Young Earth Creationism

[Euphorbia]

"Another possibility is that there existed a sort of "superforce" outside of the universe which is independent of time"...

That statement alone clearly points to a creator and as for reading the rest of your post science has no solid answer for what caused the big bang or at least you never put forth one, As far as time goes it does not exist outside of this earthbound realm.

For every finger pointed towards a creator there are three pointing back towards reality...

[Archangel Oger]

For every finger pointed towards a creator there are three pointing back towards reality...

If you lay down one finger beside three fingers the three fingers would be wider than the single finger..."broad is the path that leads to destruction"

[Stellar]

That statement alone clearly points to a creator

Not at all. I did not say that the superforce was an intelligent, conscious being. The superforce may be a physical force obeying physical laws. Unintelligent, unconscious.

Unless you can define your god to be unintelligent and unconscious, and not actually putting any "thought" into creation, then they are two separate things.

and as for reading the rest of your post science has no solid answer for what caused the big bang or at least you never put forth one,

Umm... thats exactly what I said in my post. What's your point?

As far as time goes it does not exist outside of this earthbound realm.

It certainly does exist outside of the Earth.

[saucy]

If you lay down one finger beside three fingers the three fingers would be wider than the single finger..."broad is the path that leads to destruction"

nice

[Archangel Oger]

Not at all. I did not say that the superforce was an intelligent, conscious being. The superforce may be a physical force obeying physical laws. Unintelligent, unconscious.

Unless you can define your god to be unintelligent and unconscious, and not actually putting any "thought" into creation, then they are two separate things.

Umm... thats exactly what I said in my post. What's your point?

It certainly does exist outside of the Earth.

"Umm... thats exactly what I said in my post. What's your point?"

Point being is what I said from the start science doesn't have a answer for what caused the big bang (And they never will at least not scientifically), And you can't have the order and complexity that's within the universe without a creator, The ball is not going to get rolling on its own without something or a superforce as you put it getting it started. It would have to have intelligence again (order and complexity) if it was just a random happening with still no answer as to what caused or started the random happening we would not be having this discussion.

[Copasetic]

And how many code for eyes, or how many code for any part of the physical body of any living organism?

I think you misunderstand genes. This seems a pretty common misconception because of the analogy of "blueprints" used for genes. When we draw that analogy ("genes are blueprints") it is a loose analogy. There isn't a direct mapping from "genes to organisms", like there is with say the blueprint for a building. A better analogy would be that genes are recipes, like for making a cake. You don't find "add two eggs" in the final cake, rather the cake itself is an emergent property of the process of "cooking".

Like wise there isn't genes which "code" for an eye, or any other gross anatomical feature for that matter. It gets rather complex and I don't have time to do embryological development justice right at the moment. The short version is we develop by responding to "fields" of growth factors, these make cells behave by simple rules such as "Divide into one pluripotent stem cell and one multipotent stem cell". This differential division in response to morphogenetic fields gives rise to structures like "the eye" or "arms".

Genes remember, only code for proteins. As such their cannot be a gene for the eye. There is genes however, which respond to fields who's expression of their genes (differential gene expression) results in an "eye".

Are you telling me that the genes that code for eyes, for example are not all similar across the spexctrum of all organisms that share this feature?

Yes, that is what I'm telling you. And that is what anyone who has studied biology can tell you. We can say certain eyes are homologous in gross anatomical structure (such as the mammalian eye) which is not homologous with say, the mollusk eye (even though they superficially appear the same). We know this because we can study their embryological development and see how various gene cascades leads to the eye.

Likewise, even within groups eyes are not the "same" genes. Our eyes for example, have different rhodopsins than those of dolphins (another mammal). It is clear, upon further scrutiny that genes which code for these rhodopsins come from the "same" source-That is to say an ancestral gene.

Here is where your "theory" does not work. We know that descent with modification happens (you aren't your parents, just as they aren't theirs)--In other words, individuals are born and variation is introduced into genes. This isn't a "theory" or "idea" this is an observable phenomena of life--That organisms bequeath similar, slightly different organisms.

Those modifications are done in the genes, more specifically through mutation(s) (bare in mind that encompasses a wide variety of changes at the molecular level). To explain without evolutionary theory your "theory" needs to explain descent with modification and the extrapolation of descent with modification--Clustered and Nested sets of traits, arrayed in hierarchies consistent with modifiable descent.

If it fails to do so, then you have not "offered an alternative", you've only chosen to ignore data because your model is not capable of addressing it.

My statement was not only in connection with life, but with the entire genetic map of a human being. The closser the physical features between organisms like a human and a Gorilla for example are in the high 90 percentile becasuse they do share similar features, what I'm getting at, which I'm sure you disagree with, is that they don't have to necessarily share a common ancestor for this to happen. There are other adequate explanations which can explain this.

Wrong, as I just demonstrated above, there very well could be an "alternate explanation"-But it needs to account for all the available data. Not the bits and pieces you choose because it fits into your worldview. This is where scientists and "creation scientists" part ways. In science we DO NOT start with an ending in mind and seek only to prove that ending to ourselves, because we'd need to do exactly as you have and omit data from the world around us.

Furthermore, We can easily demonstrate that some of those genes shared by us and gorillas derive from an ancestral gene through mutation which are selected for by differential survival and reproduction relative to the environmental context they exist in. Now your idea not only has to explain nested hierarchies, descent with modification, mutations and gene homologies, but selection for variant forms of genes (alleles) in differing environments.

When functions are shared between living organisms that share a high degree of common function, like a body part or even a liver, the genes will inevitably all be similar as well.

