80 SEA GRANT COLLEGES 



NEWEST FRONTIER: THE WORLD OCEAN 



G. William Miller, L.L.B., University of California, 1952. Joining 

 Textron, Incorporated in 1956, he rose to President in 1960, at the age 

 of 35, of this major diversified manufacturing company operating 

 more than 100 plants in 30 states and several foreign countries. 

 Textron's corporate headquarters are in Providence, Rhode Island. 



Twenty years ago, I graduated from the Coast Guard Academy in New Lon- 

 don, receiving a degree in marine engineering. At that time we were a nation 

 deeply involved in a great war. We were endeavoring to defend not only our 

 nation but our free societies throughout the world. Almost five centuries ago 

 Columbus made the most important sea voyage of all history. Between that time 

 and the time that I graduated, the world was beset by enormous change. In the time 

 between my graduation and the present there has been just as much change as 

 took place in those five centuries. The characterization of our time indicates we 

 are living in a time of accelerating change. For example, we have expended 

 more for scientific research, since World War II, than was spent between Colum- 

 bus' voyage and the war, so that the acceleration of effort has been really enor- 

 mous. 



This technological revolution has been going on very rapidly and has been 

 changing our society at an accelerated pace. Now this is about to be surplanted 

 and superimposed with demographic ways that will have tremendous impact. 

 We're on the threshold of a population change that is unprecedented. This com- 

 bination of technological development and population explosion will certainly 

 have enormous impact over the next one hundred years. There are some people 

 who are rather gloomy about this future. They predict the results are going to 

 be very disastrous and we are going to have vast dislocations. They predict in- 

 creasing unemployment, and our available resources of food and shelter will be 

 exhausted. It is a very gloomy prospect. The forecasters of this doom are see- 

 ing disaster for the whole world. 



I don't share their views. 



In our dynamic age this challenge is going to be nmet by the people who have 

 the vision, the imagination and determination to change scientific knowledge into 

 useful effort to overcome the dangers to humanity. The concept of the sea-grant 

 university is an example. Thoughtful people have responded to the needs of our 

 society, trying to plant the seeds that willblossom into real advantage and bene- 

 ficial use of resources for centuries to come. The world ocean, after all, is our 

 greatest resource. The sea-grant university certainly is a foundation to insure 

 that this resource is developed for the good of everyone. The key to meeting 

 the challenge of technological change and demographic explosion is people. That 

 is the human element of the whole resource equation. The solution is with 

 people of vision, people w'.th knowledge, and the determination to do that which 

 must be done. This describes the people attending this conference. 



We have urgent needs in this field, particularly dealing with national de- 

 fense. We need to be able to see, identify, and locate vehicles in the water, just 

 as precisely as we can locate objects in the air with radar and reconnaisance 

 satellites. We need to have systems that are far more accurate, more powerful 

 and more effective than anything we now have if we're to secure our shores 

 from hostile activity. At the same time, we must not be shortsighted. Our needs, 

 while urgent in the field of national security, are far more important in the 

 longer term needs to develop the wealth of the sea. The explorers that came to 

 the new world, originally, were seeking treasure. The wealth they sought, the 

 windfall of picking up gold fronri the streets was indeed a very tarnished concept 

 and turned out to be nothing but fool's gold. Their greatest legacy to all of us was 



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