Age of the Earth.

[fantome profane]

This thread is to discuss/debate the age of the earth, various dating methods, and other possible evidence.

The commonly accepted age for the earth in science is approximately 4.5 billion years old (4500000000). It has been argued by various Biblical literalists that the earth is only approximately 6000 years, or sometimes 10 000 years or even sometimes 13 000 years old.

So to start with I would like to give an idea of the scale of the discrepancy that we have here. To say that the earth is only 6000 years old would be equivalent of saying that the moon is only 500 metres away (850 metres for 10 000 years or 1.1 km for 13 000 years). Or it would be the equivalent of saying the distance from New York to Los Angeles is a little over 5 metres (or just under 9 meters or just over 11 metres). So the point I am labouring to make here is that there is a huge discrepancy. And with such a huge discrepancy a few thousand years make little difference either way.

If it bothers you that I am assuming that the 4.5 billion year date is correct for my examples above just reverse it. The scale of the error here is equivalent to thinking that your living room is 4000 kilometres long, or perhaps in thinking that the nearest grocery store is 380 000 km away. Before we even begin to discuss this I want people to have a sense of how big the difference is between the respective viewpoints.

Moving on.

There are several methods used for dating the earth. There is of course radiometric dating, which are actually several different methods.

Carbon-14/Nitrogen-14
Aluminium-26/Magnesium-26
Iodine-129/Xenon-129
Samarium-147/Neodymium-143
Uranian-235/Lead-207
Potassium-40/Argon-40
Uranium-238/Lead-206
Thorium-232/Lead-208
Rhenium-187/Osium-187
Rubidium-87/Strontium

These different radiometric dating methods each cover different ranges of timescales. And when the do overlap they all agree. They all agree and none of the lead to the conclusion of a young earth.

There is also of course dendrology, which is tree ring dating. This method of dating covers much of the same time range as Carbon dating and each can be used to confirm the other. Again we have agreement in dating methods

Then there is Varve Dating which are alternating dark and light sedimentary layers which are use date the earth (also called geochronology). Again this method agrees with radiometric dating and dendrochronology.

Then there is Ice Core dating. This is similar to Varve Dating and tree rings as you can detect the layers of ice caused by variations in temperature. Again this method agrees with the others.

There may be other methods that I have not mentioned here, and I have just given a brief introduction to these. If there are any questions about these or others I hope that I or someone else will be able to answer them. I hope that as this thread moves on we will expand and explain all of these in much greater detail.

I don’t believe there are any scientific dating methods that lead to the conclusion of a young earth. But if I am wrong in this I hope that someone will correct me and we can explore those as well.

 

[Willamena]

Nonsense. Everyone knows the Earth is but a moment old.

 

[fantome profane]

Nonsense. Everyone knows the Earth is but a moment old.

And everyone knows that “a moment” is a unit of time approximately equal to 4 and a half billion years.

 

[darkendless]

It makes me sad that this is even a debate.

Anyone with a weeks learning in geology will know that the earth is at least, bare minimum, 1 billion years old ignoring more advanced geological topics.

 

[RedOne77]

There are several methods used for dating the earth. There is of course radiometric dating, which are actually several different methods.

Carbon-14/Nitrogen-14
Aluminium-26/Magnesium-26
Iodine-129/Xenon-129
Samarium-147/Neodymium-143
Uranian-235/Lead-207
Potassium-40/Argon-40
Uranium-238/Lead-206
Thorium-232/Lead-208
Rhenium-187/Osium-187
Rubidium-87/Strontium

These different radiometric dating methods each cover different ranges of timescales. And when the do overlap they all agree. They all agree and none of the lead to the conclusion of a young earth.

Radiometric dating assumes that the sample had X amount of parent to daughter ratio, and that the sample didn't gain or lose any amount of the two elements. I have yet to see any solid evidence or reason why scientists accept they know these axioms to be true. Could you possibly explain this to me?