Wrong, as I pointed out above. The mammalian eye;

and mollusk eye;

,

While appearing superficially similar in both form an function are derived from two separate lines of ancestral genes which last shared company over 500 million years ago.

As such one can state that depending on the function we have common genes within all species that will function in exactly the same way with a minimum of variation.

Yes and no. As I stated, there are around 500 genes conserved across all taxa. These are for the most basic of cellular processes, such as energy generation (even though you could argue we -all eukaryotes- don't have our own "energy" genes, as much of our energy metabolism is carried out in mitochondria, which are ancient bacteria and often use their own ancestral bacterial genes for such tasks) or deciphering hereditary material.

No, because as I stated above "superficial" homology does not the homologous structure make. In fact we can use homology as a test of evolutionary theory. Something which evolutionary theory is able to account for, and your "form and function are the same because of a universal creator"-fails to explain (or as we'd say in science, you've falsified your hypothesis that "similar features have the same genes because of a common creator").

Accordingly, if this creator is such a genius then why do we see literally no borrowing between hierarchical lineages? Why for instance, since feathers are such a good idea for birds (obviously, as all birds have feathers) did the creator not "borrow" the "feather genes" to use some for bats? Or moths? Or Flying Phalanger (a flying marsupial)?

Again, your hypothesis fails to explain.

Just as my genes and yours are rather close to 100% identical as well, I may share similarities of a 0.0001% with family members, the rest are identical to yours and any other member of the human race.

?

Are you saying you may have family members you are only .0001% related too while you are near 100% related to me?

No, that is not possible, it is outside the realm of statistical likelihood. You are more related to your family than me because you share a more recent common ancestor with them. To be "more closely" related to me, you're genes would have to have a staggering number of mutations which impart a genotype closer to me than your family--Which isn't possible.

Likewise, you and I are more closely related to each other than South American Pygmies (assuming your ancestors aren't from South America) because we share a more recent common ancestor. Just as you, the pygmies and I share a more recent common ancestor than you do with say, Homo neanderthalensis . Just as you, the pygmies, neanderthal man and I share a more recent common ancestor than Australopithecus. And we all share a more recent common ancestor than with chimpanzees. Whom we all share a more recent common ancestor than with gorillas. Etc, etc, etc.

Edited October 22, 2010 by Copasetic

[Copasetic]

"Umm... thats exactly what I said in my post. What's your point?"

Point being is what I said from the start science doesn't have a answer for what caused the big bang (And they never will at least not scientifically), And you can't have the order and complexity that's within the universe without a creator, The ball is not going to get rolling on its own without something or a superforce as you put it getting it started. It would have to have intelligence again (order and complexity) if it was just a random happening with still no answer as to what caused or started the random happening we would not be having this discussion.

You are mistaking causation in the world you live in with how "causation" happens in physics. If we had a chemical reaction with 1 molecule of each that proceeded;

A + B ↔ C + D

what causes it to occur? Does a supernatural entity mediate the reaction?

[Euphorbia]

If you lay down one finger beside three fingers the three fingers would be wider than the single finger..."broad is the path that leads to destruction"

Yes....Christianity has led a pretty broad path hasn't it...

[Archangel Oger]

Yes....Christianity has led a pretty broad path hasn't it...

You mean....The humans have made a pretty broad path

[+Sherapy]

You are mistaking causation in the world you live in with how "causation" happens in physics. If we had a chemical reaction with 1 molecule of each that proceeded;

A + B ↔ C + D

what causes it to occur? Does a supernatural entity mediate the reaction?

Jay, what is your PHD in?

Thank you for the posts , I am reading and learning.

[Stellar]

Point being is what I said from the start science doesn't have a answer for what caused the big bang

And whats the point of this? So what if they dont have an answer for the cause of the big bang yet? It doesnt invalidate evolution nor the big bang.

(And they never will at least not scientifically)

You have no way of knowing that.

And you can't have the order and complexity that's within the universe without a creator,

Order and complexity? Subjective. You have no evidence to say that the "order and complexity" of the universe can not happen without a creator.

Furthermore, do you claim that this "creator" is more chaotic and less complex THAN the universe?

The ball is not going to get rolling on its own without something or a superforce as you put it getting it started.

Opinion.

It would have to have intelligence again (order and complexity) if it was just a random happening with still no answer as to what caused or started the random happening we would not be having this discussion.

There was no cause of this "random happening", nor was it "random".

If you place a ball on a slope, is it a "random happening" that it rolls downhill? No, it infact isnt random at all. It has no choice, hence its not random nor are the chances anything less than 100% that it happen.

[Beckys_Mom]

You mean....The humans have made a pretty broad path

Yes the humans that invented christianity

[IamsSon]

You have no way of knowing that.

Actually, as discussed in another thread, due to the inherent limits of science, we cannot use science to determine what happened before the Big Bang. Sure we can use information contained within the universe to make certain guesses, but as well-educated and as well-accepted as they may become, there will be no way to use science to tell whether they are anywhere near the truth or not.

There was no cause of this "random happening", nor was it "random".

If you place a ball on a slope, is it a "random happening" that it rolls downhill? No, it infact isnt random at all. It has no choice, hence its not random nor are the chances anything less than 100% that it happen.

Of course it isn't random, someone had to place the ball at the top of the hill. Not at all the same as saying something was there for no discernible reason and then for absolutely no reason it exploded.

[Dr. D]

I don't have to pick sides. I'm still "on the fence" about my faith and beliefs. As I stated in other threads, I'm on a learning curve. I don't claim to know everything when I think I know something and I'm proven wrong by much brighter people than I on this forum, then it helps me to learn. I don't like spouting out "medieval" evidence, but that's all I know at the moment. I've been "taught" certain things, things which obviously isn't true, or at least, was thought to be true a long time ago.

