Solution to carbon dating debate

[Autodidact]

Carbon dating is a form of radiometric dating. Different minerals have different half-lives, so are suitable for different ranges. It's a bit as if you had an old fashioned scale with weights for 100 pounds, 10 pounds, pounds and ounces. Carbon dating is like an ounce measure.

 

[Dirty Penguin]

Carbon dating is a form of radiometric dating. Different minerals have different half-lives, so are suitable for different ranges. It's a bit as if you had an old fashioned scale with weights for 10 pounds, 10 pounds, pounds and ounces. Carbon dating is like an ounce measure.

Thanks. That helps....

 

[Alceste]

Thanks. That helps....

Penguin, the Greatest Show on Earth has a great chapter on radiometric dating, FYI. I'm finding it really fascinating and well-written if you can get over the fact Dawkins presents his narrative in the context of a creationist "controversy". That annoys me. He writes about life science as if he thinks the reader is going to find it difficult to believe and keeps throwing in digs at creationists. From my perspective, creationists are totally irrelevant to the topic of biology and I'd rather learn about it without ongoing subtext of imagined conflict (a la SJ Gould). Nevertheless, it's a wonderful book, guaranteed to satisfy your curiosity about the science of evolutionary biology.

 

[Nepenthe]

Penguin, the Greatest Show on Earth has a great chapter on radiometric dating, FYI. I'm finding it really fascinating and well-written if you can get over the fact Dawkins presents his narrative in the context of a creationist "controversy". That annoys me. He writes about life science as if he thinks the reader is going to find it difficult to believe and keeps throwing in digs at creationists. From my perspective, creationists are totally irrelevant to the topic of biology and I'd rather learn about it without ongoing subtext of imagined conflict (a la SJ Gould). Nevertheless, it's a wonderful book, guaranteed to satisfy your curiosity about the science of evolutionary biology.

Dawkins does have something of a condescending attitude, which I can certainly understand when explaining things to creationists, but it gets tedious when you just want a general clear explanation of radiometric dating or evolution or whatever. I prefer something like Strahler's Science and Earth History and use it more often than any of my textbooks. It was first published in '87 and updated in '99 but it doesn't matter much when dealing with creationist claims since they're still clinging to long dead delusions anyway.
I love him but Gould's baseball analogies bug me to no end.

I also reference TalkOrigins a lot and they have a neat paper on radiometric techniques with plenty of cool links within: Radiometric Dating and the Geological Time Scale

 

[Autodidact]

Penguin, the Greatest Show on Earth has a great chapter on radiometric dating, FYI. I'm finding it really fascinating and well-written if you can get over the fact Dawkins presents his narrative in the context of a creationist "controversy". That annoys me. He writes about life science as if he thinks the reader is going to find it difficult to believe and keeps throwing in digs at creationists. From my perspective, creationists are totally irrelevant to the topic of biology and I'd rather learn about it without ongoing subtext of imagined conflict (a la SJ Gould). Nevertheless, it's a wonderful book, guaranteed to satisfy your curiosity about the science of evolutionary biology.

I really enjoyed Zimmer, Evolution, the Triumph of an Idea, not least because it has lots of nice big pictures. IIRC the format is history of science, but it presents the science in an understandable way too. Don't remember if it talked about radiometric dating or not.

 

[Autodidact]

Here's my deal about radiometric dating. Let's say you don't understand it in the least. It's a black box to you, a clock and you don't know how the numbers get there or why we can rely on them. O.K., let's just check it. Let's take something we know the age of, like a tree that's been cut down, count the rings, independently check it with carbon dating, and see whether it comes out the same. Oh, lo, it does, how about that. In fact, so do all of them. Hmmm..., looking kinda reliable. O.K. what about ice cores. You really can't doubt that we can count them, and they go back for thousands of years in some places. Oh, look, radiometric dating matches up with that too, how about that? Well, what if we look at varves, which are also annual. Pity the poor grad student who has to count them, but we can, it's very comprehensible. There are a couple of spots on earth with millions of annual varve pairs, and when we count them--they match up with radiometric dating. That's how we know it works. We checked it.

Do they think scientists are bunch of idiots? I'd like to see one of them get a Ph.d. in Geology and then call all the Geologists a bunch of morons. Not to mention Physics.

 

[MSizer]

Penguin, the Greatest Show on Earth has a great chapter on radiometric dating, FYI. I'm finding it really fascinating and well-written if you can get over the fact Dawkins presents his narrative in the context of a creationist "controversy". That annoys me. He writes about life science as if he thinks the reader is going to find it difficult to believe and keeps throwing in digs at creationists...

