Accelerated Radioactive Decay

Hi Dr. Cresswell,The thread that you were watching, I started and it was inspired by a thread that JonF started in the Coffee House (or whatever that general non-evolution forum is). It got shut down (for good reasons--albeit technical ones), but it made me curious about what JonF was trying to say.After my thread got started, it was obvious to me that the k40 restriction was too much, but AdminNosy likes to stick closely to the original topic...and I can understand his wanting to do that.I was going to try to start a more general thread, but I'm even gladder you did. I did find the k40 very restrictive and I felt that you, JonF, PaulK, NosyNed and few others were offering me some excellent and thoughtful input on this subject of decay in general--and that there was more to discuss. To which I must say, "Thanks."Unfortunately, I am currently trying to play catch-up after my little vacation...so I won't be able to offer any thoughtful input (not that I will have much thoughtful input anyways--maybe some good questions, though) until next week sometime. I'm enjoying the discussion, at any rate.--TheLit

and don't you also need to accelerate the mechanism for making ¹⁴C to have enough to decay at the accelerated rate, thus forcing the formation from ¹⁴N to be an accelerated process even though it is not due to radioactivity?This message has been edited by RAZD, 03*18*2005 10:00 PM

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Parasomnium, But isn't the current, measurable isotopic ratio the only "reality"? How that ratio came to be is just guessing, isn't it? Are these conclusions based on ANY assumptions? I was not aware that it was utterly undeniable truth that any rock was as old as its radiometric date.If the world were created by God, then the creation event cannot be examined with known physical laws and all the conclusions based on the assumption that it can would likely be wrong.--TheLitThis message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 03-26-2005 04:39 AM

JonF,Are you saying that zircon cannot possess lead as an inclusion? Or are you specifically separating lead inclusions from radiogenic lead? If so, how? Or, is lead NEVER an inclusion in zircon crystals? (Inclusions arise when a pure substance crystalizes AROUND a foreign substance, right?)Edited due to typo.This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 03-26-2005 04:41 AM

Is that a reasonable statement? Is anyone saying they are examining the creation event?Aren't people saying that they are examining the results, the output of the creation event?Is there any reason that we should not be able to examine the product that resulted from creation regardless of how that creation happened?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Jar,Let me rephrase the statement: I believe that is a very reasonable statement. Since this is an event (creation of planets, life and the universe) we have never observed, I don't see how it could be other than beyond the grasp of science as we know it. "How old is the earth?" That is a question thought to be answered (more or less) through radiometric dating techniques. So, yes, I would say, that to some extent, we humans are attempting to study the creation event--or, if you prefer, the origin of the earth. We have examined the creation extensively and learned much about HOW IT OPERATES, but we can ONLY SPECULATE about HOW IT CAME TO BE.--TheLitThis message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 03-26-2005 11:11 AMThis message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 03-26-2005 11:12 AM

Is that actually the case?The age of the earth has nothing to do with how it came to be. That only deals with when it happened.Is the conflict then between what the actual facts tell us, and what some people interpret the Bible to say? Does that have anything to do with what is? No argument. As a Creationist (I do believe GOD created the universe) I still have no problem with an age of billions of years. The idea that the creation story in Genesis is not to be taken literally is not something new. After all, even St. Augustine was saying just that back in the 4th Century AD.But no one is speculating on how it came to be. What science tells us is what IS. It simply shows that regardless of the mechanism, the earth is billions of years old. As Bishop Sims said in his Pastoral letter: You can read the full text of the letter here.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I am not an expert on the physics of crystallization. It's impossible for any significant amount of lead to be incorporated in the crystal lattice of zircon. Lead inclusions are possible (I think they are rare) but are easily detected (zircon is pretty transparent and lead is not) and are easily avoided (modern SHRIMP systems can measure samples that are disks about 5 μm [0.0002 inch] diameter and 1 μm [0.00004 inch] thick; that's pretty darned tiny).From Zircon: "the Key Mineral":

