ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Jane Poynter - Biospherian
After weathering two years in Biosphere 2, Jane Poynter is trying to create technologies that allow us to live in hostile environments -- like outer space.

Why you should listen

Jane Poynter is one of only eight people to live in Biosphere 2 for two years. In 1991, she and seven others were locked in a three-acre, hermetically-sealed environment in the Arizona desert. Nothing was allowed in or out, and everything had to be recycled. Poynter, and the rest of the team, endured dangerously low oxygen levels and constant hunger, but they survived -- something many scientists said was impossible. 

After leaving Biosphere 2, Poynter went on to found Paragon Space Development Corporation, along with her former fellow biospherian and now husband, Taber MacCallum. Paragon develops technologies that might allow humans to live in extreme environments such as outer space and underwater. As president of Paragon, Poynter has had experiments flown on the International Space Station, Russian Mir Space Station and US Space Shuttle, as well as working on underwater technologies with the US Navy. 

However, Poynter has not given up on her homeland -- Biosphere 1. She continues to consult on and write about sustainable development and new green technologies. In concert with the World Bank, she has worked on projects to mitigate climate change and to grow crops in typically arid and hostile regions of Africa and Central America. Through talks and appearances, she builds awareness of the fragile state of the environment. After all, she knows what it's like to watch your biosphere begin to break down.

