Dax Dasilva: Echoes from Eden
Species Unite
elizabeth novogratz
5.0 • 911 Ratings
🗓️ 28 January 2026
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
"I really think it's a story is about the heroes, the conservation heroes. It's each one of their stories and then it's about my personal growth story of being absolutely useless in the jungle and how I got decent by the end of it." – Dax Dasilva
There are moments when you look at the world — at forests collapsing, oceans warming, species disappearing — and you feel a kind of disbelief that we've allowed this to become normal. Because what's happening to the living world isn't abstract.
It's ancient ecosystems being stripped bare.
It's entire islands scarred by erosion.
It's extinction unfolding in real time — while most of us go about our lives as if the natural world will somehow survive without us changing anything.
This conversation not about doom. It's about what happens when someone decides: Not on my watch. It's with Dax Dasilva — founder of Lightspeed — who, after seventeen years as CEO, stepped back for two years and poured $40 million into frontline conservation projects around the world. Dax returned to Lightspeed in 2024.
He went where most people will never go — deep into the Amazon, into Haiti and Madagascar where deforestation has pushed ecosystems to the brink… onto beaches where leatherback turtles, older than the dinosaurs, are still fighting to survive.
His new book is called Echoes from Eden, a tribute to the people doing everything they can to save the planet - the local conservation heroes quietly holding the line for all of us.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Species. |
| 0:01.0 | Species. |
| 0:02.0 | I really think it's a story is about the heroes, the conservation heroes. |
| 0:17.0 | It's each one of their stories. |
| 0:19.0 | And then it's about my personal growth story of being absolutely useless in the jungle |
| 0:23.5 | and how I got decent by the end of it. |
| 0:31.6 | Hi, I'm Elizabeth Novogratz. This is Species Unite. |
| 0:41.2 | Yeah. Hi, I'm Elizabeth Novagrats. This is Species Unite. There are moments when you look at the world at forest collapsing, oceans warming, species |
| 0:47.0 | disappearing, and you feel kind of a disbelief that we've allowed this to become normal. |
| 0:52.5 | Because what's happening to the living world isn't abstract. |
| 0:56.0 | It's ancient ecosystems being stripped bare. Its entire island scarred by erosion. It's extinction |
| 1:02.4 | unfolding in real time. Well, most of us go about our lives as if the natural world will |
| 1:08.1 | somehow survive without us changing much. It might sound like it's going |
| 1:13.5 | to be, but this conversation is not about doom. It's about what happens when someone decides |
| 1:19.3 | not on my watch. It's with Dax De Silva, founder of Lightspeed, who, after 17 years as CEO, |
| 1:26.0 | stepped back and poured $40 million into frontline conservation projects |
| 1:29.8 | around the world. He went where most people don't. Deep into the Amazon, into Haiti, |
| 1:35.8 | Madagascar, where deforestation has pushed ecosystems to the brink. On the beaches where |
| 1:41.1 | leatherback turtles, as oldest of dinosaurs, are still fighting to survive. |
| 1:46.7 | His new book is called Echoes of Eden, and it's a tribute to the people doing everything they can to save the planet. |
| 1:53.8 | The local conservation heroes quietly holding the line for all of us. |
| 1:58.2 | It's a book about what hope looks like when it becomes a decision. |
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