[_ Old Earth _] Carbon dating in respect to Creation/ Darwinian Evolution

[abrown9]

What the tree growth rings gives us is less than 4000 years, which is mostly known.

Deep ocean sediment cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples, and speleothems does not give any dates to samples to verify their carbon compositions. These rely on other radioactive dating mechanisms, when the entire process is in question.

"basis for the terrestrial calibration data set beyond the beginning of the tree rings at 12.4 kyr".....

"INTCAL04 TERRESTRIAL RADIOCARBON AGE CALIBRATION, 0–26 CAL KYR BP"

It appears that they use tree rings up until 12400 years ago. I'm going to drop this topic here though, because like I said, I don't know that much about it and will not be able to hold an informed debate on dating via radioactive decay.

I would state my opinion that a lot of the older dating methods are probably less than perfectly accurate, whatever that means. That being said, if something is dated ~ 1 billion years old, it is probably not only 6000 years old. Maybe it's only 900 million.

 

[abrown9]

I doubt everything credited to Wikipedia. Would you cite Wiki when publishing an article for peer review? I get so surprised when the atheists who pride themselves on their logic and facts and intellectual honesty--think nothing of citing Wiki as a legitimate source for information.

Of course not. There is a substantial difference between posting on an online forum and submitting an article for peer review.

Like I said, it's about as accurate a secondary source as you are going to get, and it has the good forethought to provide hotlinks directly to the primary source that the wikipedia author based their writing on. I found the above article I linked for Felix via Wikipedia.

I also like the fact that you manged to get a jab in at atheists in your post.

Did Nature recall the study or did EB just ask them to?

Also I'm sure www.dummies.com is a bastion of intellectual integrity and fact checking.

 

[theLords]

Of course not. There is a substantial difference between posting on an online forum and submitting an article for peer review.

Like I said, it's about as accurate a secondary source as you are going to get, and it has the good forethought to provide hotlinks directly to the primary source that the wikipedia author based their writing on. I found the above article I linked for Felix via Wikipedia.

I also like the fact that you manged to get a jab in at atheists in your post.

Did Nature recall the study or did EB just ask them to?

The irony is hilarious. It's hard not to point it out.

But, a new future is on the horizon.

 

[abrown9]

The irony is hilarious. It's hard not to point it out.

But, a new future is on the horizon.

Please point out the irony for me.

And what is this new future you speak of?

 

[Barbarian]

How about outcome of 8 PhDs proving that 1 PhD you referred is wrong?

(list of young earth creationists, including a hebrew scholar as "experts")

In fact, there are tens of thousands of geologists who acknowledge that the system works. But more important than opinions (after all, you found several geologists out of tens of thousands who have a religious objection) is the evidence. As you see, it's a myth that every source gives you a different answer. Wildly divergent methods all converge on the same answer. Your YE creationists have no answer for that.

Such research, even reported in the conventional scientific literature, has found that rocks of known age often yield erroneously old radioactive age estimates because either one of the first two assumptions, or both, can be demonstrated to be false. And if the radioactive “clocks†have not always “ticked†at the currently measured slow rates but were grossly accelerated in the past

We know that's wrong. You see, if it was accelerated like that, a huge amount of ionizing radiation would have been released, killing all living things on Earth.

then these radioactive dating methods cannot be used to provide reliable age estimates for rocks.

That's been tested. Argon/argon testing accurately called the eruption that buried Pompeii. Want to learn about that?

After all, if these “clocks†don’t work on rocks of known ages

Turns out, they do. Austin's little trick was to include xenocrysts (unmelted, and therefore very old) in the sample he submitted. And he made sure he submitted it to a lab whose equipment was not calibrated for very young material. And then he claimed to be surprised when it dated the material as old.

At the end of the presentation Austin was confronted by another member of our group, who asked, "Whatever happened to Stuart Nevins? Does he publish anymore?" Those of you familiar with ICR literature may recognize the name from tracts published in the late 70's. Austin admitted that he had published under that penname. So much for his recent, Mt. St. Helen's-induced conversion to creationism.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/icr-visit/bartelt1.html

 

[Barbarian]

Deep ocean sediment cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples, and speleothems does not give any dates to samples to verify their carbon compositions. These rely on other radioactive dating mechanisms, when the entire process is in question.

No, that's false. Varves, for example, deposit two layers annually, a light colored, and a dark colored one. It's easy to count to get an accurate reading of the age of each varve. We know that they form annually, by observation, and by pollen content of the varves.

