Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
2nd edn (Oxford University Press, 1930) Joly accepted some of A. C. Lane's arguments
that suggested 300 million years was a better estimate for his sodium method.
Various publications by a number of English commentators on the sodium
method and chemical denudation are worthwhile consulting: T. M. Reade,
'President's Address', Proceedings of the Liverpool Geological Society 3,part3,
(1876), 211-235; T. M. Reade, Chemical Denudation in Relation to Geological
Time (London: Daniel Dogue, 1879); and T. M. Reade, 'Measurement of geological
time', Geological Magazine, New Series, 10 (1893), 97-100; W. J. Sollas, 'Anniversary
address of the President: position of geology among the sciences; on time considered
in relation to geological events and to the development of the organic world; the
rigidity of the Earth and the age of the oceans', Proceedings of the Geological Society
65 (1909), lxxxi-cxxiv. Osmund Fisher's review of Joly's 1899 paper makes interesting
reading: 'Review of ''An estimate of the Geological Age of the Earth'', by John Joly',
Geological Magazine, New Series, 7 (1900), 124-132.
Reaction from the United States came in G. F. Becker, 'Reflections on
J. Joly's method of determining the ocean's age', Science 31 (1910), 509-512;
F. W. Clarke, 'A preliminary study of chemical denudation', Smithsonian
Miscellaneous Collections 56, part 5 (1910), 1-19; G. F. Becker, 'The age of
the Earth. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections 56, part 6 (1910), 1-28;
H. S. Shelton, 'The age of the earth and the saltness of the sea', Journal of Geology
18 (1910), 190-193; and A. C. Lane, 'The Earth's age by sodium accumulation',
American Journal of Science, Series 5, 17 (1929), 342-346.
Joly's work was finally discredited by the third decade of the twentieth
century. See A. Harker, 'Some remarks on geology in relation to the exact sciences,
with an excursus on geological time', Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological
Society 19 (1914), 1-13; J. Barrell, 'Rhythms and the measurements of geologic
time', Geological Society of America Bulletin 28 (1917), 745-904; J. W. Gregory,
'The age of the Earth', Nature 108 (1921), 283-284; T. C. Chamberlin, 'The age of the
earth from the geological viewpoint', Proceedings of the American Philosophical
Society 61, part 4 (1922), 247-271; and Arthur Holmes, 'Estimates of geological
time,
with
special
reference
to
thorium
minerals
and
uranium
haloes',
Philosophical Magazine, Series 7, 1 (1926), 1055-1074.
For a modern assessment of the composition of early oceans see L. P. Knauth,
'Salinity history of the Earth's early ocean', Nature 395 (1998), 554-555.
Chapter 13. Radioactivity: invisible geochronometers
The most comprehensive account of the history and modern use of radioactivity
in dating rocks is that by G. Brent Dalrymple, The Age of the Earth (Stanford