There is also of course dendrology, which is tree ring dating. This method of dating covers much of the same time range as Carbon dating and each can be used to confirm the other. Again we have agreement in dating methods.

Dendrochronology assumes that each year produces one ring, while many studies have shown that trees can yield multiple rings per year.

Then there is Varve Dating which are alternating dark and light sedimentary layers which are use date the earth (also called geochronology). Again this method agrees with radiometric dating and dendrochronology.

I don't know anything about this dating method, but what I know of radiometric dating and dendrochronology leaves me skeptical of this one.

Then there is Ice Core dating. This is similar to Varve Dating and tree rings as you can detect the layers of ice caused by variations in temperature. Again this method agrees with the others.

As with tree ring dating, multiple layers can form in one year.

There may be other methods that I have not mentioned here, and I have just given a brief introduction to these. If there are any questions about these or others I hope that I or someone else will be able to answer them. I hope that as this thread moves on we will expand and explain all of these in much greater detail.

Indeed, I am very much a novice when it comes to dating methods; so I hope this thread will be informative.

I don’t believe there are any scientific dating methods that lead to the conclusion of a young earth. But if I am wrong in this I hope that someone will correct me and we can explore those as well.

Again I'm not familiar with any dating method in detail. I usually leave that up to the other creationists, which have become largely quiescent regarding this site. I am willing to learn what I can, just be aware that beating me here says absolutely nothing about their validity, only that you can convince an ignorant creationist to conform to your paradigm

 

[johnhanks]

Radiometric dating assumes that the sample had X amount of parent to daughter ratio, and that the sample didn't gain or lose any amount of the two elements. I have yet to see any solid evidence or reason why scientists accept they know these axioms to be true. Could you possibly explain this to me?

If errors of this kind were to creep in we would expect to see huge discrepancies when dating a rock using two or more isotopic pairs: in practice, as fantôme said, independent dating by several radiometric methods generally gives close agreement. There are also statistical methods for dealing with leakage events.

I don't know anything about this dating method, but what I know of radiometric dating and dendrochronology leaves me skeptical of this one.

Setting aside that what you know of radiometric dating and dendrochronology might charitably be called limited, think of the poor logic you are deploying here. If you were on a jury and had doubts about the testimony of witnesses A and B, would that justify your ignoring witness C?

As with tree ring dating, multiple layers can form in one year.

Odd, then, that a procedure prone to such arbitrary variability ends up agreeing closely with other dating methods.

 

[darkendless]

Geology for 12 years olds:

There is (in Tweed shire geology where i live) about 1.6m of soil before bedrock is hit. Of those 1.6 metres, the bottom 1.3m is usually low plasticity clay and ardulite (weak rock strata, like to annoy me by forming slip planes on hillsides making my job harder). Above that, 30cm is what is considered topsoil of various horizons (meaning distinct layers and various levels of organic content). So therefore, there is 1.6m of soil.

Generally speaking, it takes 9000 to develop 0.15m of soil.

Therefore, 1.6/0.15 x 9000 = 96000 years.

This is the simplest way of explaining that young earth creationism is silly, and that is ignoring bedrock and all sorts of earth pressure, the rock cycle and a tonne of other factors in calculations.

 

[gnostic]

Again I'm not familiar with any dating method in detail. I usually leave that up to the other creationists, which have become largely quiescent regarding this site.

Which is like asking a bunch of high school drop-outs clowns and louts to know theoretical astrophysics.

What make you think creationists understand radiometric dating?

They already think all the evidences accumulated by biologists, geologists, archaeologists, astronomers (and all other related fields) are wrong and their interpretations of the bible are right, without the evidences, just blind faith of their own immense knowledge and understanding.

A less than 6000 years earth is certainly not scientifically valid. Nor is the assertion of the YEC of 13,000 years.