The New York Times looks back on the Biosphere 2 story >>

More profile about the speaker
Jane Poynter | Speaker | TED.com
TEDxUSC

Jane Poynter: Life in Biosphere 2

Jane Poynter: A vida na Biosfera 2

Filmed:
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Jane Poynter conta sua história de ter vivido 2 anos e vinte minutos na Biosfera 2 – uma experiência que a estimulou a pesquisar como podemos manter a vida nos ambientes mais hostis. Esta é a primeira TED Talk transmitida de um evento organizado independentemente, uma TEDx, que ocorreu na Universidade do Sul da Califórnia – USC.
- Biospherian
After weathering two years in Biosphere 2, Jane Poynter is trying to create technologies that allow us to live in hostile environments -- like outer space. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:12
I have had the distinct pleasure
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Eu tive o prazer distinto
00:15
of living inside two biospheres.
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de viver em 2 biosferas.
00:18
Of course we all here in this room live in Biosphere 1.
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É claro que todos nós aqui nesta sala vivemos na Biosfera 1.
00:22
I've also lived in Biosphere 2.
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Eu também vivi na Biosfera 2.
00:26
And the wonderful thing about that is that I get to compare biospheres.
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E a melhor parte disso é que eu posso comparar as biosferas.
00:30
And hopefully from that I get to learn something.
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E estou esperançosa que vou aprender algo com isso.
00:33
So what did I learn? Well,
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Então o que aprendi? Bem,
00:35
here I am inside Biosphere 2, making a pizza.
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aqui estou dentro da Biosfera 2, fazendo pizza.
00:38
So I am harvesting the wheat, in order to make the dough.
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Estou colhendo trigo, para fazer a massa.
00:41
And then of course I have to milk the goats
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E é claro que tive de ordenhar as cabras
00:43
and feed the goats in order to make the cheese.
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e as alimentar para fazer o queijo.
00:46
It took me four months in Biosphere 2 to make a pizza.
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Demorou 4 meses para eu fazer uma pizza na Biosfera 2.
00:48
Here in Biosphere 1, well it takes me about two minutes,
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Aqui na Biosfera 1, eu demoro uns 2 minutos.
00:51
because I pick up the phone and I call and say,
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Porque pego o telefone e digo,
00:53
"Hey, can you deliver the pizza?"
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"Ei, você pode entregar pizza?"
00:55
So Biosphere 2
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A Biosfera 2
00:58
was essentially a three-acre,
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é em essência um
01:00
entirely sealed, miniature world
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mundo em miniatura de 3 acres, totalmente isolado
01:02
that I lived in for two years and 20 minutes.
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onde vivi por dois anos e 20 minutos.
01:05
(Laughter)
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(risos)
01:08
Over the top it was sealed with steel and glass,
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A parte de cima é selada com aço e vidro.
01:10
underneath it was sealed with a pan of steel --
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Abaixo é selado com aço.
01:13
essentially entirely sealed.
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Inteiramente isolado.
01:15
So we had our own miniature rainforest,
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Então tínhamos nossa floresta em miniatura,
01:17
a private beach with a coral reef.
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uma praia particular com um recife de corais.
01:19
We had a savanna, a marsh, a desert.
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Tínhamos uma área gramada, pântano, deserto.
01:22
We had our own half-acre farm that we had to grow everything.
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Tínhamos nosso próprio meio acre que tínhamos de plantar de tudo.
01:25
And of course we had our human habitat, where we lived.
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E claro que tínhamos nosso habitat humano, onde vivíamos.
01:28
Back in the mid-'80s when we were designing Biosphere 2,
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Nos anos 80 quando estávamos planejando a Biosfera 2
01:31
we had to ask ourselves some pretty basic questions.
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Tínhamos de perguntar a nós mesmos coisas bem básicas.
01:33
I mean, what is a biosphere?
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Quero dizer, o que é uma biosfera?
01:35
Back then, yes, I guess we all know now
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Acho que nós todos sabemos
01:37
that it is essentially the sphere of life around the Earth, right?
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que é essencialmente uma esfera de vida em torno da Terra, certo?
01:40
Well, you have to get a little more specific than that if you're going to build one.
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Bem, você deve ser mais específico que isso caso for construir uma.
01:43
And so we decided that what it really is
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E então decidimos que na realidade é
01:46
is that it is entirely materially closed --
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que é materialmente fechada,
01:49
that is, nothing goes in or out at all, no material --
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isto é, nada sai nem entra, nenhum material,
01:52
and energetically open,
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mas é energeticamente aberta.
01:54
which is essentially what planet Earth is.
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Que é basicamente o que o planeta Terra é.
01:56
This is a chamber that was 1/400th the size of Biosphere 2
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Isto é uma câmara 400 vezes menor que a Biosfera 2
01:59
that we called our Test Module.
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que era nosso módulo de testes.
02:01
And the very first day that this fellow, John Allen,
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E logo no primeiro dia, John Allen,
02:03
walked in, to spend a couple of days in there
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entrou para passar alguns dias ali,
02:05
with all the plants and animals and bacteria that we'd put in there
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com todas as plantas e animais e bactérias que colocamos lá
02:07
to hopefully keep him alive,
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esperando mantê-lo vivo.
02:09
the doctors were incredibly concerned
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Os médicos estavam incrivelmente preocupados
02:11
that he was going to succumb to some dreadful toxin,
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que ele fosse sucumbir a alguma toxina letal,
02:13
or that his lungs were going to get choked with bacteria or something, fungus.
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ou que seus pulmões iriam ficar infestados de bactérias ou fungos.
02:17
But of course none of that happened.
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Mas claro que nada disso ocorreu.
02:20
And over the ensuing few years,
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E nos próximos poucos anos,
02:22
there were great sagas about designing Biosphere 2.
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houve grandes sagas no planejamento da Biosfera 2.
02:24
But by 1991
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Mas em 1991
