The Structure of the Atlantic : 19 



we need a more general and comprehensive definition of our sub- 

 ject. 



Two entirely different ways of looking at an ocean and of defining 

 it are possible. Each way has some advantages for particular purpose, 

 but, naturally, the definition of the Atlantic that we wish to adopt 

 is the one that is current today and that is generally accepted by geog- 

 raphers, oceanographers and navigators. 



One way restricts the ocean to the main mass of its waters, a vast 

 open sea. This view emphasizes the distinction between the broad 

 reach of ocean waters that stretch between continents and ocean wa- 

 ters that touch or penetrate the shores of the continents, peninsulas, 

 islands, etc. This view tends to separate the main ocean from its related 

 seas, sounds, bays, straits and other tributary waters. This view im- 

 plies that all shoreward, lesser or tributary bodies of water are different 

 from the ocean and require a different treatment or that they are not 

 sufficiently important to be taken into account. This view was more 

 popular in the past than it is today and at that time there were 

 geographers who carried the process of division even further speak- 

 ing of a "North Atlantic" and a "South Atlantic" as though they 

 were separate bodies of water existing independently of each other. 

 It would be an exaggeration to say that the geographer or his- 

 torian who separated an ocean from its adjacent and tributary seas 

 was like an anatomist who said that a man consisted of head and 

 trunk and that arms and legs, hands and feet could be ignored. Still 

 it is quite probable that the tendency to give separate names and sep- 

 arate consideration to many different bodies of water delayed the rec- 

 ognition of the organic and integral character of the Atlantic and the 

 systematic study that scientists have brought to bear on it in recent 

 decades. 



The other view acceptable to modern scientists is that an ocean 

 consists not only of the deep and wide expanse of its main mass of 

 waters but also of adjacent seas and tributary waters such as Mediter- 

 ranean Seas (of which several are recognized including the original 

 Mediterranean) and bays, gulfs, channels, etc. When this view is 

 adopted and applied, a clear and more simplified view of the oceanic 

 waters of the world emerges and it appears that these are naturally 

 divided into three great ocean systems: the Pacific, the Indian and 

 the Atlantic. 



This way of dividing and defining the ocean systems aside from 

 the major virtues of completeness, clarity and conformity with the 

 general geological structures of the earth has other advantages. It rec- 



