IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 
ITS 
My comment on Clarke’s statement would at once give an explanation of the 
excess of chlorine over sodium in sea water. It is, that if the chlorine has 
accumulated and disintegrated in the ocean it has been at a much slower rate 
than has been the disintegration of sodium in the ocean or slower than the 
decay of the parent of sodium where it was derived from the land. 
It is obvious that whether we consider the radioactive data or only the data 
of geo-chemistry, that it is convenient to assume sodium to be a radioactive 
element. There has been proposed by no one any other explanation for the 
discrepancies to which attention is called in this paper. However, it may be 
noted that the age of the earth as calculated from the chlorine in the ocean is 
yet much smaller than that given by the radioactive data. I . do not believe this 
discrepancy detracts from the argument as presented. 