And it's a relatively simple matter to calibrate the amount of C-14 present in different ages.

 

[felix]

Before I could give a response, I want to know how half lives are calculated. Since some half lives are millions/billions of years, how are they actually experimented and confirmed to be true? I have also read that stable isotopes 'may' have half life more than the age of universe, hence have no half life. I did check Mr. Google but I can't find the actual experiment process to verify how accurate it is.

 

[jasoncran]

:D yes indeed the new future doth draweth nigh.

 

[Barbarian]

Before I could give a response, I want to know how half lives are calculated.

Is it possible that you are correcting all those physicists who worked out the methods, and you don't even know how they do it? That is stunning arrogance.

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/1997-12/879475822.Ot.r.html

 

[felix]

Is it possible that you are correcting all those physicists who worked out the methods, and you don't even know how they do it? That is stunning arrogance.

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/1997-12/879475822.Ot.r.html

If all are saying the world is flat, someone like me needs to come and correct all, right?

I would like to remind you, the Geiger-Muller Tube is a 'theory' and not a 'fact'. This is why people take theory as facts and build their own assumptions forgetting the core assumptions made. The Geiger counter can only give you the impulses made from electrons and the rest are assumptions based on theories and calculations esp, the energy given out by a decaying radioactive atom.

 

[abrown9]

If all are saying the world is flat, someone like me needs to come and correct all, right?

I would like to remind you, the Geiger-Muller Tube is a 'theory' and not a 'fact'. This is why people take theory as facts and build their own assumptions forgetting the core assumptions made. The Geiger counter can only give you the impulses made from electrons and the rest are assumptions based on theories and calculations esp, the energy given out by a decaying radioactive atom.

I would like to remind you about the difference between the word "theory" from a scientific perspective, and the word "theory" from a layman's perspective. Facts and proofs only exist in mathematics. In the physical sciences, the word theory is used to describe a hypothesis that has been enormously strengthened by piles of evidence.

Old assumptions are corrected all the time in science, but they are corrected by people who possess who are intimately knowledgeable about the area and devote their lives to studying that area. There are whole journals devoted to radiocarbon dating.

You seem to be automatically dismissing Barbarian's responses without any real consideration of what has been said. You had a question about the fluctuation of C14 in the atmosphere and that was answered. You then automatically dismissed the answer because you thought the methods of calibration were inaccurate because they relied on other forms of radiometric dating..making the logic of calibration circular (even though the two forms of radiometric dating are quite different). This was shown to be false, as there are many ways of physically determining the age of the sample (tree rings, sediments, etc.) that do not rely on radiometric dating and should be adequate to use for calibration under your strict standards (which are based on a lack of trust of any radiometric methods).

You ignored this response and then proceeded to disparage radiometric dating because you feel half-lives cannot be accurately calculated (without knowing how they calculate half-lives). You then automatically dismissed the method because it is merely a theory (a term I've found quite common on this site).. yet you are poking no holes in the theory. If you could find holes to poke, you would be a very distinguished scientist.

I would then pose this question to you: What is your true reason for doubting the validity of radiometric dating? Is it based on inaccuracies with the methods like you have claimed (and subsequently been shown contrary evidence), or is it due to religious beliefs?

 

[stovebolts]

Just wanted to say "thanks" felix :waving

 

[Barbarian]

If all are saying the world is flat, someone like me needs to come and correct all, right?

The problem is that geologists say the world is round, and you're claiming it's flat.

I would like to remind you, the Geiger-Muller Tube is a 'theory' and not a 'fact'.

Nope. It's a fact. I've seen them operate, and they are quite reliable.

This is why people take theory as facts and build their own assumptions forgetting the core assumptions made.

Inferences. The evidence from particle physics is impossible to dismiss by your hand-waving.

The Geiger counter can only give you the impulses made from electrons

No, that's wrong. Perhaps you better do some research and learn about it. Like your uninformed criticism of things you admit you don't understand, this is the wrong approach if you hope to contribute something believable here.

 

[felix]

The problem is that geologists say the world is round, and you're claiming it's flat.

Geologists didn't exist before modern days. Sometime in the past, a guy had to come and say, hey, the world is a sphere and not flat. So, he is making all the believes of the past as rubbish.

Nope. It's a fact. I've seen them operate, and they are quite reliable.

What do you mean by 'quite' reliable? You still have doubts on it.. don't you? All that a Geiger counter does is detect ionizing radiation, usually beta particles and gamma rays (or alpha rays). Wiki says, each particle detected produces a pulse of current, but the Geiger counter cannot distinguish the energy of the source particles.