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Uranium and thorium are found in many minerals, of which, however, only a small number are suitable for dating using the U, Th-Pb approach. This is because only a few are adequately retentive towards them and of these the most retentive is zircon. Other useful minerals include pitchblende (or uraninite, U308), monazite, sphene and apatite. In zircon, the concentrations of U and Th average 1330 and 560 ppm respectively. When in pegmatites, zircons contain more of these elements than they do in normal igneous rocks. Uranium and thorium are found in zircon through the isomorphous replacement of Zr4+ (with an ionic radius of 0.87 ) by U4+ (1.O5 ) and Th4+ (1.10 ) as well as through the presence of thorite inclusions. Such substitution is restricted by the differences in the relevant ionic radii. Pb2+ is excluded altogether because its ionic radius is 1.32 and it bears a lower charge. The result is that zircon does not contain much lead at the time of its formation and has very high ratios for U/Pb and Th/Pb, making it a valuable geochronometer (Bowen, 1988). For this reason, this mineral is widely utilised in dating by the U, Th-Pb isotope method, for instance by C. J. Allgre et al. (1974).

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For pictures of samples, see SHRIMP Analysis - Part 2 and SHRIMP.

Jar, Okay. That's a good point. OTOH, they are looking at what a certain rock sample's parent/daughter elemental ratios ARE, and then acting like they also know HOW those ratios CAME TO BE. Such things cannot be known.The main complaint against supernaturally accelerated decay rates is that it would destroy life or boil off the oceans. But what if (and it is pure speculation on my part) the energy had been used to make the earth's center molten? What if all the water was frozen "in the beginning"? The sun wasn't created until day 4, yet plants were created on day 3 and every other kind of creature was created on days 5 & 6...surely the sun could not have heated much up (enough for living things to exist bountifully) in one or two days...if the earth had had NO heat already. What if some of the energy was used, indeed, to boil off some of the oceans to make the atmosphere?I personally still don't have a problem with the ratios, even if it involves lead in zircon, being created in situ (if I have used that term properly). We have never seen a creation event. We don't know how that works or what's involved. So, I don't believe we can know that the ratios represent "age" either.

Let's try sticking to little bites that may be taken instead of going whole hog. That is certainly one of the objections but not the only or even major objection. Well, is there a mechanism that could do that? Are there other explanations for a molten center? Genesis clearly states that it was without form. Ice, the frozen phase of water, has form. But even if that were the case it would make no difference. The amount of heat that would be generated would be more than enough to not only change ice into the liquid form but to also carry it through the transition to the gaseous form, steam. Yet another whole series of unsupported and unsupportable assertions.First, no one has ever been able to show a model of how the earth could form without the sun first being there. If you coalesced the material to form the earth without the sun first being there, when you coalesced the mass for the sun the earth would simply spiral down into it. Somehow you need to conserve the momentum needed to have the earth circle the sun in orbit.Second, without the energy source from the sun there would be no living things. No one has shown a mechanisim to have critters before the energy.The third assertion, is a combination of truth and falsehood. It's true that critters could not exist without the energy source. But it's false about the time that the sun would heat up. The sun would begin heating even before it became a sun. The initial heat would come from gravitaional attraction, the heat of collapse as the matter coalesced. Eventually the heat became high enough for the nuclear reactions to begin and from that instant, we had a real sun.But throughout the whole process, heat from the protosun and sun reached the position of the earth in about 8 minutes.If we assume increased rates of radioactive decay, that increase would also affect the protosun and instead of the rather benign Sol we are familar with we would have a nova, and no Earth, Moon, Mercury, Vensus, Mars and most likely a second smaller star where Jupiter is.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I think you need to tell us what you mean by "known".We can measure the rate of decay. We can, through quantum mechanics determine it as well. We can both calculate and measure the ratios which result from decay.The ratios support and correlate with the physical evidence of the positions in the geology.These and other pieces of observable evidence all say the same thing.What you have is 'what if this' and 'what if that'. Your what ifs are created ad-hoc to answer some current question. Then you create a different and possibly contraditory 'what if' for some other question. In fact, this is a big part of why the earth is still molten. Now, have you done the calculations that determine how the heat would be distributed based on whatever hypothosis about the nature of the earth at formation? In fact, do you have a creationist reference for the calculations.Guess what! You don't! They don't do this. It doesn't work out. Once again, you reach a dead end and there is no help from the creation "scientists" that you would expect to have dealt with this.Aren't you beginning to see a common trend here? An example of the "what if" type of stuff. Before you even open you mouth to voice such unfounded speculation you have to do some calculations on the specific heats involved and the energy that you have to account for.You aren't aware of the degree of detail that backs up what you are arguing against. For that reason you don't know how silly this looks. This sounds like the "God made it look that way" answer. If that is exactly what it is we have discussed it before. If this is the only answer you are left with we can resolve the argument now.What we do is say in front of all scientific conclusions that: "God made it look like....". And for the very firm literalists add at the end "... but it really isn't that way."Now some may think this is ok but it seems to me that many would conclude that God has a very strange sense of humour. In fact, many call this the "God the liar" hypothosis.The other way to take this is that you are saying "We just don't have a clue". I guess that is ok if you like it. Just don't expect almost all of science classes to be replaced with "We dunno.".It seems that when faced with a great deal of evidence that points to only one conclusion the decision is to conclude that it is all invalidated in some completely unknown way and that we are unable to know anything about the natural world.If that is the position you wish to put forward I'm afraid it will appear pretty simply utterly rediculous to many, many people.

