Sir David Attenborough: The Voice of the Natural World Turns 100 | From Big Lives

Summary

Against the Rules: The Big Short Companion

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Big Lives - Sir David Attenborough: The Voice of the Natural World Turns 100
Pushkin Industries / BBC Studios | Released April 27, 2026

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Overview

In this special episode of “Big Lives,” hosts Emmanuel Jochi and Kai Wright celebrate the 100th birthday of the legendary nature broadcaster, Sir David Attenborough. Drawing from the vast BBC archives, the hosts chart Attenborough’s remarkable life, evolution as a broadcaster, and enduring influence on how humans relate to the natural world. Through memorable clips, anecdotes, and personal reflections, they reveal Attenborough as not just the voice of nature documentaries, but a key architect of television history and environmental communication—complete with an honest look at his late-life environmental advocacy and its impacts.

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Main Themes

• Attenborough’s personal and professional evolution: From nerdy Midlands child to BBC executive to global nature ambassador.
• Shaping the language of nature: How Attenborough reinvented the nature documentary, blending storytelling, science, and awe.
• Changing relationship with environmentalism: His journey from wilderness romantic to climate change activist—and the broader context behind his public stance.
• Legacy and cultural influence: The impact of his voice, narrative choices, and even late-life “conversion” on generations of viewers and environmental policy.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Attenborough as a Personal and Media Icon

• [02:17] – Emmanuel Jochi frames Attenborough as “the world’s most famous nature broadcaster,” whose voice transcends generations—a “warm bath” of reassurance and wonder.
• [02:49] – Kai Wright’s image: “An old man crawling around in the dirt, whispering at a bug… He was a snack.”
  – Emmanuel doubles down: “Bonafide snack.”
• [03:50] – Emmanuel reflects: “He has been making nature programming for the BBC at this point for over 70 years. Is actually his 100th birthday this May. … He’s always been this old, kind of revered figure.”

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2. The Wonder—and the Uncomfortable Truth—of Nature Shows

• [04:30] – What sets Attenborough apart: his narration doesn’t shy from the brutality of nature, but it's imbued with “childlike wonder.”
• [07:04] – Drinking in both awe and existential discomfort: “The constant engine noise disrupts the underwater soundscape, disorientating the whales…" (David Attenborough, [07:04])
• [08:24] – Emmanuel’s epiphany: “This is so different to the nature programming I grew up watching. … All these animals took part in a world divorced from us.”
  • But in recent programs, humans are inseparable—even as destroyers.

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3. Attenborough’s Origins and TV Innovation

• [11:02] – Born 1926, Midlands, UK. Part of the “first generation allowed to take advantage” of post-WWII British society (for “the white ones at least…”).
• [12:35] – Young Attenborough obsessed with rocks, animals; “a nerd from the off.”
• [13:16] – His brother Richard is the "old guy in Jurassic Park”—revealing a family legacy in arts and media.
• [14:47] – Early TV: Nature shows were animals on tables ("the animal always bit him or escaped"), not in the wild.
• [16:36] – Ridiculous early wildlife TV: Jacques Cousteau literally dynamites coral reefs to show fish.
• [18:53] – "Zoo Quest” (1954): Revolutionary for bringing cameras into the wild, but also “a real program of its times": colonial, extractive, with little awareness of animal conservation ethics.
  • Emmanuel: “It does feel very much a creature of colonialism … British people roaming the world, figuring out what’s mine.” [23:34]

Quote:

“There was a rustle on the other side of the thicket. We looked up, and there was the anteater itself galloping across the savannahs. Without thinking how we were actually going to catch it, Jack and I set off wildly in pursuit.” —David Attenborough, [21:43]

• [25:59] – As BBC2 controller, Attenborough shapes TV itself—insisting on innovations like yellow tennis balls for better color broadcasting ([26:36]).

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4. From Producer to Nature’s Trusted Storyteller

• [28:26] – “Life on Earth” (1979) redefines nature television: not just spectacle, but coherent evolutionary storytelling.

  • “There are some 4 million different kinds of animals and plants in the world. … This is the story of how a few of them came to be as they are.” —Attenborough ([28:26])

• [31:08] – Global success: dubbed into many languages, “the whole world gets to see it.”

• [37:57] – The magic: shifting to “storyifying” animal behavior, focusing on empathy rather than mere display or collection.

Quote:

“We and animals share a certain attitude to life. We’re all born, we all die, we all hope to mate and leave our genes in another generation. … A little fly gets very upset because its children are being attacked. And you wouldn’t think it would bring a lump to your throat, a fly, but I’m sure you will.” —David Attenborough, [37:59]

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5. The ‘Wilderness Myth’ and Attenborough’s Evolving Ethics

• [39:21] – Emmanuel notes the paradox: Attenborough brings empathy by anthropomorphizing animals, but “completely ignores Human existence”—rarely discussing how reserves were created (often by dispossession) or humanity’s negative impact except as a poetic afterthought.
• [41:44] – Attenborough’s own philosophy (1974): He saw his role as sparking delight without lecturing or proselytizing for conservation, believing enchantment would lead audiences to care and act.

Quote:

“I get an additional pleasure from telling you about it … If I can communicate that pleasure to others … that is an enormous reinforcement of the pleasure for me. I’m not proselytizing, though I dare say perhaps I am unconsciously so doing. … But I actually think the best way of taking the message to the people is by showing them the pleasure.” —David Attenborough, [41:44]

• [44:24] – Kai notes: “That’s a modern idea. He’s articulating it in ‘74, and I find it very compelling.”

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6. Climate Change: Attenborough’s Late Conversion

• [47:46] – Kai: “We haven’t uttered the words climate change.”
• [48:25] – Revelation: Attenborough was initially a climate skeptic, only convinced in 2004 after a scientist’s lecture in Belgium; he describes being persuaded by “the congruence” of global temperature, population, and atmospheric chemistry data.

Quote:

"The congruence of those things convinced me beyond any doubt whatever, that not only was the climate changing, but that humanity was responsible for that.” —David Attenborough, [49:03]

• [51:34] – Attenborough testifies: “If you become aware of what is happening, you don’t have any alternative.”
  • He waited “until the facts seemed incontrovertible” before publicly advocating ([53:02]).
• [54:16] – First climate-focused programs (2006) mark a clear, urgent shift:

“Now it’s changing once again. But this time we ourselves are contributing to those changes. … We still have time. There are ways to minimize these changes, if we all choose now to adopt them.” —Attenborough, [54:16]

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7. Environmental Impact, Emotional Complexity, and Attenborough’s Legacy

• [55:05] – The hosts explore the tension: Why wasn’t Attenborough an early campaigner? But also, his willingness to “change” is praiseworthy—a lesson in humility and adaptation.

• [57:34] – In “Blue Planet II,” climate and human impacts are central, heartbreakingly direct, and drive real-world policy change:

Quote:

“A mother is holding her newborn young. It’s dead. … Industrial chemicals can build up to lethal levels, and plastic could be part of the problem.… Unless the flow of plastics and industrial pollution into the world's oceans is reduced … marine life will be poisoned … for many centuries to come.” —David Attenborough, [57:34]

• [59:47] – Kai: “He’s not trafficking in outrage. … What’s missing [in climate action] is a shared will to do so … There has to be a place where we figure out how to shift our actual emotional relationship to other species… not stewardship, but relationship. And that’s what he’s doing.”