Inferences. The evidence from particle physics is impossible to dismiss by your hand-waving.

I can dismiss particle physics through classical physics and vice versa yet both are correct. When you go into the level of particle physics, there are tons not yet discovered and no known equation works for most of the things at quantum level. I am not dismissing it but I am am saying to consider it as a theory rather than a fact.

No, that's wrong. Perhaps you better do some research and learn about it. Like your uninformed criticism of things you admit you don't understand, this is the wrong approach if you hope to contribute something believable here.

True, that's not my area and I am no expert in it. I learn only from wiki or google to find information. So, I will ask some questions or have a discussion with my christian friend who is doing his PhD in plasma stuff and get back to this thread.

 

[Barbarian]

Barbarian observes:
The problem is that geologists say the world is round, and you're claiming it's flat.

Geologists didn't exist before modern days. Sometime in the past, a guy had to come and say, hey, the world is a sphere and not flat. So, he is making all the believes of the past as rubbish.

When do you suppose that happened, Felix?

Barbarian observes:
Nope. It's a fact. I've seen them operate, and they are quite reliable.

What do you mean by 'quite' reliable?

For example, I've never seen one that went bad. Apparently, they build them very well, particularly the newer ones.

You still have doubts on it.. don't you?

No more than I have doubts about Bernoulli's principle. And I don't have any problem with flying.

All that a Geiger counter does is detect ionizing radiation, usually beta particles and gamma rays (or alpha rays). Wiki says, each particle detected produces a pulse of current, but the Geiger counter cannot distinguish the energy of the source particles.

There are, however, instruments that can. Geiger counters are rather crude instruments compared to the stuff of geochronologists.

Barbarian observes:
Inferences. The evidence from particle physics is impossible to dismiss by your hand-waving.

I can dismiss particle physics through classical physics and vice versa yet both are correct.

I can tell that you haven't studied either in any depth, then.

Barbarian observes:
No, that's wrong. Perhaps you better do some research and learn about it. Like your uninformed criticism of things you admit you don't understand, this is the wrong approach if you hope to contribute something believable here.

True, that's not my area and I am no expert in it.

Learn something. Do you understand how it looks when you have such basic misconceptions, and yet criticize physicists, claiming they have it wrong?

 

[felix]

Barbarian, patience my friend. I am not a young earth creationist but align myself to gap theory stuff but not completely into it, yet believe God created everything on 6 days (but a day is not 24 hrs as sun was created only on the 4th day) excluding heaven and earth as in Gen 1:1, which is even before the 1st day (i.e, heavens and earth were created before 'day' itself is defined by God).

It is also interesting to learn from scriptures that God fastened foundations of earth and laid it's corner stone which means He did design and built it which is described as one word 'God said..' in Gen account. Job 38:6-7 also describes the existence of sons of God and stars when foundations and corner stones were laid on earth which means Gen chap 1 is a very brief layman explanation not the detailed description of what God actually did during the creation process.

Having said the above, what you said regarding ages and older dates could very well be biblically correct but being older ages does not mean Darwinian Evolution is true. God created man only around 6000 years ago. Me questioning all processes are in purely in scientific sense and I am more interested in verifying C14 (as they calculate age of living beings once lived) which is also the actual question of this thread. I will get back once I have some answers from my friend who is a PhD student doing some research in plasma related.

 

[Barbarian]

Barbarian, patience my friend. I am not a young earth creationist but align myself to gap theory stuff but not completely into it, yet believe God created everything on 6 days (but a day is not 24 hrs as sun was created only on the 4th day) excluding heaven and earth as in Gen 1:1, which is even before the 1st day (i.e, heavens and earth were created before 'day' itself is defined by God).

That's a rather new idea. Originated with the Seventh-Day Adventists. As St. Augustine noted, mornings and evenings with no sun to have them, rules out Genesis as a literal six days.

It is also interesting to learn from scriptures that God fastened foundations of earth and laid it's corner stone which means He did design and built it which is described as one word 'God said..' in Gen account.

You think Earth has corners and a foundation? I thought we were done with that flat Earth stuff. And when do you think people realized the Earth wasn't flat?

Having said the above, what you said regarding ages and older dates could very well be biblically correct but being older ages does not mean Darwinian Evolution is true.

Physics, genetics, anatomy, and the nested hierarchy of living things means it's true. Scripture neither supports nor denies biology.

God created man only around 6000 years ago.

That would be odd, considering that men were building fires, building shelters, and drawing very good art on cave walls long before that.