02:26
we finally had this thing built.
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nós finalmente tínhamos ela construída.
02:28
And it was time for us to go in
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E era a hora de nós entrarmos
02:30
and give it a go.
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e fazer o teste.
02:32
We needed to know,
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Tínhamos que saber,
02:34
is life this malleable?
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será que a vida é tão maleável?
02:36
Can you take this biosphere,
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Podemos pegar esta biosfera,
02:38
that has evolved on a planetary scale,
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que evoluiu em escala planetária,
02:40
and jam it into a little bottle,
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colocar dentro duma garrafa,
02:42
and will it survive?
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e será que vai sobreviver?
02:44
Big questions.
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Grandes perguntas.
02:46
And we wanted to know this both for being able to go somewhere else
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E queríamos saber isso tanto para podermos ir a algum outro lugar
02:49
in the universe -- if we were going to go to Mars, for instance,
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no universo, se formos para Marte por exemplo,
02:52
would we take a biosphere with us, to live in it?
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poderíamos levar uma biosfera para viver dentro?
02:54
We also wanted to know so we can understand more about
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Também queríamos saber mais sobre
02:56
the Earth that we all live in.
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a Terra em que todos vivemos.
02:58
Well, in 1991 it was finally time for us to go in
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Bem, em 1991 era finalmente hora de entrarmos
03:01
and try out this baby.
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e testar esta coisa
03:03
Let's take it on a maiden voyage.
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Vamos fazer uma viagem inaugural.
03:05
Will it work? Or will something happen
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Será que vai funcionar? Ou algo irá acontecer
03:07
that we can't understand and we can't fix,
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que não podemos entender e consertar?
03:11
thereby negating the concept of man-made biospheres?
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Assim negando o conceito de biosferas feitas pelo homem.
03:15
So eight of us went in: four men and four women.
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Então 8 pessoas entraram. Quatro homens e 4 mulheres.
03:18
More on that later.
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Mais sobre isso depois.
03:20
(Laughter)
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(risos)
03:22
And this is the world that we lived in.
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E este é o mundo em que a gente viveu.
03:25
So, on the top, we had
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Então em cima tínhamos
03:27
these beautiful rainforests and an ocean,
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estas belas florestas e um oceano.
03:29
and underneath we had all this technosphere, we called it,
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E abaixo tínhamos esta tecnosfera, como a chamávamos.
03:33
which is where all the pumps and the valves
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Onde estava todas as bombas e válvulas
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and the water tanks and the air handlers, and all of that.
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e tanques de água e tubos de ar e essas coisas.
03:38
One of the Biospherians called it "garden of Eden
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Um dos biosferistas chamava isso de "Jardim do Éden
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on top of an aircraft carrier."
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no topo de um porta-aviões."
03:42
And then also we had the human habitat of course,
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E é claro que também tínhamos nosso habitat humano,
03:44
with the laboratories, and all of that.
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com os laboratórios e coisas do tipo.
03:46
This is the agriculture.
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Esta é a agricultura.
03:48
It was essentially an organic farm.
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Era basicamente uma fazenda orgânica.
03:51
The day I walked into Biosphere 2,
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No dia em que entrei na Biosfera 2,
03:53
I was, for the first time,
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Eu estava, pela primeira vez,
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breathing a completely different atmosphere
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respirando uma atmosfera completamente diferente
03:58
than everybody else in the world,
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de todos no mundo
04:00
except seven other people.
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exceto sete outras pessoas.
04:02
At that moment I became part of that biosphere.
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E naquele momento me tornei parte daquela biosfera.
04:06
And I don't mean that in an abstract sense;
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E não digo num sentido abstrato.
04:09
I mean it rather literally.
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é no sentido literal.
04:11
When I breathed out, my CO2
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Quando eu exalava ar, meu CO2
04:14
fed the sweet potatoes that I was growing.
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alimentava as batatas doces que eu estava cultivando.
04:18
And we ate an awful lot of the sweet potatoes.
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E nós comemos um monte horrível de batatas doces.
04:21
(Laughter)
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(risos)
04:23
And those sweet potatoes
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E essas batatas doces
04:25
became part of me.
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se tornaram parte de mim.
04:27
In fact, we ate so many sweet potatoes
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Na verdade, comemos tantas batatas doces,
04:29
I became orange with sweet potato.
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que fiquei alaranjada de batata doce.
04:31
I literally was eating the same carbon over and over again.
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Eu estava literalmente comendo o mesmo carbono várias e várias vezes.
04:35
I was eating myself in some strange sort of bizarre way.
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Estava comendo eu mesma de uma maneira estranha e bizarra.
04:39
When it came to our atmosphere, however,
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Quanto à nossa atmosfera, entretanto,
04:41
it wasn't that much of a joke over the long term,
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não foi tão divertido no longo prazo.
04:45
because it turned out that we were losing oxygen, quite a lot of oxygen.
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Pois começamos a perder oxigênio.
04:49
And we knew that we were losing CO2.
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E sabíamos que estávamos perdendo CO2.
04:51
And so we were working to sequester carbon.
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E então trabalhamos para sequestrar carbono.
04:54
Good lord -- we know that term now.
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Meu Deus, agora conhecemos este termo.
04:56
We were growing plants like crazy.
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Estávamos cultivando plantas feito loucos.
