Deep sea floor mining hasn’t had a presence long enough to have collected sufficient information on its side effects, though marine biologists can extrapolate. Shallow seafloor mining has been a practice with recorded effects, such as choking bottom-feeders with disturbed sediment and destabilizing fish populations by killing off their prey species.
“Shark Week” has slowly focused more on attacks and making sharks seem like killing machines waiting for unsuspecting humans to go into any body of water. Now, with the popularity of reality TV, the educational roots of the special have tapered off even more.
Millions of species, past and present, call the earth home. However, human presence seems to set itself apart from those other inhabitants as we grow and evolve as a worldwide community.
I could’ve dropped the class. It was completely out of my comfort zone – in the words of my friends, “it wasn’t me,” but I didn’t. I’m still not sure what compelled me to stay that first day.