3.5billion yrs

[10CC]

For 3'5billion years life has existed on this rock we call earth.
For 3.5billion years every single one of those lives has DIED (sans current).
2000yrs ago according to some people everything changed, some don't die.
For the last 2000yrs every living thing has still died.
Which reality are you prepared to accept?
That is the question.

[lao tzu]

Ok, thanks for correction and sorry for my mistake.

But this makes me wonder, how were the stones dated then? If there were used radiometric dating I still think radiometric dating is not reliable, because for example it assumes without good knowledge the conditions at the start point.

"Dammit 1213, I'm a mathemagician, not a geologist!"

But I did at one time take an interest in dating techniques, and how they're verified. There are dating techniques that are independent of initial concentrations. One of the simplest is isochron dating. Isochron dating compares separate minerals in a sample against each other, graphing out daughter and parent isotopes for each mineral, normalized using a stable isotope of the daughter element, e.g. Sr-87/Sr-86 vs. Rb-87/Sr-86 for the decay of Rb-87 to Sr-87 relative to its stable sister Sr-86. This normalized graph is a line if the minerals have not been disturbed by temperature excursions, and is thus self-verifying.

This line is called an isochron. The slope of the isochron determines the age. It is independent of initial daughter concentrations. As a bonus, the y-intercept of the isochron gives the initial concentration if anyone is interested, though I can't readily imagine why they would be.

That's a broad overview. There's a baby-step explanation at talk-origins, complete with responses to the most common young-earth creationist objections. Much better, and my primary source when investigating the topic, is Brent Dalrymple's The Age of the Earth, 1994, though he has another book covering the same topics, Ancient Earth, Ancient Skies: The Age of Earth and its Cosmic Surroundings, 2004, intended for a more general audience less fond of math and graph-reading.

As ever, Jesse

[lao tzu]

Hi Jesse,

I find your post very civil and polite.

Hello John,

I wish I could say the same.

As ever, Jesse

[10CC]

Actually, his link, Earliest evidence of life found: 3.49 billion years ago, did not include a reference to carbon dating, which, as you note, is about the ratios of C-14 to C-12, but rather a reference to the biological signal imputed by the ratio of C-13/C-12. C-13,unlike C-14, is a stable isotope. That is, C-13 doesn't decay, and hence isn't used in dating.

Ok, thanks for correction and sorry for my mistake.

But this makes me wonder, how were the stones dated then? If there were used radiometric dating I still think radiometric dating is not reliable, because for example it assumes without good knowledge the conditions at the start point.

What qualifications do you possess in the field of radiometric dating? How many years of study have you invested in this subject?

[JohnA]

Hi Jesse,

I find your post very civil and polite.

Hello John,

I wish I could say the same.

As ever, Jesse

That was not civil, nor polite

Some Priests and con men are civil and polite too. That does not follow they are not selling nonsense, have unintentional or intentional harm in mind.

Surely mathematician binary true false should be a game of proof.
Am quite disappointing that you did not respond just because I applied the same civil and polite response that you offered me. The difference was your rule 1; I applied that.

[Goat]

Actually, his link, Earliest evidence of life found: 3.49 billion years ago, did not include a reference to carbon dating, which, as you note, is about the ratios of C-14 to C-12, but rather a reference to the biological signal imputed by the ratio of C-13/C-12. C-13,unlike C-14, is a stable isotope. That is, C-13 doesn't decay, and hence isn't used in dating.

Ok, thanks for correction and sorry for my mistake.

But this makes me wonder, how were the stones dated then? If there were used radiometric dating I still think radiometric dating is not reliable, because for example it assumes without good knowledge the conditions at the start point.

You seem to think that C14 to C12 is the only form of radiometric dating. It is not.

For example, another radiometric dating method is potassium/argon. Radiocarbon dating is only accurate up to 50,000 years.

[1213]

Oh come one now. Let's be honest. "That" is not really the reason you find radiometric dating un-reliable now is it?