• [61:49] – Emmanuel: “He’s a person on a journey. His life has been the journey of that relationship. … How is my child, Should I have children, gonna watch this?”

• [62:32] – “We don’t know much about what the future is going to hold, but…[Attenborough and people like him]—they're prophets.”

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “Listening to his voice is like sliding into a warm bath.” —Emmanuel Jochi [03:50]
• “We kill a whale.” —Kai Wright, on the brutality of nature and human impact [07:27]
• “He’s a TV genius is what you’re telling me.” —Kai Wright, on Attenborough’s influence on television itself [26:51]
• “On the one hand, it’s really a bummer that one of the most powerful people on the face of the earth, when it comes to messaging about nature, wasn’t banging the drum. On the other hand, here’s someone who saw the science and just had a reaction of, ‘let me change. My bad. Let’s do this and lean hard into it.’” —Emmanuel Jochi [55:22]
• “Sir David Attenborough, the snack who had to grow.” —Kai Wright [62:53]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 02:17 – Introduction to Attenborough as a “cultural icon”; what his voice means
• 07:04 – Modern Attenborough shows address human impact (shipping lanes, climate, plastics)
• 13:16 – Early life, family, and nerdy beginnings
• 14:47 – The early days of BBC nature programming: animals in the studio
• 18:53 – The creation and impact of “Zoo Quest”—and its colonial overtones
• 26:07 – Attenborough as BBC2 executive; influence on color broadcasting (tennis balls)
• 28:26 – “Life on Earth” and the rise of the narrative-driven nature doc
• 37:59 – Attenborough’s focus on empathy and “the humanity of animals”
• 41:44 – His 1974 statement on not wanting to “proselytize”—focusing on delight
• 47:46 – The (late) arrival of climate change as a theme in Attenborough’s work
• 49:03 – The lecture that changed Attenborough’s view on climate forever
• 54:16 – Attenborough embraces advocacy: “We are causing the world to heat up.”
• 57:34 – Blue Planet II: From empathetic storytelling to real-world policy impact

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Conclusion

This episode masterfully uses archival sound, candid modern reflections, and thoughtful discussion to present Sir David Attenborough’s “journey” from wide-eyed naturalist and TV innovator, to global storyteller, to cautious environmentalist, to impassioned activist—always with the warmth, wit, and humility that have made him such a beloved figure. By tracing both his personal evolution and the changing cultural landscape, Jochi and Wright illuminate how the way we see—and feel about—nature is continually reshaped by voices like Attenborough’s.

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“He’s a person on a journey. His life has been the journey of that relationship.”
—Emmanuel Jochi [61:49]

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(Next week’s icon: mystery singer/actor with a legendary showbiz lineage …)

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Transcript

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[Emmanuel Jochi]

culture bites to viral food spots, it's all on TikTok. Download TikTok now to explore.

[Kai Wright]

Pushkin. Hi, listeners.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

This is Kai Wright and Emmanuel Joci. We're dropping into your feed today to share our new podcast, Big Lives.

[Kai Wright]

Each week we explore a cultural icon, from music to comedy to film to tv, you name it. But someone who too often has been flattened into just a meme, a punchline, or a single photo we can't unsee.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And we do this by diving into the BBC archive. I'm talking 100 years of some of the more surprising, interesting, and honestly complicated moments that have ever been broadcast.

[Kai Wright]

I hope you enjoy it. And if you do find Big Lives, wherever you listen to your podcasts

[Emmanuel Jochi]

from BBC Studios and Pushkin Industries, this is Big Lives. I'm Emmanuel Jochi.

[Kai Wright]

I'm Kai Wright.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And on this show, what we do is we take a single cultural icon and break down their legacy with the help of the BBC's vast archive. And today, Kai, we're going to be talking about Sir David Attenborough.

[Kai Wright]

Sir David Attenborough. Even the Sir. Even the sir part.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

I know I had special joy in, like, adding that bit to the script I'm reading. I was like, it is Sir David. Thank you very much. But okay, when you think of Sir David Attenborough, what do you think of

[Kai Wright]

an old man crawling around in the dirt, whispering at a bug or like snake or lion or something, you know, And I have to say also. Cause I discovered David Attenborough late in life, you know, once he was older and then I looked back at like, who was he as a young man? Also, I think of he was a snack.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Oh, okay. That is not what I'd expect. He's a bonafide snack. But yes, you are right. The old man whispering, like, describing nature. Like, just stuff like this.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

This is a poison dart frog. Males raise their young in a very special way. A father will place each one of his tadpoles in its own tiny pool of water. This is one nice and safe.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Oh, listening to his voice is like sliding into a warm bath. You know what I mean? Yes. So David Attenborough is of course the world's most famous nature broadcaster. That voice we've talked about and that we've been gushing over is so distinctive. And I don't know, he's basically, I feel like my entire lifetime, but also my parents entire life, he has been the voice of the natural world. Like, he's been making nature programming for the BBC at this point for over 70 years. Is actually his 100th birthday this May. Oh, wow.

[Kai Wright]

Because he's still making stuff. Like, I watched everything from him fairly recently.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

He's still making stuff. It's funny you described him like both as an older man and as a younger man because in my brain he's kind of always been old. But I say that with the utmost respect, you know, I mean, he's always been this old, kind of revered figure, this voice, you know. You know, the thing I've always loved about him is this narration that he does. It doesn't shy away from like the truth of the way the natural world works, right? Like things die and get killed. But he's always talking from this place of just utmost wonder, you know, like almost childlike wonder. But recently I had a kind of different experience.

[Kai Wright]

You're not getting ready to ruin David Atterbor for me, are you?

[Emmanuel Jochi]

No, no, no, no, no, no. But you know, occasionally I am prone to, to the occasional bout of insomnia. And a couple weeks ago I was unable to sleep and I just rolled over, pulled out my phone, was like, you know what I should watch to get to sleep? I should just watch some nature program and David's soothing voice will put me to sleep. You know what I mean? Was kind of my vibe and I was watching this episode and it's this beautiful scene. It basically takes place in what I guess I can only describe as a ocean sort of nursery, right? Picture like beautiful pristine waters. And in these pristine waters, this ghale has just given birth to like, her calf and is raising it and it's the most idyllic sort of fun. And so David Attenborough comes in and sort of sets up. You know, they've been in this wonderful place for months and months, but, you know, they're gonna have to move on because they gotta go get food. I'll play a bit of it here for you.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

It's time for the pair to head north. Since arriving three months ago, the female has lost a third of her body weight. So now she must begin the long trek back to her feeding grounds.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And I was like, okay, I've been here before.

[Kai Wright]

I've seen this one. I've seen this one. I read.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. I'm like, I'm 32. I've been watching these programs my whole life. I know that you have introduced me to this cute as hell little baby calf. And it is gonna have to find some way to survive on this journey in the open water.

