David Attenborough Quotes

Celebrated naturalist and broadcaster, renowned for his documentary series on the natural world.

All our environmental problems become easier to solve with fewer people and harder - and ultimately impossible to solve - with ever more people.

Steve Irwin did wonderful conservation work but I was uncomfortable about some of his stunts. Even if animals aren't aware that you are not treating them with respect, the viewers are.

I don't like rats, but there's not much else I don't like. The problem with rats is they have no fear of human beings, they're loaded with foul diseases, they would run the place given half the chance, and I've had them leap out of a lavatory while I've been sitting on it.

We are not overpopulated in an absolute sense; we've got the technology for 10 billion, probably 15 billion people, to live on this planet and live good lives. What we haven't done is developed our technology.

Dealing with global warming doesn't mean we have all got to suddenly stop breathing. Dealing with global warming means that we have to stop waste, and if you travel for no reason whatsoever, that is a waste.

I think a major element of jetlag is psychological... -David Attenborough

I think a major element of jetlag is psychological. Nobody ever tells me what time it is at home.

People must feel that the natural world is important and valuable and beautiful and wonderful and an amazement and a pleasure.

It's coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so. It's not just climate change; it's sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now.

I don't run a car, have never run a car. I could say that this is because I have this extremely tender environmentalist conscience, but the fact is I hate driving.

Many individuals are doing what they can. But real success can only come if there is a change in our societies and in our economics and in our politics.

It seems to me that the natural world is the greatest source of excitement; the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living.

I like animals. I like natural history. The travel bit is not the important bit. The travel bit is what you have to do in order to go and look at animals.

There is no question that climate change is happening; the only arguable point is what part humans are playing in it.

Apart from anything else, I am designed by evolution, like we all are: if we see a little thing like that, big eyes, tiny nose, we go 'aaah'. That's what evolution does. We are programmed to do that. So to find babies the most amazing, isn't surprising, I don't think.

An understanding of the natural world and what's in it is a source of not only a great curiosity but great fulfillment.

Before the BBC, I joined the Navy in order to trav... -David Attenborough

Before the BBC, I joined the Navy in order to travel.

Discovering the context

The quote indicates that prior to working for the BBC, the speaker enlisted in the Navy with the intention of traveling. It suggests that joining the Navy was a deliberate choice made by the speaker to fulfill their desire for travel experiences.

All we can hope for is that the thing is going to slowly and imperceptibly shift. All I can say is that 50 years ago there were no such thing as environmental policies.

The process of making natural history films is to try to prevent the animal knowing you are there, so you get glimpses of a non-human world, and that is a transporting thing.

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