People don't like to mix science and God together, but I do. I love discovery. I love learning. I try to think outside the box, but I am also humble enough to admit that I don't know a lot of things.

Saucy, I am not religious but I can defend religious thought. I am not an atheist but I have often defended them within these threads. I am not a Christian but I would quickly defend any of their positions that I considered to be right.

And so it is that I offer my viewpoint on this ancient conflict between God and science.

I believe that science is a language. It is the language used to interpret the mechanisms of God's work. Whether or not he created the universe with but a word or a process of trillions of years, it cannot be readily understood by the simplicity of Genesis and demands broader linguistics to bring it into the scope of human understanding.

For some people E=MC2 is just letters from the alphabet but those who use the language of science have found it to open doors to new realms of knowledge where the monuments of human awareness are defined to sub-atomic particles.

Sometimes the translators of science make errors. Some of those errors become tradition, perpetuated in our framework of reference. Science tells us that perpetual motion does not exist and yet we watch planets endlessly orbit about the sun, driven by a impetus from the beginnings of our solar system.

Do we then find conflict between the discoveries of science and the content of scripture? Only when we do not season our thoughts with imagination. I remember once that my small daughter saw a shooting star and asked what it was. I told her that it was God striking a match across the floor of heaven. She was satisfied with it. She was delighted, actually. I am convinced that it was so with the early scribes who attempted to tell of creation in forms best understood by the rich and poor, the informed and the ignorant. It was a tale that needed to be shared with all and needed to be told in its most fundamental manner.

And so the language of science is every growing, gaining a new vocablary with each step of progress. In the end, however, I think God looks at Hubble and is content with our desire to know the mechanics of his great work and probably laughs with the knowledge that it will never happen.

[IamsSon]

Saucy, I am not religious but I can defend religious thought. I am not an atheist but I have often defended them within these threads. I am not a Christian but I would quickly defend any of their positions that I considered to be right.

And so it is that I offer my viewpoint on this ancient conflict between God and science.

I believe that science is a language. It is the language used to interpret the mechanisms of God's work. Whether or not he created the universe with but a word or a process of trillions of years, it cannot be readily understood by the simplicity of Genesis and demands broader linguistics to bring it into the scope of human understanding.

For some people E=MC2 is just letters from the alphabet but those who use the language of science have found it to open doors to new realms of knowledge where the monuments of human awareness are defined to sub-atomic particles.

Sometimes the translators of science make errors. Some of those errors become tradition, perpetuated in our framework of reference. Science tells us that perpetual motion does not exist and yet we watch planets endlessly orbit about the sun, driven by a impetus from the beginnings of our solar system.

Do we then find conflict between the discoveries of science and the content of scripture? Only when we do not season our thoughts with imagination. I remember once that my small daughter saw a shooting star and asked what it was. I told her that it was God striking a match across the floor of heaven. She was satisfied with it. She was delighted, actually. I am convinced that it was so with the early scribes who attempted to tell of creation in forms best understood by the rich and poor, the informed and the ignorant. It was a tale that needed to be shared with all and needed to be told in its most fundamental manner.

And so the language of science is every growing, gaining a new vocablary with each step of progress. In the end, however, I think God looks at Hubble and is content with our desire to know the mechanics of his great work and probably laughs with the knowledge that it will never happen.

Very nice.

[the1truebat]

I suscribe to the Great A'Tuin theory.

[xihui_firefly]

Just in response to the original post:

I'm a young-earth, literalist creationist- not sold on 6000 years specifically, but I think it's in the 10k neighborhood. As for radiometric dating, I spent a lot of time researching and thinking on the matter, and while I don't completely understand it- really nobody does- I've come to a few conclusions I think are worth considering:

1. One must assume they know the amount of parent material in the thing being dated, which nobody can actually say with any certainty.

2. One must assume that the environment decay happens in is closed. This isn't a very reasonable assumption, since most systems on earth are not closed systems. Between this and the first point, there's a good chance that the calculations could be wrong based on untestable & possibly faulty starting assumptions.

3. One must assume that the rate of decay has always been constant. This can't be proven, and if you consider all the events in the earth's history, there's no reason to believe it. Just as an example, I've seen some studies showing seasons & solar flares can affect decay rates on a small scale. If that's the case, then what do you think would be the effect of things like the earth's formation on radioactive decay rates? It's a pretty important but unaddressed problem for anybody interested in it. Chances are, no matter how you think the earth came to be, that its formative period or any other cataclysms in its past probably had some impact on decay. Thus, it's unreasonable to assume decay was constant, and if it's not constant, the whole thing goes out the window.

4. Even if you assume it was constant, there's no way to verify the dates without going to some other kind of radiometric dating, and so no independent way to verify the method. Like take K-Ar dating, for example. It's not supposed to work on anything under 100k years old. Do we have anything we can date, through entirely independent (ie. non-radiometric) methods, to be at least that old, so that we can verify that K-Ar dating works? No. So really I have no reason to believe it's valid.

5. Some studies (usually done by creationist scientists, & thus disregarded automatically like saucy said) have show it to have a lot of problems. In one study, they took volcanic rocks observed to have formed around 100 years ago and sent them to a lab to be tested. They came back with dates of up to 3.5 million years. In other, non-creationist studies, several different methods (each supposedly reliable) gave back widely varying dates for one archaeological site, so much so that they've been unable to date this level of the site for decades, and still debate it (of course, nobody questions if the dating methods themselves are wrong). In another one, they carbon-dated stuff at an archaeological site to be 2000 years old- these materials were associated with middle stone age tools (they estimated to be at about 200k years old). That's a huge discrepancy. The solution, for the researchers, was to disregard the carbon dates- not exactly compelling science. If these methods are supposed to be accurate and infallible, then why do they sometimes give "wrong" dates?