[Kai Wright]

You are gonna put this calf in danger, David Attenborough.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

We know it's coming, but what's interesting is you don't go immediately to, like, some other sea animal coming out of nowhere to hurt this baby. Well, instead, these whales have to go through shipping lanes.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

The constant engine noise disrupts the underwater soundscape, disorientating the whales and increasing the risk of a collision. Scores of whales die every year in ship strikes in these waters,

[Emmanuel Jochi]

and guess what happens, Kai?

[Kai Wright]

We kill a whale.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

No, what does happen is that the whale gets her baby calf through all these shipping lanes without incident. Everything's great, and then a bunch of orcas come in and just murk her kid, just like killer whales. Listen, but the propaganda that Free Willy perpetuated about the killer whale needs to be studied. They really tricked us as a species. But I digress. I digress. I was sitting there heartbroken, but still kind of stuck on the whole shipping lane part of it, because I was just like, oh, this is. This is so different to the sort of nature programming that I feel like I grew up watching. Right. Like, it felt like all these animals took part in a world kind of a little bit divorced from us. You know, that he was narrating and, like.

[Kai Wright]

Right. You're just like, oh, they're just. We're just watching. We're just, you know, we're just watching nature.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

I know. And it's not a whole TV show that takes place in the real world, right. Where, like, animals don't do exactly what you want them to do. And, yeah, humans are destroying the planet. And as I lay there now very much not able to go to sleep. I don't know. I was like, oh, David Attenborough is someone who, even at nearly 100 years old, is still evolving, you know. And as I went through the BBC archive to just learn more about him, I realized that his life's work has really shaped our complicated and fraught relationship with the Earth for the last 70 odd years. And I don't know, Kai, it made me question some things about the effort to save the planet in a way that really surprised me.

[Kai Wright]

I am excited to hear about this because I have too been challenged by David Attbrohl.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

All right, let's get to it after the break. Everybody knows Shaq, but off camera, he's

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

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[Emmanuel Jochi]

Welcome back to Big Lives. Today we're talking about Sir David Attenborough. So, guys, like I said earlier, so David is turning 100 on the 8th of May.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

Crazy.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Which means he was born in 1926 in the Midlands in the UK and he's part of this generation of British men who seem to enter the world at the exact right time. And what I mean, by that is, he grew up and was old enough to have to live through World War II. Right. But he was young enough that he got to experience the building of society that took place after World War II. Right. Post World War II, there are all of these things that are being created in almost every single sector of life, like all these institutions that we now take for granted as existing forever. They're coming into, therefore, after the Second World War. And he's part of that first generation that is totally allowed to take advantage of all of it. Anything they want to do, they can kind of do, because it's starting.

[Kai Wright]

The white ones, at least.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yes, yes, the white. Definitely the white ones, yes. I should preface this by saying it's a great time to be a white man, which it kind of always is, but it definitely was.

[Kai Wright]

But this was the golden age of being a white man.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Definitely. And maybe, unsurprisingly, as he grows up, he's a nerd from the off. Right. He has all these stories about just, like, riding his bike around the Midlands, looking at rocks, because he's so into them. Like, that's his. That's his whole thing as a kid. Here's him talking about that in an interview he did in 1974.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

I used to bicycle a great deal all over the Midlands. And from a geological point of view, of course, Midlands is marvellous because. Well, for one thing, it is not. It's provincial. The Midlands is enormously famous throughout the world amongst geologists. There's a fossil. There's a little village which I used to know very well, and I'm sure it's still there. Whether it's a village still, I don't know. Tilton. Tilton is on the ironstone country, and there's one particular kind of fossil called tiltonoceras, which was internationally known after that little village, the Charnwood Forest, one of the key sites where people really discovered some of the oldest rocks on the surface of the Earth.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

His brother is Richard Attenborough, who, you know, is famous thespian, known to many people as the old guy in Jurassic park who owns the park. Oh, wait, I didn't know this. Yeah, yeah, that is his brother. His older brother, yes.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

Wow.

[Kai Wright]

Okay.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. And he's interested in so many different things besides just rock. So, you know, he ends up studying a bunch of sciences at university, including zoology. He ends up, like, sort of joining the navy. He's doing that for a while, then he goes on to work in editing. Like, he's editing children's textbooks for A while. And then he decides, okay, that's not actually my jam. And so what he picks is the BBC, which has existed, of course, in radio for years, but in terms of the TV sort of started during the war, but it was really coming to the fore now, like in this period after the Second World War. And he gets hired versus a production assistant and becomes a producer. And in these days, like, the BBC is not that big as a TV institution. If you're a producer, you kind of get to do whatever you want. And you're doing all sorts of programming. And what David really wanted to do were nature programs. Except, you know, nature programs back then, and by now we're talking about, like, the 50s look very different to what they look like now. I'm just gonna play you a clip of David explaining this from the interview he did on the BBC in the 1970s.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

The man in the early 50s for animals was very great naturalist called George Cansdale. And George Cansdale was at the London Zoo, and he used to bring in animals from the zoo and he would show them on a table. It's a doormat thing, which is absolutely the right way to do it. And the animals always bit him or escaped or something. And of course, great headlines in newspapers. But of course, the trouble with that was that you. The animal looked sort of as though it was extraordinary. You didn't understand why it had legs that shape or tail that shape. And you could only understand that if you saw it in the wild.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

I don't know if you remember this from kindergarten or this was your experience, but it's like, I remember being in kindergarten and like, one day in the class, there'd be somebody from the zoo who'd bring like a chinchilla to school.

[Kai Wright]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Like, that's kind of what they would do. But just on tv, it became a David Letterman bit.

[Kai Wright]

It was like, that's what I remember it from. He had that guy that would bring on, like, animals, and the animal would wild out, and then it'd be like

[Emmanuel Jochi]

human getting crazy 100%, just the whole of, like, what if you put an ostrich in a studio? What happens? But David wanted to be out in the world filming animals in their live habitats. And to be fair, there were people that were doing that, and they were doing it in a very kind of extreme way to what we do now. You had people like Jacques Cousteau out making these sort of big films. There's a very infamous one from, like the 1950s in which he's trying to show People a bunch of fish underwater in this coral reef. And there's no real underwater camera technology that we have today. So the dude literally just throws dynamite into the coral reef and just films as all of the fish just rise to the water. No, it is.

[Kai Wright]

So they blow up the coral reef.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

They blow up the coral reef and you just see, like, all of these fish just kind of floating in the water and then they put all of them onto shore and you see this poor little pufferfish just kind of, like puffing its heart out. Like, it's dark. It's dark.

[Kai Wright]

That is wild.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

You have that on one extreme, like, not suitable really for public tv. Just.

[Kai Wright]

Who was the producer that was like, oh, I got it. I know what we'll do. We'll blow it up and then the bodies will come out and we'll be

[Emmanuel Jochi]

like, not a bad. So you either have stuff like that, which is, like, kind of too ghastly for TV even by standards of that day. Right. And then you have another type of TV programming that is really just more about the exploration of a place. And there was this one couple, Armand and Mikaela. Denise and I just want to play you a bit of their show so you can see what that's like.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

The Flying Foxes camp was in the very heart of the swamp. To get close enough to them for good pictures, we had to make up our minds to cross the swamp and reach their camp on the foot.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

At any moment, you may miss your footing, go down into this bubbling mat and be hardly able to extricate yourself.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

It takes some true devotion to photography and on the part of a wife, some true devotion to her husband to go and set up cameras in the middle of a mangrove swamp.

