Summations Only

I submit your posts as evidence. The fact that you can't come up with any plausible defence of the flood story is rather better than anything you've produced.

While strictly off-topic this post deal with issues raised in the thread ad is at least tangentially related in that it deals with what happened following the Flood.Mindspawn claims that the earliest cave dwellings and the earliest cities were in Turkey and that this is in agreement with the flood model.What the Bible says:The Ark came aground in the mountains of Urartu (the Eastern edge of Turkey)Noah planted a vineyard, presumably somewhere in the vicinity of the ArkThat some time later all of the people went East and built a brick city in the Land of Shinar (believed to be Sumeria). Genesis 11 indicates that the people were scattered no more than 310 years after the flood.Now it is clear that living in caves isn't mentioned. Nor are any major permanent settlements prior to Babel - there isn't even a good reason to expect any. Nor is there a good reason for choosing Turkey as the region of interest - we should be primarily looking at Urartu, Shinar and the land immediately west of Shinar which would correspond in modern terms to the Eastern edge of Turkey and modern Syria and Iraq.Moreover, in the Bible the major dispersal of the people comes from Babel, in Sumeria, not from Turkey.It should also be noted that the major point is not the presence of settlements IN the region of interest, but the ABSENCE of settlements outside it. The Bible does not describe them building much in the way of settlements prior to Babel - but it does clearly indicated that there were no other humans around.Mindspawn's scenarioMindspawn places the Flood at the boundary between the Permian and the Triassic. He's said almost nothing about how his compressed timescale relates even to the Biblical chronology aside from that. But it's clear that the earliest post-Flood settlements should appear in the Triassic and we have to question whether even Babel should appear later than, say, the Cretaceous.Mindspawn's evidence (from Message 549):I will give the conventional dates on the understanding that Mindspawn accepts them only as indications of relative age.

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Early Turkish caves:
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The occupation of this cave is dated to 45,000 years ago. However, humans were using the Blombos Cave in South Africa 100,000 years ago. And that's a Middle Stone Age site.(Another post pointed to a cave in Laos that was occupied at least 47,000 years ago).This cave is also outside the primary region of interest, being too far West.

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Could you kindly back up your statements with evidence when you confidently state that the earliest buildings were not found in Turkey. The earliest building is the Gobekli Tepe temple in Turkey:
Gbekli Tepe - Wikipedia
Ancient surprises in Turkey

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This may be the earliest stone structure known with construction of stone circles maybe starting as early as 9600 BC, but that is hardly enough to say that it is the earliest building. There was a settlement at Jericho at about the same time. Indeed, it would be better for Mindspawn's argument if Gobekli Tepe did not exist, because the mud-brick built, small, settlement at Jericho is more in line with what the Bible would lead us to expect of the period between the Flood and Babel.It must be noted that all these dates are surprisingly late, given Mindspawn's scenario. Gobekli Tepe was not abandoned until around 8000 BC. Can we really fit everything that is dated from the beginning of the Triassic to 8000 BC in a period of 300 years or less ?In summary, the Blompas cave in itself is enough to refute Mindspawn's claim. Biblically there should be no people in South Africa in the period between the Flood and Babel. Even using modern dates as indicators of relevant age Blompas cannot reasonably be moved to later than Gobekli Tepe as Mindspawn's argument requires.
It hardly seems necessary to go any further.Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

You're missing a bigger point. If the Bible story, as mindspawn interprets it, is true the Triassic layers shouldn't exist. How can we get so much geology in mere thousands of years?

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I do not know enough about the process to state the extent of the effect. Or the maths behind it. All I have at this stage is a likely mechanism that would logically effect the rate of decay.

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So much for any attempt to be accurate, or any concern with the science. At the very least you ought to check to see how plausible your mechanism is and what effects it actually does have.

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This process would affect all those processes in which heavy isotopes decay into daughter isotopes. And it would affect all processes that are calibrated against those original processes.

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But can it explain why the different dating mechanisms agree to the extent they do ? (No, it can't).

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Regarding Rubidium, I'm not a YEC, and have no problem with an old earth. Its more the 0- 600 million ya period that I dispute, I believe it represents a 0-6500 ya period.

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I don't know what the point of saying that you are not a YEC is, when your views are so close that it makes little difference in the matter. You still have to explain why rubidium dating gives the "wrong" results.Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

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The theory is that muons cause fusion (and other processes), which maintains the current natural neutron flux which is currently slowing the decay rate through neutron capture.

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We might object that it is well known that the chain-reaction used in fission reactors - and fission bombs - relies on the production of fast neutrons produced by fission. Assuming that neutrons automatically slow decay requires more than assertion.With no numbers - and no evidence of slowed decay rates - this is barely a speculative hypothesis, but let's check the logic.

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The Neutron Capture Process - Windows to the Universe
"Neutron capture can occur when a neutron approaches a nucleus close enough for nuclear forces to be effective. The neutron is captured and forms a heavier isotope of the capturing element."

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THis simply states that an isotope can be changed to a heavier isotope. Nothing about slowing decay. (Also,we note that it is referring to the interior of the Sun where conditions are somewhat different to those on Earth).

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Instead of heavy isotopes steadily decaying, we have a simultaneous process of heavy isotopes being created, or lighter isotopes becoming heavier. This slows down the amount of daughter isotope present in the rock, the parent maintaining its heavy and unstable state.

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This is not SLOWING decay, this is HIDING the evidence of decay! If the daughter isotope is present in reduced amounts then methods which rely on measuring the quantity of the daughter isotope will show LOWER ages!Going off course to argue against yourself is hardly a sign that you have rationally considered your position,

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hal - Archive ouverte HAL
First, neutrons are formed as a result of interaction of cosmic radiation with atomic nuclei of material of the atmosphere and the earth’s crust.

