The Oceans - A Key to the Past

In an earlier generation scientists suggested that the oceans

might be of real help in determining the age of the earth. After

all, the seas completely surround the land masses and thus receive

the output of the rivers that flow into them. The rivers carry

sediment and chemicals in solution which have eroded from the

continents.

Scientists have assumed, therefore, that most of the chemical

composition of ocean water is derived from the weathering of

rocks. Sverdrup et al wrote: "According to present theories,

most of the solid materials dissolved in the sea originated from

the weather of the crust of the earth."(2)

H. Kuenen wrote in 1965: "Apart from meteoric dust and

gaseous matter, the ultimate sources of all sediments are igneous

and metamorphic rocks."(3) And Kuenen continued:

Ground water containing dissolved matter including

silica, calcium, sodium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus,

humic acids, etc., reaches the sea by way of rivers, or

directly by seepage along the shore. Apart from gases,

including carbon dioxide, derived directly from the

atomosphere, this is the main source of dissolved matter

in the sea water . . . A minor contribution comes from

volcanic exhalations and from the expulsion of sea water

trapped between the grains of the older marine

sediments.(4)

Thus today scientists expect that much of the past history of

the earth can be deduced from the chemical content of the oceans.

For instance, the salt NaCl is the most abundant constituent of

sea water, and both Na and Cl are present in the rocks.

Therefore scientists have supposed that a knowledge of the

amount of NaCl in the sea, compared with the amount entering the

seas each year by the weathering of the land, would give a close

approximation of the age of the earth. An earth age of about 100

million years was estimated by earlier scientists by following

this assumption.

But other dating methods have been developed. Based on

radioactive decay analysis, scientists have decided that the earth

must be approximately 4.5 billions years old. The age of millions

of years deduced from the ocean evidence was decisively rejected

in favor of the longer radioactive ages.

Supposedly a much more acceptabe timetable was gained for all

of the developments imagined by evolutionists. Very little is

heard today from researchers investigating the content of sea

waters as far as total earth dating is concerned.

But the oceans still exist. Since this world is presumably

more than 4 billions years old, and since oceans as well as

continents have existed continuously, certain relationships and

equilibriums must exist between the continents and the oceans.

Contentions of earlier scientists about an earth-ocean time

relationship should still be valid. Assuming that present natural

phenomena are a key to the past, examination of the relationship

of the materials of the continents to those of the oceans should

result in some kind of a timetable for geological history.