Ocean Circulation

Abstract

As the strength of Mr. Croll's conviction that he has completely demolished the “gravitation theory” of oceanic circulation by the “crucial test” to which he subjected it before the Geographical Section of the British Association, is not unlikely to influence the minds of some, I shall be glad to be allowed to point out (1) that I have never denied the existence of a horizontal “wind-circulation,” and (2) that the doctrine to which he applied his test was not mine, but a creation of his own. For his whole argument was based on the assumption that the ocean is in a state of static equilibrium; whereas the theory I advocate, which was originally advanced by Lenz, and which Sir William Thomson (in commenting upon Mr. Croll's paper and my reply to it) pronounced to be a matter “not of argument, but of irrefragable demonstration,” is, that the ocean never is and never can be in a state of equilibrium, so long as one part of it is subjected to polar cold, and another to equatorial heat; but that it is in a state of constant endeavour to recover the equilibrium which is as constantly being disturbed.