David Suzuki

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David Takayoshi Suzuki was born on March 24, 1936 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. He is an academic, science broadcaster, writer, and environmental activist.

His parents were Setsu Nakamura and Kaoru Carr, and Suzuki has a twin sister, whose name is Marcia, and two other siblings, Geraldine (now known as Aiko) and Dawn. Suzuki is a third generation Canadian, since both his parents were born in Canada, and both the families of their parents were emigrated to Canada at the beginning of the 20th century, from Hiroshima and from Aichi Prefecture.

During the second world war, Suzuki’s family suffered internment in British Columbia: the business of the family, a dry cleaning, has been sold by the government, and the components of the family have been sent in a camp at Slocan, with just his father been sent to a labour camp in Solsqua. At the end of the war they were released, and they moved to Islington first, and to London, Ontario, in a second moment.

Suzuki attended the “Mill Street Elementary School” in Islington, and “London Central Secondary School” in London. He attended the “Amherst College” in Massachusetts, where he received his bachelor degree in biology in 1958, and he completed his studies at the “University of Chicago”, where he received his Doctor of Philosophy degree in zoology in 1961.

Suzuki worked from 1961 to 1962 at “Oak Ridge National Laboratory”, and in 1962 and 1963 he worked as an assistant professor at the University of Alberta. He started working as a professor in the genetics department at the University of British Columbia from 1963, and he spent almost forty years in that role, until his retirement in 2001, when he’s been named professor emeritus at a university research institute.

In 1970 Suzuki started working on TV with a weekly show, dedicated to the children, whose name was “Suzuki on Science”. In 1974 Suzuki founded a radio program, “Quirks and Quarks”, that aired on CBC AM radio from 1975 to 1979. He also hosted a program dedicated to an adult audience, the weekly “Science Magazine”. Starting from 1979, Suzuki hosted the program “The Nature of Things” on CBC. In this program, Suzuki wanted to stimulate interest towards the nature, the wildlife habitat, and towards the renewable energies, to limit the footprints that the human activity is leaving on our planet.

Starting from 1993, Suzuki hosted the successful series “The Secret of Life”, with which he kept pointing out how the human activities should try to preserve and protect the nature and the wild.

In 1997, Suzuki wrote a book, “The Sacred Balance”, that later became a five-hour mini-series for the Canadian public television (2002). Always in 1997, Suzuki produced “Yellowstone to Yukon: The Wildlands Project”, a documentary for Discovery Channel in which he focused about the need to preserve the habitat of the wildlife by creating reserves that will preserve biological diversity.

In the recent times, Suzuki became a central spokesperson on the global climate change. His position in this matter is well resumed by the statement present in the David Suzuki Foundation website: he describes how the path to sustainability passes by 1) Environmental Rights (whose goal is to “Establish the legal right for all Canadians to live in a healthy environment”); 2) Climate Solutions (whose goal is to “Accelerate the transition to a low-carbon future”); and 3) Biodiversity (whose goal is to “Protect and restore nature”).

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Suzuki is a strong supporter of the fact that the climate change is real, and that is largely caused by the human activity. The consensus in this matter is growing, and the public and the media seem to agree that there is enough scientific evidence to sustain that there is a change in the climate in act, and that the skepticism that for years has slowed down the acknowledgement of this problem, has been caused by a fake campaign to protect the interest of the lobbies of the coal and oil companies.

In a recent interview to “the anthrotorian”, Suzuki said about the biggest threat to the environment that “People always ask me, "is it deforestation, is it species extinction, is it the ocean destruction, the ozone layer, or climate change..." I believe that the real challenge or threat is the human mind.

I don't think we have any lack of solutions to the various problems we face, but so long as the human mind clings to its beliefs and values, that is what is limiting us. … You see, we create these ideas about the economy, capitalism, corporations or human borders, the market, and currency, and we act like these are the most important things in the world … What I say is this: you can't go for three minutes without air or you die. ... So surely everyone in the world would have to agree that clean air has got to be our highest priority. Without that, you are either dead or sick. How then can you use air as a garbage can? Let's get things straight here — yes, the economy is important, but we MADE the economy. Air is something that we DID NOT MAKE, and without it we are dead. So surely whatever we do economically shouldn't infringe on the air we breathe... We need to recognize that we are biological creatures — we are animals — that need clean air, clean water, clean food, and clean energy, or we're dead. Those things have to be protected above EVERYTHING else.”

Focusing on Suzuki’s personal life, he’s been married to Setsuko Joane Sunahara from 1958 to 1965, and the couple had three children, Tamiko (1960), Troy (1962), and Laura (1964). In 1973, Suzuki married a second time to Tara Elizabeth Cullis, with whom he had two aughters, Severn and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarika">Sarika</a>.

David Suzuki is obviously very active in social media, and he and his foundation have more than 100k followers on Twitter, and more than 460k followers on Facebook.

References: 
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Suzuki

https://davidsuzuki.org/

http://theanthrotorian.com/culture/2015/6/30/interview-with-the-incomparable-david-suzuki

https://www.facebook.com/DavidSuzukiFoundation/

https://twitter.com/davidsuzuki?lang=en

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