Talk:Ocean

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WikiProject Geography
Geography Portal

This article is supported by the Geography WikiProject, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage on Geography and related subjects on Wikipedia. Please participate by editing the article Geography, or visit the project page for more details on the projects.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the assessment scale.
WikiProject Oceans

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Oceans, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of oceans, seas, and bays. If you would like to participate, you can edit this article or you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks or take part in the discussion.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the Project's quality scale.
??? This article has not yet been assigned a rating on the Project's importance scale.
After rating the article, please provide a short summary on the article's ratings summary page to explain your ratings and/or identify the strengths and weaknesses.
This article has been reviewed by the Version 1.0 Editorial Team.
Version 0.5
 This article has been selected for Version 0.5 and subsequent release versions of Wikipedia.

This is part of a WikiProject.
For guidelines on contributing see Wikipedia:WikiProject Ecoregions
and meta:spacetime DTD and meta:ecoregion DTD

Contents

[edit] History

Be nice to see some recent research into the history of oceans: how they came to be, how old they are, etc. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.68.249.80 (talk) 21:08, 18 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Unknown sea creature

Could anyone help me identify the strange creatures in this picture? Thanks, – Quadell (talk) (help)[[]] 23:05, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Southern Ocean

The disclaimer on this page on the Southern Ocean bullet point ("...generally not considered...") is not consistent with the explanation on the topic's own page, which I think is definitive. Unless there is argument to the contrary, I will replace the disclaimer with a blurb saying that S.O. is a new definition. Sharkford 04:17, 2005 Mar 5 (UTC)

hi my name is sheila and i don't like what u did to my article about the oceans .


[edit] Abyssal and other zones

There should be a paragraph discussing and linking to Abyssal zone and other ecological zones within the oceans, but I'm not up to trying to write it right now. 216.240.37.31 04:28, 8 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Disambiguation page

I added a link to Ocean Software Ltd since in many articles it is referred to as Ocean. I will try to cleanup those pages. Meanwhile should a disambiguation page should be created? Felsir 13:01, August 15, 2005 (UTC)

Coming here from an AfD discussion, I wonder if any ocean expert(s) here could do something about the section on Origins. There ought to be something in Wikipedia on that topic, but I'm not convinced a separate article is necessary until at ledhgcast a section's been written here. I'm not, however, the one to write it, at least not now. -GghbTBacchus(talk) 02:56, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Science collaboration of the week

Physical oceanography is a current candidate on the Science collaboration. Vote for it if you want to see this article improved. --Fenice 07:18, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What is an ocean?

I came to this article to see a definition of ocean, but I failed to find one. Or, even worse, I found one which is followed by sentence "From this point of view, there are three "oceans" today: the World Ocean, and the Black and Caspian Sea..." which is not what the most common sence of the word in question is. I'm not being bold and inserting a definition myself because I don't have one, but I really feel this article could use a decent definition of ocean... --Dijxtra 23:26, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Also, I think there's too much about this "World Ocean" business in the intro, considering its relative importance in the context of "oceans" in general. I'd suggest making a note about the implications of the geologic definition later on and leave only "Geologically, an ocean is an area of oceanic crust covered by water" in the intro. -Elmer Clark 22:31, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
Is it better now? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Unschool (talk • contribs) 23:03, 16 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Fish

Can you talk about fish?


--Sam Wang 22:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

...try here? -Elmer Clark 22:32, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ocean (artist)

i'd like for someone to contact me -username thesurfer - who is editing this page. you need to include the music artist, Ocean, into the music list. i would be happy to contribute this. the gospel group, Ocean, had disbanded in the early 1970's and yet they are listed.

I contacted the record company that distributes her CDs and asked for information to create my article about her.Her career warrants being included on this page and i am a supporter of her work, and her amazing contributions to saving life in the oceans too.

also, i've noticed that many bands or performers are listed in wiki who are not nearly as accomplished or well-known as is Ocean, and i wonder why whomever edits this page has not included her or so far allowed me to include her and to keep the edits i've made. please explain to me why you are displaying this sort of prejudice? cite - the page for "cosmic", and many other pages. the artists in music holding these otherwise generic names are always listed at wikipedia, regardless whether they are household names yet. Larger music sites had stopped listing the old gospel group of the same name a few years ago and have Ocean, the singer-songwriter-producer i would like to add the information on, as an additional listing for Ocean on the page we are discussing. I can also cite references and listings where needed.

This article is about the ocean, not things called ocean. So the 'See also' section links to relevent ocean (as in sea) related articles. The external links section is similar but, obviously, links to external sites. The website for the artist known as ocean is not really related to the ocean, and will not help anyone gain any further information about the ocean by looking at it. If the artist is big enough for an article to be written you could request an article and see if someone is willing to write one. Also, the Ocean (disambiguation) page is for linking to articles on wikipedia, not to external sites, otherwise these pages would be full of links to other sites.

