194 Scientific Intelligence. 



the hypothetical case was false, and that the moon has not origi- 

 nated by fission from the earth in this way. 



" (5) In applications to the binary stars the results are less defi- 

 nite because of the meager data regarding these systems. But 

 assuming that fission in stars will occur when the Jacobian ellip- 

 soids branch in the corresponding homogeneous masses, we find 

 for the density a in terms of water at the time of fission when 

 the two stars are of equal mass 



0-016 



where P must be expressed in mean solar days. Even though 

 fission should not occur until the density is ten times this amount 

 (which, if true, makes the evidence against fission in the solar 

 system much stronger), all visual binaries of two approximately 

 equal masses must have separated, if they have originated by 

 fission, while they were yet in a nebulous state. The results are 

 of the same order so long as the disparity in the two masses of a 

 binary is not very great, and this probably includes all of the 

 visual binaries. 



" (6) Certain formulas, not connected with the question of fis- 

 sion, were developed for binary systems " * * * * 



"The results obtained by the computations given are quite 

 adverse to the fission theory, in general, except if it is applied to 

 masses in the nebulous state, and seem practically conclusive 

 against it so far as the solar system is concerned, either in the 

 future or past. Perhaps the hypothesis that stars are simply 

 condensed nebulas, which has been stimulated by a century of 

 belief in the Laplacian theory, should now be accepted with 

 much greater reserve than formerly. Up to the present we have 

 made it the basis not only for work in dynamical cosmogony but 

 also in classifying the stars. It may be the time is ripe for a 

 serious attempt to see if the opposite hypothesis of the disinte- 

 gration of matter — because of enormous subatomic energies, which 

 perhaps are released in the extremes of temperature and pressure 

 existing in the interior of suns, and of its dispersion in space 

 along coronal streamers or otherwise — can not be made to satisfy 

 equally well all known phenomena. The existence of such a 

 definitely formulated hypothesis would have a very salutary 

 effect in the interpretation of the results of astronomical obser- 

 vations. We should then more readily reach what is probably a 

 more nearly correct conclusion, viz., that both aggregation and 

 dispersion of matter under certain conditions are important 

 modes of evolution, and that possibly together they lead in some 

 way to approximate cycles of an extent in time and space so far 

 not contemplated" (pp. 159, 160). 



In the next paper on " The Bearing of Molecular Activity on 

 Spontaneous Fission in Gaseous Spheroids" T. C. Chamberlin 

 considers from the standpoint of the moment of momentum the 

 postulation of a shrinking gaseous spheroid reaching a critical 

 stage at which centripetal and centrifugal forces balance each 