[Kai Wright]

It sounds like a Mel Brooks.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

It does, it does. And no shade to them. It's like, you know, and you're hearing that narration, right, as you see these two, like, white people walking through the swamp. You can barely even see the animals that they are getting to, the flying foxes, but. And besides that little bit of humor, to be honest, it's kind of boring, right?

[Kai Wright]

Yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Like, there's not that much that happens. And actually, is David Attenborough talking about that again from that 1970s interview.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Nobody thought that the elephants were going to charge them or bite them or do the other things they would do to George Cansdale. So I thought if you could put the two things together, you might have quite a good recipe for a program. So let's do one where you film the animal in the wild. It's then caught and Then you have it in the studio live. And that was the basis of Zoo Quest.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Now, Zoo Quest was David Attenborough's first big coming out party in terms of nature programming. It came out in 1954 and it was like revolutionary.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Tonight we've got rather a different program for you.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Zoo Quest was so massive because it was in the wild, Right. I feel like the way nature programs were because we're just in the wild looking at a thing. And David Attenborough is telling us about that thing. Right. But what David did was he constructed a whole sort of storyline and a reason for them to be in Africa, for example, for the first season. And the whole program is David Attenborough and the BBC tagging along with the London Zoo as they capture animals to bring back to that zoo.

[Kai Wright]

Oh, wow. So he was literal in his description.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yes, like literal. Zoo Quest, like the whole first series is framed around basically this small, cool looking bird called Epica Fartes that looks like a miniature bald ostrich. It's like, we're gonna look for this bird. And along the way of looking for this bird in this sort of quest, they then show you all these other animals. And David Attenborough is not the initial host of this program. The initial host of this program is one of his friends who works at the zoo who's sort of helping lead his expedition, this man named Jack Lester. And so David's producing him, sort of offering the program. Then Jack gets sick and he can't actually host the first episode. And so David takes over. And the format of this show is that it's still kind of a live show insofar as it kind of looks like the nightly news. So David Attenborough is there sitting at a desk. And I just have to say, seeing him young like that is mind blowing. One, he's very good looking.

[Kai Wright]

This is what I said. I had to look it up. I looked it up at one point. I was like, what was this man? Because he's like, I only know him as this old, old, old man. And I was like, what's he look like? And I was like, damn, he's a snack.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

You know, at this point he's in his 30s, right? The prime of his life. And you can tell he looks, he's got it going on. And I don't know. So interesting to see him because even though, you know, he is like a fully grown man at this point, he still looks so youthful and so wide eyed. Yeah. And just so excited and happy to be doing the thing. I'm Just gonna play you this scene from Zoo Quest to set the scene for you. David Attenborough and like, his colleagues, they're sort of looking, I think, in the undergrowth for one specific animal when they hear another animal might be nearby and they go after it. I'm just gonna play you this.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

There was a rustle on the other side of the thicket. We looked up, and there was the anteater itself galloping across the savannahs. Without thinking how we were actually going to catch it, Jack and I set off wildly in pursuit.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And, like, literally, that's what you watch. You watch a young David Attenborough chasing across the savannah on foot after an anteater bat wants no parts of this. And, I mean, it's messed up in a bunch of ways, but it is funny because David Attenborough is bad at catching this anteater.

[Kai Wright]

It's not in his nature. He already knows, like, this isn't what I'm supposed to be doing.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yeah. And he doesn't have the wheels like that. But basically what happens is one of the locals that's helping them catches the anteater and be like, okay, here it is. We're taking it off to the zoo. And then you would see it later in the studio with David. So you sort of have that sort of combo thing. But, yeah, the show is a real program of its times. There's no real discussion at any point. You can tell. It doesn't even occur to anybody that, huh, you know, how many of these, like, animals are there for us to just take from this place? And I have to say, there were times I felt uncomfortable watching it because the whole sort of conceit of it is like, right, we're out in the world exploring this pristine land that we can just take stuff from. So it does feel very much still a creature of colonialism, you know, I mean, like, they're dressed up like the bad guy in Jumanji, you know, just like the, like, sort of khaki, like, pants and, like, that white, like, they have on all of that stuff.

[Kai Wright]

British people roaming the world, figuring out what's mine.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. And it's interesting because, like, the local people exist in it, but they exist in it kind of as a vehicle for, like, you know, like, they're part of the attraction in that kind of way. But, you know, 50s. The show is a massive hit.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

That was the end of our Zoo Quest. Good night.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And I should say today, that is on record now basically being like, yeah, it's not aged well. This is what we did at the time, that would not fly now all the rest of it. But it's a big hit. And they do it for a couple of years and they do these different excursions to different parts of the globe. Even at that time, that sort of practice of zoos just going to any country they want in the world and just grabbing animals is starting to get frowned upon. Like, the World Wildlife Fund is up and running by this point, and it's not necessarily the organization that it would become today, but, you know, essentially a bunch of rich people come together and are like, you know what? We should conserve some of these animals that we've been collecting. Maybe we've collected enough. And so they start basically trying to replicate the national parks model that exists here in the US like in other places, to preserve some of these animals. And so a show like Zoo Quest is not really the vibe. And as it is, David Attenborough has sort of flirted with being a host, Liked it. But ultimately he's still a producer at heart and goes into the development work as like an exec. Like, that's the track he chooses. He basically chooses to be the version of our boss.

[Kai Wright]

That's crazy. I can't imagine David Attenborough running around as an executive to be like, how do we fund this thing?

[Emmanuel Jochi]

100%. But that is exactly what he does. And he rises through the ranks pretty quickly. At this time. So much change is happening at the BBC. Right. Like, you know, I have said they were pretty small when he started there, and he's there as it starts expanding. So BBC at first was just like one channel, like BBC1, but then it grows. So then you have BBC2, and BBC2 becomes sort of like the cool younger cousin of BBC1 and is doing all these different sorts of experimental programming, particularly really leaning into color television.

[Shaquille O'Neal (Superhuman Shaq)]

Yeah.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

Good evening. This is BBC2.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And the person who really helps usher in that era and who gets tapped to run BBC2 is David Attenborough.

[Kai Wright]

Wow. I did not know this.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

The more I learned about this, I was like, oh, this makes sense, you know? You know, when you learn about something, you're like, oh, right. The rules of television are still being made up, even with color television. So I'll just give you an example. So you know how tennis balls are the color that they are like yellow and stuff?

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Uh huh.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Do you know why that is?

[Kai Wright]

I could guess for Wimbledon to be able to see the ball going back and forth.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Exactly. But you know who really pushes for that?

[Kai Wright]

No. David Attenborough.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

David Attenborough pushes for that because he's just like, we've transitioned to color. You can't really see the balls up against the grass at Wimbledon, we should really change the ball color. And so that's what happens.

