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From the Publisher
Origin of the Ocean
Earth’s Dynamic Ring of Fire
“Nowhere on Earth is there more evidence of the powerful processes that reshape the planet than around the rim of the Pacific Ocean. Where continents and oceanic plates collide, there is a necklace of active volcanoes behind deep-sea trenches.”
Swimming in the Sea of Life
A Century of Loss & Learning
“Technological advances in the 20th century accelerated the ability of people to find, take, market, and consumer greater amounts of sea life than during any other era in history. But, at the same time, new technologies made possible unprecedented powers of exploration, computation and communication.”
Open Ocean Life
Deep & Going Deeper in the Open Ocean
“Nowhere in the ocean are there straight lines defining constant conditions. Temperature, salinity, water clarity and chemistry are constantly shifting vertically and horizontally depending on currents, the weather, the season, and the creatures moving within the water column, stirring and mixing as they go.”
Atlas of the Ocean
Why We Map the Ocean
In the first volume of National Geographic magazine in 1888, Gardiner G. Hubbard wrote, “When we embark on the great ocean of discovery, the horizon of the unknown advances with us and surrounds us wherever we go. The more we know, the greater we find is our ignorance. “
He might have added, “and that is why we keep exploring!”
The first people to see the ocean many thousands of years ago likely wondered how big it was, how deep, and what unknowns were beyond the horizon.
Some 3,500 years ago seafarers from islands in Polynesia stepped into outrigger canoes to find out, equipped with only their understanding of the stars, winds, currents, and the flights of birds. Gradually they learned to read the currents and to integrate their knowledge to document directions and the distances to other islands, and then continents. They recorded this information on stick charts, the world’s first maps of the ocean. The placement of shells and fibers indicated islands, waves, and currents.
Early Pacific navigators passed their knowledge, discoveries, and instruments from generation to generation, spawning lines of master Pacific navigators who seemed born with an inherent understanding of the dimensions of the sea. Meanwhile, other seafarers across the globe were finding their own ways to document their known ocean.
Today, the international initiative Seabed 2030 is promoting compilation of bathymetric data into a 100-meter-resolution digital model of the world seafloor over the coming decade. High-resolution geographic information systems (GIS) technology uses various data to create 3D visualizations that show magnificent geologic formations, ocean currents, sea life distribution, environmental impacts, mass animal migrations, volcanic action at plate boundaries, and more.
That vital mapping, as evidenced throughout this book, does not always bring good news: It records declining coral reefs, gyres filled with plastic, melting ice shelves, pockets of dying sea life, burgeoning toxic algae, and precious seafloor minerals as well. Still, we need it to continue, to be as accurate as possible. Because it is important for us to know this mysterious 70 percent of our planet. Because the ocean must be celebrated and protected. Because the ocean is the origin our life—and because our lives depend on it.
“Extraordinarily beautiful book by the most extraordinary woman. Perhaps the greatest advocate our oceans have ever had.”
—Richard Branson
Publisher : National Geographic (November 16, 2021)
Language : English
Hardcover : 512 pages
ISBN-10 : 1426221924
ISBN-13 : 978-1426221927
Item Weight : 5.95 pounds
Dimensions : 9.65 x 1.75 x 12.2 inches
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