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We were taking their biomass, storing them in the basement,
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Pegávamos suas biomassas, guardávamos elas no depósito,
05:00
growing plants, going around, around, around,
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cultivamos plantas, de novo e de novo e de novo,
05:02
trying to take all of that carbon out of the atmosphere.
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tentando tirar todo aquele carbono da atmosfera.
05:04
We were trying to stop carbon from going into the atmosphere.
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Estávamos tentando impedir aquele carbono de ir pra atmosfera.
05:07
We stopped irrigating our soil, as much as we could.
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Nós paramos de irrigar nosso solo, o quanto podíamos.
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We stopped tilling, so that we could prevent greenhouse gasses from going into the air.
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Paramos de arar o solo para não emitir gases do efeito estufa.
05:13
But our oxygen was going down faster
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Mas o oxigênio estava diminuindo mais rápido
05:15
than our CO2 was going up, which was quite unexpected,
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do que subia nosso CO2, o que foi bem inesperado.
05:18
because we had seen them going in tandem in the test module.
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Porque tínhamos visto no módulo de teste que iam juntos.
05:21
And it was like playing atomic hide-and-seek.
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E era como um esconde-esconde atômico
05:24
We had lost seven tons of oxygen.
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Nós perdemos sete toneladas de oxigênio.
05:26
And we had no clue where it was.
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E não tínhamos nenhuma pista de onde ele estava.
05:28
And I tell you, when you lose a lot of oxygen --
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E digo a vocês, quando você perde muito oxigênio --
05:31
and our oxygen went down quite far;
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e nosso oxigênio caiu bastante,
05:33
it went from 21 percent down to 14.2 percent --
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ele passou de 21% pra 14.2% --
05:36
my goodness, do you feel dreadful.
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Meu Deus, você fica com muito medo.
05:39
I mean we were dragging ourselves around the Biosphere.
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Nós estávamos nos arrastando pela biosfera.
05:42
And we had sleep apnea at night.
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E tínhamos apnéia do sono de noite.
05:44
So you'd wake up gasping with breath,
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Quando você acorda engasgado sem ar.
05:47
because your blood chemistry has changed.
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Porque a química do seu sangue mudou.
05:49
And that you literally do that. You stop breathing and then you -- (Gasps) --
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E você realmente faz isso. Para de respirar e então você – (Soluço) --
05:52
take a breath and it wakes you up. And it's very irritating.
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respira novamente e isso te acorda. É muito irritante.
05:54
And everybody outside thought we were dying.
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E todos do lado de fora pensavam que estávamos morrendo.
05:56
I mean, the media was making it sound like were were dying.
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Quero dizer, a mídia fez parecer que estávamos morrendo.
05:58
And I had to call up my mother every other day saying, "No, Mum, it's fine, fine.
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E eu tive de ligar para minha mãe várias vezes pra dizer "Não mãe, está tudo bem.
06:01
We're not dead. We're fine. We're fine."
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Não estamos mortos. Estamos bem."
06:03
And the doctor was, in fact, checking us
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E o médico estava de fato nos examinando
06:05
to make sure we were, in fact, fine.
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para ter certeza de que estávamos bem.
06:07
But in fact he was the person who was most susceptible to the oxygen.
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Mas na verdade era ele que estava mais suscetível ao oxigênio.
06:11
And one day he couldn't add up a line of figures.
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E um dia ele não conseguiu alinhar umas figuras.
06:13
And it was time for us to put oxygen in.
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E era então hora de nós colocarmos oxigênio.
06:17
And you might think, well,
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E você pode pensar, bem,
06:19
"Boy, your life support system
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"Seu sistema de suporte de vida
06:21
was failing you. Wasn't that dreadful?"
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estava falhando. Não era assustador?"
06:23
Yes. In a sense it was terrifying.
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Sim, de uma certa forma era aterrorizante.
06:27
Except that I knew I could walk out the airlock door
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Exceto que eu sabia que eu poderia sair pela porta
06:30
at any time, if it really got bad,
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a qualquer momento, se ficasse muito ruim.
06:32
though who was going to say, "I can't take it anymore!"?
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Mas quem iria dizer "Não aguento mais?"
06:35
Not me, that was for sure.
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Eu não, isso é certeza.
06:37
But on the other hand, it was the scientific gold of the project,
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Mas por outro lado isso era o objetivo científico do projeto.
06:41
because we could really crank this baby up,
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Porque realmente podíamos decifrar isso,
06:43
as a scientific tool,
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como uma ferramenta científica,
06:45
and see if we could, in fact, find
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e ver se podíamos, de fato, encontrar
06:47
where those seven tons of oxygen had gone.
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onde as sete toneladas de oxigênio foram parar.
06:50
And we did indeed find it.
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E de fato as encontramos.
06:52
And we found it in the concrete.
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No concreto.
06:54
Essentially it had done something very simple.
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Aconteceu algo muito simples.
06:56
We had put too much carbon in the soil in the form of compost.
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Colocamos muito carbono no solo como composto.
06:59
It broke down; it took oxygen out of the air;
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Ele se quebrou e retirou oxigênio do ar.
07:01
it put CO2 into the air; and it went into the concrete.
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Colocou CO2 no ar e foi absorvido pelo concreto.
07:04
Pretty straightforward really.
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Realmente bem direto.
07:06
So at the end of the two years
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Então ao final de dois anos
07:08
when we came out, we were elated,
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quando saímos, estávamos extasiados.
07:10
because, in fact, although you might say
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Porque, na verdade, embora possam dizer
07:13
we had discovered something that was quite "uhh,"
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que descobrimos algo meio ruim,