Overall, I think there's something we're missing in all this. And so, I generally will be disregarding radiometric dates until more research is done to understand it.

[+Sherapy]

Actually, as discussed in another thread, due to the inherent limits of science, we cannot use science to determine what happened before the Big Bang. Sure we can use information contained within the universe to make certain guesses, but as well-educated and as well-accepted as they may become, there will be no way to use science to tell whether they are anywhere near the truth or not.

Of course it isn't random, someone had to place the ball at the top of the hill. Not at all the same as saying something was there for no discernible reason and then for absolutely no reason it exploded.

It's because science doesn't deal in fantasy/subjectivity.

G-d/ subjective ideas are not in the scope of scientific methodology. Science deals in the practical and provides physical measurable results of the practical; contingent on the results having the ability to be repeatable/falsified.

In the absence of any measurable results from physical evidence we have no way to assign a truth value.

How can fantasy/subjectivity be measured ; if you can come up with a practical way .

By all means let science know.

[Copasetic]

Just in response to the original post:

I'm a young-earth, literalist creationist- not sold on 6000 years specifically, but I think it's in the 10k neighborhood. As for radiometric dating, I spent a lot of time researching and thinking on the matter, and while I don't completely understand it- really nobody does- I've come to a few conclusions I think are worth considering:

1. One must assume they know the amount of parent material in the thing being dated, which nobody can actually say with any certainty.

2. One must assume that the environment decay happens in is closed. This isn't a very reasonable assumption, since most systems on earth are not closed systems. Between this and the first point, there's a good chance that the calculations could be wrong based on untestable & possibly faulty starting assumptions.

3. One must assume that the rate of decay has always been constant. This can't be proven, and if you consider all the events in the earth's history, there's no reason to believe it. Just as an example, I've seen some studies showing seasons & solar flares can affect decay rates on a small scale. If that's the case, then what do you think would be the effect of things like the earth's formation on radioactive decay rates? It's a pretty important but unaddressed problem for anybody interested in it. Chances are, no matter how you think the earth came to be, that its formative period or any other cataclysms in its past probably had some impact on decay. Thus, it's unreasonable to assume decay was constant, and if it's not constant, the whole thing goes out the window.

4. Even if you assume it was constant, there's no way to verify the dates without going to some other kind of radiometric dating, and so no independent way to verify the method. Like take K-Ar dating, for example. It's not supposed to work on anything under 100k years old. Do we have anything we can date, through entirely independent (ie. non-radiometric) methods, to be at least that old, so that we can verify that K-Ar dating works? No. So really I have no reason to believe it's valid.

5. Some studies (usually done by creationist scientists, & thus disregarded automatically like saucy said) have show it to have a lot of problems. In one study, they took volcanic rocks observed to have formed around 100 years ago and sent them to a lab to be tested. They came back with dates of up to 3.5 million years. In other, non-creationist studies, several different methods (each supposedly reliable) gave back widely varying dates for one archaeological site, so much so that they've been unable to date this level of the site for decades, and still debate it (of course, nobody questions if the dating methods themselves are wrong). In another one, they carbon-dated stuff at an archaeological site to be 2000 years old- these materials were associated with middle stone age tools (they estimated to be at about 200k years old). That's a huge discrepancy. The solution, for the researchers, was to disregard the carbon dates- not exactly compelling science. If these methods are supposed to be accurate and infallible, then why do they sometimes give "wrong" dates?

Overall, I think there's something we're missing in all this. And so, I generally will be disregarding radiometric dates until more research is done to understand it.

*Sigh*. "Researching" on the internets and reading creationist literature is not "researching" radiometric dating. Please read this;

Radiometric Dating A Christian Perspective

All of it please.

[Copasetic]

Jay, what is your PHD in?

Thank you for the posts , I am reading and learning.

AMO (atomic, molecular and optical) physics. I started off in CCD research and found it boring. I left for spectroscopy and realized how much I liked biochemistry and went to biochemistry full time. I got more into molecular biology, then clinical microbiology and that's how I ended back in school in an MD program

[arglebargle]

I suscribe to the Great A'Tuin theory.

The turtle moves!

[angelusarcane]

Just in response to the original post:

I'm a young-earth, literalist creationist- not sold on 6000 years specifically, but I think it's in the 10k neighborhood. As for radiometric dating, I spent a lot of time researching and thinking on the matter, and while I don't completely understand it- really nobody does- I've come to a few conclusions I think are worth considering:

1. One must assume they know the amount of parent material in the thing being dated, which nobody can actually say with any certainty.

2. One must assume that the environment decay happens in is closed. This isn't a very reasonable assumption, since most systems on earth are not closed systems. Between this and the first point, there's a good chance that the calculations could be wrong based on untestable & possibly faulty starting assumptions.

3. One must assume that the rate of decay has always been constant. This can't be proven, and if you consider all the events in the earth's history, there's no reason to believe it. Just as an example, I've seen some studies showing seasons & solar flares can affect decay rates on a small scale. If that's the case, then what do you think would be the effect of things like the earth's formation on radioactive decay rates? It's a pretty important but unaddressed problem for anybody interested in it. Chances are, no matter how you think the earth came to be, that its formative period or any other cataclysms in its past probably had some impact on decay. Thus, it's unreasonable to assume decay was constant, and if it's not constant, the whole thing goes out the window

4. Even if you assume it was constant, there's no way to verify the dates without going to some other kind of radiometric dating, and so no independent way to verify the method. Like take K-Ar dating, for example. It's not supposed to work on anything under 100k years old. Do we have anything we can date, through entirely independent (ie. non-radiometric) methods, to be at least that old, so that we can verify that K-Ar dating works? No. So really I have no reason to believe it's valid.

