Then Rutherford looked at Kelvin and told him that his method of determining the earth's age based upon how long it would take the earth to cool from molten rock to its present cool, solid form was essentially correct. But there was a new, previously unknown source of heat that Kelvin had not included in his calculation and therein lay his error. Kelvin apparently grinned at Rutherford for the remainder of his lecture. What was this "new" source of heat that Rutherford knew about that had thrown Kelvin's calculation so far off ?

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The new source of heat that Rutherford knew about which had thrown off Kelvins calculation of the Ea... View the full answer