07:16
when your oxygen is going down,
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quando seu oxigênio está diminuindo,
07:18
stopped working, essentially, in your life support system,
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parou de funcionar nosso sistema de suporte de vida,
07:21
that's a very bad failure.
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e isso é uma falha muito grave.
07:23
Except that we knew what it was. And we knew how to fix it.
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Exceto que sabíamos o que era. E sabíamos como consertar.
07:26
And nothing else emerged
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E mais nada apareceu
07:28
that really was as serious as that.
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que fosse tão sério quanto isso.
07:30
And we proved the concept, more or less.
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E provamos o conceito, mais ou menos.
07:32
People, on the other hand, was a different subject.
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As pessoas, por outro lado, era um tópico diferente.
07:35
We were -- yeah I don't know that we were fixable.
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Nós estávamos -- não sabia que éramos consertáveis.
07:38
We all went quite nuts, I will say.
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Nós todos ficamos meio malucos, eu diria.
07:40
And the day I came out of Biosphere 2,
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E chegou o dia que saí da Biosfera 2
07:42
I was thrilled I was going to see all my family and my friends.
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Estava emocionada que iria ver minha família e meus amigos.
07:46
For two years I'd been seeing people through the glass.
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Passei dois anos vendo as pessoas pelo vidro.
07:49
And everybody ran up to me.
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e todos correram para mim.
07:51
And I recoiled. They stank!
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E eu recuei. Elas fediam!
07:55
People stink!
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As pessoas fedem!
07:57
We stink of hairspray and underarm deodorant,
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Fedem a spray de cabelo e desodorante,
08:00
and all kinds of stuff.
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e todos os tipos de coisas.
08:02
Now we had stuff inside Biosphere to keep ourselves clean,
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Tínhamos coisas na Biosfera pra nos mantermos limpos.
08:05
but nothing with perfume.
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Mas nada com perfume.
08:07
And boy do we stink out here.
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E como fedemos aqui fora.
08:10
Not only that,
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E não só isso,
08:12
but I lost touch of where my food came from.
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mas perdi a noção de onde vem minha comida.
08:16
I had been growing all my own food.
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Eu plantava toda minha comida.
08:19
I had no idea what was in my food, where it came from.
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Eu não tinha mais noção do que tinha na minha comida, de onde vinha.
08:22
I didn't even recognize half the names in most of the food that I was eating.
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Eu nem reconhecia metade dos nomes dos alimentos que eu comia.
08:25
In fact, I would stand for hours in the aisles of shops,
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Na verdade, eu ficava horas no mercado,
08:28
reading all the names on all of the things.
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lendo os nomes de todas as coisas.
08:30
People must have thought I was nuts.
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As pessoas devem ter pensado que eu era louca.
08:32
It was really quite astonishing.
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Foi realmente impressionante.
08:38
And I slowly lost track
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E eu lentamente perdi a noção.
08:41
of where I was in this big biosphere, in this big biosphere that we all live in.
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de onde eu estava nessa grande biosfera, onde todos vivemos.
08:45
In Biosphere 2 I totally understood
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Na Biosfera 2 eu entendia que eu
08:48
that I had a huge impact on my biosphere, everyday,
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tinha um grande impacto na minha biosfera, todo dia,
08:52
and it had an impact on me,
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e ela tinha impacto em mim,
08:54
very viscerally, very literally.
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muito visceralmente, literalmente.
08:56
So I went about my business:
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Então segui com trabalho.
08:58
Paragon Space Development Corporation,
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Paragon Space Development Corporation,
09:00
a little firm I started with people while I was in the Biosphere,
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uma pequena firma que iniciei enquanto estava na Biosfera,
09:02
because I had nothing else to do.
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porque eu não tinha mais nada para fazer.
09:04
And one of the things we did was
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E uma das coisas que fizemos foi
09:06
try to figure out: how small can you make these biospheres,
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tentar descobrir quão pequenas podem ser estas biosferas.
09:08
and what can you do with them?
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E o que você pode fazer com elas?
09:10
And so we sent one onto the Mir Space Station.
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E então enviamos uma para a Estação Espacial Muir.
09:13
We had one on the shuttle and one on the International Space Station,
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Tínhamos uma na nave e outra na Estação Espacial Internacional,
09:16
for 16 months, where we managed to produce
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por 16 meses. Conseguimos produzir
09:18
the first organisms to go through
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os primeiros organismos a
09:20
complete multiple life cycles in space --
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completar múltiplos ciclos de vida no espaço.
09:22
really pushing the envelope
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Realmente um avanço
09:24
of understanding how malleable
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no entendimento de quão maleável
09:26
our life systems are.
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nossos sistemas de vida são.
09:29
And I'm also proud to announce
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E estou orgulhosa de anunciar,
09:31
that you're getting a sneak preview -- on Friday we're going to announce
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que vocês vão ter uma prévia -- vamos anunciar na sexta feira
09:34
that we're actually forming a team
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que estamos formando uma equipe
09:36
to develop a system to grow plants on the Moon,
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para desenvolver um sistema para cultivar plantas na Lua.
09:39
which is going to be pretty fun.
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o que será bem divertido.
09:41
And the legacy of that is a system that we were designing:
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E o legado disto é que estamos desenvolvendo um sistema.
09:44
an entirely sealed system to grow plants to grow on Mars.
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totalmente isolado para cultivar plantas em Marte.
09:48
And part of that is that we had to model
