Duxbury/Introduction to the World's Oceans, 6/e

Dr. Bill Nye Review

The first thing I like about this book is that it's complete. Just about anything about the ocean that you might want to investigate is covered in some way. Whether it's the primordial history of the Earth's continents or the very latest in global climate changes, somewhere in here you'll find some good information and sources to learn more. There are web site addresses sprinkled throughout. The ones I checked were very well chosen. Although many of them may be out of date one day, each address shows the reader the extent of the research being done on the sea. And that it's all available gives the clear impression that these data and theories are part of humankind's ancient need to know the sea. From the start, the authors want you to sense the long history of oceanography. They want the reader to grasp the difficulties scientists have in learning about the ocean and how important that knowledge can be to our future.

The book is beautiful to look at. It's replete with charts, tables, graphs, illustrations and photographs. For the most part they're excellent, especially the photos. Having never seen any, I'm sure I could identify Arctic pancake ice in an instant. From reading World's Oceans, I'm sure I could tell the difference between an iceberg and a sea-ice floe. Based on a sidebar marked by a sea-green tab, I have tremendous confidence in the accuracy of the Acoustic Thermometry of Ocean Climate data. The map shows me where these data were collected, and the text clearly tells me how scientists found ways to measure ocean temperatures thousands of kilometers from where their instruments were set up. Its matter of fact presentation is compelling.

The second feature that appeals to me is the use of sidebars. They're set off with sea-green tabs; they're excellent. The best things about them may be their length and size. The layout says to the reader, "Here are the ideas in words; here are the pictures that show where the ideas were formed. And, all of this information is on a portion of one or two pages that one can absorb as a whole.

The sky blue chapter pages and the folio of people working at sea are illuminated with an old-fashioned quill-pen style font. The layout carries forward the idea that ocean exploration is a human endeavor, at once old and rudimentary and now new and vital. The text is direct. You read it and are logically presented with fact after fact. The organization of the material gives the reader a good sense of why the facts matter.

The third, and to me perhaps the strongest, feature of each chapter is subtle. It's something that many users might gloss over or not review thoroughly- I encourage all readers to check out the Study Questions. They are excellent. In every chapter I found them very useful. Many of them are just plain hard to answer right away; the reader has to think. What more could one ask of a textbook?

There are a few things that I'd change. As an introductory textbook, I would prefer that the first few things we come across be not only about the physics, chemistry, and astronomy of the sea, but also about the biology of the sea. The life science entries don't appear until Chapter 12. And even then, the focus starts out on humans disturbing ocean ecosystems rather than how these ecosystems work. Biodiversity is covered primarily in a sea-green tabbed sidebar with no pictures, not one. All of the mid-water nektonic (free-swimming) species are covered in less than a page of text and a single illustration. I feel that an introductory text should have more about living things earlier on, not only for the student but also for the professor or teacher trying to find her or his way.

Humans have sought sea knowledge not only to travel and trade, but also to eat. The astonishing abundance of the sea and the great variety of living things that are alien to us are worth earlier placement. What's there is good; I just wish there were more of it sooner. By the way, the illustrations in Chapter 15, "The Plankton" are spectacular. And, I applaud the authors' inclusion of the term "sea jelly" for jellyfish. It reflects a logical look at sea life. A view we'll need to keep the Earth hospitable in the near and distant future. (Let's get sea jellies in the index next time.)

The sections about planetary motion and the tides are very well illustrated. To make them beautiful, they should depict the Earth and Moon against blue-black deep-space backgrounds. In the physics of tides, the authors have chosen to describe tidal motion in terms of "centrifugal" force. The assumption seems to be that a novice oceanographer will find fictitious forces easier to grasp than the real center-seeking, or centripetal forces, that are measured in inertial frames of reference. Well, I disagree. In this case I feel that fundamental physics is ultimately easier to grasp than misperceptions. If you use centrifugal frames of reference, it's easy to get the wrong answer. The authors did a fantastic job collecting information from researchers all over the world. But here and there, the units are not quite consistent. Measurements in the centimeter-gram-second (cgs) system are mixed with the meter-kilogram-second (mks) system. It bugs me. Although it makes sense to present the information exactly as the original researchers might have, I would prefer the authors take the time to convert all their data into mks units. It would be better pedagogy, because students would be exposed to the discipline of scientific measurement. And, it would give me the feeling that the authors really had reviewed the data shown and felt that the researchers really did know what they were talking about.

All in all, it's a terrific textbook. Because of its thoroughness, much of it will stand the test of time and be used by students long into their professional careers. Here's hoping more than a few students, who get hold of this text, take it to heart and become full time ocean scientists. We need them, and they can sure use this book. (Keep up the good work everyone!)

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