Me questioning all processes are in purely in scientific sense and I am more interested in verifying C14 (as they calculate age of living beings once lived) which is also the actual question of this thread.

The calibration of C-14:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/varve.html

Notice dendrochronology fits very nicely in the curve.

I will get back once I have some answers from my friend who is a PhD student doing some research in plasma related.

A doctoral candidate in plasma physics is not the best person to be asking about radioisotope dating.

 

[felix]

That's a rather new idea. Originated with the Seventh-Day Adventists. As St. Augustine noted, mornings and evenings with no sun to have them, rules out Genesis as a literal six days.

It's not a new idea. It's always there since Torah was written 4000 years back and I have nothing to do with SDA cult.

You think Earth has corners and a foundation? I thought we were done with that flat Earth stuff. And when do you think people realized the Earth wasn't flat?

Hellenic period, may be? So, what's the difference?

That would be odd, considering that men were building fires, building shelters, and drawing very good art on cave walls long before that.

How did man who is good at art 50000 years before does not know how to write till 3100 BC and all of a sudden there are many languages throughout the globe?

May be there was a global flood and God dispersed mankind. You must infer from evidence mate.

The calibration of C-14:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/varve.html

Notice dendrochronology fits very nicely in the curve.

The website link questions Geiger-Müller counter: Every scientist must answer them before using them:

1. Reich never mentioned calibrating a G-M counter. Ever.
2. Whenever Reich saw a high background count, he took it as evidence that the background was emitting more radiation, not as evidence that his G-M counter was in need of recalibration.
3. Reich equated the G-M count with the radiation level, rather than with the number of charged particles passing through the tube.
4. Reich reported absolute counts per minute, without reference to the counts per minute shown by that same G-M counter on that same day for any radioactive control source. He considered the counts per minute to be an absolute measure of the radiation level, so if a given source read 400 counts per minute on one day and 800 counts per minute the next, he interpreted this to mean that the radiation flux from the source had doubled.
5. Reich had more than one G-M counter, and each counter was probably calibrated differently, yet in his writings he did not specify whether the same or a different counter was used for different measurements.
6. Reich seemed to assume that the energy to turn the rotary pulse counter came from the radiation incident to the tube, rather than from the high voltage passing through the tube.
7. Reich assumed a priori that mainstream physics had gotten it all wrong, and that a G-M counter was actually measuring orgone radiation, not charged particles or electromagnetic radiation.

Ref: http://www.rogermwilcox.com/Reich/geiger.html

 

[Barbarian]

Barbarian observes:
That's a rather new idea. Originated with the Seventh-Day Adventists. As St. Augustine noted, mornings and evenings with no sun to have them, rules out Genesis as a literal six days.

It's not a new idea. It's always there since Torah was written 4000 years back

No. It has never been orthodoxy in Judaism to believe the world is 6000 or so years old.

and I have nothing to do with SDA cult.

If you're a YE creationist, you do. Until the SDA brought YE to evangelicals, most creationists were OE. It was the form of creationism presented at the Scopes trial, for example.

Barbarian observes:
You think Earth has corners and a foundation? I thought we were done with that flat Earth stuff. And when do you think people realized the Earth wasn't flat?

Hellenic period, may be?

Nope.

So, what's the difference?

For one thing, the corners you think the Earth has. Where are these corners?

Barbarian smiles:
That would be odd, considering that men were building fires, building shelters, and drawing very good art on cave walls long before that.

How did man who is good at art 50000 years before does not know how to write till 3100 BC

Actually, we find symbolic information carved on material considerably older, at least tens of thousands of years old. We no longer know what they mean, but they were added over time to the objects, in some sort of code.

So, that, too was gradual in appearance.

and all of a sudden there are many languages throughout the globe?

Actually, the evidence shows that there were many languages long before 4000 B.C.

May be there was a global flood and God dispersed mankind. You must infer from evidence mate.

No evidence a global flood, and scripture doesn't say there was one.

The calibration of C-14:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/varve.html

Notice dendrochronology fits very nicely in the curve.

The website link questions Geiger-Müller counter: Every scientist must answer them before using them:

That's not how it's done. Sorry about that.

 

[jasoncran]

barb, while i like st.agustine but we arent catholics and the apochrya isnt scripture and uh sda is a cult and and when the word yom has a number in front of it. it can only be a unit of 24 hr measurment

for in six long ages (per barb) god made the hevens and the earth. and on the seventh age he rested.

in context that talks about the week and the seventh day being the sabbath. so if that is age then when did the first sabbath end?