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E como parte disso tivemos que modelar
09:50
very rapid circulation of CO2
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Uma circulação muito rápida de CO2,
09:54
and oxygen and water through this plant system.
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oxigênio e água através desse sistema de plantas.
09:57
As a result of that modeling
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E como resultado dessa modelagem
09:59
I ended up in all places,
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Eu acabei indo para vários lugares,
10:01
in Eritrea, in the Horn of Africa.
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na Eritrea, no Chifre da África.
10:04
Eritrea, formerly part of Ethiopia,
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Eritrea, antes parte da Etiópia,
10:07
is one of those places that is astonishingly beautiful,
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é um desses lugares incrivelmente bonitos,
10:12
incredibly stark, and I have no understanding
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incrivelmente severo, e não entendo como
10:16
of how people eke out a living there.
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as pessoas sobrevivem ali.
10:18
It is so dry.
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É tão seco.
10:20
This is what I saw.
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Isto é o que eu vi.
10:22
But this is also what I saw.
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Mas também vi isto.
10:24
I saw a company that had
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Vi uma companhia que tinha
10:27
taken seawater
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pego água do mar,
10:30
and sand, and they were growing
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e areia, e eles estavam cultivando
10:33
a kind of crop that will grow on pure salt water without having to treat it.
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um tipo de planta que cresce em água salgada sem ter de tratá-la.
10:37
And it will produce a food crop.
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e ela produz alimento.
10:39
In this case it was oilseed.
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Neste caso eram sementes oleosas.
10:41
It was astonishing. They were also producing mangroves
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Fiquei deslumbrada. Eles também estavam produzindo
10:44
in a plantation.
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manguezais em uma plantação.
10:46
And the mangroves were providing wood
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E os manguezais forneciam madeira
10:48
and honey and leaves for the animals,
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e mel, e folhas aos animais,
10:50
so that they could produce milk and whatnot,
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então podiam produzir leite e coisas assim,
10:52
like we had in the Biosphere.
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como tínhamos na Biosfera.
10:54
And all of it was coming from this: shrimp farms.
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E tudo vindo disto, fazendas de camarão.
10:58
Shrimp farms are a scourge on the earth,
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Fazendas de camarão são uma praga na terra,
11:00
frankly, from an environmental point of view.
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do ponto de vista ambiental.
11:02
They pour huge amounts of pollutants into the ocean.
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Eles jogam quantidades absurdas de poluentes nos oceanos.
11:05
They also pollute their next-door neighbors.
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Também poluem os vizinhos próximos. Estão todos cagando uns nos outros.
11:08
So they're all shitting each other's ponds, quite literally.
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Literalmente.
11:11
And what this project was doing
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E o que este projeto estava fazendo,
11:14
was taking the effluent of these,
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era pegar esses poluentes,
11:16
and turning them into all of this food.
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e transformar eles em alimento.
11:18
They were literally turning pollution into abundance for a desert people.
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Eles estavam basicamente transformando poluição em fartura para as pessoas do deserto.
11:23
They had created an industrial ecosystem, of a sense.
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Criaram um ecossistema industrial, de certa maneira.
11:27
I was there because I was actually modeling the mangrove portion
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Eu estava lá porque tentava modelar a parte dos manguezais
11:31
for a carbon credit program, under the U.N.
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para um programa de crédito, sob o sistema
11:33
Kyoto Protocol system.
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do Protocolo de Kyoto da ONU.
11:35
And as I was modeling this mangrove swamp,
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E enquanto eu modelava este manguezal,
11:37
I was thinking to myself, "How do you put a box around this?"
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Eu pensava comigo mesma "Como encaixotar isso?"
11:40
When I'm modeling a plant in a box, literally,
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Quando estou modelando uma planta numa caixa,
11:43
I know where to draw the boundary.
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eu sei onde estão as bordas, os limites.
11:45
In a mangrove forest like this I have no idea.
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Numa floresta de mangue como essa eu não tenho a menor idéia.
11:48
Well, of course you have to draw the boundary around the whole of the Earth.
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Claro, você tem que desenhar a borda ao redor de todo o planeta.
11:51
And understand its interactions with the entire Earth.
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E entender suas interações com a Terra toda.
11:54
And put your project in that context.
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E colocar seu projeto neste contexto.
11:59
Around the world today we're seeing an incredible transformation,
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Estamos vendo transformações incríveis ao redor do planeta.
12:04
from what I would call a biocidal species,
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Do que eu chamo de uma espécie biocida,
12:08
one that -- whether we intentionally or unintentionally --
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que intencionalmente ou não intencionalmente
12:11
have designed our systems to kill life, a lot of the time.
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planejou sistemas para matar a vida, a maioria das vezes.
12:15
This is in fact, this beautiful photograph,
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Na verdade, esta linda foto,
12:19
is in fact over the Amazon.
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é acima da Amazônia.
12:21
And here the light green are areas of massive deforestation.
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E aqui as áreas claras são áreas de grande desmatamento.
12:26
And those beautiful wispy clouds
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E aquelas nuvens finas
12:28
are, in fact, fires, human-made fires.
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Na verdade são queimadas.
12:32
We're in the process of transforming from this,
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Estamos no processo de transformar isto,
12:35
to what I would call a biophilic society,
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no que chamo de sociedade biofílica,
12:39
one where we learn to nurture society.
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onde aprenderemos a nutrir a sociedade.
12:42
