"The sea fryseth not": science and the open polar sea in the nineteenth century

Abstract

While generally dismissed by historians as a romantic fantasy, the theory of an open polar sea fit into the context of a more unified view of the natural world developed in the early nineteenth century and exemplified by romantic philosophical ideas. Oersted's discovery of electromagnetism encouraged research into the possible connections between electricity, magnetism, heat and light. At the same time, there was renewed interest in geomagnetism inspired by Hansteen's revival of the four-pole theory of the Earth's magnetic field. Incorporating these works into a new theory of climate created a space for an ice-free Arctic by allowing a milder climate in the high latitudes. This attempt to fuse the study of meteorology and geomagnetism reinforced existing beliefs in an open polar sea and placed this sailor's dream into a holistic worldview that joined different natural phenomena in an effort to find one unifying principle behind all of nature.