[edit] Image

Image:Oceans.png
Image:Oceans.png

I understand why the image next to the opening paragraph was place here--it's a rather unique view. But I think it should be replaced, or at least removed. First of all, and most importantly, by the admission in the caption, it is simply out of date--the Southern Ocean needs to be represented. Even without that, I can't figure out for the life of me why the South China Sea is demarcated. Seems to make the image even more confusing. Unschool 23:05, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

It is a featured picture, and should be kept in until a better version is produced. --Henrygb 14:01, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
I have since created an animated GIF (which transitions through the various reckonings of the major oceans) and replaced the above image. Feedback would be appreciated. Quizimodo 17:49, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
I guess it's a little late for feedback on this, but yeah, the animated GIF is fantastic. It's neat because it's something that kinda set apart this project from the run of the mill encyclopedia. It certainly beats the pants off of that old image. The only thing that I would change is that I wish that there was a way (and, for all I know, there is and I'm just ignorant of it) to stop on one image and/or move through them at a viewer-controlled pace. Unschool 03:00, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. Better late than never: I can change such images fairly easily. However, I do not think there is a way to stop this animated GIF or move through it at a variable pace. I set the tempo to what I thought was a reasonable rate, and there are few enough slides so that it is hopefully not confusing. The only other suggestion I have is to create a series of static slides and place then somewhere in the article ... perhaps with the table? (see below) :) Quizimodo 13:00, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit]  % of earths surface?

The Arctic Ocean takes up approximately 17% of the Earth's surface. The Pacific takes up about 32%, The Atlantic takes up close to 27%, and The Indian ocean takes up 24%.

if you add all those up: 17 + 32 + 27 + 24 = 100%. that seems to me to mean that it is referring only to the % of the Earth's water surface (whatever the correct phrase for that is), and not to the entire surface. Otherwise this statement seems to indicate that the entire surface of the planet is covered in Ocean. unless I'm missing something of course, which is entirely possible. Sahuagin 21:29, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Hi there! I believe it is referring to the % of the oceanic (or World Ocean) surface; a relative slither of the entire water surface is not covered by the oceans. Anyhow, as its unsourced I have removed the information in its current form: I am preparing a summary table for the oceans and will place it in the next day or so. Quizimodo 21:36, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

It's 70%

[edit] The ocean is a world

The ocean is a world; amazing, unexplained, simple, extreme, strange, normal, wonderful. Can one define the word ocean?

The ocean is often poluted, such as the world we live in. The ocean contains different creatures, and different ways of surviving; fighting, harmony, chaos, peace. It is not that different from what we would call "our world".

Watching the waves crash, and the moonlight reflect off the water, its the unexplained, desirable, world of water.

[edit] Oceanography?

I wonder about the appropriateness of making this article separate from oceanography. Michael Hardy 01:36 Feb 12, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Oceanic Currents?

this article should explain how and why oceanic currents are formed. Is it the rotation of the earth?205.155.15.1

[edit] Cut down the Extraterrestial Oceans section?

I added a bit to the existing section. So far, we have a confirmed case of a planet with 'hot ice', a disputed case of water vapour and a planet that could have oceans if the composition is right. The first two 'transit', so there is evidence what they are made of, whereas the third is not in line-of-sight with the Earth and its sun and its nature is unknown.

Still, there are more worlds being found all the time and the section could grow. Or be separated off, with a shorter paragraph and a link to the main article.--GwydionM 18:18, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

No one commented, so I added Oceans Beyond Earth. Now linked here as well.--GwydionM 15:25, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Didn't see your suggestion until now. Here's what I think:
  • The separate article is a very good idea. Glad to see that you've created it.
  • I think the the material regarding non-earth oceans that remains here in Ocean should be removed. Maybe at the top we can have something in italics like "This article deals with Oceans on Planet Earth. For information about other oceans on other celestial bodies, see Oceans Beyond Earth.
  • I actually would prefer a less fluffy title for your new article, to me it sounds a bit like the title for a novel. My suggestion would be to simply call it, Extraterrestial Oceans.
Whether you take my suggestions or not, good job! Unschool 17:07, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I've changed the section title. Now that Oceans Beyond Earth exists, should we reduce what's said here? Mention just Mars and Europa, which are the best cases? Say that exoplanets with oceans are expected but there are none yet found?--GwydionM 17:08, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I have taken the liberty to move the article to 'Extraterrestrial oceans', which I believe is a far more encyclopedic title; I've also edited the article lead to reflect this. Quizimodo 23:16, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Expert

Ocean#Trivia

The first source doesn't appear to be very authoritative, though the argument it propounds is fairly compelling. The second source is an academic article but I don't have the resources to asses its reliability. I reckon the information does have a place within the article, probably Ocean#Physical properties. Leobh 18:45, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Moved to physical properties section under new color subsection. Deleted trivia section - don't need a magnet for nonsense. Removed expert tag, do you have a reason for questioning the authority of the Amsci.com source? Vsmith 21:10, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
OK, apologies, that was completely unnecessary of me. Added a link to the article on the matter (of water's color). Leobh 15:18, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Introductory sentence

I am not reverting right now, because I avoid edit wars at almost all costs, but I ask you to re-read what you have reverted this to. The current opening sentence reads: An ocean . . . is a principal part of the hydrosphere: a major body of saline water that, in totality, covers about 70% of the Earth's surface.