Now it may not seem like it, but we are.
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Pode não parecer, mas estamos.
12:45
It is happening all across the world,
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Está acontecendo em todo o planeta,
12:48
in every kind of walk of life,
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em todos os tipos de lugares,
12:50
and every kind of career
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e de carreiras
12:52
and industry that you can think of.
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e de indústrias que você puder pensar.
12:56
And I think often times people get lost in that.
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E acho que às vezes as pessoas ficam perdidas com isso.
12:59
They go, "But how can I possibly find my way in that?
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Elas pensam "Como posso encontrar minha parte disto?"
13:02
It's such a huge subject."
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É algo tão gigantesco.
13:04
And I would say that the small stuff counts. It really does.
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E eu digo que as coisas pequenas contam. Realmente contam.
13:08
This is the story of a rake in my backyard.
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Esta é a história de um rastelo no meu quintal.
13:13
This was my backyard,
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Este era o meu quintal,
13:15
very early on, when I bought my property.
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no começo, quando comprei o lugar.
13:17
And in Arizona, of course, everybody puts gravel down.
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E no Arizona, claro, todos colocam pedras e areias no chão.
13:20
And they like to keep everything beautifully raked. And they keep all the leaves away.
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E gostam de deixar tudo maravilhosamente arrumado. Retiram todas as folhas.
13:24
And on Sunday morning the neighbors leaf blower comes out,
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e nas manhãs de domingo, os vizinhos saem com seus removedores de folhas,
13:27
and I want to throttle them.
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e eu quero enforcá-los.
13:29
It's a certain type of aesthetic.
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É um certo tipo de estética.
13:32
We're very uncomfortable with untidiness.
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Somos muito desconfortáveis com a desordem.
13:35
And I threw away my rake.
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Mas eu joguei meu rastelo fora.
13:39
And I let all of the leaves fall from the trees that I have on my property.
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E deixei todas as folhas cair das árvores que tinha ali.
13:43
And over time, essentially what have I been doing?
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E com o tempo, o que eu estava fazendo, em essência?
13:45
I've been building topsoil.
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Eu estava criando uma camada superior de terra.
13:47
And so now all the birds come in. And I have hawks.
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E agora todos os pássaros vem. E tenho águias.
13:49
And I have an oasis.
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e um oasis.
13:53
This is what happens every spring. For six weeks,
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Isto é o que ocorre toda primavera. Por seis semanas,
13:57
six to eight weeks, I have this flush of green oasis.
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seis a oito semanas, eu tenho este oasis verde.
14:00
This is actually in a riparian area.
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Esta é na verdade uma zona ribeirinha.
14:02
And all of Tucson could be like this
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E toda Tucson poderia ser assim
14:04
if everybody would just revolt and throw away the rake.
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se todos se revoltassem e jogassem fora o rastelo.
14:07
The small stuff counts.
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As coisas pequenas contam.
14:11
The Industrial Revolution -- and Prometheus --
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A revolução industrial e Prometeus,
14:14
has given us this, the ability to light up the world.
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nos deram isso, a habilidade de iluminar o mundo
14:19
It has also given us this,
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E também nos deram isso,
14:21
the ability to look at the world from the outside.
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a habilidade de olhar o mundo por fora.
14:25
Now we may not all have
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Mas nem todos têm
14:27
another biosphere that we can run to,
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outra biosfera pra ir,
14:29
and compare it to this biosphere.
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e comparar com esta biosfera.
14:32
But we can look at the world,
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Mas podemos olhar o mundo,
14:34
and try to understand where we are in its context,
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e tentar entender onde estamos neste contexto,
14:39
and how we choose to interact with it.
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e como escolhemos interagir com ele.
14:43
And if you lose where you are in your biosphere,
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E se você perder seu lugar nesta biosfera,
14:46
or are perhaps having a difficulty connecting
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ou talvez estiver tendo dificuldades de se conectar
14:48
with where you are in the biosphere,
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com o seu lugar nesta biosfera,
14:50
I would say to you,
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Eu diria a você,
14:53
take a deep breath.
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para respirar fundo.
14:56
The yogis had it right.
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Os yogues tinham razão.
14:58
Breath does, in fact, connect us all
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Respirar, de fato, conecta todos nós
15:01
in a very literal way.
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literalmente.
15:03
Take a breath now.
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Respire fundo agora.
15:05
And as you breathe, think
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E enquanto respira, pense
15:07
about what is in your breath.
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sobre o que está na sua respiração.
15:11
There perhaps is the CO2 from the person sitting next-door to you.
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Talvez tenha CO2 da pessoa ao lado.
15:16
Maybe there is a little bit of oxygen
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Talvez um pouco de oxigênio
15:18
from some algae on the beach not far from here.
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de alguma alga na praia não muito distante.
15:23
It also connects us in time.
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E também nos conecta no tempo.
15:26
There may be some carbon in your breath
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Deve haver algum carbono na sua respiração
15:30
from the dinosaurs.
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que veio dos dinossauros.
15:33
There could also be carbon that you are exhaling now
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Também pode haver carbono que você está exalando agora,
15:38
that will be in the breath
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que estará na respiração dos seus
15:42
of your great-great-great-grandchildren.
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tataranetos.
15:45
Thank you. (Applause)
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Obrigado.
Translated by Eduardo Schenberg
Reviewed by Fernando Marinheiro