Literalist,Let me show you something funny. A while back in this thread, I said:

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They are using an ad hoc argument in order to fit reality into their warped world view.

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You quoted me on that, as you may remember.Right after I said that, I went on to say:

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If Scripture and reality are not in agreement on something, then it's reality that's wrong. But, not to worry, that's easily fixed: just propose some solution - any solution - that'll make 'reality' (i.e. the fantasy that it becomes) concur with Scripture and all is well.

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Then, in your last post, you say this:

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The main complaint against supernaturally accelerated decay rates is that it would destroy life or boil off the oceans. But what if (and it is pure speculation on my part) the energy had been used to make the earth's center molten? What if all the water was frozen "in the beginning"?

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Can you see what is happening here? You are doing exactly what I said a YEC^* does. If there's a problem, what did I say a YEC will do? They will - and I'll quote myself again - "just propose some solution - any solution - that'll make 'reality' [...] concur with Scripture [...]".So, here you are, faced with a problem - the excess heat of accelerated radioactive decay - and what do you do? You say: "what if this, what if that?" What does that look like, you think? I'll tell you: it looks like ad hoc hypothesizing. Just in case you are unfamiliar with the term, here's a description I pulled from Wikipedia: ^*I didn't say "YEC's" at the time, I said "creationists", but because I realised Jar considers himself a creationist and he does not make the mistakes I'm on about here, I owe it to him to make the distinction from now on.

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We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further. - Richard Dawkins

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What if all the water was frozen "in the beginning"? The sun wasn't created until day 4, yet plants were created on day 3 and every other kind of creature was created on days 5 & 6...

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I'm not to sure what it is that you are getting at here. But, if you're contemplating that the accelerated decay of radioactive minerals could provide the heat that was lacking until the creation of the sun I think we need to go back to the calculations of extra heat due to accelerated decay. In my opening post I reported the calculation that had the acceleration of 40K to have all that decay happen in 2000 years would increase heat input by 20%. It follows from that, that to provide less than about twice the heat input we currently receive from the sun (a not uncomfortable amount), those "days" without sun would need to have lasted something like 200-500 years. Which is compatible with a "day" means an extended period of time, but not if you consider it to be a 24h period of time.

