The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-01-31
SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY
THE NEW PHYsIos--wATER IN
 THE GROUND.
A Perpetual Electric Generator Speaking Moving -Pictures-A Radium Indicator-Intensity of Sunlight--The Brain
 Under Electricity.


 Condensed into few words. these are the Modern Views of Matter" as ex- pounded by Sir Oliver Lodge: Electricity ls a substance, the only kind of substan g. and all matter Is merely an accumula. ton Of electric charges. It appears prob able that these electric charges are aI of exactly the same amount, although some are positive and some negative. and that the atoms of the chemical elements are formed by varying numbers and ar rangeHnts of these charges, or electrcns. Thero are about 700 electrons, $50 positive and $50 negative, fin the hydrogen atom. which has been so long regarded as the hnal and indivisible unit of matter. the-o must be about sixteen times as many in an oxygen atom, and about 255 times IS many. say 10000, in a radium atom, the heaviest known. >- -
 The land surface of the globe covers 52Ooo,Oo0 square miles. and the water sur face, 1A,7o0.o00. Taking the average pore space of the surface rocks occupied py moisture at 10 per cent S. Slichter. of the U. s. Geological Survey, estimates the amount Of ground water-which reaches & depth of six miIes-at 555,O00 million million cubic yards. This is thought to- De about one-third the amount of became water. and would cover the globe to depth Of 5000 or $500 feet.
 Radium constantly generates heat, and Wien has now shown that it may con- stantly generate electricity. It gives off both positive and negative electrons, and the former-sevcral hundred times as large as the latter--may be held back by seive of glass or any other of variety qf substances. - 
 Cation afirms that heredity is one-half derived from parents, one-fourth from grandparents, one-eighth from great Grandparents. An apparently simple idea upon which recent inventors have toiled Is that of moving pictures that can speak. The words and other sounds are easily re- corded by the photograph and moving objects are pictured by the cinemato- graph, but jt has seemed well-nigh impos. sibie 10 mako the two kinds of apparatus perform their work in exactly the same time. It is claimed that the difficulty is at last overcome by the 'chronophoEe' of Gaumont and Decaux, two French in- ventors. The clnematograph needs con siderable power while the phonograph re- quires uniform speed, but perfect syn chronism has been secured by operating
 
 receiving electric current through tkc photograph shaft and automatically reg ulated by the turns of the latter. Eli sons early dream of mechanical repio- duction of operas and plays seems dc Stined to be realized
 Suggestive at least are the conclusions of Hon.. R. J.. Strut, of Bath, Eng. He lium--Which Sir William Ramsay has In ha sslo eri ,fpta exists in the gases Of the city's largest hot mineral spring, and test of the de- posit III tie spring has revealed small proportion of radiun1. It is believed that these substances are brought up from a large deposit of radium deep in the earth By an ingenious arrabgemnt. -Ch. Fabry .a1as diminished the suns light by pas sage through q slit and then through an ammonical solution of copper sulphatt and has compared it with; d light of known candle-power. He concludes that with the sun at zenith, the solar light ait sea level is more, than 100000 times that Of q standard candle at a distance of orc meter. The intensity of light at the suns surface is about ten times as great for the same area as that in the electric arc.
 ..
 Paper car wheels, made by nEessure
 
 dition for q second set of steel tires after the first set is worn out by run of 301,- 900 miles.
 Brain substance, Von Ziemsseu has shown, is the best conductor. of electricity in the body-about 5000 times more con- ducting than muscle Investigating the action of the currents, S. Leduc con- cludes that electricity is avoided in the fro Of an exaggerated notion of %the dangers, but that when properly applied from back to front the currents are not only harmless but beneficial When a condn- uous current is passed from ear ito car the effect Is different, giddiness being pro- duced with an apparent whirling round of all objects. Sleep may be produced and for thhs the best arrangement Is a current of naiuiampores at % volts, ln- terrupted 100 times per second for nine tenths of the period of interruption. Speech disappears first, then the motor faculties. Respiration and pulse are unaf- footed, but may be temporarily or finally stopped by q moro powerful current. Awakening IS instantaneous the, after effect being one of refreshmnt.
 The atmosphere near sea-level is found by Prof. Hahn to have this composition: Nitrogen, IS per ceSt; oxygen, 21; argon. O.9; carbonic acid 0.0S; hydrogen, 0.01; tine three other elements from OO01 to 00O0l. At six miles, the average temperature