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Jane Poynter - Biospherian
After weathering two years in Biosphere 2, Jane Poynter is trying to create technologies that allow us to live in hostile environments -- like outer space.

Why you should listen

Jane Poynter is one of only eight people to live in Biosphere 2 for two years. In 1991, she and seven others were locked in a three-acre, hermetically-sealed environment in the Arizona desert. Nothing was allowed in or out, and everything had to be recycled. Poynter, and the rest of the team, endured dangerously low oxygen levels and constant hunger, but they survived -- something many scientists said was impossible. 

After leaving Biosphere 2, Poynter went on to found Paragon Space Development Corporation, along with her former fellow biospherian and now husband, Taber MacCallum. Paragon develops technologies that might allow humans to live in extreme environments such as outer space and underwater. As president of Paragon, Poynter has had experiments flown on the International Space Station, Russian Mir Space Station and US Space Shuttle, as well as working on underwater technologies with the US Navy. 

However, Poynter has not given up on her homeland -- Biosphere 1. She continues to consult on and write about sustainable development and new green technologies. In concert with the World Bank, she has worked on projects to mitigate climate change and to grow crops in typically arid and hostile regions of Africa and Central America. Through talks and appearances, she builds awareness of the fragile state of the environment. After all, she knows what it's like to watch your biosphere begin to break down.

The New York Times looks back on the Biosphere 2 story >>

More profile about the speaker
Jane Poynter | Speaker | TED.com