[Kai Wright]

It's just funny. I don't. It's kind of blowing my mind because it's making me think of him so differently, you know, Like, I just. I really do think of him as a naturalist, you know, like who somebody was like, point a camera at this guy, you know, but he's a TV genius is what you're telling me. Like, he is like creating tv.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And at the same time as he's making these decisions, the BBC is expanding one of its key units, which is its natural history unit, which is this team of producers, but also this team of scientists who was devoted to like natural world programming. Now by this point, we've left the 50s behind and now we're moving closer and closer to the 70s. And the technology for filming nature has moved ahead leaps and bounds. And there are a bunch of young people at BBC who want to do stuff with that and they want to put it into like a never before seen TV spectacle. And so David Attenborough hears about this and is just like, being executive has been fun, but I actually think that I would rather go back to programming, which is a big deal because he is so good at his job that people are talking about him running the entirety of a BBC.

[Kai Wright]

Wow.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So he quits and what he ends up doing becomes like this seminal program. It is this big, massive demonstration that just captures life on Earth. And that is exactly what it is called. It's this program called Life on Earth. I'm just gonna play you a clip of it.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

There are some 4 million different kinds of animals and plants in the world. 4 million different solutions to the problems of staying alive. This is the story of how a few them of. Of them came to be as they are.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So I saw a flash of recognition in your face when I said life on Earth. Did you watch this as a kid?

[Kai Wright]

Not as a kid. I mean, the stuff was on in the background. But I have to say, you know, I've been on for the last, like three or four years this journey for myself around like my relationship to the natural world. And at one point in that started binging David Attenborough shows and life on Earth, like it was all I would watch on television for a really long time.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Wow, wow, wow. Well, so I don't need to explain you. Like, life on Earth is extraordinary. So the version that I remember seeing As a kid, they had edited it down into like three episodes, basically. But actually the way it originally aired, it was like 13 episodes that aired every week. And it was must see appointment television. What it did was it told essentially the story of evolution by looking at modern animals that exist today. And it's extraordinary. And it's funny because I watched it again in preparation for this episode and I have to say, you know, as beautiful as all the nature programming is now, the shots of this are just gorgeous, like really, really beautiful. And in the middle of it all, holding it all together, is Sir David. And the thing that he does that is revolutionary in this program is that he really inhabits for the first time the sort of narration we know him for in a bunch of different ways, which is that it's not just that you're watching a nature program. It's not that you're watching him exploring through nature in some sort of colonial way. What you have is this authoritative voice who is telling you a story, who is making an argument and watching it. You can tell he's having fun doing it. Like so, so much fun doing it. And he's, you know, the talk of the town. He goes on this, like, late night talk show hosted by this guy, Terry Wogan. And I just want to tell you a little bit of it because it's just so fun to see him talking about just how big it was. Like all these British people just marveling at like, wow, this became a global sensation.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

Life on Earth, that monumental series done in 1979. Three years to do and seen all over the world. You must, you must be famous worldwide.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

I talk Finnish rather remarkably well. I walked into a theater, into a hotel in Helsinki and saw myself saying all these Finnish words which rather impress me because they're dubbed as into Finnish.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

But yeah, but in America, I understand they, they decided your voice wasn't good enough, didn't they?

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

No, they, they, they actually, they did take it as it was.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

Did they? I, I had read somewhere that that one of the Americans said, oh, well, he's not, he's a little too British for us.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

We had to argue about that and we won.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Oh, yeah. But basically he gets dubbed, right. In all these different languages. And so the whole world gets to see this nature program which like super juices it.

[Shaquille O'Neal (Superhuman Shaq)]

Yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

As you probably realize by now, we're in the late 70s, like 1979, going into 80. And all of this is happening at this time when modern environmental activism is really, really taking off. Right. Like, you know, I talked about the world Wildlife Fund being formed, like in the 60s, 10 years later, 70s, we have the Save the Whale campaign, we have Earth Day, this big sort of collective campaign to get people interested in the earth and interested in green policy in a way that they never have been before. So that together with all of this expanded programming that David Attenborough is doing happens at exactly the right time. And so the ratings are through the roof. And through the 80s, he sort of starts making the stuff that in a way we sort of know him for. And, and it's interesting to watch him in the shows that he does after Life on Earth because he's in the shots, like way more obviously now that he's an older man. He's not actively in nature doing as much anymore. He's mostly a voice occasionally popping in front of the camera. But in those days he's in it quite a lot. And I watched one particular interview that really surprised me and sort of changed my view of him a little bit. So I'm gonna set the scene for you. It's 1984. David Antenberg is appearing on that same late night TV show. Wogan,

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

my next guest, is also pretty well known as a traveler. Of all the people in television, perhaps he's the one who receives not only the most popular but also the most critical acclaim. David Attenborough.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And David. David Attenborough comes on and him and his host, Terry Wogan get talking about just the difficulties of his job. Because Wogan is legitimately curious. He's like, how are you doing this? How are you doing like? Because even the concept of like shooting something like that over a period of three years, right, where you have to be in the right spot to watch like a frog give birth, that was all still new to the public.

[Kai Wright]

It's still pretty marvelous. I still watch this stuff and I'm like, how much money did this require? How much time did this require? Is pretty marvelous.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. And David Attenborough tells this anecdote about a recent shoot he's been on where him and his team come up with this stunt that he's gonna do where the whole point is he's gonna talk about the upper canopy of the rainforest and how important that is while actually being in the upper canopy of the rainforest. And they're brainstorming how they're gonna do this because these trees that he's talking about are like 80ft tall, right? So how's he gonna get to the top? And one of his producers comes up to him and is just like, we'll make it work. We'll put you in this sort of super complex pulley system. And I'm just gonna play you a bit of David Attenborough describing this.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

What we'll do is we'll shoot the ropes over with bow and arrow or that sort of thing. Or I will climb up and we'll tie ropes so that we eventually end up with a rope, one rope which goes from 150ft up down to the sea, and then you climb up it. And I said, how? And he said, well, you've got these sort of handles with ratchets on them which will go up and you have slings and you put your legs in and you just work your way up. And when you want to come down again, you just take the rope and you pass it around here and you bring that round there. Then you uncover, clip this and then you make sure that you undo that. Then you do the other, take four more turns around the rope and fall back. And you'll be absolutely okay? Oh, yes. I said, fine.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So of course this poor man has no idea what the hell his producer is talking about, but he knows enough. He starts pulling himself up and, you know, at first he's going pretty well, right?

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

First 18 inches, it's good. You know, this is amazing. And after about two feet, you think it's quite tiring. After about three foot six, you think, God, I'm a long way up.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

But he's really high up in the air when he realizes, oh, I'm kind of screwed because I can't remember all these instructions as to how to come down. And he's too far up, away from all his producers to give him those instructions.

[Kai Wright]

This is ridiculous.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

One more time. So I'm just going to play you what happens next.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

And so I started talking to myself and I was saying things like, now there is no need to panic. All you have to do is to remember the little rabbit came out of his hole and he went round the log three times and then he went back in there. And then I started swearing and I looked down and I saw the boys from the crew falling about than laughter and I couldn't think what they were laughing at. And of course, I'd fallen for the oldest trick in the game. I had forgotten that I got a radio mic on everywhere that I.

