SECTION G OCEANOGRAPHY 



(Hall 8, September 21, 3 p. m.) 



CHAIRMAN: REAR-ADMIRAL JOHN R. BARTLETT, United States Navy. 

 SPEAKERS: SIR JOHN MURRAY, K.C.B., F.R.S., Edinburgh. 

 PROFESSOR K. MITSUKURI, University of Tokio. 



THE RELATION OF OCEANOGRAPHY TO THE OTHER 



SCIENCES 



BY SIR JOHN MURRAY 



[Sir John Murray, Naturalist, b. Coburg, Ontario, Canada, March 3, 1841. 

 K.C.B., Knight of the Prussian Order Pour le Merite, F.R.S., LL.D., D.Sc., 

 Ph.D.; Cuvier Prize, Institut de France; Humboldt Medal, Gesellschaft fur 

 Erdkunde, Berlin; Royal Medal, Royal Society; Founders' Medal, R.G.S.; 

 Neill and Makdougall-Brisbane Medals, Royal Society of Edinburgh; Cullum 

 Medal, American Geographical Society; Clarke Medal, Royal Society of New 

 South Wales; Lutke Medal, Imperial Russian Society of Geography. Visited 

 the Arctic Regions, 1868; one of the naturalists with H.M.S. Challenger during 

 exploration of physical and biological conditions of great ocean basins, 1872- 

 76; first assistant of staff appointed to undertake publication of scientific results 

 of Challenger Expedition, 1876-82; appointed editor, 1882; took part in Knight 

 Errant and Triton expeditions. Author of A Summary of the Scientific Re- 

 sults of the Challenger Expedition, and of numerous papers on subjects con- 

 nected with geography, geology, oceanography, marine biology, and limnology ; 

 joint-author of The Narrative of the Cruise of the Challenger; and the Report on 

 Deep-Sea Deposits. Editor of the Report on the Scientific Results of the Chal- 

 lenger Expedition.] 



WITHIN the past half-century our knowledge of the ocean has been 

 very greatly extended by the explorations of scientific men belong- 

 ing to nearly every civilized country. The depth of the ocean, the 

 temperature, the composition, and the circulation of ocean waters, 

 the nature and distribution of oceanic organisms and of marine 

 deposits over the floor of the ocean, are now all known in their 

 broad general outlines. We are at last in a position to indicate, and 

 to speculate concerning, the relations of oceanography to the other 

 and older sciences. 



We now know that the greatest depth of the ocean below sea- 

 level exceeds the height of the highest mountain above the sea- 

 level. If Mount Everest, the highest mountain peak in the world, 

 were placed in the Nero Deep in the North Pacific, where a depth of 

 31,600 feet has been recorded, its summit would be submerged by 

 about 2600 feet, and if placed in the Nares Deep of the North 

 Atlantic, where 28,000 feet have been recorded, it would form a small 