Okay, now first of all, I completely agree with your desire to make it clear that the ocean/oceans covers/cover 70% of the earth's surface, regardless of whether they are seen as one ocean or several. We're in agreement on that point. But your version actually fails to make this clear.

You start off using the singular indefinate article, "an", which, when combined with the next phrase "is a principal part of the hydrosphere", is perfectly fine. No problems thus far. Then you go on to say (after a rather undesireable colon—but I'll leave that alone today) "a major body of saline water". I've got some minor problems with this (due to the colon), but there are no overt errors thus far.

But then you say, "in totality". Of what are you speaking here? Sure, sure, neither of us are idiots, and we both know that what you mean is the totality of all of the world's oceans. But that's not what you are saying, because you have only referred to "an ocean". You've never told us that there are multiple oceans, and, even if you had, since within the same sentence you were defining a non-specific single ocean, if strict logic is followed, you are telling us that "an ocean covers 70% of the world's surface," because you've made the amount of the earth's surface covered by "an ocean" part of the definition of "an ocean". By further extension, if there do happen to be as many as two oceans in the world (assumable since you did not refer to "the ocean", then together they must cover 140% of the world's surface. If you're thinking that this sounds absurd, you're right. But I didn't write it; it is at the bare minimum one possible interpretation of the verbiage that you've chosen to employ. I won't argue that this is the only way to interpret the wording (though I believe it to be the most logically sound—thus absurd), but it's certainly better to find a way to word it that doesn't lead to this interpretation.

Now look at the verbiage that you eliminated. An ocean . . . is a major body of saline water and a principal part of the hydrosphere. In totality, the world's oceans cover about 70% of the Earth's surface (or an area of some 361 million square kilometers).

As I see it, you have one principal point of contention with this that may merit revision. There is no mention of the fact that the world's oceans can very correctly be considered to be a single body of water. Personally, I think that the fact that this issue is addressed in the first sentence of the second paragraph is more than adequate. (Indeed, if it is to be covered in this introductory paragraph, it will necessitate a re-writing of the second paragraph's opening sentence, or it will sound stupidly redundant.) But all that is besides the point, because, as I read it, your edit does not address this issue any better than the one you just got rid of. Why? Because, for the grammatical issues mentioned above, you have have not made clear to the reader whether there is one ocean or multiple oceans or (as the case of course is) that both views are viable.

In summation, you use a verb of the third person singular while rendering the definition of an indefinate subject, but include a statement that only makes sense either with a set of plural indefinite subjects or a definate singular subject. You can't have it both ways—it is grammatically nonsensical. The previous edit was grammatically sound. It only failed to make clear that many sources regard the World Ocean as a single entity. And since this is addressed moments later, in a section that, for Pete's sake, is labeled "Overview", is that so bad?

