110 SEA GRANT COLLEGES 





Centers to receive support must be identified on the basis of their capacity to 

 carry out the total concept of the sea- grant university, as well as their being 

 centers of research excellence. 



HAROLD H. HASKIN, Professor of Zoology and Oyster Investigations, Rutgers 

 University 



Of course no one concerned with the development of our marine resources 

 can be opposed to the primary idea of this conference --that additional financial 

 support be provided for this purpose. It is easily understandable also that we 

 are impressed with the accomplishments of agricultural sciences and therefore 

 are thinking of ways and means to establish similar national support for the 

 marine sciences. I cannot, however, agree with the several speakers at this 

 conference who held that our basic knowledge in marine science is at such a 

 high level that we can de-emphasize basic research and should now concentrate 

 on application of this knowledge, through marine engineering, to the conquest 

 and occupation of the sea. One speaker even stated that the management of the 

 shallow water coastal resources was easy and that we should move at once to 

 the more challenging problems of offshore waters. As one who has worked with 

 estuarine shellfish resources over the past 20 years, I should like to point out 

 that we don't even have the basic knowledge to insure proper management of 

 such relatively well- studied species as the oyster, hard clam and soft clam. 

 These estuarine populations have been placed under severe stress largely 

 through engineering "improvements" in channels, harbors, stream control, 

 water diversions, sewage disposal, etc. This conference should not push for all 

 out engineering advances without frank recognition that we require stronger 

 basic research programs to support such advances. 



CLARE P. IDYLL, Institute of Marine Science, University of Miami 



It is widely recognized that understanding of the ocean environment is 

 necessary in order to reduce its potential to use. And it is further realized that 

 this understanding can only come through the mechanism of scientific enquiry; 

 that this must then be followed by the development of engineering technology; 

 that, finally, the technology must be demonstrated to the industrial community 

 and adopted by them. Ocean scientists have stated and restated this conviction 

 often enough in recent years that the public and the Congress are dinaly perceiv- 

 ing it. But in such cases it often takes an eloquent expression of the idea for it 

 to achieve realization in any reasonable time. Dean Spilhaus' imaginative con- 

 cept of the sea- grant college and his eloquent exposition of this concept is the 

 kind of spark required to pick the idea out of its tracks and carry it to realiza- 

 tion. It is clear that the sea-grant college idea has caught the imagination of 

 the ocean science community, and properly handled by that community it can 

 also capture the imagination of Congress. If Congress adopts the concept and 

 establishes sea- grant colleges the oceanographic community will find itself 

 called upon to increase its activity enormously to keep up with the demand for 

 information and skills at all levels. 



But while it seems certain that this widely ranging kind of activity will 

 result from the establishment of sea- grant colleges, it will be fatal to try to 

 create them full-blown by attempting to include all things for all oceanographers. 

 The great danger now is that Dr. Spilhaus' key idea will be ignored and that all 

 of us go baying after our own modified vision of the "sea-grant college" regard- 



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