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In fact this paper refers to THREE sources of neutrons:

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Cosmic radiation is currently high (from a weak magnetic field). The neutron background was therefore weaker during periods of strong magnetic fields. This weaker neutron flux would allow more of the parent isotope to decay into a stable state, and we would have had a historical period of rapid parent to daughter transition.

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Would it ? Why ? Wouldn't it depend on the elements and isotopes involved ? And why would it reduce the ages ? Doesn't that depend on the method ? It would be more honest to admit that you HAVEN'T done the necessary work to produce a viable hypothesis - and wiser, too, since you've made it absolutely obvious that you haven't.How can you honestly present this as a serious post ? I would call it desperately clutching at straws, but even that would be giving it too much credit.

Let us be clear, transmuting the daughter product to a different isotope does not "slow down decay", it simply hides the evidence - or to be more accurate the most easily measured evidence.Even if there were zero effect before the present day, then you would need the actual decay rate to be 50,000 times the measured decay rate to place the beginning of the Triassic 4500 years ago.Unfortunately there can't be zero effect. Not only would there have been a neutron flux in the past, but the neutron flux in the present will still be affecting samples brought in for dating. In fact it should have a very large effect, if your hypothesis is correct.And because you assume that the actual decay rate is fast, any method which counts decays rather than measuring daughter products after the fact should show the real rate. A factor of 50,000 should easily be enough.Come to that where are the products of neutron capture. Shouldn't they show up in the mass spectrometer measurements, too ? Since the vast majority of the daughter product must be converted, it would seem that it would show up quite readily. Why has nobody noticed it ?And a final question for you. Why are you so confident in wild speculations that you clearly haven't thought about ?

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He thinks that the present-day neutron flux is much lower than in the past.

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No, he thinks that we have a higher neutron flux now, that "slows down decay" (which doesn't mean slowing down decay, just transmuting the decay products).e.g from Message 899
Message 916

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What is slowed is the amount of parent isotope that has decayed into daughter isotope. The rate of transformation from one to the other is slowed down. Our assumption of long timescales is based on currently measured rates of the proportions of parent to daughter isotope over short timeframes.

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I see now what you're claiming. You assert that for all heavy elements neutron capture converts the atom into a heavier isotope which later decays into the original isotope. Which doesn't affect the actual decay rate.There are obvious problems with this. First it isn't true. Second you haven't thought about the quantities your argument requires. Third you haven't even thought about how it would affect measurements of decay rates. Nor do you have any evidence that it is actually happening.

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Yes it definitely depends on the elements. Most elements used in radiometric dating are heavy elements and have lengthy half-lives, and are more prone to neutron capture.

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And the effects of neutron capture ALSO depend on the element and the isotope. for instance, neutron capture usually causes U235 to decay. Speeding up is not slowing down.. And changing the decay rate of the isotopes used in fission bombs and reactors by a large amount would have obvious - and catastrophic - consequences.That is the sort of thing you need to take into account instead of assuming that all atoms of heavy elements behave in the same way.

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The reason I came to the conclusion about the neutron flux is that recently Purdue University and the Geological Survey of Israel have noted the following four patterns in decay behavior which was always previously thought to be constant (I'm sure you are aware of the Purdue University studies, I will attach links if necessary):
1) Solar flares slow decay
2) Decay slows during July
3) Decay slows at midnight.
4) Decay slows according to the 11 year solar cycle
300 Multiple Choices

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Let us note that all these changes are tiny. The change that you need is massive. THat's why you need numbers.

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These are the same behaviour patterns of muons, which show a stronger flux in all four of those conditions (I can supply links if required. Logically the July and midnight effect are largely caused by the tilt of the magnetic pole in winter, and the point of best penetration of the solar wind)

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Let us note that you are speculating here. THe same would apply to any charged particle.

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I noticed that muons had a matching pattern and also they caused neutrons in more than one manner, and neutrons would have logically had a direct effect through neutron capture , but as you say the decay path is different to the neutron capture path and the near equilibrium that I am proposing is not actually observed.

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There doesn't seem to be anything logical about it. It's piling speculation on speculation with no attempt to check the truth of those speculations. To rationally conclude that neutron flux caused any significant reduction in decay rates, one would have to investigate the consequences of neutron capture to see if the mechanism is plausible, and work out the effect that this mechanism would have on real measurements of decay rate. And that's still a long way from having anything that would amount to a serious challenge to radiometric dating.

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Therefore the current assumption that decay has always been constant and the Purdue observations have only a minor effect on decay, is a little premature when we consider how directly a strong magnetic field has protected earth from the solar wind in the past. ie something in the solar wind (like proton induced muons) is having a current effect on decay, and that effect has the same pattern as particles that are sensitive to magnetic field fluctuations.

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The irony of it! In fact the conclusion that the effect is minor is far better supported than your view that neutrons are responsible. We have the opinion of the researchers and we have the consilience of different methods to point to two. That is rather better than speculations made in ignorance of the facts.So, why do you place such great faith in your idle speculations ?And answer to this could do much to illuminate the mindset of the creationists.Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

I think that the disconnect is between the idea that there might be a significantly larger effect in the past (possibly true) and the idea that the effect might be large enough for the Permian-Triassic boundary to be a mere 4500 years ago (not likely enough to be worth considering).The C14 data is very strong evidence against the latter, but it doesn't rule out larger effects than those observed, or those compatible with the C14 data, in the more distant past.

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Except that the operation of atomic clocks has nothing to do with decay rates of radioactive material. So you can keep right on speculating about an effect that to the best of my knowledge has never been observed.

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How about the nuclear batteries used in some satellites and probes?