FOREWORD 



Polar exploration has reached an advanced stage of intensive search 

 in critical places. So much is now known that the unknown is rather 

 closely localized. Airplane and airship have vastly increased the 

 speed 'of surface reconnaissance, and blank areas of substantial size 

 will soon disappear. This impels science to hasten in like degree the 

 search for secrets that only the Polar Regions may yield. A world 

 conference on objectives in polar research seems eminently desirable, 

 and to supply an equivalent the present book has been undertaken 

 by the American Geographical Society. It forms a symposium by 

 thirty-one recognized students of polar problems. The emphasis 

 is on neither past achievements nor heroic adventure but on the 

 major problems remaining to be solved by further field study, where 

 and by what means those problems may best be attacked, and what 

 manner of cooperation between the sciences most concerned may 

 yield the largest harvest of results. 



It is fitting to record grateful appreciation for the time and thought 

 that have been given by the authors of these papers and for their 

 willingness to join the Society in making a fresh examination of the 

 outstanding problems that inspire modern polar exploration. The 

 whole assembly of contributions makes it convincingly clear that sci- 

 ence, not adventure, will be the ruling motive in future polar work. 

 This represents a great gain for science because it focuses attention 

 upon principles rather than personalities. The Society hopes that 

 increasing support for well-qualified expeditions may be an additional 

 result of the publication of this comprehensive group of distinguished 

 papers and of the companion volume, "The Geography of the Polar 

 Regions." 



Isaiah Bowman 



