Ocean Science at Manchester

Historians of oceanography will be well represented at the International Congress on the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine, held in Manchester in 2013. We are excited to take part in it! ICHO has co-sponsored (with the Pacific Circle) the following panel. The links should work, so go ahead and have a look around!

S108. Knowledge at work in the oceans of the world

Sponsoring bodies

DHST Oceanography Commission

DHST Pacific Circle Commission

Symposium organisers:
Walter LENZ | Institute of Oceanography, Germany
Vera SCHWACH | Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education, Norway

Mon 22 July, late morning until late afternoon

S108-A. Observers and instruments

Mon 22 July, late morning

Chair: Walter LENZ | Institute of Oceanography, Germany

Commentary: Roy MACLEOD | University of Sydney, Australia

Jakov DULCIC | Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries, Croatia

Marine science and Croatian naturalists, from the sixteenth century to modern-day collaborations

Loïc PÉTON | Université de Bretagne Occidentale, France

Georges Aimé (1810-1846), an observer of the Mediterranean Sea

Vera SCHWACH | Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education, Norway

At sea with science, at work with water samplers: the importance of instruments in oceanography, 1890-1920

Artur SVANSSON | University of Gothenburg, Sweden

Oceanographic instruments: Walfrid Ekman’s repeating current meter and its use at deep-sea, 1930

S108-B. Expeditions

Mon 22 July, early afternoon

Chair: Vera SCHWACH | Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education, Norway

Johan VAN BENNEKOM | Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Netherlands

The science of the oceans at work on the oceans

Cornelia LÜDECKE | University of Hamburg, Germany
Colin SUMMERHAYES | Scott Polar Research Institute, United Kingdom

German echo-soundings of the south Atlantic seabed, 1938-39

Hauke BIETZ | Independent scholar, Germany

The Danish deep-sea expedition of the Galathea II, 1950-1952: results and epistemological traces

Marcel WERNAND | Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Netherlands
Hans VAN DER WOERD | Free University Amsterdam, Netherlands
Winfried GIESKES | University of Groningen, Netherlands

Globe-wide response of ocean colour to climate change over the last twelve decades

S108-C. On the interpretation of in-situ data

Mon 22 July, late afternoon

Chair: Cornelia LÜDECKE | University of Hamburg, Germany

Erik DÜCKER | Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands

The pioneering investigations of Paul Regnard (1850-1927) into the physiological demands on organisms in the deep sea

Natascha ADAMOWSKY | University of Freiburg, Germany

Visualising the uncertain: William Beebe’s A Half Mile Down. Epistemological-aesthetical thoughts on the construction of a submarine space of knowledge using the example of deep sea exploration

Walter LENZ | Institute of Oceanography, Germany
Guenther RADACH | (not listed), Germany

On the understanding of plankton blooms in the North Sea: from single-net catches to 3D-dynanical computer simulations

Commentary: Roy MACLEOD | University of Sydney, Australia

Symposium abstract

When historians turn seaward the view include not only the coastline, but also the ocean which for a large part is not discernible by men directly. Thus ships, machines, gears, tools, instruments and skills have been critical for the attempts to understand the conception of the sea. Science was – and is- of critical significance as a way of knowing the sea, and the technologies used by scientist mediated crucial knowledge about the ocean. The contributers to the Symposium will through their cases-studies examine the importance of some of the tools and the methods used in the field studies on the ocean, in order to deepen the overall understanding of scientific practice and scientists at work.