Yes, but as he mentions in the beginning of the book, one of the reasons for this book is to combat the increasing pseudoscience with respect to evolution. He specifically states that it hadn't ever occured to him in the past that he'd actually have to take evolution back to basics, he just wrote his books from the perspective that evolution is a given. Since then society in general has shown that we aren't sophisticated enough to be treated as sensible when it comes to biology, so there is a need to write the book in the way that he has.

 

[Alceste]

Yes, but as he mentions in the beginning of the book, one of the reasons for this book is to combat the increasing pseudoscience with respect to evolution. He specifically states that it hadn't ever occured to him in the past that he'd actually have to take evolution back to basics, he just wrote his books from the perspective that evolution is a given. Since then society in general has shown that we aren't sophisticated enough to be treated as sensible when it comes to biology, so there is a need to write the book in the way that he has.

I guess, but I think that for anyone who is going to read the book, evolution IS a given. Creationists aren't going to touch it with a ten foot pole because his name is slapped across the cover. So I keep thinking "who's he talking to?" Can't be me, since I don't need convincing. Can't be the creationists, because they only listen to each other. I'm left with the impression he's talking to a pack of creationist bogeymen living in his head, which is a vaguely disconcerting thought.

On the other hand, he also wrote that his intention is to arm "our side" with all the evidence we need to effectively debate (I'd say "educate") creationists, so I suppose I can sort of see his reasoning, even if I find it a little off-putting because I'm not much of a "joiner". I'd rather not participate in intellectual rumbles, even if they tempt me sorely.

 

[Alceste]

I really enjoyed Zimmer, Evolution, the Triumph of an Idea

I prefer something like Strahler's Science and Earth History

Thanks, I'll put those on my list. Biology is such a fascinating subject I'd be tempted to go professional, except that I can't bear the thought of dissecting anything.

 

[Nepenthe]

I really enjoyed Zimmer, Evolution, the Triumph of an Idea, not least because it has lots of nice big pictures. IIRC the format is history of science, but it presents the science in an understandable way too. Don't remember if it talked about radiometric dating or not.

Oh yeah! Zimmer is a great writer and his blog is wonderful. Evolution, the Triumph' is great, and I'm a sucker for glossy pics too. I won't derail again with book recommendations, but speaking of glossy pics Johanson's From Lucy to Language is full of life-sized hominid fossils and is so beautiful it almost makes me cry.

 

[Alceste]

That's it. I'm going to the book store.

 

[JeLy]

That's it. I'm going to the book store.

Check your local library first!!! (IF you have a decent one)

I have the new book by Dawkins on waitlist. I love buying books - but boy am I poor. Hooray for libraries!

Another good one on evolution is Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True

 

[Alceste]

Check your local library first!!! (IF you have a decent one)

I have the new book by Dawkins on waitlist. I love buying books - but boy am I poor. Hooray for libraries!

Another good one on evolution is Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True

Oh, yeah - Dawkins actually references that one quite a bit.

Re: the library. That's where I tend to go for fiction, but these sorts of books I like to keep around since I am likely to refer to them again. Bookstore! (I'm poor too )

 

[Autodidact]

On the other hand, he also wrote that his intention is to arm "our side" with all the evidence we need to effectively debate (I'd say "educate") creationists, so I suppose I can sort of see his reasoning, even if I find it a little off-putting because I'm not much of a "joiner". I'd rather not participate in intellectual rumbles, even if they tempt me sorely.

I'd say yes, he wants to help you win your internet battles.

 

[Alceste]

I'd say yes, he wants to help you win your internet battles.

But I NEVER win. NEVER. Facts only help when you're talking to people who care about facts.

 

[JeLy]

But I NEVER win. NEVER. Facts only help when you're talking to people who care about facts.

I always try to remember this on a public forum - you may never win in the other person you're debating's mind, but on an open forum there are always other people looking. You could give them information they never knew and could help "win" them over.

 

[Alceste]

I always try to remember this on a public forum - you may never win in the other person you're debating's mind, but on an open forum there are always other people looking. You could give them information they never knew and could help "win" them over.

Well, that is a comforting thought after all.

 

[Vile Atheist]

Check your local library first!!! (IF you have a decent one)

I have the new book by Dawkins on waitlist. I love buying books - but boy am I poor. Hooray for libraries!

Another good one on evolution is Jerry Coyne's Why Evolution is True

It's a good read

 

[thedude82]

At least MoF didn't use the other creationist argument for why radioisotope dating doesn't work. "Because nothing died or got sick before the fall of man radioisotopes could emit more radiation without hurting life, so they might have decayed faster then, and we wouldn't know." Yeah...except that the earth would have been a giant breeder reactor before the "fall".