Dinosaur fossils have been found and dated between about 230 million and 65 million years ago, confirmed not just by evolutionists, but archaeologists, geologists, earth scientists and radiometric dating scientists.

Do you know what some RF members, supporters of creationism (which probably other non-members believe in too), gave as excuses of the dinosaur fossils?

1. There were dinosaurs created about the time of Adam, but died out in the flood.
2. There were no living dinosaurs ever, God put the fossils there, and made it only looked old.
3. Or a combination the variations of the two above (1 & 2): God created dinosaur in Adam's time and died out in the flood, and God made the fossils looked old.
4. God turned dinosaurs into stones, like Medusa in Greek myth, or similar to when Lot's wife was turned into a pillar of salt.
5. The archaeologists and scientists are in global conspiracy, and created false fossil evidences.

None of these above hypotheses by the creationists have any evidence to support them. All of these claims are just ridiculous. Just wishful thinking that the dinosaurs would stop go away.

With 1st claim, there are no evidences whatsoever to support that dinosaur lived between 4000 and 10,000 years ago. All evidences support that the last of the dinosaur died out about 65 million years ago.

As to claim 2 (and 3), you would have to ask why: why would a God put fake fossils in the ground?

Claim 4 is nothing but fanciful fable created by these useless creationists. You might as well as believe in pink unicorn, fairy godmother, or ghouls and goblins.

And lastly 5, fossils are found all over the world, so why would any scientists fake them, and some of these archaeologists were actually Christians.

These claims by creationists are definitely hypotheses that have been analyzed, scrutinized and discarded as being baseless; their claims certainly not factual theories. They have tried to twist the evidences and observations found to suit agenda, which is to make bible into science textbook.

Asking creationists about science is like asking village farmer to perform neurosurgery.

Keep creationism in theology and out of science, RedOne, because that's where creationism belonged.

 

[Man of Faith]

Of course it has already been pointed out that all dating methods assume three things, what the conditions were like at time zero, there was no contamination, and a constant decay rate. The same way we have to assume evolution to find evidence for it, we have to assume millions of years to find evidence for it. We can see from global warming scientists tactics that the data that doesn't match what they want, they throw out. Same with earth age data. Recent lava flows show an old age.

 

[tumbleweed41]

Radiometric dating....lets see. How many different methods are there?
C-14, Uranium-lead, Samarium-neodymium, Potassium-argon, Rubidium-strontium,
Uranium-thorium, Fission track, Chlorine-36, Optically stimulated luminescence, argon-argon, iodine-xenon, lanthanum-barium, lead-lead, lutetium-hafnium, neon-neon , rhenium-osmium , uranium-lead-helium , uranium-uranium....


Now, each of these methods confirms the other. Then Varves also confirm the dating methods. Geological columns, ice core sampling, sedimentation, glaciation, erosion, geophysics, plate tectonics, cosmology, and astrophysics. All confirm each other as they all point to the same approximate age.

Now what could be the reason for doubting methods that cross confirm each other?

"what the conditions were like at time zero, there was no contamination, and a constant decay rate"

These are weak arguments at best. You see. That is why cross confirmation is so important. Yes, these things are "assumed", but then they are crossed checked with other known dating methods. And the results confirm the "assumptions".
This is how science works.
Falsifiability. Using multiple tests and observations to either verify or disprove the hypothesis.
Unless Young Earthers can present dating that not only confirms their 6,000-10,000 yr old date, but can also be replicated by any geophysicist, then they are just .....spitting in the wind.

 

[Man of Faith]

There is evidence that varves can be laid down quickly and from Mt. Saint Helens we see that sediments can be laid down quickly also. Plates can move quickly during a cataclism. This is further evidence that ones prior beliefs lets them see what they want to see. Also saying that YEC's dont have confirmation of a young earth is not true. I have information confirming my faith.

 

[Man of Faith]

Seeing how this is a thread that includes "other possible evidence" of the age of the earth, I feel free to post some of the YEC evidence. Let me know if I am out of line on this, I don't want to hijack the thread.

