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“It’s hard work changing a culture,” Nichols
notes. “It was important for the fishermen to have
buy-in” — and for the gringo outsiders to respect If people can be helped to understand the
their dignity.
Nichols’ community efforts to save the sea importance of wild water and the joy it can
turtles weren’t part of his dissertation, but he had
found the work he wanted to do. bring, they are more likely to support efforts
His winding academic path — after his
undergraduate work in biology and Spanish, he’d
picked up an economics master’s at Duke before to mitigate climate change and to work for
doing his Ph.D. — had given him a toolbox of
different disciplines to do boundary-jumping the preservation of lakes, rivers and oceans.
science outside the university system.
“My interest was always in solving problems,”
he says. “I wanted to roll up my sleeves — and In the book, Nichols writes of
my pants — to solve problems. A lot of academics everything he’s learned about the gifts
describe and don’t solve. I always wanted to do of water, gifts that enrich sea turtles and
both.” humans, not to mention the planet at large.
Armed with his doctorate, Nichols became A laudatory Washington Post review, noting
a research associate at the California Academy that the book was “rooted in real research,”
of Sciences, a museum and aquarium that is the declared it a “fascinating study of the
oldest science institute west of the Mississippi. A emotional, behavioral, psychological and
prolific writer, he turns out scholarly and popular physical connections that keep humans so
articles, and through his part-time post he gets enchanted with water.”
his ecological message out to the general public. Climate change is already here, Nichols
“They’ll put my work in exhibitions. I do points out, and his Blue Mind efforts help
writing projects. I do print media, videos. It’s a people understand its effects.
nice relationship.” “Sea level is rising, and the
In the past year, he also became a senior redistribution of water is a reality. The
fellow with the Center for Blue Economy, a planet is warming. It’s not a debate; it’s a
research institute in Monterey dedicated to the reality. There will be more rain in some
health of the planet’s oceans. In between, he’s places and less rain elsewhere.”
helped found numerous ecology nonprofits, and If people can be helped to understand
for a time he was a regular staff scientist at the the importance of wild water and the joy it
Ocean Conservancy. But he’s discovered he does can bring, they are more likely to support
his best work unmoored from a full-time job. efforts to mitigate climate change and to
His current “big thing” is the Blue Mind work for the preservation of lakes, rivers
project, summed up in the tongue-twisting title and oceans.
of his 2014 book, “Blue Mind: The Surprising And that includes the Sea of Cortez,
Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or the home of Nichols’ beloved sea turtles.
Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, Nichols has lately been involved in Billion
More Connected, and Better at What You Do.” Baby Turtles, a fundraising effort to pay
“It came out of the sea turtle stuff,” he local people living near breeding grounds to
explains. “Neuroscientists are studying this: the protect the area.
emotional, psychological, cognitive and spiritual Happily, today the turtles are doing
benefits of water.” a little better. With their population
As an ocean swimmer, diver and surfer, slowly increasing, the species has
Nichols long ago learned the psychological been “downlisted” from endangered to
benefits of splashing into ocean waves, dipping threatened.
into quarry water and dancing in the first “That’s good!” Nichols says. Clearly,
monsoon rains of a Tucson summer. though, there’s still work to be done.

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