It seems to me that only reason why radiometric dating is taken seriously is that Evolution Theory needs that support. And Godless people need that so that they could explain why they reject God's will.

I dont think I would have in any case that reason and therefore I dont see why I would think any other way than as I think now.

In my opinion it is not reasonable to believe that we could get real ages of stones that were formed 3.5 billion years ago. Even, if I wouldnt know anything about the Bible.

This line is called an isochron. The slope of the isochron determines the age. It is independent of initial daughter concentrations. As a bonus, the y-intercept of the isochron gives the initial concentration if anyone is interested, though I can't readily imagine why they would be.

Maybe I didnt understand wholly that method, but I dont see any reason why the same problem is not with Isochron dating (Baseless assumptions are made in my opinion). And I think there is another problem in that method, how sample is prepared for dating, which is also problem in other methods also. It is possible that the preparation method distorts the result.

What qualifications do you possess in the field of radiometric dating? How many years of study have you invested in this subject?

Obviously too few, because I cant believe it.

You seem to think that C14 to C12 is the only form of radiometric dating. It is not.

For example, another radiometric dating method is potassium/argon. Radiocarbon dating is only accurate up to 50,000 years.

Yes, actually I know that there are many methods and I think they all have same problems that can distort the result and people have no way to know it, unless the measured material can be some other reliable way dated.

[lao tzu]

Oh come one now. Let's be honest. "That" is not really the reason you find radiometric dating un-reliable now is it?

It seems to me that only reason why radiometric dating is taken seriously is that Evolution Theory needs that support. And Godless people need that so that they could explain why they reject God's will.

Hello 1213,

Yes, I've heard that concern addressed before. The usual response points out that most Christians also accept both radiometric dating and evolution.

While deep time is necessary for evolution, it's important to keep in mind that it preceded and informed Darwinian evolution rather than the other way around. Darwin was given a copy of Lyell's Principles of Geology before setting out on his voyage on the Beagle.

In my opinion it is not reasonable to believe that we could get real ages of stones that were formed 3.5 billion years ago. Even, if I wouldnt know anything about the Bible.

it's not really that difficult, conceptually. Since to do so we need to track decay over the past few billions of years, we need isotopes that haven't decayed away over that time. So it's just a question of whether such isotopes exist, and, if they do, whether we can determine their half-lives in a reasonable, human-scale amount of time.

Rb-87 is such an isotope. It decays to Sr-87 via beta decay, where a neutron transforms into a proton that stays in the nucleus, and an electron that leaves but can be detected with a Geiger counter. Rubidium is fairly common, and about a quarter of it is Rb-87. Given a sample of purified Rubidium, we can calculate the number of Rb-87 atoms by weighing it. Count the decays over a few months, divide by the number of atoms and we have an accurate specific rate of decay. A little math and that decay rate can be turned into a half-life. Its half-life has been calculated in this way, and is 49 billion years.

This line is called an isochron. The slope of the isochron determines the age. It is independent of initial daughter concentrations. As a bonus, the y-intercept of the isochron gives the initial concentration if anyone is interested, though I can't readily imagine why they would be.

Maybe I didnt understand wholly that method, but I dont see any reason why the same problem is not with Isochron dating (Baseless assumptions are made in my opinion). And I think there is another problem in that method, how sample is prepared for dating, which is also problem in other methods also. It is possible that the preparation method distorts the result.

Baseless assumptions? What assumptions are these? You've spoken so far only of initial concentrations, and we can work around that using isochrons and other methods. (Zircons, for example, have zero daughter isotope initially because they can't be incorporated into the mineral when it's first crystallized.) Please understand that baseless assumptions that are unnamed are indistinguishable from baseless objections.

As far as quality control, there are whole journals and professional societies devoted to identifying and removing errors from dating labs. Have a care that your religious concerns avoid slandering professional geochronologists without cause. That would do little service to the pursuit of truth, and less than little service to the will of any god deserving of the name.

