The Scale of the Ocean

"Swimming over the sleepers" by Franco Banfi, an entry for the 2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year contest.

"Divers swim over a pod of sleeping sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) in the Caribbean Sea near Dominica. The sperm whale is the largest of the toothed whales and is known to dive as deep as 1,000 meters in search of squid to eat."

-Credit: Franco Banfi/2017 National Geographic Nature Photographer of the Year

-Credits: The Economist

How to decipher the scale of the ocean?

Mystical and vast as it is, the ocean is a crucial component that were often overlooked in the discourse of Landscape Architecture. The huge volume of water is an alien concept to human. We struggled to understand it. The ocean has an entire undiscovered surreal mechanism that is at a much more larger scale than the land. Yet, one shall not see them as two separate systems, but rather a reflective and interlocked network between the land and the ocean. For instance, the water cycle reveals the complexity of matter on land and off shore: evaporation, condensation, precipitation, and the entire system of rivers are just the glimpse of the cycle. The ocean current is similar as the river system on land. Water with low density rises and those with higher density sinks. There are more in the ocean. It is three-dimensional.

Melville wrote in Moby Dick about our desire for the ocean. The subliminal sensation brought by the vast continuous mattress is merely the surface of the ocean. The ocean, in fact, is three-dimensional. Thus acknowledging the ocean as a three-dimensional body is essential. His character lamented,

"And still deeper the meaning of that story of narcissus... that same image, we ourselves see in all rivers and oceans. It is the image of the ungraspable phantom of life' and this is the key to it all."

In other words, the ocean is alluring. Can we separate ourselves from the romantic and mystical sublime we had for the ocean and look at it in a logical manner? I do not know. In Hunting of the Snark, Lewis Carroll wrote about a captain who announced his ability to control the ocean. In a pure and innocent tone, the captain exemplified our mere knowledge and understanding of the ocean. The captain produced a map of the ocean,

Our claims were two-dimensional, gliding on the surface of the ocean. How else can we define it? By the edge between land and water? By the static rocks on the ocean bed? The movement of water in ocean made it very difficult to define.

The magical and mystical notions we had towards the ocean and the nuances and intricacy of our emotional tides to the ocean shall be further understood and elaborated. In addition, it is important for us to understand it at the systemic level. We may be speculative, scientific,or poetic, but we shall look at ocean. As sea level rises, and costal resilience become an important element of urban development, understanding the ocean would benefit costal cities as well as towns around water bodies. At the larger scale, we can track datas and predict future trends that would contribute to resilience, ecological benefits, and urban-rural developments.

CItations:

Herman Melville, Moby Dick, 1851, selected passages Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the Snark, 1876, selected passages William Beebe, Half Mile Down, 1934, selected chapters

Timothy Beatley, “Blue Urbanism: The City and the Ocean,” in Places: Forum of Design for the Public Realm, 04.18.11 Charles Moore, Plastic Ocean, 2011

Robert B. Gagosian, “Abrupt Climate Change: Should We Be Worried?” Woods Hole Geographic Institute, 27 January 2003