Soracilla defends the Flood? (mostly a "Joggins Polystrate Fossils" discussion)

Understatement. It's exactly a century since Ernest Rutherford realized that radioactivity could be used to date rocks. From "The Age of the Earth", G. Brent Dalrymple, Stanford University Press, 1991, pg. 71:

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In March of 1905 Ernest Rutherford, then the Macdonald Professor of Physics at McGill University, delivered the Silliman Lectures at Yale University. In them, he (1906: 18792) offered the possibility of using radioactivity as a geological timekeeper:

The helium observed in the radioactive minerals is almost certainly due to its production from the radium and other radioactive substances contained therein. If the rate of production of helium from known weights of the different radioelements were experimentally known, it should thus be possible to determine the interval required for the production of the amount of helium observed in radioactive minerals, or, in other words, to determine the age of the mineral (Rutherford, 1906: 187-88).

Rutherford offered two examples of the proposed radioactive method of calculating ages. The first was a sample of the mineral fergusonite, an oxide of the elements yttrium and niobium that contains 7% U and 1.81 cm³ of He per gram of the mineral. From a production rate of 5.2 x 10^-8 cm³ of He per year for each gram of U and its associated Ra, the age of the mineral was

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1.81/(0.07 * 5.2 * 10^-8) = 497 Ma

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This age, cautioned Rutherford, was a minimum, for some of the He had probably escaped. A calculation for a second mineral, a uraninite from Glastonbury, Connecticut, also yielded a minimum UHe age of about 500 Ma.

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Rutherford, E., 1906. Radioactive Transformations, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

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{fixed typo}This message has been edited by JonF, 03-16-2005 08:15 AM

Not a bit, really. The coal argument is a red herring. Whether a process occurs rapidly or not has little to do with the age of the earth. That's a fact. Similar to pointing out that Darwin was wrong in some respects, or that there have been hoaxes perpetrated on science in the past. Desperation? Grasping at straws?

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PS: I also was well aware that Nevins changed his name to Austin. Big Deal.

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And it doesn't bother you that Austin says the MSH eruption turned him away from evolution, even though Nevins was writing creationist tracts before the eruption?Not a big deal, eh? That you have been lied to? Hmmm, your standards seem to be dropping, Randy. What would you say if an evolutionist did this same thing?

Edge: And it doesn't bother you that Austin says the MSH eruption turned him away from evolution, even though Nevins was writing creationist tracts before the eruption?Randy: Well I would fist have to talk to Austin about this, and exactly what he meant by it -- rather than simply assume (as you have done) that he lied. I strongly suspect that what he meant was that he was about 95-98% certain that we had been duped by the evolutionist crowd with regard to the Age of the Earth, and that after the Mt. St. Helens eruption, he was 99-99.999% sure of it >> meaning that it DID in fact, turn him (further) away from evolutionary mytys.Also, it is a FACT that there is NO WAY that life could (somehow -- other than in the minds of men and Fairy tales) spontaneously assemble itself and cause itself come alive -- at least not in the world of empirical (i.e. observed) science. Therefore, Darwins most basic foundation -- that there is No Creator involved with the Creation -- is a Lie.Also, the fact that there are so many (as MANY 1,000's) different types of Butterflies and Moths and flys and Beetles that undergo a Metamorphosis from worm-like creature to legged and winged creature in a matter of days, tells us that someone or something (with great intelligence) programmed their DNA -- thus eliminating the need for millions of years (of slow changes). I discuss this in more detail at: Evolution Theory vs Creationism – How Old Is The Earth? – Earth AgeThey very FACT that the Caterpillars internals organs completely dissolve before they "Morph" into a Butterfly, is clear evidence (to those willing to see it) that their DNA was pre-programmed: -- for the simple reason that haphazard "trial and error" (i.e. mutations) will only allow for very minor changes. In other words, Darwin was (and is) wrong, and there must be a Creator -- even though He, at present, has not revealed Himself to those who don't want Him to rule over their lives. This is because you can't force someone to Love you, no matter how much you may Love them. Nor can you force people to choose good, or make morally right choices, because we are basically selfish and want nothing more than to please ourselves -- and little or nothing to do with God, or serving Him -- even though He IS our Creator.Cheers,
Randy

It was the very issue of Coal, and how it was formed, that caused men like Buffon, and Hutton, and Lyell, to speculated that the earth was many 1000's (or millions) of years old, for the simple reason that, if each coal seam was the result of a Forest, then there would not be enought time for that (100+) forests to grow and be buried within the 6,000 year time frame of Genesis.But for more on how the (highly speculative age of the) Earth came to be 4.5 "Billion" years: See http://www.unmaskingevolution.com/6-earthage.htmRandy

This is getting way off topic.Your "fact" is no such thing; it's just an expressionmof your incredulity. The TOE is not founded on any such thing. The TOE works even if there were a creator involved in the creation.