Exponential decay in the earth's magnetic field (half-life of 1400-2000 years). This half-life can't be extrapolated back more than about 10,000 years without the field becoming intolerably powerful.

 

[Gabethewiking]

Seeing how this is a thread that includes "other possible evidence" of the age of the earth, I feel free to post some of the YEC evidence. Let me know if I am out of line on this, I don't want to hijack the thread.

Exponential decay in the earth's magnetic field (half-life of 1400-2000 years). This half-life can't be extrapolated back more than about 10,000 years without the field becoming intolerably powerful.

I want you to explain why methods that you find acceptable to be valid (such as above example), whiles methods that show you are wrong invalid?

Why do the worldwide community show by hundreds, if not thousands, various way that the earth is older then 10 000 years, Conspiracy? The majority of these people are religious.

 

[tumbleweed41]

There is evidence that varves can be laid down quickly and from Mt. Saint Helens we see that sediments can be laid down quickly also. Plates can move quickly during a cataclism.

Yes, that is all taken into consideration. Especially when comparing data. This is why multiple and repeatable tests are required. Using the various dating techniques to verify. For instance. If we relied only on the sediment at Mt. St Helens, we would be foolish. but if we used radiometric dating on the volcanic rocks, observed the organic compost laid down, and took into account all other data, we could easily determine that the volcano erupted in the 1980's.
See how all data has to work together?

This is further evidence that ones prior beliefs lets them see what they want to see. Also saying that YEC's dont have confirmation of a young earth is not true. I have information confirming my faith.

No, this is evidence of known variations that are considered when comparing all data.

Seeing how this is a thread that includes "other possible evidence" of the age of the earth, I feel free to post some of the YEC evidence. Let me know if I am out of line on this, I don't want to hijack the thread.

Go right ahead.

Exponential decay in the earth's magnetic field (half-life of 1400-2000 years). This half-life can't be extrapolated back more than about 10,000 years without the field becoming intolerably powerful.

Unfortunately, you are relying on an obsolete model of the earth's interior.
The earth's magnetic field is known to have varied in intensity and reversed in polarity numerous times in the earth's history. This is entirely consistent with conventional models and geophysical evidence of the earth's interior.
Empirical measurement of the earth's magnetic field does not show exponential decay.

For further peer reviewed data see...

• Glatzmaier, G. A. and P. H. Roberts. 1995. A three-dimensional self-consistent computer simulation of a geomagnetic field reversal. Nature 377: 203-209.
• Gubbins, David, Adrian L. Jones and Christopher C. Finlay. 2006. Fall in Earth's magnetic field is erratic. Science 312: 900-902. See also: Kono, Masaru. 2006. Ships' logs and archeomagnetism. Science 312: 865-866.
• Song, X. and P. G. Richards. 1996. Seismological evidence for differential rotation of the earth's inner core. Nature 382: 221-224.

 

[Man of Faith]

I want you to explain why methods that you find acceptable to be valid (such as above example), whiles methods that show you are wrong invalid?

Why do the worldwide community show by hundreds, if not thousands, various way that the earth is older then 10 000 years, Conspiracy? The majority of these people are religious.

It is very simple Gabe, it is because of my world view. I look for creation evidence, others look for evolution evidence. I interpret all data in a YEC worldview and it fits.

 

[Gabethewiking]

It is very simple Gabe, it is because of my world view. I look for creation evidence, others look for evolution evidence. I interpret all data in a YEC worldview and it fits.

I do not look for Creation or Evolution evidence, I see the evidence that exist and make a logical conclusion after what is.

Do you not think that deciding the answer before asking is somehow a bad thing to do? As you do with YEC? This makes you deny all the real evidence given to you as it goes against your alredy decided view, does it not?

