How Old Is The Earth?

[oldbadger]

Hello Pegg!

Question...... Suppose..... just suppose, that scientific dating of bone, wood, etc was proved beyond doubt; and from that it was shown that mankind had developed over the last half a million years, would the Jehovah Witness movement collapse? The point is:- I don't see for one second why it should.

Some years ago the Elder that visits me for tea, and parks his car at my place when visiting the locality, explained to me that, as you explained earlier, the Earth was clearly over 4 billion years old and that, for instance, the dinosaurs had lived and died, etc. Fine! So the bible's explanation of creation was written for anybody to grasp the basic idea of. But that was a development, in the clear evidence of new information.

Since Daniel spoke of years as 'days', and so many other examples of metaphor were used in the bible,why could not the lineage tree be metaphorical? How could this point be so integral for you? Your faith has grown so fast in my area that the Kingdom Hall that was completed only a few years ago is now so small for your Witnesses that two services have to be held to fit everybody in! Do you really think that it can crumble over this? I doubt it!

 

[Pegg]

Hello Pegg!

Question...... Suppose..... just suppose, that scientific dating of bone, wood, etc was proved beyond doubt; and from that it was shown that mankind had developed over the last half a million years, would the Jehovah Witness movement collapse? The point is:- I don't see for one second why it should.

Some years ago the Elder that visits me for tea, and parks his car at my place when visiting the locality, explained to me that, as you explained earlier, the Earth was clearly over 4 billion years old and that, for instance, the dinosaurs had lived and died, etc. Fine! So the bible's explanation of creation was written for anybody to grasp the basic idea of. But that was a development, in the clear evidence of new information.

Since Daniel spoke of years as 'days', and so many other examples of metaphor were used in the bible,why could not the lineage tree be metaphorical? How could this point be so integral for you? Your faith has grown so fast in my area that the Kingdom Hall that was completed only a few years ago is now so small for your Witnesses that two services have to be held to fit everybody in! Do you really think that it can crumble over this? I doubt it!

hi,

i view it in this way, whatever the scientists may come up with and no matter how confident they are in their results, it is still their word against Gods. A person with true faith in God is not going to be quickly shaken from their view because a scientist has come to a different conclusion and believes it is based on physical evidence.

When it comes to dating things from the past, we know there are difficulties associated with it. Perhaps the sample tested has been contaminated, a bit of wood from the heart of an old tree might contain live sap, or perhaps an organic solvent was used and a trace of the solvent might be left in the portion analyzed. Charcoal may have been penetrated by rootlets from living plants...there are many variables that cannot be 100% removed.

There is even the problem that the proportion of Carbon 14 is affected by the quantity of stable carbon in the air. In the past century, the burning of fossil fuels, especially coal and oil, has permanently increased the quantity of atmospheric carbon dioxide. This is going to affect dating no matter what anyone wants to tell you.

So we have to look at it objectively. Is the bible historically accurate? Yes. Does it contain truth pertaining to mans nature? Yes. Does it contain historically provable and accurate prophecies? Yes.
So why would we throw all that away based on the dating of a few artifacts that cannot be 100% accurately dated.


I will give the bible the benefit of the doubt before i give it to an old bone.

 

[Photonic]

hi,

i view it in this way, whatever the scientists may come up with and no matter how confident they are in their results, it is still their word against Gods. A person with true faith in God is not going to be quickly shaken from their view because a scientist has come to a different conclusion and believes it is based on physical evidence.

When it comes to dating things from the past, we know there are difficulties associated with it. Perhaps the sample tested has been contaminated, a bit of wood from the heart of an old tree might contain live sap, or perhaps an organic solvent was used and a trace of the solvent might be left in the portion analyzed. Charcoal may have been penetrated by rootlets from living plants...there are many variables that cannot be 100% removed.

There is even the problem that the proportion of Carbon 14 is affected by the quantity of stable carbon in the air. In the past century, the burning of fossil fuels, especially coal and oil, has permanently increased the quantity of atmospheric carbon dioxide. This is going to affect dating no matter what anyone wants to tell you.

So we have to look at it objectively. Is the bible historically accurate? Yes. Does it contain truth pertaining to mans nature? Yes. Does it contain historically provable and accurate prophecies? Yes.
So why would we throw all that away based on the dating of a few artifacts that cannot be 100% accurately dated.


I will give the bible the benefit of the doubt before i give it to an old bone.

Again, not understanding something does make it right for you to reject it as wrong. I can't believe how often I've had to say that in the past few days.