As ever, Jesse

[Goat]

Oh come one now. Let's be honest. "That" is not really the reason you find radiometric dating un-reliable now is it?

It seems to me that only reason why radiometric dating is taken seriously is that Evolution Theory needs that support. And Godless people need that so that they could explain why they reject God's will.

That is one of the most silliest arguments I have ever heard in my entire life. First of all, radiometric dating stands on it's own. It doesn't need the TOE, it doesn't need 'god' , or lack there of. It is the conclusion based on evidence, and it has been confirmed with multiple lines of evidence.

I dont think I would have in any case that reason and therefore I dont see why I would think any other way than as I think now.

It seems to me that you reject it because you think it contradicts the bible. Well, cosmology, physics and geology just don't care. The bible, or God, just do not enter into their consideration of the evaluation of the evidence, one way or another.

In my opinion it is not reasonable to believe that we could get real ages of stones that were formed 3.5 billion years ago. Even, if I wouldnt know anything about the Bible.

This line is called an isochron. The slope of the isochron determines the age. It is independent of initial daughter concentrations. As a bonus, the y-intercept of the isochron gives the initial concentration if anyone is interested, though I can't readily imagine why they would be.

Maybe I didnt understand wholly that method, but I dont see any reason why the same problem is not with Isochron dating (Baseless assumptions are made in my opinion). And I think there is another problem in that method, how sample is prepared for dating, which is also problem in other methods also. It is possible that the preparation method distorts the result.

What qualifications do you possess in the field of radiometric dating? How many years of study have you invested in this subject?

Obviously too few, because I cant believe it.

You seem to think that C14 to C12 is the only form of radiometric dating. It is not.

For example, another radiometric dating method is potassium/argon. Radiocarbon dating is only accurate up to 50,000 years.

Yes, actually I know that there are many methods and I think they all have same problems that can distort the result and people have no way to know it, unless the measured material can be some other reliable way dated.

Funny on how all these methods produce the same conclusion. It is known as 'Convergence of evidence'. Now, radiometric dating can be used on proper samples of KNOWN ages, and, guess what.. The dating method works. It give the age of the sample independently, without bias.. when we have a sample that is a known age.

[1213]

Baseless assumptions? What assumptions are these?

I think this is baseless assumption:

(Zircons, for example, have zero daughter isotope initially because they can't be incorporated into the mineral when it's first crystallized.)

...at least until I get good answer to my question: How can we be sure that it will not happen in any conditions?

[lao tzu]

Baseless assumptions? What assumptions are these?

I think this is baseless assumption:

(Zircons, for example, have zero daughter isotope initially because they can't be incorporated into the mineral when it's first crystallized.)

...at least until I get good answer to my question: How can we be sure that it will not happen in any conditions?

Hello 1213,

"Baseless" doesn't mean "incorrect"; it means lacking a base. Hence a baseless assumption isn't merely an assumption that is wrong, it is an assumption that comes out of the blue, with no support. In this case, I'm fairly confident that what we're seeing is instead a baseless objection, even more confident that the earlier objections were similarly baseless, and entirely certain the current objection is not sustainable.

Before you made this objection, or even now for that matter, could you say what the daughter element is? Or even the parent for that matter? Are you familiar with the crystal structure of a zircon? What effect does that crystal structure have on the elements that can be incorporated into it? Lack of knowledge would show the objection baseless. Knowledge of these matters forms the base of the assumption. That knowledge exists. Your accusation is baseless.

Moreover, this objection relates to a topic that had not been mentioned when you began speaking of baseless assumptions. Were there any assumptions you had in mind at the time? Surely you can understand why one might suspect you were not arguing in good faith, and are not now, but are instead merely wasting your correspondents' time.

Until you can provide reason to believe otherwise then, I bid you good day, sir.

As ever, Jesse