Television of course actually started in Britain in 1936, and it was a monopoly, and there was only one broadcaster and it operated on a license which is not the same as a government grant.
— David Attenborough
The whole of science, and one is tempted to think the whole of the life of any thinking man, is trying to come to terms with the relationship between yourself and the natural world. Why are you here, and how do you fit in, and what's it all about.
The fundamental issue is the moral issue.
Well, I'm having a good time. Which makes me feel guilty too. How very English.
You can only get really unpopular decisions through if the electorate is convinced of the value of the environment. That's what natural history programmes should be for.
In the old days... it was a basic, cardinal fact that producers didn't have opinions. When I was producing natural history programmes, I didn't use them as vehicles for my own opinion. They were factual programmes.
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.
The question is, are we happy to suppose that our grandchildren may never be able to see an elephant except in a picture book?
I've been to Nepal, but I'd like to go to Tibet. It must be a wonderful place to go. I don't think there's anything there, but it would be a nice place to visit.
I think a major element of jetlag is psychological. Nobody ever tells me what time it is at home.
Before the BBC, I joined the Navy in order to travel.
I mean, it is an extraordinary thing that a large proportion of your country and my country, of the citizens, never see a wild creature from dawn 'til dusk, unless it's a pigeon, which isn't really wild, which might come and settle near them.
I'm not in politics.
I'm against this huge globalisation on the basis of economic advantage.
Being in touch with the natural world is crucial.
Crying wolf is a real danger.
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's a moral question about whether we have the right to exterminate species.
I just wish the world was twice as big and half of it was still unexplored.
I don't approve of sunbathing, and it's bad for you.
I suffer much less than many of my colleagues. I am perfectly able to go to Australia and film within three hours of arrival.
People must feel that the natural world is important and valuable and beautiful and wonderful and an amazement and a pleasure.
An understanding of the natural world and what's in it is a source of not only a great curiosity but great fulfillment.
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.
If I can bicycle, I bicycle.
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.
People are not going to care about animal conservation unless they think that animals are worthwhile.
You know, it is a terrible thing to appear on television, because people think that you actually know what you're talking about.
The only way to save a rhinoceros is to save the environment in which it lives, because there's a mutual dependency between it and millions of other species of both animals and plants.
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.
I'm absolutely strict about it. When I land, I put my watch right, and I don't care what I feel like, I will go to bed at half past eleven. If that means going to bed early or late, that's what I live by. As soon as you get there, live by that time.
Getting to places like Bangkok or Singapore was a hell of a sweat. But when you got there it was the back of beyond. It was just a series of small tin sheds.
It is that range of biodiversity that we must care for - the whole thing - rather than just one or two stars.