 

[oldbadger]

I'm cool with all of your answer! But I asked...... suppose!

The thing is, I don't know if Jehovah's Witnesses always accepted the creation account as being metaphorical,but certainly some faiths believed it was spot on literal truth, and they just accepted new evidence as it came to light, and accepted that the reports in the bible were metaphorical accounts for minds that could not possibly have taken in the facts.

So..... my point is, I honestly don't think that the Jehovah's Witness movement would be affected one jot by this, one way or the other. And this is not a crafty underhand move of mine! Just what I think. Your faith grows faster than you can built Halls around here! Honest!

 

[PolyHedral]

scientists have to assume that the rate of decay was the same millions of years ago as it is today....that creates a degree of doubt.

They know what the rate of decay is today, but they dont know what it was 5,000 years ago... does the atmosphere contain the same amount of radioactivity as it did 10,000 years ago or a 100,000 years ago? Is the atmosphere the same now as it was back then? These are possible variables that they do not know for sure.

The rate of decay may not have been as severe as it is today...can all the additional pollutants in todays atmosphere increase the rate of decay? Considering nuclear waste and the nuclear bombs that have been released into the atmosphere in the past 100 years, it would be naive to assume that the atmosphere is the same now as it was back then, right? Things may appear much older then they might actually be.

The rate of decay of carbon-13 into carbon-12 is based on the ratio of the strong and electromagnetic force strengths, and the mass of the proton. These things are fundamental constants of the universe. They are not going to change.

Also, the atom bomb was only invented 60 years ago. We are arguing on time-scale of 50,000+ years. 0.1% uncertainty doesn't mean much.

 

[oldbadger]

Again, not understanding something does make it right for you to reject it as wrong. I can't believe how often I've had to say that in the past few days.

Have you read what you just wrote? ....not understanding does make it right..... to reject......

Just look at how easy it is for a scientist to make a mistake and reverse everything. You can't always trust these scientists!!

 

[Photonic]

The rate of decay of carbon-13 into carbon-12 is based on the ratio of the strong and electromagnetic force strengths, and the mass of the proton. These things are fundamental constants of the universe. They are not going to change.

Also, the atom bomb was only invented 60 years ago. We are arguing on time-scale of 50,000+ years. 0.1% uncertainty doesn't mean much.

Hijacking your response to add on to that.

Uncertainty also includes large scale events like that. It's shown as a lump sum of uncertainty to us, but in the background all that stuff is calculated. This is called calibration.

 

[oldbadger]

The rate of decay of carbon-13 into carbon-12 is based on the ratio of the strong and electromagnetic force strengths, and the mass of the proton. These things are fundamental constants of the universe. They are not going to change.

Also, the atom bomb was only invented 60 years ago. We are arguing on time-scale of 50,000+ years. 0.1% uncertainty doesn't mean much.

Yep.... got all that..... mind blown-away as usual. But the Penguin got in there ahead of you with some god smacking detail. Brilliant stuff.

I just can't see how this is that important when somebody reported a creation and human development in 'easy-stuff' style for early minds.

 

[Me Myself]

hi,

i view it in this way, whatever the scientists may come up with and no matter how confident they are in their results, it is still their word against Gods.

You mean their word against one of the many books that says come from Divine inspiration.

So we have to look at it objectively. Is the bible historically accurate? Yes.

You cannot say that objectively. Sure, there is some history in the bible, but there is some history in Spiderman too. I wouldn´t call either to be "historically accurate"

Does it contain historically provable and accurate prophecies? Yes.

You might want to go to this thread:

http://www.religiousforums.com/foru...ufilled-biblical-prophesy-19.html#post3103549

Cause I haven´t seen one convincing prophecy.

So why would we throw all that away based on the dating of a few artifacts that cannot be 100% accurately dated.

Cause they are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay closer to objectivity than what you just claimed.

 

[Man of Faith]

I can tell you one thing, without an old earth, the religious book written by Darwin couldn't be true.

 

[Pegg]

I'm cool with all of your answer! But I asked...... suppose!

The thing is, I don't know if Jehovah's Witnesses always accepted the creation account as being metaphorical,but certainly some faiths believed it was spot on literal truth, and they just accepted new evidence as it came to light, and accepted that the reports in the bible were metaphorical accounts for minds that could not possibly have taken in the facts.

the genesis account is a literal account of the creation in our view. We accept that it was God who created the universe, the earth, living things and mankind. But what the bible does not state is exactly how God did it. It doesnt give specific detailed analysis which is why it does not contradict the study of biology... biology gives us the 'details' of how things grow and change over time (evolve if you prefer to use that word) So we can accept the scientific explanation without ditching the bible in the process.

