earth science

Moby-Duck

Moby-Duck is a earth science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Moby-Duck rather than just read about it. In short: Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author, Who Went in Search of Them is a book by Donovan Hohn concerning 28,800 plastic ducks and other toys, known as the Friendly Floatees, which were washed overboard from a container ship in the Pacific Ocean on 10 January 1992 and have subsequently been found on beaches a…

Key takeaways

Moby-Duck belongs to earth science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Moby-Duck to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Moby-Duck from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author, Who Went in Search of Them is a book by Donovan Hohn concerning 28,800 plastic ducks and other toys, known as the Friendly Floatees, which were washed overboard from a container ship in the Pacific Ocean on 10 January 1992 and have subsequently been found on beaches around the world and used by oceanographers including Curtis Ebbesmeyer to trace ocean currents. The book was published in the United States in March 2011 by Viking (ISBN 978-0670022199) and in the UK in February 2012 by Union Books (ISBN 978-1908526007) with a shorter subtitle: Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea. It was noted by The New York Times as one of the 100 Notable Books of 2011, shortlisted for the 2012 Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism, runner-up of the 2012 PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award and runner-up of the 2013 PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award. The title is a reference to Herman Melville's classic seafaring novel Moby-Dick.

References

External links Scribe publisher's description Archived 9 July 2014

Illustrations

Moby-Duck: Cover of 2012 UK edition — Cover of 2012 UK edition

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Moby-Duck

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Moby-Duck claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In earth science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Moby-Duck before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Moby-Duck ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Moby-Duck

In research: Moby-Duck appears in earth science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Moby-Duck in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Moby-Duck is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2011 English-language non-fiction books, 2011 non-fiction books, American non-fiction books, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Moby-Duck outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Moby-Duck in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Moby-Duck means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Moby-Duck out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Moby-Duck in simple terms?

Why does Moby-Duck matter?

Because it connects several earth science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Moby-Duck?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Moby-Duck.