212
H. von Storch, J. S ¨
undermann, and L. Magaard
from the time of my arrival here to 1970. It was essentially in the tradition of W¨ ust,
studying the deep circulation. There were two motivations. The deep circulation was
per se of interest, but the deep circulation was basically considered stationary: once
you know it you know it for the century, at least. But at Scripps I had learned how fast
the upper ocean moves and that it is necessary to study the changes that are going on
within weeks and months. For that reason I concentrated the work on the Indian Ocean
Atlas on the study of the annual variation, which is of course natural for the Indian
Ocean because of the monsoons. But if you do these things you are getting new results.
By the way, that was something I learned from W¨ ust: “if you take a new instrument or measure something more frequently, you will find something new.” This is a
basic principle and this is how my Ph.D. thesis came into being.
12
There was no idea what you will find?
There was no idea what one might find. You take a new instrument, measure more
frequently than anybody before you and you are going to find something. This was
the philosophy. For instance, if everybody looks at the mean stationary state, then
you look at the variability and you will get something new. In this way I found most
interesting things.
You have here in your list
13 the question ‘Wie entsteht wissenschaftlicher
Fortschritt?’
14 and you list four items ‘F¨ orderung’, ‘Gelegenheit’, ‘Personen’,
‘Zufall’
15 . In my opinion all items are important. But a basic prerequisite for scientific Fortschritt ist, daß man sich wundert.
16 Man wundert sich ¨
uber etwas, was
nicht leicht erkl¨ arbar ist. Ich habe mich ¨
uber zwei Dinge gewundert, die schließlich
beide zum El Ni˜ no gef¨ uhrt haben.
Das erste waren die Seiches in the Baltic. Eines sch¨ onen Tages—und da kommen
wir wieder auf W¨ ust zur¨ uck—war in Kiel Hochwasser.
17 Das Hindenburgufer
18 war
¨
uberflutet und am n¨ achsten Morgen rief mich W¨ ust in sein Office und sagte, “Herr
Wyrtki haben Sie sich das Hochwasser am Hindenburgufer angesehen?” Ich sagte,
“ja, ja”. “Ja, aber wir m¨ ussen doch wissen, warum das zustande kommt. Suchen Sie
sich mal all die Daten zusammen und dann werden Sie das analysieren.” That were
12 see page 204.
13 In the tentative list of questions prepared for the interview.
14 How is scientific progress generated?
15 Funding, opportunity, people, coincidence.
16 Here, Dr. Wyrtki spontaneously changed into German: “a prerequisite for scientific progress is that one is
wondering. One is wondering about something not easily explainable. I was amazed over two things that
both finally led to El Ni˜ no. The first were the seiches in the Baltic. At a certain day the Hindenburgufer
18 in Kiel as flooded. On the next morning W¨ ust called me into his office and said, “Herr Wyrtki, have
you seen the flooding of the Hindenburgufer?” I said, “yes, yes”. “We must know how this happened.
Collect all data, and analyze them.”
17 3 December 1952; see Wyrtki, K., 1953: Die Dynamik der Wasserbewegungen im Fehmarnbelt I. Kiel.
Meeresforsch., 9 (2), 155–170.
18 A promenade in Kiel at the banks of the Kiel Bight.
H. von Storch, J. S ¨
undermann, and L. Magaard
from the time of my arrival here to 1970. It was essentially in the tradition of W¨ ust,
studying the deep circulation. There were two motivations. The deep circulation was
per se of interest, but the deep circulation was basically considered stationary: once
you know it you know it for the century, at least. But at Scripps I had learned how fast
the upper ocean moves and that it is necessary to study the changes that are going on
within weeks and months. For that reason I concentrated the work on the Indian Ocean
Atlas on the study of the annual variation, which is of course natural for the Indian
Ocean because of the monsoons. But if you do these things you are getting new results.
By the way, that was something I learned from W¨ ust: “if you take a new instrument or measure something more frequently, you will find something new.” This is a
basic principle and this is how my Ph.D. thesis came into being.
12
There was no idea what you will find?
There was no idea what one might find. You take a new instrument, measure more
frequently than anybody before you and you are going to find something. This was
the philosophy. For instance, if everybody looks at the mean stationary state, then
you look at the variability and you will get something new. In this way I found most
interesting things.
You have here in your list
13 the question ‘Wie entsteht wissenschaftlicher
Fortschritt?’
14 and you list four items ‘F¨ orderung’, ‘Gelegenheit’, ‘Personen’,
‘Zufall’
15 . In my opinion all items are important. But a basic prerequisite for scientific Fortschritt ist, daß man sich wundert.
16 Man wundert sich ¨
uber etwas, was
nicht leicht erkl¨ arbar ist. Ich habe mich ¨
uber zwei Dinge gewundert, die schließlich
beide zum El Ni˜ no gef¨ uhrt haben.
Das erste waren die Seiches in the Baltic. Eines sch¨ onen Tages—und da kommen
wir wieder auf W¨ ust zur¨ uck—war in Kiel Hochwasser.
17 Das Hindenburgufer
18 war
¨
uberflutet und am n¨ achsten Morgen rief mich W¨ ust in sein Office und sagte, “Herr
Wyrtki haben Sie sich das Hochwasser am Hindenburgufer angesehen?” Ich sagte,
“ja, ja”. “Ja, aber wir m¨ ussen doch wissen, warum das zustande kommt. Suchen Sie
sich mal all die Daten zusammen und dann werden Sie das analysieren.” That were
12 see page 204.
13 In the tentative list of questions prepared for the interview.
14 How is scientific progress generated?
15 Funding, opportunity, people, coincidence.
16 Here, Dr. Wyrtki spontaneously changed into German: “a prerequisite for scientific progress is that one is
wondering. One is wondering about something not easily explainable. I was amazed over two things that
both finally led to El Ni˜ no. The first were the seiches in the Baltic. At a certain day the Hindenburgufer
18 in Kiel as flooded. On the next morning W¨ ust called me into his office and said, “Herr Wyrtki, have
you seen the flooding of the Hindenburgufer?” I said, “yes, yes”. “We must know how this happened.
Collect all data, and analyze them.”
17 3 December 1952; see Wyrtki, K., 1953: Die Dynamik der Wasserbewegungen im Fehmarnbelt I. Kiel.
Meeresforsch., 9 (2), 155–170.
18 A promenade in Kiel at the banks of the Kiel Bight.