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Author Topic:   Peanut Gallery for Great debate: radiocarbon dating, Mindspawn and Coyote/RAZD
JonF
Member (Idle past 158 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 16 of 305 (710911)
11-12-2013 1:01 PM
Reply to: Message 14 by Percy
11-12-2013 12:53 PM


Re: Great Debate Message 4 and Correlations
Inclusive or, of course.

This message is a reply to:
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Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 3.8


Message 17 of 305 (710915)
11-12-2013 2:06 PM
Reply to: Message 15 by NoNukes
11-12-2013 1:01 PM


Re: Great Debate Message 4 and Correlations
Hi NoNukes,
Aaron
Yeah, he did a good job. It was refreshing debating with someone who could really engage with an issue like that. He PM'ed me a while back; he's well and is busy with study.
Mutate and Survive

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Replies to this message:
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Diomedes
Member
Posts: 995
From: Central Florida, USA
Joined: 09-13-2013


Message 18 of 305 (710917)
11-12-2013 3:40 PM
Reply to: Message 17 by Granny Magda
11-12-2013 2:06 PM


Re: Great Debate Message 4 and Correlations
I never did interact with Aaron. I did glance at the thread and yes, I agree that at least he tried.
In most cases, what I end up seeing is a continuous back and forth to the point where the creationist is finally talked into a corner. At which time, they generally rant or come up with some excuse of why they cannot continue. And the discussion ends at that point.

This message is a reply to:
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JonF
Member (Idle past 158 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 19 of 305 (710945)
11-13-2013 8:11 AM


MIndspawn's on a roll...
... and it seems there's no way to stop him. I'm not sure what Coyote's strategy is, but it's obvious that mindspawn can't comprehend what Coyote's written.

Replies to this message:
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ramoss
Member (Idle past 602 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 20 of 305 (710956)
11-13-2013 9:27 AM
Reply to: Message 19 by JonF
11-13-2013 8:11 AM


Re: MIndspawn's on a roll...
It sort of reminds me of recent incidences where I had to call the technical help desk for my local cable company , because I was having issues with my internet. They had to follow the script, practically word for word, and when the issue diverged from the script, they kept to the script, even though it was obvious that wasn't the problem.

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Diomedes
Member
Posts: 995
From: Central Florida, USA
Joined: 09-13-2013


Message 21 of 305 (710958)
11-13-2013 9:39 AM
Reply to: Message 19 by JonF
11-13-2013 8:11 AM


Re: MIndspawn's on a roll...
I'm not sure what Coyote's strategy is, but it's obvious that mindspawn can't comprehend what Coyote's written
It's not necessarily a question of comprehension: it is merely a case of extreme denial.
How difficult is it to grasp a graph like the one Coyote put forth? It has scattered data points and a line of best fit. This is high school stuff.
The issue does not come down to a disagreement between peers: this is a seasoned professional having a discussion with a zealot. As evidenced by the most recent post by mindspawn, he disagrees with the graph and he indicated he will disagree with virtually ANY piece of data put forth that counters his dogmatic belief. There is no real 'debate' in this case, although I think we all realized that from the get go.

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Diomedes
Member
Posts: 995
From: Central Florida, USA
Joined: 09-13-2013


(2)
Message 22 of 305 (710959)
11-13-2013 9:47 AM
Reply to: Message 21 by Diomedes
11-13-2013 9:39 AM


Look at this doozy
Mindspawn writes:
Its entirely possible that the consensus in radiocarbon dating is obtained merely through misunderstanding rainfall sensitive data as representing annual/seasonal data
Doesn't that in and of itself really showcase the absurdity of this debate?
How precisely does a mis-understanding of rainfall data have ANYTHING to do with the interaction of the weak nuclear force in isotope decay??

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Replies to this message:
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JonF
Member (Idle past 158 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 23 of 305 (710969)
11-13-2013 12:26 PM


Maybe mindie doesn't understand that the correlation with other methods is not an integral part of the 14C dating method.