This belongs in "dates and dating".The criticism of the Pb-Pb isochron is lying by omission, e.g. by omitting Murthy & Patterson, "Primary isochron of zero age for meteorites and the Earth", J. Geophys. Res., v67 pp 1161-67, which expands on the analysis critized in your reference and answers many of the criticisms. See "The Age of the Earth", G. Brent Dalrymple, Stanford University Press, 1991.The criticism of the 4.3 billion year old zircons betrays a severe misunderstanding of concordia-discordia methods. It also lies by ommission, omitting mention of Wilde, S.A, Valley J.W., Peck, W.H., Graham, C.M, 2001, Evidence from detrital zircons for the existence of continental crust and oceans on the Earth 4.4 Gyr ago, Nature 2001 Jan 11; 409:175-8, available online at Evidence from detrital zircons for the existence of continental crust and oceans on the Earth 4.4 Gyr ago; Peck, W.H., Valley, J.W., Wilde, S.A, Graham, C.M., 2001, Oxygen isotope ratios and rare earth elements in 3.3 to 4.4 Ga zircons: Ion microprobe evidence for high δ18O continental crust and oceans in the Early Archean, Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 65: 22: 4215-4229, available online at Oxygen isotope ratios and rare earth elements in 3.3 to 4.4 Ga zircons: Ion microprobe evidence for high δ18O continental crust and oceans in the Early Archean; and Bowring, S A. & Williams, I. S., 1999. Priscoan (4.00-4.03 Ga) orthogneisses from northwestern Canada, Contrib. Mineral. Petrol. v134 #1 pp 3-16 (not avaialble onlinbe, but here's one of their Tera-Wasserburg diagrams):
{Image rescaled to "100%" to restore page width to normal. - Adminnemooseus}
Full Scale VersionThe section on diamonds is just crap. Of course they would have accepted the result if it had fitted with the thousands of other results, and of course they questioned and reinvestigated the result when it didn't fit with the thosands of other results. That's how science works. And nobody has shown K-Ar dating to be completely eroneous; some have demonstrated occasional errors, and many have demonstrated that such errors are rare. See Radiometeric Dating Does Work!; the results of studying historic lava flows to which he refers are available at Radiometric Dating. And, of course, the claim that "The majority of [other] authors simply said that they used a particular isotope dating method and reported their final results. All the data 'massaging' is hidden. And the world is no wiser" is a lie of commission; it's common to publish the raw data and raw data is just about always available on request. See, e.g. the papers on Jack Hills zircons linked to above.{As noted in message 129, this message is very off-topic here - Adminnemooseus}This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 03-19-2005 01:16 PM

So what? This is just one of many things that lead early geologists(or doing science that would become geology) to suspect an old earth. It is interesting history.These examinations only lead to estimates which have, as noted, been superceded by much better data.As noted they are now historically interesting and no longer "central" to the debate.As for your source:
That is getting too far off topic here. Take it to the dates and dating forum as a new topic if you really want to defend a young earth.

Nice post JonF but this is not the topic here.This message has been edited by AdminNosy, 03-19-2005 09:54 AM

Well, what else would you call it? You seem ready to condemn evolutionists at the slightest whim, and yet for a YEC, you need more firsthand evidence. LOL! How many suspicions, decimals and parenthetical statements do you need to make a specious and gullible argument? And you accuse us of making up fairy tales! WAY of topic again, Randy. Having trouble focussing? Off topic AGAIN! I can understandt your anger, but we do need to stay on topic a little better than this. I will no longer respond to such posts unless Admin tells us it is okay to wander.

Nonsense. Please find a reference stating that the formation of coal was Lyell's only line of reference in deducing an old earth. In fact it was not even his earliest evidence. As the site below shows, Lyell was writing about uniformitarianism about a decade before visiting the Nova Scotia coal fields.Charles Lyell - WikipediaThis short history of estimates for the age of the earth does not even mention coal, even though Lyell is.http://gpc.edu/~pgore/geology/geo102/age.htm Off Topic.

Jon Said: The TOE (i.e. Theory of Evolution) is not founded on any such thing. The TOE works even if there were a creator involved in the creation.Randy: That is not the way it is taught in public Schools.Also, if (which is a virtual certainty) there was a Creator involved in the (Slow) Creation Process then what we have is Slow Creation -- NOT evolution.Randy

Here is why I think Radiometric Dating is highly questionable -- if not a total fabrication that is riddled with error.Earth Age – The Truth About Earth's Age

Then you should post on a radiometric dating thread. I'm tired of respoding to your posts and then being cautioned for going off topic...Or is this some scheme you have of avoiding responses?

Edge said: You seem ready to condemn evolutionists at the slightest whim, and yet for a YEC, you need more firsthand evidence.Randy: No not at the slightest whim, but because they attempt to dismiss clear evidence that points to a Creator. Now perhaps if they could actually observe nature making a single homochiralic protein molecule they would have something to boast about, but as it now stands, we still need 40,000 of them (with 600 different types), along with DNA, RNA, ribosomes, a cell membrane, and a MORE COMPLEX host organism just for that one single living bacterium to be able to replicate itself.God forbid that anyone should call an insurmoutable Wall what it is (i.e. an insurmountable wall).