 

[Man of Faith]

I do not look for Creation or Evolution evidence, I see the evidence that exist and make a logical conclusion after what is.

Do you not think that deciding the answer before asking is somehow a bad thing to do? As you do with YEC? This makes you deny all the real evidence given to you as it goes against your alredy decided view, does it not?

When you make a logical conclusion from the evidence you are doing that based on your biases, whether you admit it or not.

 

[fantome profane]

Radiometric dating assumes that the sample had X amount of parent to daughter ratio, and that the sample didn't gain or lose any amount of the two elements. I have yet to see any solid evidence or reason why scientists accept they know these axioms to be true. Could you possibly explain this to me?

Radiometric dating does not assume that there was no daughter element present, nor does it assume that there was no lose or gain of either two elements. In fact these ideas are taken into account for every dating technique. In most cases this gives the dating method a margin of error that is usually between 1-5%. But this is nowhere near sufficient to get the kind of dates that would be required for a young earth. To get dates within the range of a young earth you would have to assume that the margin for error was around one hundred million percent. And I hope you will agree that this is absurd. This is why I spent the first part of my OP talking about the scale of the problem.

Dendrochronology assumes that each year produces one ring, while many studies have shown that trees can yield multiple rings per year.

I am not familiar with this but I will take you word for it, although I would enjoy seeing a link if you (or anyone) has one. But tree ring dendrochronology has been confirmed by carbon dating. Now you would have to argue that not only are both methods are incredibly flawed, but are incredibly flawed by exactly the same amount and in exactly the same way. And again you have to take into account the scale of the problem, to get the kind of dates necessary for a young earth you would have to assume that all trees (not just some) used for dendrochronology have produced not just multiple rings per year but have produced hundreds of rings per year. Again this is absurd.

I don't know anything about this dating method, but what I know of radiometric dating and dendrochronology leaves me skeptical of this one.

Varve dating
Varve Analysis

Again I'm not familiar with any dating method in detail. I usually leave that up to the other creationists, which have become largely quiescent regarding this site. I am willing to learn what I can, just be aware that beating me here says absolutely nothing about their validity, only that you can convince an ignorant creationist to conform to your paradigm

Nice, setting up your excuses for failure before the battle is even begun:help:. Actually I think this is very wise of you.

If we were talking about one, or even a few different dating methods then your criticisms might be valid. But there are over 40 different radiometric dating methods and they all agree. You would have to argue not only that they are all incredibly inaccurate (millions or billions of percent error), but you would also have to explain why they all give the same incredibly inaccurate answer. And then you would have to explain why all the other non-radiometric methods confirm this incredibly inaccurate answer. And then on top of that you would have to some method that supports the dates for a young earth. If you were confident of your ability to do this you would be an idiot.


Let me tell you that I am also not usually the lead science guy in these threads. I believe that I have a good grasp of general science and a good understanding of the philosophy of science. But when it comes to the math and the charts I find I have a lot of work to do. And there are usually others around here that can explain these things better than I. But although I welcome their help I am not going to bow out, I am going to try to stretch myself here. I hope that in trying to explain these concepts I will gain a better understanding of them myself.

My hope for you is that even if you are not convinced by anything in this thread you come away with a better understanding. This could in fact make you a much better proponent for a young earth. That is what we need here, not more creationists, but better creationists.

(so cut the excuses and lets get to work )

Here is a good link.

Radiometric Dating A Christian Perspective

 

[Gabethewiking]

When you make a logical conclusion from the evidence you are doing that based on your biases, whether you admit it or not.

What biased? If I know nothing about Evolution, how could I make a biased decision (counting before I knew)... Please explain.

 

[Man of Faith]

What biased? If I know nothing about Evolution, how could I make a biased decision (counting before I knew)... Please explain.

Ever since I have known you, you have been touting evolution, that is a bias. If you didn't accept evolution, you wouldn't be touting it. If you accepted creation you would be touting creation, that is what I am talking about.