5. Some studies (usually done by creationist scientists, & thus disregarded automatically like saucy said) have show it to have a lot of problems. In one study, they took volcanic rocks observed to have formed around 100 years ago and sent them to a lab to be tested. They came back with dates of up to 3.5 million years. In other, non-creationist studies, several different methods (each supposedly reliable) gave back widely varying dates for one archaeological site, so much so that they've been unable to date this level of the site for decades, and still debate it (of course, nobody questions if the dating methods themselves are wrong). In another one, they carbon-dated stuff at an archaeological site to be 2000 years old- these materials were associated with middle stone age tools (they estimated to be at about 200k years old). That's a huge discrepancy. The solution, for the researchers, was to disregard the carbon dates- not exactly compelling science. If these methods are supposed to be accurate and infallible, then why do they sometimes give "wrong" dates?

Overall, I think there's something we're missing in all this. And so, I generally will be disregarding radiometric dates until more research is done to understand it.

Answers corespond to the numbered questions:

1. There are cycles in the earth, as in all things in nature and the universe. Humankind has learned to observe and record. Do you not think with this great ability to do both that we have not tested and rested various samples over all the earth to determine a constant? I do not think such people of intelligence would just take one sample and base their findings on it. I know that they take numerous samples over an area [if it is indead something speficid in time and area that they are studying] to make sure that their results are either conclusive, inclonclusive or just nonclonclusive.

2. No one expects a closed system. There are various methods of ascertaining variables in an enviroment based on observatin of that environment.

3. Decay is not constant on all parts of the earth at all times. Again, these tests have been preformed over and over, to an almost exhaustive state. For a place like a mountain, one takes into account the notions of plate tectonics, uplift, errosion and any other factors that are native to a particular mountain. Mt. Everest surely has a different overall evolutionary path than say Mt. St. Helen. These even differ greatly to those of the "mountains" beneath the ocean that were either formed from volcanic activity or were once above water and now submerged. There are constant variables that have been observed and well noted in taking calculations of decay.

4. Science is an amazing thing, it is always expanding it's boundaries. Radio carbon dating was, I imagine, first tested against recent objects. Then they moved back in time with things that did have written information on them, such as American civil war artifacts. None of us were there to see these items being dropped, but we know that the Civil War in America existed from photos and written accounts. Then they moved back further to objects that had no writeen accounts to them other than perhaps if it was an egyptian heiroglyph that stated what year it was. There was a gradual back-dating of items that proved this method, for those objects to be within 50 years or so. Which in the grand scheme of things isn't much

5. As quoted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%E2%80%93Ar_dating "Due to the long half-life, the technique is most applicable for dating minerals and rocks more than 100,000 years old. For shorter timescales, it is likely that not enough Argon 40 will have had time to accumulate in order to be accurately measurable. K–Ar dating was instrumental in the development of the geomagnetic polarity time scale.[2] Although it finds the most utility in geological applications, it plays an important role in archaeology. One archeological application has been in bracketing the age of archeological deposits at Olduvai Gorge by dating lava flows above and below the deposits.[8] It has also been indispensable in other early east African sites with a history of volcanic activity such as Hadar, Ethiopia.[8] The K–Ar method continues to have utility in dating clay mineral diagenesis.[9] Clay minerals are less than 2 micrometres thick and cannot easily be irradiated for Ar–Ar analysis because Ar recoils from the crystal lattice"

Please provide your proof of the less than 100 year old lava that exhibits this. Also if the region tested is an active lava flow area, there are rocks that are new-ish [less than 100 years old] mixed in with rocks that are perhaps millions of years old. This is accounted by the fact that the earth's crust broke and lowers sediments were brought to the surface.

I do not discount the capacity of man to observe. Man has been observing the stars and earth changes for thousands of years, and I dare say more than 6,000 years ago.

The Bible, in my eyes, in all it's editions, translations and interpretations is just a metaphorical backdrop on which to enlighten the human soul. With all it's contracictions, omissions and deletions, is a man made book that is falable. It is not a history lesson.

[IamsSon]

Just in response to the original post:

I'm a young-earth, literalist creationist- not sold on 6000 years specifically, but I think it's in the 10k neighborhood. As for radiometric dating, I spent a lot of time researching and thinking on the matter, and while I don't completely understand it- really nobody does- I've come to a few conclusions I think are worth considering:

1. One must assume they know the amount of parent material in the thing being dated, which nobody can actually say with any certainty.

2. One must assume that the environment decay happens in is closed. This isn't a very reasonable assumption, since most systems on earth are not closed systems. Between this and the first point, there's a good chance that the calculations could be wrong based on untestable & possibly faulty starting assumptions.

3. One must assume that the rate of decay has always been constant. This can't be proven, and if you consider all the events in the earth's history, there's no reason to believe it. Just as an example, I've seen some studies showing seasons & solar flares can affect decay rates on a small scale. If that's the case, then what do you think would be the effect of things like the earth's formation on radioactive decay rates? It's a pretty important but unaddressed problem for anybody interested in it. Chances are, no matter how you think the earth came to be, that its formative period or any other cataclysms in its past probably had some impact on decay. Thus, it's unreasonable to assume decay was constant, and if it's not constant, the whole thing goes out the window.

