【正确答案】
C
【答案解析】[解析] 31-40
Students, I hope this first lecture which I've called "The Uses of Oceanography"
will provide a helpful starting point for our studies this semester. In order to
be a valid area of study it has been said that the scientific study of the sea or
oceanography, as we call it, must point to the practical benefits that can be gained
for humankind. There is no doubt—many are the benefits which have been
identified as a result of study in this field.
Firstly, through careful study, oceanography helps us to determine where new raw
materials for the future may come from—such as where new foods, for example,
may be harvested. Certainly to reap the harvest of the ocean is {{U}}just as difficult{{/U}} as it is Q31
on the land —microscopic plants and animals or plankton are neither easy to gather
nor edible for humans. Fortunately, our marine creatures do an excellent job at both
gathering and eating so we must continue to go out into the oceans and confront the
often difficult oceanic conditions in an attempt to capture them for food. Of course,
even in the most fertile areas, stocks of profitable and edible fish are not inexhaustible.
In many areas around the world, limits are placed on numbers of fish that can be
caught. Improving our understanding of marine species' behaviour is therefore a
dominant area of study for oceanographers.
For hundreds of years, the ocean has been a cheap highway for commerce but the
challenge for those who travel it has always been to do so safely. Oceanographers
therefore attempt to bring some {{U}}predictability to the movement of currents{{/U}} Q32
as well as the wields that blow and the effect these have on the waves that are
generated.
Early oceanographers such as Edward Forbes, a native of the {{U}}Isle of Man{{/U}} and Q33
considered by many to be {{U}}the founder of the science of oceanography{{/U}}, was the Q34
person to lay the foundation for British government support of oceanography in
the mid 19th century. Another of Forbes' contemporaries, Irishman J. Vaughan
Thomson, collected and studied marine plankton off the Irish coast in 1828.
In addition to marine life, Thomson's interests were in the {{U}}tidal patterns{{/U}} and Q35
currents of the ocean. Another of the early professional naturalists that made
significant contributions to marine biology was {{U}}Charles Darwin{{/U}}. Darwin, Q36
most famous for his later works on theories of evolution, was commissioned
early in life as a naturalist on H.M.S. Beagle expeditions in the early 1800s.
{{U}}The Englishman{{/U}} collected and studied numerous marine organisms during Q37
this famous voyage, which eventually led to his subsidence theory of coral reef
formation. According to this theory fringing reefs form along the edges of an
island and then, as the island subsides, a barrier reef is created. So we see that
early oceanographers were interested in bringing predictability to the ebb and
flow of the vast ocean.
With industry pumping out more and more waste, another area in which
oceanographers have busied themselves is in the use of the ocean as a means of
waste disposal. In an attempt to discover a satisfactory answer to the question,
the processes of {{U}}diffusion and mixing{{/U}}, and the manner in which they depend on Q39
waves, tides and currents remains a focused area of study. Nuclear waste has also
been an important area. Oceanographers are currently studying the {{U}}effects of the{{/U}} Q38
{{U}}burial of waste{{/U}} into the mud of remote ocean sites. The nuclear waste is packed
into metal containers and transported via ship to a selected burial site. There is
always debate concerning whether seabed disposal of radioactive waste is simply
dumping today with little thought for tomorrow. As we cannot predict the future,
this question is a difficult one to answer. Instead of merely burying the nuclear
waste, {{U}}other means of disposal{{/U}} must be explored. This situation provides a Q40
strong future challenge for oceanographers and ensures their need for many years
to come. In next weeks' lecture we will continue...