614 



CYCLES OF ORGANIC AND IXOR(iAXIC SUBSTANXES 



27SOO 



? 27 S J} ■ 



?27-8lS? 



.VSJI 



27Sb2 



Fig. 8. Resident water masses each in neutral adiabatic equilibrium in the 

 deep waters of the Bay of Biscay below 1400 m depth. 



crepancies between replicate oxygen analyses are concentrated in 

 the zones of conflict. They are rare in the water masses in adiabatic 

 equilibrium. This suggests that the zones of conflict are extremely 

 complex and that the boundaries are so sharp that a single water 

 bottle may bring up a sample cut out of t\\-o sharply separated 

 layers. 



An observation of Revelle et al. (1955) is consistent with this 

 description. They labeled deep water with a radioactive marker 

 and observed that it spread laterally in a sheet about a meter thick 

 and extending over an area of 100 or more square kilometers, that 

 is the marker spread outwards along an isopycnal surface. 



All advance in deep-sea oceanography, using salinities, depends 

 on interpreting differences not much greater than the errors of 

 measurement. This is so here. An exact measure of statistical 

 significance is not readily made but on a rough assessment the 

 chance that the thesis of this paper might ha\-c been derived from 

 data which are, in fact, randomly distributed is about one in 

 twenty, i.e., there is this probability that the whole paper is no more 

 than a canard. 



