MARINE SCIENCE 59 



water masses and their chemical composition. Truly the sea is a 

 dynamic system Avith constant interaction between organism and 

 environment. 



The point that I am trying to emphasize is that we cannot draw a 

 sharp line and say, "on this side we have basic research and on the 

 other we have applied; that there is an identifiable or predictable 

 area of knowledge that is useful and one that is not." Indeed, there 

 is an incessant feedback and reciprocal fertilization that highlights a 

 symbiotic relationship between these two. 



And yet there is a real difference. There is a distinctive intellec- 

 tual flexibility, a freedom from any obligation to find an answer to a 

 specific question that, if it is not unique for basic research, is most 

 characteristic of the approach and the climate in which the uncom- 

 mitted search for new knowledge is best fostered. Further, if basic 

 research were to be justified wholly on the grounds of future or pos- 

 sible usefulness, there is a danger that science will come to be equated 

 with technology and looked upon only as a means to practical ends. 



Such motivation would greatly lessen the chances for novel dis- 

 coveries and fundamental advances in understanding. It is of the 

 utmost importance to all men, and to the general welfare of all our 

 people in a philosophical as well as a practical sense, that continued 

 and increased opportunities for basic research be vigorously sup- 

 ported and jealously guarded. 



Recognizing this, the Committee on Oceanography has identified 

 many of the broad, significant problems that are unique to the sea, 

 whose solution will require a major effort in basic research. These 

 problems touch upon questions of the greatest import in each of the 

 marine sciences. They can be grouped roughly into five categories 

 as follows : 



(1) History of the oceans: As our horizons expand to encompass 

 new appreciation of the physical universe, we are increasingly aware 

 of our acute ignorance about the evolution of our own planet ; about 

 the origin of the waters; their separation from land; the changes in 

 geographical regions covered by the seas and in the bottom contours : 

 the dramatic fluctuations in climate during ages past. Many of these 

 secrets are locked in the sediments and materials on the ocean floor. 

 Probing with new tools and greater insight, the depths of the sea will 

 reveal much that has till now remained shrouded in mystery and 

 speculation. 



(2) Life in the sea: More than 90 percent of the earth's different 

 kinds of animals are marine. Of the 28 or so well-recogiiized phyla 

 of animals, representati-\-es of all live in the sea and many are con- 

 fined w^holly to the marine environment. It is likely that animal 

 life as we know' it originated in the sea and our present knowledge 

 of its great diversity and richness, though extensive, is still frag- 

 mentary indeed. Eecent findings of creatures like Latimeria, long- 

 believed to be extinct, and Neopilina, not previously known to zoolo- 

 gists, serve to illustrate this. 



Who knows how many other new forms may yet be found. The 

 knowledge gained from a more complete study of marine life would 

 help to fill in the gaps that make charting the course of animal e^'olu- 

 tion so perplexing. The structure of marine communities, the inter- 

 dependence between species, their fluctuations in abundance, the role 



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