Please give this some serious consideration. I may be away for a while (perhaps for as long as two or three weeks), so I can't promise that I'll respond quickly. I do feel that the current edit simply cannot stand, for grammatical reasons alone. But I don't need to have the previous version reinstated, as long as what we get is both factual (something that I know from your history that you value greatly) and correct from technical standpoint. Cheers. Unschool 02:19, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I reverted your edits to the introduction because of one principal point of contention: that the ocean is also considered a single body of water which spans the globe. Consult other volumes, in addition to the sources in this article, and this unity of the ocean is prominently noted -- for instance, the Merriam-Webster's entry for 'ocean' indicates the following:
  • 1 a : the whole body of salt water that covers nearly three fourths of the surface of the earth
  • b : any of the large bodies of water (as the Atlantic Ocean) into which the great ocean is divided
The original introduction is an attempt to equitably and succinctly deal with this duality (perhaps not ideally), but your edits definitely do not. I do not agree with your assertion that the '140%' interpretation is the most logical. 'In totality' may include the waters of adjoining seas, which are sometimes excluded when considering the area of the ocean(s) proper.
So, feel free to edit the introduction while keeping this duality in mind. Perhaps, for comparison, glance at the entries for 'ocean' in some other volumes. Quizimodo 08:00, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure that this dodges the point about seas particularly well, but how about ...
An ocean (from Ωκεανός, Okeanos (Oceanus) in Greek) is a major body of saline water, and a principal component of the hydrosphere. Approximately 70% of the Earth's surface (an area of some 361 million square kilometers) is covered by ocean, with more than half of this area over 3,000 meters (9,800 ft) deep. There are several geographical categorisations of the ocean area on Earth, with different schemes recognising 1 (World Ocean), 3 (Atlantic, Pacific, Indian oceans), 4 (+ Southern Ocean) or even 5 (+ Arctic Ocean) oceans. Average oceanic salinity is around 35 parts per thousand (ppt) (3.5%), and nearly all seawater has a salinity in the range of 31 to 38 ppt.
This (hopefully) improves the grammar of the intro, and introduces the idea that "ocean" is defined several different ways on Earth. Or am I missing the point? By the way, as an oceanographer, I'm much happier with salinity expressed as PSU. PPT is also correct, but salinity is rarely expressed that way in my experience. Cheers, --Plumbago 11:36, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks -- generally, I like it. As for the third sentence, in all honesty, I think it may be redundant and perhaps it can be refined or we can do without it: while it does summarise the various reckonings, these are elaborated upon in the image caption upfront and (with consideration of seas) in the 'Overview' section. (FWIW, I like how various models are briefly dealt with in the introduction of the 'continent' article.) As for salinity, I think PPT is far more common and easily understood by the general audience (and some of the volumes above indicate ocean salinity that way), but there's no reason why PSU cannot be dealt with as well/elsewhere. Quizimodo 16:34, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
Cool. I don't mind losing the third sentence, I just thought it was worth having that in there to make it clear that there are multiple definitions of the "oceans" (I'm a four basin man myself - the Arctic ain't no ocean!; except when it's the world ocean). As for PSU, well, you're probably right - PPT is more easily understood by general readers, and it's not as if readers can't follow links on salinity to find out more about the PSU scale. Cheers, --Plumbago 17:12, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your reconsideration of the intro. I consider this current edit to be perfectly acceptable. I appreciate both your comments and your well-thought out edits. But I would like you to know that I completely agree with the importance of noting that unity of the world's oceans. In fact, if you will look back here, you will see that the language used in the beginning of the second paragraph, making clear the unity of the oceans, is largely unchanged from what I wrote over six months ago. I'm not sure why you doubted my concurrence with this important concept. Anyway, looks super! Unschool 02:57, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
No problem: I don't think there's any doubt now of your concurrence; it was just that your recent edits didn't fully communicate that. :)
Speaking of which: perhaps the following sentence (or similar) can be supplanted for Plumbago's 3rd sentence above:
  • ... A continuous body of water surrounding the Earth, it is customarily divided into several principal oceans using various oceanographic criteria. ....
oceanographic = geographic instead?
It's brief and gets the point across, but is not as detailed as the originally suggested text. (It may still be redundant with content elsewhere, though.) I also intend on (belatedly) creating a brief table of the oceans, for placement in the 'Overview' section. Thoughts? Quizimodo 12:44, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed 'Oceanography' wikiproject

Please be advised that an 'oceanography' wikiproject is being proposed. I encourage any editors of this page to enroll. Thanks! Quizimodo 13:12, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No ocean pic?

Uhh, this may be a stupid question, but why is there no pic of an ocean in the article? All the charts and graphs are very informative, but they dont give you a sense of what he ocean IS.

Yeah, well, I guess that's my fault. I told another editor that I'd take such a picture myself (you know, so there'd be no copyright issues), but when I tried, even with my best panoramic lens, I just couldn't fit the whole thing in. My bad.

[edit] Proposed oceans project

Anyone interested in joining a project to deal with the oceans is free to indicate their support at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Oceans. John Carter (talk) 22:39, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] oceans

have you ever thought of how the ocean got to where it is now? well some people say that there was just one lake or pond that evaporated them made rain clouds and it rained on and on till it was the ocean.of course this would have taken millions or billions of years in the process, but it still has the point in how the ocean came to be. well imagine that the world looks like how mars looks today,"blank." (well it would have bumps and mountains of course or else there would be no land today.)it could be like that but it is almost imposible for that to be.well now imagine that the earth was all water to begine with.there could be underwater volcanoes to create the land that we live on now.for all we know we could be living on millions of extict volcanoes right now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.167.168.10 (talk) 01:38, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Legal status

I wonder, does this page mention the legal status how the oceans are treated by countries? Should it? I added a link to the Law of the Sea in the see also. – b_jonas 12:53, 11 April 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia is not always correct...

People who use wikipedia be warned... Wikipedia is not always correct. Although much of it's information is factual and real, some of it can be a lie or a twisted version of the truth. This is because anyone can edit pages and create new pages. Although Wikipedia checks edited and newly created pages, it can sometimes miss some of the false text. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.190.180.135 (talk) 10:48, 26 April 2008 (UTC)