4. Even if you assume it was constant, there's no way to verify the dates without going to some other kind of radiometric dating, and so no independent way to verify the method. Like take K-Ar dating, for example. It's not supposed to work on anything under 100k years old. Do we have anything we can date, through entirely independent (ie. non-radiometric) methods, to be at least that old, so that we can verify that K-Ar dating works? No. So really I have no reason to believe it's valid.

5. Some studies (usually done by creationist scientists, & thus disregarded automatically like saucy said) have show it to have a lot of problems. In one study, they took volcanic rocks observed to have formed around 100 years ago and sent them to a lab to be tested. They came back with dates of up to 3.5 million years. In other, non-creationist studies, several different methods (each supposedly reliable) gave back widely varying dates for one archaeological site, so much so that they've been unable to date this level of the site for decades, and still debate it (of course, nobody questions if the dating methods themselves are wrong). In another one, they carbon-dated stuff at an archaeological site to be 2000 years old- these materials were associated with middle stone age tools (they estimated to be at about 200k years old). That's a huge discrepancy. The solution, for the researchers, was to disregard the carbon dates- not exactly compelling science. If these methods are supposed to be accurate and infallible, then why do they sometimes give "wrong" dates?

Overall, I think there's something we're missing in all this. And so, I generally will be disregarding radiometric dates until more research is done to understand it.

xihui,

This is a nice try, but I'm sure someone will find a site that explains it away. It would be good if you posted a link to the story you mention in point 5, and it would also be good if you posted other examples, specific information that can't be dismissed with other generalized answers. Take for example the findings of the Age of the moon based on the rocks brought back by Apollo 11. The results of the study were published in "Science" and as this article points out, there were some interesting activities involved in getting the rocks to give the "correct" age.

Even before the Apollo 11 astronauts brought rocks back from the moon, scientists from all over the world were clamoring to get the chance to analyze them. Therefore, NASA gave many scientists the opportunity to write proposals telling how they would analyze the moon rocks if they were given the opportunity. Based on the merit of the proposals and the qualifications of the scientists, they allowed a few select scientists access to the samples. Their findings were presented at the Apollo 11 Lunar Science Conference, and the complete proceedings (335 pages) were published in the January 30, 1970, issue of Science. Nine of the papers presented at the conference deal with the age of the moon. For convenience, we have numbered those nine papers in Table 1. We will refer to those sources by number in Table 2.

Table 1. References from Science, 30 January, 1970

“The Moon Issue” dedicated to the proceedings of the Apollo 11 Lunar Science Conference

1. Mitsunobu Tatsumoto, et al., “Age of the Moon: An Isotopic Study of Uranium-Thorium-Lead Systematics of Lunar Samples” pages 461-463.
2. A. L. Albee, et al., “Ages, Irradiation History, and Chemical Composition of Lunar Rocks from the Sea of Tranquillity” pages 463-466.
3. Grenville Turner, “Argon-40/Argon-39 Dating of Lunar Rock Samples” pages 466-468.
4. Leon T. Silver, “Uranium-Thorium-Lead Isotope Relations in Lunar Materials” pages 468-471.
5. K. Gopalan, et al., “Rubidium-Strontium, Uranium, and Thorium-Lead Dating of Lunar Material” pages 471-473.
6. P. M. Hurley, et al., “Rubidium-Strontium Relations in Tranquillity Base Samples” pages 473-474.
7. William Compston, et al., “Rubidium-Strontium Chronology and Chemistry of Lunar Material” pages 474-476.
8. V. Rama Murthy, et al., “Rubidium-Strontium Age and Elemental and Isotopic Abundances of Some Trace Elements in Lunar Samples” pages 476-479.
9. R. K. Wanless, et al., “Age Determinations and Isotopic Abundance Measurements on Lunar Samples” pages 479-480.

Table 2 shows the minimum and maximum calculated ages for every moon rock.

Table 2. Minimum and Maximum Moon Rock Ages Sample Age (x 10⁹) Method Source 10003 <1.0 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 4.025 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 1 10017 < 0.25 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 4.67 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 4 10020 3.765 ²⁰⁶Pb/²³⁸U 1 3.996 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 1 10022 < 0.75 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 3.59 ± 0.06 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar high temp 3 10024 < 0.2 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 4.050 ± 0.7 ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁷Rb isochron 5 10044 < 0.8 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 3.74 ± 0.05 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar high temp 3 10045 4.17 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 4 4.17 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 4 10047 4.21 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 4 4.95 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 4 10050 3.680 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 1 4.051 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 1 10057 2.27 ⁴⁰K-⁴⁰Ar unspiked 9 4.173 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 1 10060 3.365 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 4 5.76 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 4 10061 4.594 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 1 4.710 ²⁰⁶Pb/²³⁸U 1 10062 < 1.0 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 3.83 ± 0.06 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar high temp 3 10069 0.04 Cosmic ray exposure 2 4.9 ± 0.4 ⁴⁰K-⁴⁰Ar feldspar glass 2 10071 3.374 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 1 3.826 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 1 10072 < 0.6 ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar low temp 3 4.13 ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb 4 10084 4.31 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 4 8.2 ²⁰⁸Pb/²³²Th 9 10085 4.44 ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁷Sr 2 As you can see, the age of the same rock measured by different scientists using different techniques varied widely.

We don’t have space in the printed version of the newsletter to list all the published age measurements, but we have put the entire table on our web page. Which age is correct? None of them!

Sample 10017 was dated by five different sources with nineteen different results. Here is how one of those sources tried to spin the results.

