The magic of water

The Wizard

Studying Hydrology (and hydrological models) during my PhD had a much greater impact on my firmest perceptions of reality than I ever imagined.

The main culprit for this wasn’t my colleagues or local professors at the IPH, but the articles and books of a certain British hydrologist, Keith Beven. This fellow, besides looking like a wizard of the Merlin or Gandalf variety, manages to make Hydrology a far more interesting (and mysterious) science than I had ever even considered.

A hilarious situation, recorded on YouTube, is when he talks to another eminent hydrologist, the Canadian Jeffrey J. McDonnell. In this instance, after being introduced to give a lecture, Beven recommends that the students in the audience not read all of his books and articles – at the risk of never being able to complete their master’s or doctoral degrees.

At the end of 2021 (already vaccinated against covid), at a hybrid-format conference, I had the opportunity to ask him a few questions directly via teleconference. I remember him wishing me good luck with my studies.

Uncertainties

Uncertainty may be uncomfortable, but certainty is absurd.
— Voltaire

The problem with Hydrology is that there is a massive scarcity of data at the time and space scales that are truly relevant to understanding exactly what is happening.

When building computational models, this lack of information forces us to list a series of assumptions that can hardly be verified (or refuted) in practice. The result is epistemological uncertainties, rather than statistical ones, associated with the model results.

For example, the water flow in a river might be 1 m³/s; but it could also be 1.3 m³/s, or even 0.8 m³/s. We don’t have much of a basis to state which number is actually correct. An even worse situation is when very similar numbers can be obtained from quite different systems and models, leaving us once again without much solidity in our objective statements.

It comes as no surprise that Beven, a geographer by training, was never very well understood by the Hydrology scientific community, which is heavily dominated by engineers…

The Magic

There is nothing like water to be something uncertain, mysterious, causing a certain shiver, even fear. The fluidity, the beauty, the gift. The danger, the violence. Reflections, illusions, evanescent patterns.

As Carla Madeira wrote, water integrates a poetic flow of the River that flows to the Ocean. “Everything is a River”.

The uncertainties of Hydrology, a Science of numbers, dialogue closely with art and subjective perceptions. It is no coincidence that Keith Beven himself is now dedicated to making art, in his case, photography.

And with even less coincidence, he profoundly recognises the magic of the water and landscapes of Cumbria, the region where he lives in England.

Since in art nothing is created, everything is copied, I decided to follow his example. On this blog, I will release my own photographic production of South American waters alongside the posts.

(waters that are much, much more mysterious than those in England!)