NEW YORK—Eleven years ago, environmental scientist Jesse Ausubel dreamed aloud in a commencement speech: What if scientists could record the sounds of the ocean in the days before propeller-driven ships and boats spanned the globe?
They would listen to chit-chat between blue whales hundreds of miles apart. They would record the familiar chirps and clicks of a pod of dolphins. And they would do so without the cacophony of humankind—and develop a better understanding of how that undersea racket has affected sea life.
