When I worked with wildlife a lot in the Eighties and Nineties, I learnt the meaning of patience. And when I worked with trees, I learned the meaning of humility.

The 'New Yorker' asked me to shoot a story on climate change in 2005, and I wound up going to Iceland to shoot a glacier. The real story wasn't the beautiful white top. It ended up being at the terminus of the glacier where it's dying.

Each of us can and must shift our behavior according to our ability. For some, that means changing diet, shopping locally, or putting solar panels on their house. For others, it means using their voice to inspire transformative change.

When I worked with wildlife a lot in the Eighties and Nineties, I learnt the meaning of patience. And when I worked with trees, I learned the meaning of humility.

The cumulative effect of each person making a change in his or her own life will make a difference.

Ultimately, we have to ask ourselves an essential spiritual and ethical question: Are we the kind of people who take everything for ourselves and leave nothing for others, or do the angels of our better nature still live? I believe the angels are still alive.

The problem is almost everybody is just recording the world with home photographic toys, not doing metaphor or ideas. We have a photographic culture that's not conditioned to think in terms of symbol.