[Kai Wright]

Part of the intoxication of watching those shows.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

He is a great storyteller, Such a great storyteller. And he's funny. And around the time he goes and makes what was one of the first nature programs I ever saw called the trials of life. And the whole point of this film is to basically point out, in a way, the humanity of animals. And, you know, this is where I feel like you start seeing the shift to what we know Sir David does super well. Right. Which is just like really storifying the lives of animals. Like presenting them as characters in a narrative plot, like telling that we go on to here. I'm gonna play you this script from another interview he does with Terry Wogan in 1990.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

I think we were actually very brave and ambitious to do this because this is entirely about behavior. It's easy enough to get a shot of an animal sitting in a tree or going to sleep. But if an animal actually doing the thing you want to do, whether it's fighting or finding the way or signalling or courting, is very much more difficult. And this entire series is made up of those sort of things.

[Interviewer or Host (possibly Terry Wogan)]

And what do you hope the series will achieve?

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

I hope it will be bring a realization to people that animals, we and animals share a certain attitude to life. We're all born, we all die, we all hope to mate and leave our genes in another generation. And we all actually have extraordinarily similar problems looking after the children. In the first, second program, there's a sequence when a little fly gets very upset. Cause its children are being attacked. And you wouldn't think it would bring a lump to your throat, a thigh, but I'm sure you will.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So you can see that he's like. He's like, right, that's what we're out for here, is empathy, right? Empathy and storytelling with these animals.

[Kai Wright]

And it is profound. Like, I really have to say, like, I do think the mission he describes there, it's a profound one that had a profound effect on me watching him execute it all these years, decades after it, you know, if you binge them the way I did of, like, yeah, life is some basics, you know, like born, you got to take care of the kids, you got to find some food, you got to have sex in order to. You know, like, we're all trying to have sex and then, like, you're going to face death, you know, like, that's it. Like, there's some basics here. And it is a profound point.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. I think that's one of the things that is so compelling about his work. And it's interesting watching that because he's projecting humanity in that kind of way onto animals, getting us to see empathy in that way. But a thing that is kind of striking about these films is like, it completely ignores the Human existence. Actually, we're talking about animals in a human way without talking about people. There are very few instances, even in his narration, where he's open about the fact that they're filming in, like, a national preserve somewhere. You know, you just kind of. There's a sense of wonder and glory and to the point of almost like, religious adoration. Right. About, like, what we're seeing without talking about the fact, really, that. Right. We're killing these things. There's, like, mentions here and there of poaching and stuff like that.

[Kai Wright]

There's all this human culture around it and it's.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And to be fair, at that time, that's not out of the ordinary. I feel like people were committed to what is known as a wilderness myth. Are you familiar with that at all?

[Kai Wright]

Yes.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Yes.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right. It's just, like, the idea, right, that you create these national parks, these reserves, to sort of conserve nature. But those places are alive. Like, we have many of them in the US In a sense. Right. Like, it's great. I can hike and see all these beauties. All these animals are protected. But that land was yanked from a bunch of. So that was possible.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

Mm.

[Kai Wright]

And that, like, the wilderness idea, that there's this little tiny piece of it that is left, quote, wild.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right.

[Kai Wright]

And that we are apart from that most of the time, and thus, like, we have no impact on the planet

[Emmanuel Jochi]

if we're apart from the wilderness 100%. And, you know, that's the water that David is swimming in right. At that point.

[Kai Wright]

Yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And really the birth of the green movement that's happening and pulsating throughout this period, like, him not talking about that as much in his programming actually is a calculated choice that he makes philosophically. David doesn't think at this point that he should be talking about that kind of stuff in programming. I'm just gonna play you a clip of him talking about it from slightly earlier. This is in the 70s, when he's really sort of making that transition out of the BBC to programming again. This is an interview he gave on the BBC around that time.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Well, I personally get huge pleasure from seeing certain things, from seeing, let us say, a lake covered with flamingos in the early dawn in Africa, which is a marvellous, thrilling, exciting sight. Now, when it happens, you get enormous pleasure. Now I actually get an additional pleasure from telling you about it or from telling anybody about it. And if I can communicate that pleasure to others through various devices, like television cameras or whatever else, that is an enormous reinforcement of the pleasure for me. And I'm not proselytising though I dare say perhaps I am unconsciously so doing. But I'm not doing it because I wanted to go out and tell people they ought to do something. I'm just saying I think this is enormously pleasurable, inspiring, and therefore I thought you might like to see it. So you are taking enjoyment to people, but are you taking to them something that it is important for them to know, important for them perhaps to take some action about? Well, to be. To speak purely personally, I think there is a role for the program, which is the pioneering, hard hitting campaigning program. Sure, it's playing a proper role in society and all that. On the other hand, I personally can have enough of people leaning out of the television screen and saying, you lazy, irresponsible, ignorant chap, sitting there in your comfortable suburban home, why don't you care for this or subscribe to that or go out and do the other? I mean, there is a place for that, but not for me. And there's a lot of that in nature programs on television. Well, I hope there's not too much. I mean, I think every now and again that it's worth reminding people that these splendid things have got to be looked after. But primarily I think the programs are so that people may share the delight in the things that have brought you a delight. Are you worried about conservation? Very much. But you don't feel that it's part of your job to take this message to people? Oh, I do, and perhaps I am being a little. What? I don't know, but. But I actually think the best way of taking the message to the people is by. Is by showing them the pleasure. Not necessarily by saying every time you've got to do something about it, but by saying, look, isn't this lovely? And the other bit follows.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yeah, so that's all of his philosophy. Is that in that sentence, isn't this lovely? And then leaving you to do the work.

[Kai Wright]

The thing is that what he's articulating there. What year was that?

[Emmanuel Jochi]

1974.

[Kai Wright]

74, yes. And honestly, I mean, I guess like the, the thought processes around how to make us as human beings give a shit about our impact on the planet. And you know, that has changed and evolved and gone through all kinds of twists and turns, but he's articulating an idea error that is now, today quite a modern concept that like it has to start with our relationship that we have, and it's the one that I have become intoxicated with. That like a fundamental problem we have is we have a colonial relationship. To other species. And we gotta start with, like, understanding we have a relationship. We relate to one another and find joy in it if we're ever going to figure out how to then have a more responsive relationship. That's a modern idea. He's articulating it in 74, and I find it very compelling.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

No, it is. And you know, he's gonna evolve that view. You know what I mean? And that evolution is what is at the heart of so much of Sir David's work nowadays. And we're gonna get into that right after the break. And now, superhuman Shaq.

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[Emmanuel Jochi]

Welcome back to Big Lies. Today we're talking about Sir David Attenborough. And when we left off, Kai, we were talking about how for a lot of his career, Sir David's approach right to environmental issues was really not to proselytize. Right. But I feel like there's one key thing we've kind of left out here, which is just like we've talked about, you know, this burgeoning wave of conservation and, you know, campaigns like Earth Day and Save the Whales, but we haven't uttered the words climate change.