So..... my point is, I honestly don't think that the Jehovah's Witness movement would be affected one jot by this, one way or the other. And this is not a crafty underhand move of mine! Just what I think. Your faith grows faster than you can built Halls around here! Honest!

I agree. But the reason why we dont loose faith in the bible is as stated above, the bible doesnt seek to give the details. God has not revealed how he created all these things...he's left it up to us to search and discover his wonderful creation.

The reason we dont allow ourselves to be completely swept up in all the claims of science is because not all science is accurate. And no scientist is infallible...people make mistakes and come to the wrong conclusions. So when science claims that living things developed naturally on earth, we have to question that and really look closely at the other side of the coin. Life only comes from pre-existing life, yet the claim is made that this wasnt always the case...that is a highly dubious claim and not one that can be demonstrated or proven. Seeing they cannot prove it, i dont think we should believe it, do you?

 

[Photonic]

I can tell you one thing, without an old earth, the religious book written by Darwin couldn't be true.

:sleep:

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

hi,

i view it in this way, whatever the scientists may come up with and no matter how confident they are in their results, it is still their word against Gods. A person with true faith in God is not going to be quickly shaken from their view because a scientist has come to a different conclusion and believes it is based on physical evidence.

If that's really your position, why the arguments that the physical evidence is being interpreted incorrectly?

If you are bound and determined to hold fast to your interpretation of the Bible in the face of any and all evidence, why do you feel the need to try to refute it?

I mean, you have a ready-made excuse that negates any evidence: the hand of God. God (or the Devil, or any supernatural character you like) could create evidence that hints at anything while still adhering to the timeline of the Bible.

So why go to all this effort? Why not just brush it all off by saying something like "the scientists' conclusions could be all valid, but it doesn't matter, because if they are, it just means God is miraculous."

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

scientists have to assume that the rate of decay was the same millions of years ago as it is today....that creates a degree of doubt.

They know what the rate of decay is today, but they dont know what it was 5,000 years ago...

Radioactive isotopes of carbon have the same half-life everywhere. This goes back to those fundamental principles of nuclear physics I touched on.

does the atmosphere contain the same amount of radioactivity as it did 10,000 years ago or a 100,000 years ago? Is the atmosphere the same now as it was back then? These are possible variables that they do not know for sure.

The amount is variable, but this can be accounted for:

The variability of the C-14/C-12 ratio, and the need for calibration, has been recognized since 1969 (Dickin 1995, 364-366). Calibration is possible by analyzing the C-14 content of items dated by independent methods. Dendrochronology (age dating by counting tree rings) has been used to calibrate C-14/C-12 ratios back more than 11,000 years before the present (Becker and Kromer 1993; Becker et al. 1991). C-14 dating has been calibrated back more than 30,000 years by using uranium-thorium dating of corals (Bard et al. 1990; Edwards et al. 1993), to 45,000 yeas ago by using U-Th dates of glacial lake varve sediments (Kitagawa and van der Plicht 1998), and to 50,000 years ago using ocean cores from the Cariaco Basin which have been calibrated to the annual layers of the Greenland Ice Sheet (Hughen et al. 2004).

CD011.1: Carbon-14 Variability

 

[Me Myself]

I can tell you one thing, without an old earth, the religious book written by Darwin couldn't be true.

You dont even need an old Earth. For the religious book that Darwin wrote to bee true, we would at least need that it existed. So as you can see, the religious book that Darwin wrote, is not true (or false, for that matter,... or "is"... in any way)

 

[Me Myself]

the genesis account is a literal account of the creation in our view. We accept that it was God who created the universe, the earth, living things and mankind. But what the bible does not state is exactly how God did it. It doesnt give specific detailed analysis which is why it does not contradict the study of biology... biology gives us the 'details' of how things grow and change over time (evolve if you prefer to use that word) So we can accept the scientific explanation without ditching the bible in the process.



I agree. But the reason why we dont loose faith in the bible is as stated above, the bible doesnt seek to give the details. God has not revealed how he created all these things...he's left it up to us to search and discover his wonderful creation.

