The first edition of “Waves and Beaches” (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1571715.Waves_and_Beaches) by eminent oceanographer Willard Bascom in 1963 advocated throwing human-made garbage into the ocean instead of landfill. His argument was that the ocean was so much bigger, the bad stuff would get diluted, and eventually sink to the ocean floor out of harm’s way.
The first edition of “Waves and Beaches” (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1571715.Waves_and_Beaches) by eminent oceanographer Willard Bascom in 1963 advocated throwing human-made garbage into the ocean instead of landfill. His argument was that the ocean was so much bigger, the bad stuff would get diluted, and eventually sink to the ocean floor out of harm’s way.
The most recent posthumous edition in 2021 (https://www.patagonia.com/product/waves-and-beaches-the-powerful-dynamics-of-sea-and-coast-book/BK855.html) updated by a co-author and with gorgeous graphics, by the way, tries to handwave away all that by explaining ‘Eh, that was then, we know so much more now.’ I have both.
Point is, scientists can be myopically stupid as well. Laws of unintended consequence, mongoose and snake story, yada yada.
Please don’t throw chemicals into the ocean.