WHAT is the value of an ocean?

This is a big question and one that it is possible to answer in vari-
ous ways. One way is to rephrase the question. What is there in the
ocean that man finds valuable?

A hasty answer might be, "I can find nothing in sea water--it's free
--it has no value because there is so much of it."

This is too hasty an answer. Actually, though it cannot be seen,
sea water contains, dissolved within itself, practically every mineral
or chemical that man finds valuable including silver, gold, uranium,
etc., and there is so much sea water that the sum total of what is dis-
solved in the sea becomes a fabulous storehouse of value. If all the sol-
ids that are dissolved in the ocean waters were suddenly dropped out
of them, or as the chemists say precipitated, the amount in metric
tons of these solids could be expressed by the figure five with sixteen
zeros following it. This would form a layer on the crust of the earth
of forty-five meters or about 150 feet; or, if the solid matter were
squeezed out of the ocean and deposited only on the land, the layer
would be 153 meters thick or roughly 500 feet.

Now man judges the value of his things in gold and silver which
he uses in his currency. Therefore the amount of gold and silver in
the sea might give us one way of judging its value. First, it would
appear that the precious metals were very poorly represented in sea

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