The global ocean covers 71% of our planet’s surface.¹

From space, our planet is predominantly one colour. It's not green, not brown: it's blue.

When people talk about ‘Earth’ they usually refer to it from our classically human-centric perspective: that ‘Earth’ means ‘land’. But consider that land is simply a collection of islands placed in a single planet-wide ocean, and those 'islands' make up only 29% of its surface. Perhaps we should consider renaming it?

Global ocean coverage (blue) versus global landmass coverage (green).

“Living things still retain in their ionic make-up certain characteristics of the sea, indeed some authors have interpreted the blood plasma of vertebrates as a relic of the Palaeozoic Era [spanning from roughly 542 to 251 million years ago].” says John Zachary Young in conversation with Alana Mitchell in 'Sea Sick'. Mitchell concludes his thoughts... “the sea is the mother of life... we carry her within us. We are connected in the most fundamental possible way with the global ocean that gave us life. This is poetic, it it is also bilogically significant. It means that the chemistry of the ocean over time has helped to determine what forms of life could come into being. The ocean, as Tim Flannery explained, holds not just the origin but also the fate of life.” ²

1 – NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), noaa.gov
2 – ‘Sea Sick’, Alanna Mitchell (2008)