IOWA ACADEMY OP SCIENCE 
177 
favors the view that the radioactive constants are probably in error, because 
they have not been taken over data extending over a sufficiently long time, 
and under proper circumstances free from doubtful assumptions. 
I wish to suggest that there is another explanation of the discrepancy that 
requires no distrust of the radioactive constants as they have been experi- 
mentally determined. In fact the explanation is merely an extension of our 
knowledge of radioactivity to a wider field. The discrepancy disappears if 
sodium is supposed to be a radioactive element. If we accept the present data 
of radioactivity as authorative, then it must be admitted that there is not 
enough sodium in the ocean. Perhaps during geologic time elements of higher 
atomic weight may have been disintegrating into sodium, and therefore the 
annual output of the rivers now is not the average output for all time in the 
past. That is, the sodium over the land has been increasing by radioactivity 
production while sodium in the ocean has been increasing almost entirely by 
the annual river supply. Obviously this would give a greater age for the 
ocean. Or perhaps the average amount of sodium discharged annually to 
the ocean has not changed markedly, but that the sodium in the ocean has 
been very slowly disintegrating into other elements. It seems that our present 
information is not sufficient to decide which of these two views is most plausible. 
Either condition is in agreement with an earth of older age. Both conditions 
may have prevailed, and both ideas are directly in line with recent progress 
in science. Either is in agreement with further facts as presented by geo- 
chemistry. 
FURTHER EVIDENCE IN GEOLOGY INDICATING THE DECAY OF SODIUM. 
There are other soluble elements than sodium carried to the ocean by rivers, 
which indicate quite a different age of the earth, and consequently favor the 
radioactivity of sodium. Only those elements that are not deposited in the 
ocean bed or otherwise removed from the ocean water may be considered as 
for reliable information. Clark, in his Geo-Chemistry, second edition, p. 125, 
gives the following facts; the last column are my own deductions, however: 
Annual output from Amount in the Age of 
rivers, metric tonsxlO® ocean, metric tonsxlO^^ ocean 
Chlorine 155,350 25,538 160x10® 
Sodium 158,357 14,138 89x10® 
The geologists do not believe that the rivers carried on the average any less 
sodium previously than they do now. But if they did, they should also have 
carried less chlorine. We may therefore for checking purposes say nothing 
concerning the annual river output further than that it should have varied 
alike with sodium and chlorine. On this assumption the above figures show 
that there is not as much sodium in the ocean as there should be. Disregarding 
the radioactivity data altogether we see that the above evidence favors the 
radioactive decay of sodium as an element. Clarke goes further to state, “We 
can understand the accumulation of sodium in the ocean and some of the losses 
are accounted for, but the great excess of chlorine in sea water is not easily 
explained. In average river water sodium is largely in excess of chlorine; in 
the ocean the opposite is true, and we can not help asking whence the halogen 
element was derived. Here we enter the field of speculation and the evidence 
upon which we can base an opinion is scanty indeed.” 
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