Thin Ice

Other local sea leaders are equally excited by Ocean Solutions’ potential. Hopkins Director George Somero sees the center as a breath of energy that will expand the marine research balloon, formalize existing relationships and attract funding. That’ll draw more students, he says, positioning the Monterey Bay area as the training ground for the next generation of ocean experts. “There are real implications here for how to better manage the ocean,” he says in the cramped office he shares with two standard poodles.

Just a few blocks away, in the spacious downtown building housing the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary office, Sanctuary research coordinator Andrew DeVogelaere shares Somero’s enthusiasm. “I think that this will bring in a whole new group for solving problems,” he says.

While Sanctuary administrators make policy governing the protected area, they don’t deal with the social or legal aspects of marine management. “I think that [Ocean Solutions] has things to offer there,” he says. “We can’t take on the whole world, but they can.”

DeVogelaere hits on a touchy subject for the center’s coordinators, who tiptoe on the ice of credibility as they merge science and policy. Ocean Solutions aims to mediate rather than advocate, engage in “dispassionate analysis” rather than lobbying – but it’s a fine line.

Alternately sitting, jumping up, and pacing in his office about 25 minutes’ drive up Highway 1, Moss Landing Marine Laboratories Director Kenneth Coale explains the difference. In his view, Ocean Solutions is a vehicle that can shuttle the lab’s painstakingly gathered data into the hands of people who can take action. “Policy is such a human process. It’s not informed by fact; it’s informed by opinion,” he says. “Democracy is doomed if people keep making stupid decisions because they’re ignorant about environmental policy.”

But he emphasizes that scientific credibility suffers if researchers are seen as having economic or political stakes in their research: “Scientists have always avoided the public spotlight and been reluctant to speak about public issues. We are trying to do science that will inform policy, but we’re really trying to maintain a sharp division between the two.”

Stanford’s Buzz Thompson hones the distinction: While the center will avoid advocacy, it may produce ideas that activist organizations can push into adoption. “Crucial for the success of the Center for Ocean Solutions is that it maintain a reputation for scientific objectivity,” he says.

That makes Ocean Solutions an unlikely haven for activists making emotional pleas for the sake of the sea. More likely, the center hailed as revolutionary by its admirers will involve straight-laced wonks, pencil pushers and flesh-pressers discussing the future of humanity via seminars and PowerPoint presentations.

The goal, of course, is to remain anchored in data rather than dogma. But the scientific community’s deadpan diplomacy also can have the unintended effect of misleading the public, McNutt warns. “The whole culture of science is to move instantly away from everything we agree on and focus entirely on the parts that are still in debate,” she says. “By not being very clear about the groundswell of agreement on climate change, the public was confused. We don’t want to make the same mistake with the ocean.”