The ⁴⁰K-⁴⁰Ar ages are for No. 17: whole rock, 2.45 x 10⁹ years; the ⁴He age, 2.5 x 10⁹ years [u-Th from (2)]; plagioclase, 3.2 x 10⁹ years. For No. 44: whole rock, 3.45 x 10⁹ years; pyroxene, 3.6 x 10⁹ years. For No. 69: whole rock, 2.9 x 10⁹ years. For soil: feldspar glass, 4.9 ± 0.4 x 10⁹ years; brown glass, 1.6 x 10⁹ years.

Comparison of mineral and rock data demonstrates gas loss. The plagioclase for No. 17 yields a much higher age than the total rock, indicating Ar loss from the fine-grained, K-rich, interstitial phases. The concordance of He and Ar ages must be fortuitous. The maximum age is equal to the Rb-Sr age, and the general pattern is compatible with the Sr results. Assuming no inheritance of Ar, the age of the brown glass fragment shows that the soil contains particles produced by events of intermediate age (~ 10⁹ years). ¹

They think that the agreement between the argon age and the helium age is “fortuitous” (dumb luck) because both are too young and can’t possibly be right. They blame the error on “gas loss.” This is funny because potassium-argon dating on Earth rocks often gives dates that are too old. The “excess argon” problem has been known since 1969. ² We have talked about it in detail in a previous newsletter. ³ But, perhaps in 1970, it wasn’t well known to the scientists studying the moon rocks. Here’s what they said.

Abstract. Seven crystalline rock samples returned by Apollo 11 have been analyzed in detail by means of the ⁴⁰Ar-³⁹Ar dating technique. The extent of radiogenic argon loss in these samples ranges from 7 percent to >48 percent. Potassium-argon ages, corrected for the effects of this loss, cluster relatively closely around the value of 3.7 x 10⁹ years. Most of the vulcanism associated with the formation of the Mare Tranquillitatis presumably occurred around 3.7 x 10⁹ years ago. A major cause of the escape of gas from lunar rock is probably the impact event which ejected the rock from its place of origin to its place of discovery. Upper limits for the times at which these impact events occurred have been estimated. ⁴

Let’s not let that slip by unnoticed. The uncorrected potassium-argon dates were so young that they assumed almost half (48%) of the argon was lost in a speculative “impact event.” But even when they assume that the amount of argon in the rock was almost double what they actually measured, they only come up with 3.7 billion years, which still isn’t old enough.

Don’t let us put words in their mouths. Here is what they actually said.

The assumptions are made that the rock was free of argon when formed and that it has quantitatively retained ⁴⁰Ar, from the decay of ⁴⁰K, since that time. The assumption of quantitative argon retention is particularly inappropriate for the lunar rocks. The rocks returned to earth have been picked up loose from the surface of the moon, presumably at some distance from their place of origin. The presence of shock effects in some, if not all, of the crystalline rocks indicates that high-energy events, possibly meteorite impacts, may have transported the rocks from their place of origin to their place of discovery and it is very probable that argon loss occurred at the time of transfer. In an attempt to estimate the extent of gas loss and to apply a suitable correction to the potassium-argon age, an activation technique, the ⁴⁰Ar-³⁹Ar method, has been applied to seven of the crystalline lunar rocks. ⁵

If they hadn’t “known” the “true” age of the rocks is 4.4 billion years, would they have made these “corrections?” Of course not! They are just twisting the facts to fit their prejudice. But it gets better. Here’s the abstract by a different team of scientists.

Abstract. A K-Ar age of 2300 x 10⁶ years has been determined for a sample of type A crystalline rock (57,34). The presence of an anomalously large quantity of ⁴⁰Ar, in a sample of type C breccia (65,35) precluded the calculation of its K-Ar age. ⁶

There was so much “excess argon” in one of the moon rocks they could not even calculate the age! But the rocks they could calculate ages for had lost so much argon that they yielded an age that was slightly more than half of what it “should” have been.

Footnotes:

¹ A. L. Albee, et al., Science, 30 January 1970, “Ages, Irradiation History, and Chemical Composition of Lunar Rocks from the Sea of Tranquillity” pages 463-466.

²Disclosure, February 1997, “Exact Dating (More or Less)”

³Disclosure, September 2001, “Danny Defends Argon Dating”

⁴ Grenville Turner, Science, 30 January 1970, “Argon-40/ Argon-39 Dating of Lunar Rock Samples” pages 466-468.

⁵ibid.

⁶ R. K. Wanless, et al., Science, 30 January 1970, “Age Determinations and Isotopic Abundance Measurements on Lunar Samples” pages 479-480.

Here is another article dealing with the moon rocks: <a href="http://www.scienceagainstevolution.org/v12i8f.htm">Timeless Isochron

The articles have footnotes showing which peer-reviewed article the information originally came from, so it's not "creationist nuts" saying these things, it's scientific information and all the linked article does is provide explanations/clarifications.

[Copasetic]

xihui,

This is a nice try, but I'm sure someone will find a site that explains it away. It would be good if you posted a link to the story you mention in point 5, and it would also be good if you posted other examples, specific information that can't be dismissed with other generalized answers. Take for example the findings of the Age of the moon based on the rocks brought back by Apollo 11. The results of the study were published in "Science" and as this article points out, there were some interesting activities involved in getting the rocks to give the "correct" age.

You do realize that your article is being disingenuous correct? The studies they are citing are dating rocks of various ages because they are dating for a timeline of events on the moon. Only some of those studies are dating for the actual age of the earth.....

For instance, from the authors source;

Abstract. The 87Rb-87Sr internal isochrons for five rocks yield an age of 3.65 + 0.05 x 109 years which presumably dates the formation of the Sea of Tranquillity.

