already pointed the way to more efficient ex- 

 ploration by the petroleum industry. Similar 

 benefits are now becoming available to the 

 hard minerals industry. The ways in which 

 the lithospheric plates of the earth's crust 

 form, move, collide, disappear and interact are 

 telling us for the first time how the important 

 mineral deposits we find ashore are created. 

 Knowing this mechanism — the processes and 

 time scales involved — not only expedites the 

 landside search for new mineral resources, 

 but it is beginning to describe the mineral 

 resources of an area three times that of the 

 continental land masses on which, to date, 

 we have primarily relied for such resources. 

 That area, of course, is the ocean floor, the 

 description and dynamic understanding of 

 which is the main objective of the IDOE 

 Seabed Assessment program. 



One of the more intriguing aspects of this 

 line of inquiry is the evolving evidence that 

 the earth's hard mineral resources are con- 

 stantly being renewed — not only through the 

 rift valleys that characterize most of the 

 46,000 nautical miles of mid-oceanic ridges, 

 but also along the island arc and other vol- 

 canic regions where lithospheric plates col- 

 lide. No suggestion is made or even implied 

 that the rate of such hard minerals creation 

 in any way matches the rate at which modern 

 industry is drawing them down. The possibil- 

 ity, if not the probability, exists, however, that 

 rich deposits will be found beneath the deep 

 ocean floor all the way from the rift/ridge 

 structures that produce them to the continental 

 boundaries. If this is so, planetary limits are 

 still not removed, but they may be much ex- 

 panded. Once again the quest for scientific 

 knowledge produces an effect of universal, 

 very practical importance. 



The temporal benefits that soon may accrue 

 from the discovery of manganese nodules by 

 H.M.S. ChaiJenger will have taken 100 years 

 or more to be realized. The time scale from 

 basic scientific discovery in marine research 

 to practical utilization today is greatly fore- 

 shortened, and the pragmatic benefits of plate 

 tectonics research are being realized within 

 decades of initial hypotheses and within a 



very few years of actual scientific confirma- 

 tion. Through IDOE's broad international 

 participation, concerted multi-disciplinary ef- 

 forts addressed to single major scientific prob- 

 lems and the availability of modern computer 

 and numerical modeling technology, such 

 short-term pay-offs are being realized or an- 

 ticipated for every major IDOE program. In- 

 deed, if there is a problem in the realization 

 of practical benefits from these programs (e.g., 

 Seabed Assessment), it is that currently the 

 pace of oceanographic discovery with the 

 potential to serve critical current needs is out- 

 pacing the technological capability to exploit. 

 And, the natural pressure of the marketplace 

 are beginning to solve that problem. 



IDOE-supported oceanographic research 

 seeks a level of understanding of natural pro- 

 cesses that is functional rather than merely 

 descriptive, that is quantitative as well as 

 qualitative. We have already pretty well de- 

 scribed the planet; now we strive to know 

 how it works. We seek better to define its 

 limits and to realize the fullest compatability 

 between man, his needs and expectations and 

 his environment and its resources. 



The demands of most IDOE programs ex- 

 ceed the practical capabilities not only of in- 

 dividual institutions but often of individual 

 nations. A sharing of effort among many 

 institutions and nations is essential to bring 

 together sufficient financial and other material 

 resources. Since no single nation can rea- 

 sonably undertake the development of such 

 knowledge entirely on its own, it is only logi- 

 cal that there should be a common effort to 

 fulfill critical common needs. This is the 

 rationale behind the cooperative aspects of 

 IDOE. 



It is the goal of the IDOE to produce the 

 knowledge that will provide the factual bases 

 to enable man to optimize his compatability 

 with his environment, to maximize the con- 

 tinued availability of food, fuels and raw 

 materials and to minimize future sources of 

 conflict both within and among nations. The 

 least cost and shortest route to this goal is 

 through the development of a truly energetic 

 common assault on common problems. 



54 