[Kai Wright]

I was wondering when we were gonna get that right.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And, you know, that's partly because in terms of the mainstream, it was not in the mainstream for the 70s and the 80s, even as it was a thing that scientists were sort of hip to. And I guess one thing I realized as I was watching all of his programming and sort of nearing the present day was I was like, right, we're talking about conservation in terms of littering and like, all that kind of stuff. Like, when does climate change end the picture for Sir David? And it's kind of hard to tell. And the reason it's hard to tell is because for a long time, Sir David Attenborough actually did not know how he felt about climate change.

[Kai Wright]

Really?

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yes. Sir David's approach for years was basically, well, yes, there are temperature fluctuations, but there have been temperature fluctuations throughout the history of the world. He was kind of a little bit of a climate change skeptic, really.

[Kai Wright]

I mean, until when? Because we, like you say, you have to remember, like, it was not until like the late 80s that there began a mainstream conversation about the human's impact on the climate.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Well, so this is the thing that really surprised me until 2004.

[Kai Wright]

Oh, no, see, you are gonna ruin Sir David for me.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Well, okay, hold that for. Hold that for. Okay, so now we're in my era. Okay, I remember 2004. And what happens in 2004 is David Attenbrook. He attends this lecture in the city in Belgium called Liege. And this lecture is given by this American climate professor named Ralph Cicerone. What this American climate change scientist is doing in this lecture is he's just showing with cold, hard data, basically, here's what's happening to the atmosphere's chemistry. And I'm just going to read you a little quote from Sir David about this. He showed a series of graphs showing world temperature and critically, population, as well as ingredients within the atmosphere. The congruence of those things convinced me beyond any doubt whatever, that not only was the climate changing, but that humanity was responsible for that. Until then, one knows that the climate has changed over geological history. And I was not totally sure that this was not just an aberration within the parameters of variability, but basically that professor's graphs convinced him beyond any doubt at all.

[Kai Wright]

It's interesting because I always thought that David Attenborough was a scientist.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Mm.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

You know, like, you know, in time. I mean, he did study zoology at university. Like, that is true. So he's a scientist in that way, but yet he's a talent.

[Kai Wright]

I assumed he had a career in science, like in natural sciences of some sort. And then somebody came along and was like, this guy's great, let's make TV with him.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right.

[Kai Wright]

So given what I now know, I guess it's not as. Yeah, you know, I mean, he's a TV guy who likes nature. And so for him to come to understand this in 2004, I guess, isn't as shocking to me now that I learned what you have told me as it would have been before this conversation.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right, right, right. And the thing is, at the time, he took criticism for it, he was taking criticism from environmental activists who were just like, come on, you are the voice of the natural world. You, like most people on Earth who speak English, their introduction to nature, the way they think about it, is totally framed by you. Like, if we get you on our side. Yeah. If you get you on our side, we can beat this thing, you know?

[Kai Wright]

Yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And I'm just gonna play you a little bit of him talking about his evolution as part of some testimony he gave to a UK Parliament committee a few years ago.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

I'm not by nature a propagandist, and I'm not even. I mean, I. I started making natural history programs because I thought there was nothing. I prefer to see more on television than the beauties of the natural world. And I would love to just be going on doing that. That's what I enjoy. I enjoy looking at birds of paradise in display. I enjoy coral reefs. I enjoy these things, and I enjoy bringing them to people who don't have the good luck that I've had. So that's fun. But if you become aware of what is happening, you don't have any. Any alternative. Now, 50 years ago, we weren't doing. And 50 years ago, there were quite a lot of people who would have said, no, no, no, it's rubbish. Of course, we aren't affecting any. There were a lot of people saying that. And if you want to work the BBC, which is what I did and have done for all my life 50 years ago, we were. There was a duopoly. There was BBC and there was Kabasha Television. And the BBC was a public service. And if you're a public service, you have to represent a public point of view and you can't use it for propaganda. But.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So therefore, you waited for the public mood to change before you started becoming quite assertive with the impact that humans were having on the natural world.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

Not quite as easy as that. I didn't wait for public opinion to change. I waited until the facts seemed incontrovertible.

[Guest or Secondary Speaker]

And.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Yeah, so that lecture he attends in Belgium, that is his. Oh, this is incontrovertible moment. Right. But as influential as Sir David's been, right, as the voice of the natural world, he still is the talent. So what he does after Attending that lecture is he goes to the BBC, and the BBC is actually having discussions about this because, you know, early 2000s, we're still in this era of sort of like, should we be both sizing things? And if we're presenting something as fact, we need to totally make sure that it is fact, and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so they ask him, you know, what do you think? And he's like, well, no, I absolutely believe that this is the case. And he says, if you want me to go and investigate and talk to people, I will gladly do so. So what he does is he makes a couple of programs that come out in 2006 that really examine the climate change question. And really it's him talking to scientists about this. I'm just going to play you a clip from one of those programs.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Planet Earth.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

In 4,500 million years, our world has gone through many natural changes. Now it's changing once again. But this time we ourselves are contributing to those changes. We are causing the world to heat up. If we continue to behave as we are doing, our children and grandchildren will have to deal with extreme and potentially catastrophic changes. We still have time. There are ways to minimize these changes, if we all choose now to adopt them, that the next few years will be crucial.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So in that. Right, he's explicitly doing the thing he said he would never do.

[Kai Wright]

Yeah, yeah.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Whereas he's like, we can do this, we must do this, we must change.

[Kai Wright]

And I've seen a lot of this programming, like, that's part of my introduction to. Or my deep dive on him was this kind of stuff. So that's why I was a little alarmed when you were like, wait, he was a climate scout. I was like, what are you talking about?

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally. And I think in that way, to be honest, it's. I don't know, I found it surprising, but then also a little bit inspiring at the same time, where you're just like, right. On the one hand, it's really a bummer that one of the most powerful people on the face of the earth when it comes to messaging about nature, wasn't banging the drum. On the other hand, you're just like, oh, here's someone who saw the science and just had a reaction of just like, oh, let me change. Yeah, yeah, my bad. Like, let's just do this and lean hard into it.

[Kai Wright]

And it had something at stake in the change. It meant, like, I'm famous for doing one thing. I do it really, really well. I really didn't want to do Something different, because I'm really good at that. And now I have received information that tells me, well, you have to do it differently. So I got to figure out how to be good at the new thing, too. That part is really inspiring.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right. And you know, in that part of it, and I'm glad you said that, like, he's still figuring out how to do it well, how to craft that kind of messaging. So, you know, that whole program is a whole program devoted to climate change, talking to scientists, and it has, like, long soliloquies like that one. Right. But it's almost kind of divorced a little bit. It's like a different version of the same sort of problem that I guess I had with life on Earth. Right. Which is you've told me that humans are having an effect on the planet, but that effect on the planet still feels somehow not tangible. Like, I'm not seeing humans and animals in concert with each other in the way that I experience in my everyday life. Right. And so he starts making programming that does that in, like, a real way and talking more about climate change. And I feel like the way he talks about climate change actually starts bleeding into other stuff he's doing. Like, he always talked on some level about human waste in the ocean, for example, but the way he talks about it changes. Like, I'm just gonna play you a really famous one that he does. This is from Blue Planet 2, and just to set the scene for you, like, this, again, is a scene with whales. And you imagine, like, you're in a shot of the ocean and you sort of zoom in on, like, this little whale pod, and here's that clip.

