17 



of geophysics, 



B. PHYSICS OF THE OCEAIT 



Sea water, next to air and fresh water, is the most uniform 

 of all the common substances on this planet, in chemical and 

 physical character. Therefore it does not offer to the physicist 

 the opportunity that it does to the biologist for the solution of 

 the basic problems that are today most alluring in his particular 

 field of study. The immediate task of the ocean physicist is not so 

 much to investigate the properties of matter, as to explain the 

 existing manifestations of heat, light, and motion within the sea 

 water. 



The problems most immediately pressing in these fields center 

 about the responses of the water to solar radiation, as well as to 

 the atmospheric circulation to the force of gravity; and to the 

 centrifugal force that is set up by the rotation of the earth. These 

 forces are all directly measurable, and can be stated in quantitative 

 termSo Essentially, therefore, Ocean Physics is an exact science. 

 If we are not yet in a position to handle its manifestations in an 

 exact way, it is more because our regional knowledge of the sea is 

 still incomplete, and because our methods of mathematical anal-/sis 

 are not sufficiently advanced, than because of failure to understand 

 the basic physical or cosmic principles involved. 



Sea water occupies the greater part of the surface of our 

 planet. A study of its physical and chemical characters and of the 

 circulatory movements by which it responds to external and intarnal 

 forces, is, therefore, an important item in our gradually broadening 

 view of the geo-physics of the earth. We also have other impelling 

 reasons for making Ocean Physics a primary subject in the fact that, 

 as one contributor v/rites, "virtually all kinds of studies of the 

 sea are crying for more information on physical conditions \Tithin it," 

 The temperature of the water, its chemistry, and the mechanical 

 manifestations of oceanic circulation, not only govern the whole 

 economy of life in the ocean, but also produce important geological 

 results, and go far to govern climates on land, past as well as 

 present. With these last incentives, it was natural that a tendency 

 developed to treat physical and especially dynamic Oceanography as a 

 subject auxiliary to oceanic biology or to geology. The fact that 

 oceanographic work on the two sides of the Atlantic has long drawn 

 its chief impetus from the economic pressure of fisheries problems, 

 has been largely responsible for this relegation of ocean physics 

 per se , to a secondary position. This tendency, however, has 

 seriously retarded the advance, not only of our knowledge of the 

 physics of the ocean per se , but even of the very branches that it 

 was hoped to further; for it may be taken as axiomatic that only 

 when a.ny scientific field is considered as a primary object, worthy 

 of cultivation for its own sake, can satisfactory adsiance therein 

 be expected. 



The effect of this tendency has been that studies of the physical 

 state of the v/aters have rarely been the primary object in the 

 oceanographic activities of the past. This has applied, for example^ 

 to many of the deep-sea exploring expeditions; "Blake," "Albatross," 