The reason we dont allow ourselves to be completely swept up in all the claims of science is because not all science is accurate. And no scientist is infallible...people make mistakes and come to the wrong conclusions. So when science claims that living things developed naturally on earth, we have to question that and really look closely at the other side of the coin. Life only comes from pre-existing life, yet the claim is made that this wasnt always the case...that is a highly dubious claim and not one that can be demonstrated or proven. Seeing they cannot prove it, i dont think we should believe it, do you?

The thing is, you can believe a compilation of books made by people since like 2000 years ago, or you can believe the millions of evidence that support the reality of evolution and the age of the Earth.

So you either go on hearsay of some people thousands of years dead that say (and wrote) that they had revelation from God, or you can believe people alive today that can not only tell you their conclusions but show you how they got said conclusions and show you every part of the thought process.

 

[Photonic]

You dont even need an old Earth. For the religious book that Darwin wrote to bee true, we would at least need that it existed. So as you can see, the religious book that Darwin wrote, is not true (or false, for that matter,... or "is"... in any way)

I believe he is speaking about the Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin.

Which is ironic, considering it's simply a book of historical significance in the scientific community, not necessarily a book containing all the truths of evolution.

Also taking into consideration that Darwin did not know at the time the method by which characteristics in a species passed from one generation to the next. (Genetics)

 

[Me Myself]

I believe he is speaking about the Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin.

Which is ironic, considering it's simply a book of historical significance in the scientific community, not necessarily a book containing all the truths of evolution.

Also taking into consideration that Darwin did not know at the time the method by which characteristics in a species passed from one generation to the next. (Genetics)

I am giving him the benefit of the doubt about making such a stupid claim as that of the origin of species being a religious book.

 

[Looncall]

scientists have to assume that the rate of decay was the same millions of years ago as it is today....that creates a degree of doubt.

They know what the rate of decay is today, but they dont know what it was 5,000 years ago... does the atmosphere contain the same amount of radioactivity as it did 10,000 years ago or a 100,000 years ago? Is the atmosphere the same now as it was back then? These are possible variables that they do not know for sure.

The rate of decay may not have been as severe as it is today...can all the additional pollutants in todays atmosphere increase the rate of decay? Considering nuclear waste and the nuclear bombs that have been released into the atmosphere in the past 100 years, it would be naive to assume that the atmosphere is the same now as it was back then, right? Things may appear much older then they might actually be.



and it is based on the level of carbon 14 in the atmosphere today, but has the level always been the same as it is now? That level depends, in the first instance, on the rate at which it is produced by cosmic rays. Cosmic rays vary greatly in intensity at times, being largely affected by changes in the earth’s magnetic field. Magnetic storms on the sun sometimes increase the cosmic rays a thousandfold for a few hours. The earth’s magnetic field has been both stronger and weaker in past millenniums. And since the explosion of nuclear bombs, the worldwide level of carbon 14 has increased substantially.
So it is only 'assumed' that the atmosphere and the rate of decay is the same today as it was back then.

Has our atmosphere changed in recent times? Yes it has. We know global warming is caused by the release of carbon, so the atmosphere is not always stable...that being the case there is no point assuming the atmosphere is always the same. Its not. Even when the sun sends out a solar flare, we know it sends so much radiation to earth that there can be a sudden spike in the temperature. This is why radiocarbon dating may not be as accurate as believed...it is good for dating relatively young objects, but still should not be considered 100% accurate.

As others have pointed out upthread, radioactivity is very thoroughly understood and is linked to the fundamental properties of the universe. One can calculate with confidence that changes in those properties that are large enough to accommodate the time scale needed by creationist liars would also render the universe uninhabitable.

Further, there are dating techniques that have nothing to do with radioactivity, and they agree with the radiometric methods.

Your position is absolutely untenable and grotesquely dishonest. If you are determined to cling to superstition, why not just say so and leave the hard work of many, many honest researchers alone?

 

[Silvercoat]

Earth is 4.52 billion years old AND earth is 6000 years old.
Earth's orbital speed around the sun has not always been the same.
Today it is said to be ~30 km per second.
4000 years ago it was a lot slower than that. (0.3 km/s)
That's why back then one year (== one full orbit around the sun) lasted a lot longer than one year lasts today.
And 5000 years ago earth's orbital speed was even a lot slower than 0.3 km/s.
So this explains how earth can be 4.52 billions years AND 6000 years old.
The duration of ONE year has varied greatly in the course of ages.
5000 years ago ONE year (==ONE full orbit) lasted as long as 100000 years would last today.
Easy explanation for those many different theories about the distant past.
Is this theory convincing, too?