They even say as much in your author's next source;

The determination of accurate and meaningful ages of rocks and soil from many parts of the lunar surface will be of prime importance in unraveling the sequence of events which have occurred there since the moon formed as an independent object in space.

You also realize that the moon was geologically active in it's youth and still suffers impacts which because of the heat involved, is capable of creating new time-0 rocks to date?

Your authors argument is like saying "There are young and old rocks on earth" (obviously as rock is still created on earth), "therefore the great variance between the ages means they are unreliable". Rather silly no?

You also realize (obviously your author doesn't) the reason for doing the low-temperature ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar isn't to measure the "minimum age" as your author blatantly lies about. Its because doing ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar in conjunction with other techniques will tell you if the sample cannot be dated by radiometric methods. Which pretty much puts to rest your authors argument of "over dating" young rocks as old ones.......

This is also why "creationist nuts" aren't responsible for picking the rocks we use to date with.....

You've either fallen for more creationist dishonesty or are being dishonest yourself.....

From dating actual old rocks on the moon, those around during the formation, we get a consistent age of around 4-4.5 billion years. You also realize that with the error in these dating methods the "wide range" your author discusses is actually under 10% of the total age?

Here enlighten yourself;

The Apollo missions, for the first time, gave scientists the exciting opportunity to study samples from another planet. Although all the samples provide important information about the history of the Moon, for data on the age of formation of the Moon we must again look at the oldest rocks.

The surface of the Moon can be divided into the lunar highlands and the lunar maria. The highlands are mountainous upland areas that still preserve some aspects of the original impact morphology of the earliest Moon. The maria, or “seas,” are younger, lowland areas that were flooded by lava after impact by asteroid-size bodies. The Apollo missions returned samples from both the highlands and maria.

Because of the severe impact history of the early Moon and the consequent heating and metamorphism of lunar samples, the conventional K-Ar method is not particularly useful in the study of lunar rock formation because it tends to date the latest heating and impact events rather than original rock ages. The ages of lunar rocks are known primarily from 40Ar/39Ar age-spectrum and Rb-Sr isochron dating; Table 8 lists some of these ages. As can be seen from this table, the rocks from each landing site give similar ages by both methods; this agreement cannot be a mere coincidence but must reflect the true ages of the rocks within the analytical uncertainties. Table 8, however, lists only data obtained before 1974; since that time, older rocks, from the lunar highlands, have been analyzed.

Numerous 40Ar/39Ar age-spectrum ages of highland rocks fall between about 4.0 and 4.5 billion years. The oldest ages, however, have been measured by the Rb/Sr isochron method on samples from the Apollo 17 site. These include mineral isochron ages of 4.55 ± 0.1, 4.60 ± 0.1, and 4.43 ± 0.05 billion years for three different rock types. In addition, 40Ar/39Ar age-spectrum analyses from the Apollo 16 site have now shown two rocks with ages of 4.47 and 4.42 billion years (see summary in 75), and Sm-Nd isochron ages of 4.23 ± 0.05 and 4.34 ± 0.05 billion years have been determined for two Apollo 17 samples (23).

Link

Here is another article dealing with the moon rocks: <a href="http://www.scienceagainstevolution.org/v12i8f.htm">Timeless Isochron

The articles have footnotes showing which peer-reviewed article the information originally came from, so it's not "creationist nuts" saying these things, it's scientific information and all the linked article does is provide explanations/clarifications.

Baring that your website is called "ScienceagainstEvolution" (which should clue you in to it being "creationist nuts"), you should read what I have written above--The authors have clearly misrepresented the studies they are "citing"--A second clue perhaps? That's obvious to anyone who looks up the original research What is worse though, the "creationist nuts" being dishonest or you perpetuating that dishonesty?

You realize that even if radiometric dating were to be "disproved" tomorrow that would no more affect the modern synthesis (evolutionary theory) than if relativity, gravity or transition state theory were "disproved" tomorrow? Because the modern synthesis is not based upon radiometric dating, its based on molecular biology.....

Please read the Radiometric dating for Christians link Iams, don't fall in with the dishonest "creationist nuts".

Edited October 24, 2010 by Copasetic

[xihui_firefly]

*Sigh*. "Researching" on the internets and reading creationist literature is not "researching" radiometric dating. Please read this;

Radiometric Dating A Christian Perspective

All of it please.

It would be really great not to have assumptions of my level of competence thrown into the discussion. Researching includes a lot of different things, and of all the articles I mentioned, only one was by creationist researchers. And the person overseeing that experiment has a PhD in geology, and the rocks were dated independently by a well-reputed lab. Also, I know a lot about radiometric dating because I've got a degree in archaeology. I took several classes in uni about palaeolithic archaeology and human fossils trying to learn more. My opinions are based on what I read in those classes, plus what I read in creationist circles, plus just thinking a lot about it from a few different angles. I think that'd give a pretty well-informed and well-rounded look at things.

I was searching for a link to the article I mentioned with the volcanic rocks, but found a few others too, so I thought I'd just link the search page so you can have a look at some related articles, if you want. The one I mentioned is the third one down, "The Cause of Anomalous Potassium-Argon 'Ages'" etc.

http://www.icr.org/index.php?f_search_type=articles&f_keyword_any=Excess+argon’%3A+the+‘Archilles’+heel’+of+potassium-&x=21&y=6&module=home&action=submitsearch&search=AdvancedSearch&section=0&f_constraint=both&f_context_all=any&f_context_exact=any&f_context_any=any&f_context_without=any&f_context_any=any

Anyway, the thing is I don't really want to debate it. I just thought it was a good question & thought I'd offer my take on it. If you think something else, that's your prerogative, but this is what I think.