Doctoral Dissertation Research: Science in the Deep: America and British Contributions to the Development of Oceanography

科勒海洋学，像高能物理（HEP）和天文学一样，是一门“大”科学。对海洋的许多研究都需要非常庞大的研究团队和技术支持，还需要对仪器、设施、钻井平台等进行大量投资。事实上，海洋学是包括物理学在内的所有科学中人均获得资助最多的。与HEP和天文学不同，海洋学更多的是一门跨学科的科学，它吸引了生物学、物理学、化学和地质学等领域的科学家。此外，许多科学都有实际应用。尽管——或许正是因为——这种跨学科性和实际的、经济的影响，海洋学的历史几乎没有被研究过。海伦·罗兹瓦多斯基（Helen Rozwadowski）在科勒博士的指导下，正在研究美国和英国海洋学的起源。在19世纪，深海在很大程度上是深不可测的：这是一条危险的小路，成为商业和军事活动空前规模的场所。然而，由于商业上的需要，科学家们在19世纪80年代开始试图了解海洋表面以下发生的事情。Rozwadowski女士已经完成了她在美国的一半研究。有了这篇论文的资助，她将能够填写这个项目的英国部分。英国对深海的调查牢牢地植根于和平时期科学探索的悠久传统，一群自然科学家组成了英国科学促进会的各种疏浚委员会，提出了关于深海及其奇怪居民的新问题。海底电报是这些研究的主要发起者。政治家和实业家向科学家和工程师提出的问题是，如何通过海底电报电缆将“日不落”帝国的各个部分连接起来。为了实现这一目标，科学家们不得不借用从采矿升降机到钢琴线等各种工业技术。产生关于深海的科学知识需要海洋学家将自然历史与现有的海洋实践和习俗结合起来，通常是在空间有限、纪律严格、天气恶劣和食物更差的困难物理条件下进行的。海上科学工作涉及一系列复杂的关系——军官与普通海员、军人与平民绅士、博物学家、水手与陆战队员之间的关系。这些关系及其在海上的谈判所固有的冲突和合作潜力塑造了海洋学工作的实践。通过研究海洋学是如何从英美两国截然不同的文化中发展起来的，罗兹瓦多斯基女士承诺将极大地扩展我们对这门科学是如何在当今最大的科学之一中发展起来的理解。＊＊＊

9320247 Kohler Oceanography, like high energy physics (HEP) and astronomy, is a "big" science. Much of the study of the oceans requires very large teams of researchers with support technicians and massive investments for instrumentation, facilities, drilling platforms, etc. Indeed, oceanography is the most highly-funded per capita of all sciences, including physics. Unlike HEP and astronomy, oceanography is much more an interdisciplinary science drawing on scientists whose degrees are in fields like biology, physics, chemistry, and geology. Further, much of the science has practical application. Despite--or perhaps because of--this interdisciplinarity and practical, economic implications, the history of oceanography has hardly been examined. Helen Rozwadowski, under the direction of Dr. Kohler, is examining the origins of oceanography in the United States and Britain. In the 19th century, the deep ocean was largely unfathomable: a dangerous byway that became a location for commercial and military work on an unprecedented scale. Because of commercial necessity, however, scientists were driven by the 1880's to attempt to understand what transpired below the surface of the oceans. Ms. Rozwadowski has already undertaken the American half of her study. With this dissertation grant, she will be able to fill out the British part of this program. British investigation of the deep ocean was firmly rooted in the long tradition of peace-time scientific exploration, to which a group of natural scientists who formed the various Dredging Committees of the British Association for the Advancement of Science brought new questions about the deep ocean and its strange inhabitants. Submarine telegraphy was a primary instigator for these studies. The question the politicians and industrialists gave to the scientists and engineers was how to link via underwater telegraph cable various parts of the empire upon which "the sun never set." To accomplish this goal, scient ists had to borrow industrial technologies ranging from mining hoists to piano wire. Producing scientific knowledge about the deep ocean required oceanographers to integrate natural history with existing maritime practices and customs, usually under difficult physical conditions of constrained space, harsh discipline, bad weather, and worse food. Scientific work at sea involved a series of complex relationships -- between officers and common seamen, military men and civilian gentleman naturalists, mariners and landlubbers. The conflicts and potential for cooperation inherent in these relationships and their negotiation at sea shaped the practice of oceanographic work. By examining how the science of oceanography rose out of the very different cultures of Britain and the United States, Ms. Rozwadowski promises to expand greatly our understanding of how this science developed in one of the biggest of big sciences today. ***