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

A mother is holding her newborn young. It's dead. She is reluctant to let it go and has been carrying it around for many days. In top predators like these, industrial chemicals can build up to lethal levels, and plastic could be part of the problem. As plastic breaks down, it combines with these other pollutants that are consumed by vast numbers of marine creatures. It's possible her calf may have been poisoned by her own contaminated milk. Pilot whales have big brains. They can certainly experience emotions. Judging from the behavior of the adults, the loss of the infant has affected the entire family. Unless the flow of plastics and industrial pollution into the world's oceans is reduced, marine life will be poisoned by them for many centuries to come. The creatures that live in the big blue are perhaps more remote than any animals on the planet, but not remote enough, it seems, to escape the effects of what we are doing to their world.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And that whole scene is Just like it's so sad, you know, but it's

[Kai Wright]

exactly what you said going into it. Like now we're at a point of where there it's both and it's not, you know, you have politics over here, you have love for nature over here where he's like, you're in relationship to this animal also that relationship is causing damage to it.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And you in the end, totally, you're watching like a natural phenomenon, but it is human caused. It's like on the one hand, I'm so proud of this man for making the change, you know, and this stuff is so shocking and has tangible results. Like that plastics thing we just played. When that aired, it led to like real legislative action in the UK over plastics and stuff. And it's like people watch that and were outraged, but we exist now in an outraged deluge constantly.

[Kai Wright]

And it's overwhelming and it makes us sad and. But I don't think he's trafficking an outrage, Emmanuel. Cause I again for me on my own journey about my relationship to the natural world, he is a big part of that. Like going into his programs has been a big part of that. And I just think a lot of what he is doing now when he talks about climate is exactly where a lot of the climate activists I've interviewed in reporting on this have said we gotta get. Which is we already know the bad news. You know, I mean set aside the deniers, but it's a mainstream belief now that humans have been on this suicidal rampage with the climate.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Right.

[Kai Wright]

And like science has done its job, science has done enough that we can fix it. Like we have all the necessary tools as a consequence of advancements in science. What's missing is a shared will to do so. And there's a lot of belief that like we are stuck in a place where as people who now that we care about it, we immediately shut down in the way that you're describing because it seems overwhelming and insolvable and we can't move past and okay, the sin is already done and that there has to be a place where we figure out how to shift our actual emotional relationship to other species from this, you know, long standing colonial relationship. Whether it's about taking stuff for our needs and destroying the planet or taking care of the planet for our needs. Right, Right. This idea that we are the stewards is the problem and get ourselves to. We are in relationship. And that's what he's doing is he's teaching us how to be in relationship in these more modern programs or that's

[Emmanuel Jochi]

what I'm hearing, right?

[Kai Wright]

And showing that, like, here's what's at stake if you can't change your relationship. I think it's the kind of thing that we need right now, which is why, again, I was shocked to hear that he was late for the game.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

But that's the thing. It's like he's a person on a journey. His life has been the journey of that relationship. And, yeah, I don't know, you put it really beautifully. And I think one of the reasons I stayed up all night when I first watched this program was I was just like, I'm watching it in this way now. How is my child, Should I have children, gonna watch this?

[Kai Wright]

You know, that's the problem. Listen, I don't have children. I'm never gonna have children. And that part I always think about, like, God, what if I had a kid? I just can't imagine how you would think about the future. On the specific question of climate change, like, in the world we're gonna live in for your child, that would be really overwhelming to me.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Totally, totally. And I think in that way for future generations, I mean, we don't know much about what the future is going to hold, but I don't know if we're going to look at this man and people like him, like, this whole generation of people. You're talking about people like him, Jane Goodall, like, they're prophets, you know,

[Nature Documentary Narrator (David Attenborough clips)]

Sir

[Kai Wright]

David Attenborough, the snack who had to grow.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

So who do you have for me next week?

[Kai Wright]

Okay, well, let's go to the clips. Let's see if you can guess who this is.

[Guest or Secondary Speaker]

When I was 13, we went to New York and I went to a Broadway show with Mahama, and the show was called Bye Bye Birdie. And I looked up and I saw all these kids singing and dancing. I thought, now that looks like fun, too. Wait a minute. Maybe that's what I want to do.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Bye Bye Birdie.

[Kai Wright]

Okay, now there's a lot of people for whom that voice is immediately recognizable.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

And I am ashamed to say I'm not one of them.

[Kai Wright]

You're not one of them. Okay. All right. There were a lot of content clues as well. All right, let's hear the next one.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

I was reading last night through a list of awards which took two and a half pages to get through. What do you do with them all?

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

Where are they?

[Guest or Secondary Speaker]

I sort of put them up on a shelf, and every once in a while I pass by them and think, yeah, that was a couple of really good years,

[Kai Wright]

you know, she was big is what.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Okay. Okay.

[Kai Wright]

Has been big in the past. One more.

[Guest or Secondary Speaker]

I really had to win the audience. I mean, it was, you know, well, Judy Garland's bringing her daughter on, and I think that they were kind of putting up with that. And so I really had to work hard and they appreciated that.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Okay, I'm intrigued.

[Kai Wright]

All right.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Can't wait. Big Lives is a production of BBC Studios and Pushkin Industries. It's hosted by me, Emmanuel Jochi and Kai Wright. Our team over at BBC Studios includes producer Emma Reverell, archive producer Samira Chowdhury, sound design by Melvin Rickaby. Our executive producer is Annie Brown. Our production coordinator is Game Davis Connolly. Our apprentice is Amy woods, and our production manager is Mabel Finnegan Wright. The team over at Pushkin Industries includes executive producer Costanza Gallardo, producer Daphne Chen. Our legal advisor is Jake Flanagan, and our marketing team includes Morgan Ratner and Jordan McMillan.

[Kai Wright]

And now, Superhuman Shack.

[Shaquille O'Neal (Superhuman Shaq)]

I keep telling them not to say that. I'm no superhuman. Believe it or not, I struggle with moderate obstructive sleep apnea, or osa, in adults with obesity. Moderate to severe OSA is a condition where breathing is interrupted during sleep, with loud snoring, choking, gasping for air, and even daytime fatigue. Let's just say it can sound a lot like this. Sound familiar? Learn more@don'tsleeponosa.com this information is provided by

[Kai Wright]

Lilly, a medicine company. There's nowhere I wouldn't go to help someone customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual. Even if it means sitting front row at a comedy show.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Hey, everyone.

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

Check out this guy and his bird.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

What is this, your first date? Oh, no. We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual.

[Kai Wright]

Together.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.

[David Attenborough (archival interview clips)]

Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Anyways, get a [e-mail] or with your local agent. Liberty. Liberty.

[Kai Wright]

Liberty.

[Emmanuel Jochi]

Liberty.

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

Why are we all so obsessed with romance? On the Radio 831 podcast, join us, Sanjanah Bhasker and Tyler McCall as we unpack all the trending tropes. Fuzzy adaptations, booktok drama and celebrity love stories with hot takes and sharp guests. Each episode digs into what these stories reveal about desire, fantasy identity and how we love. Now Listen to the Radio 831 podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.