Dr. Cresswell,I am not saying that the accelerated-decay-rate theory is true, but I am questioning the objections raised against it.One objection is that the radiation would destroy all life. I counter that by pointing out that for the first two creation days--and part of the third--there was no life.Another objection is that the heat would boil off the oceans. I counter that by pointing out that creation of an atmosphere was accomplished on day 2 (before there was life). Such might have been done through accelerated decay rates.On day three dry land was made to appear (same day as but prior to creation of plants). Perhaps the source of energy to do this was accelerated decay.According to Genesis, life (plants) were made on day three before the sun had been made. Given that days 5 and 6 saw the creation of all the creatures that rely on plants directly or indirectly for nourishment--it can be safely assumed that these were mature plants, which needed some source of warmth. They could go a day with no sun IF the earth already had its own liveable temperature and would the next day also be recieving energy from the sun. Finally, the sun could not have heated the earth's surface up sufficiently for life in one or two days IF the earth didn't already have it's own rather warm temperature.My point is that perhaps the "too much heat" objection is starting with the assumption that the earth already had a molten core and a warm temperature. This cannot be known. What if the earth was starting from near 0 degress Kelvin (through and through, I mean), and what if the earth would not be recieving any energy from the sun for four days but would become populated with plants in three days? How much energy would be required to make the earth go from near 0 degrees Kelvin to having a liveable surface temperature and a molten core? How much heat would be needed to take SOME water of the oceans and move it into the atmosphere?So, right now, I fail to see how the "too much heat" objection is valid. However, I reiterate that I do not have a problem with the earth and universe being created with an "appearance of age" either. Just like I don't have a problem with God creating mature plants on day 3.I'm not sure if this post makes my point any clearer, I hope it does.AbE: But the first two days...and part of the third...do not involve life of any kind. I see no reason to make sure that the radiation amounts are confined to any particular levels on those days.This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 04-03-2005 05:56 AM

Jar, It is the only objection to accelerated decay rates I have seen discussed. Perhaps there are others, but I don't know them. However, it is the objection being discussed in this thread. But I am trying to counter the "too much heat" objection, which is an objection to the literal interpretation of Genesis. I am criticizing the starting assumptions of that objection within the framework of a literal interpretion of Genesis. I see no reason to consider "other explanations" for a molten center, which have nothing to do with the literal interpretation of Genesis. But what if the majority of the heat was used to make the center of the earth molten...and a little to boil off a bit of the water to make the atmosphere? That was the whole point of my post. You mention coalescing material for the earth...where did that material come from? Where did that source of material come from? etc. etc. etc. The reason you consider yourself a creationist, I assume (perhaps incorrectly), is because you conclude GOD is needed to explain the presence of something. We just have different starting points. The God I believe in can create the earth out of nothing and can create the sun afterward and can easily prevent the earth from going into the sun.
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AbE:
Also, coalescing material is part of traditional cosmology and not part of the literal interpretation of Genesis, right?
--------------------------------- And part my post explained that the energy source could have been accelerated decay rates. I may be misunderstanding you somehow, but this appears to be a mixing of the literal interpretation of the Genesis account and traditional cosmology. The objections about accelerated decay rates concern the literal interpretation of Genesis not traditional cosmology. The literal interpretation of Genesis does not include a protosun. It involves a fully-mature sun (and all stars) being created on day 4, AFTER the earth, an atmosphere, dry land & oceans, and fully mature plants had been created. But there was no sun (abe: or protosun, which is a completely non-biblical idea) and, probably, no other planets. Besides, I see no reason why God couldn't increase decay rates in one rock and not another...or in one planet and not another...or in the earth and not in the sun. Or a little in the earth's crust and a lot in the center of the earth. The God of the Bible is omnipotent--has limitless power. Why must I assume He can create the universe and can accelerate decay rates but then must also assume He cannot control where decay rates get accelerated?I reiterate to you, as I have to Dr. Cresswell, that I am not saying that God did accelerate decay rates, for I consider that unknowable; I am saying only that I do not currently see how the objections to the idea are valid.This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 04-03-2005 05:58 AMThis message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 04-03-2005 06:12 AM