the moment that basically again it challenges your preconceived notion of sharks and that's what happened to me I was surrounded by sharks in Bimini in the Bahamas praying that they wouldn't eat me and I really began to look at them and look at how beautifully they were designed really and how they were moving through the water and how I was an afterthought and that's really what got me to rethink right and you're all the time you were thinking I'm a reporter it doesn't really pay it's not in your interest to eat me exactly that was actually one of my exact anybody else yes ma'am did you find anything out about the impact of jaws right I mean the answer is it had a tremendous a tremendous impact and one one has to say a negative impact on people's perceptions I mean I think Peter Benchley and I always you know my disclaimer is Peter Benchley became a huge person who actually did work on behalf of sharks his widow Wendy Benchley does tremendous work to this day and I think that you know he really did recognize that what was interesting is he tapped into our deepest fears it's not like people weren't freaked out before but there was a way that he made it real and brought it home both through his book and his movie that you know that really you know had a tremendous effect and you can see I mean basically there are statistical studies that beach visits went down in the United States nationwide after it came out I have interviewed multiple marine biologists who told me that they stopped going in the water as kids but then ultimately one of the things is since a marine biologist in many ways is the hero of that you know of the book in the movie that then they particularly the movie more than the book they came to see it as a great profession so it's had a mix thing but there's no question that you saw shark fishing take off after that did I never thought of this did the jaws increase the the visibility of marine biology did you see a huge increase in marine biologists immediately after you know you would have to I mean basically I would again I would want the stats being a reporter but there's there's just no question that I have met particularly I have to say again men who happened to be 11 year old boys you know at the time that Jaws came out there is a key there are a number there are a number of people who have made their careers in shark research who were inspired by by Jaws in the back there hi my name is Russell mall I was sitting here trying to figure out a tagline or a tweet to send to you and the thing that kept popping in my head is just a takeaway of this and I was wondering if it kept popping my head like the Jeff Goldblum line from Jurassic Park you know life will find a way and that is that the resilient tagline learning takeaway piece that you'd like to leave with us I think that's a good tagline it's in fact I have to give credit to the fact that actually there's a fantastic researcher at Stony Brook University Damien Chapman who gave who said that line to me when he was the person who discovered that they could do asexual reproduction so I mean I think that that you know that in fact life will find a way is is one of is a pretty good summary and I but I guess part of what it is is it's the quest of figuring out how it finds a way that I find particularly fascinating not just that there is survival but how how does survival work let me take the last minute you do one last question and the one thing that makes me think in terms of resilience is that you say that I mean sharks have been around forever evolutionary I mean way before the dinosaurs and all that stuff and that as a result they're less resilient they're less adaptable what does that say for us I mean is a good that we're a new mongrel species you know it's interesting I still think it's bad news because basically what it meant is because they've been such a top predator they have not been pushed to change who they are and I think unfortunately that phenomenon applies almost as well to humans despite the fact that we're pikers in the evolutionary process great thank you very much Julia appreciate it