Replies to this message:
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NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 24 of 305 (710979)
11-13-2013 2:52 PM


Mindspawn's goals for the discussion are completely different from Coyote's. Mindspawn wins in his estimation if he keeps his YEC beliefs intact. He does not have to prove that scientists are complete idiots and have never considered and ruled out the objections he raises. Spawny simply has to raise his doubts and deny any counter arguments.
Maybe mindspawn will surprise me. I have to admit that I was completely shocked when he gave up on his neutron alters decay Uranium decay rates argument in response to a single scientist telling him it would not work.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
Richard P. Feynman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 25 of 305 (710980)
11-13-2013 2:54 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by JonF
11-13-2013 12:26 PM


Maybe mindie doesn't understand that the correlation with other methods is not an integral part of the 14C dating method.
I think that's a tough argument to make. I would not rely on it.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
Richard P. Feynman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by JonF, posted 11-13-2013 12:26 PM JonF has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 26 of 305 (710981)
11-13-2013 3:02 PM
Reply to: Message 22 by Diomedes
11-13-2013 9:47 AM


Re: Look at this doozy
Doesn't that in and of itself really showcase the absurdity of this debate?
He's not making that argument.
Mindspawn is referring to the agreement of C-14 dating with tree rings. His proposal is that scientists are mistakenly identifying some rainfall induced tree rings with annual rings.
Spawnhead thinks that varves are expected by spring tides, and tree rings counts are affected by rain. So, I wonder how he explains the extremely tight correspondence between the two. The correspondence is actually much better than uncalibrated C-14 data and either of the aforementioned non-radiometric indications. That's the kind of info he should be slammed with, because the conformance pretty much proves that his objection is absolutely wrong.
Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
Richard P. Feynman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 22 by Diomedes, posted 11-13-2013 9:47 AM Diomedes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 27 by Diomedes, posted 11-13-2013 3:27 PM NoNukes has replied
 Message 32 by RAZD, posted 11-13-2013 8:50 PM NoNukes has not replied

  
Diomedes
Member
Posts: 995
From: Central Florida, USA
Joined: 09-13-2013


Message 27 of 305 (710983)
11-13-2013 3:27 PM
Reply to: Message 26 by NoNukes
11-13-2013 3:02 PM


Re: Look at this doozy
Mindspawn is referring to the agreement of C-14 dating with tree rings. His proposal is that scientists are mistakenly identifying some rainfall induced tree rings with annual rings
Mindspawn's original objection to C-14 as a reliable dating method was that they leveraged what he considers unreliable ancillary calibration methods; i.e. tree rings, lake varves, etc.
Coyote responded by saying: Ok, if you have issue with those calibration methods, let us remove them and focus on the C-14 dating mechanism itself. He then produced a graph showing C-14 decay rates over a particular timeframe, representing the half life decay of the isotope. Mindspawn responded by going back to the tree rings and lake varves.
From my understanding, Coyote performed a concession by ignoring those things which Mindspawn had issue with and focused solely on just C-14 itself. By doing so, he eliminated the original points that Mindspawn did not agree with. In turn, Mindspawn simply ignored the graph, stated that he didn't agree with the output displayed and claimed it was 'circular reasoning'. Which is false. The graph is the result of experimentation. It was evidence leading to a conclusion. Circular reasoning is coming to your conclusion first and then finding evidence to support it. You know, like assuming the bible is the word of god and infallible and then cherry picking evidence to support that claim while ignoring evidence to counter that claim.
Edited by Diomedes, : Fixed minor typos and grammar errors.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by NoNukes, posted 11-13-2013 3:02 PM NoNukes has replied

Replies to this message:
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NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 28 of 305 (710986)
11-13-2013 4:34 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by Diomedes
11-13-2013 3:27 PM


Re: Look at this doozy
Mindspawn's original objection to C-14 as a reliable dating method was that they leveraged what he considers unreliable ancillary calibration methods; i.e. tree rings, lake varves, etc.
Coyote responded by saying: Ok, if you have issue with those calibration methods, let us remove them and focus on the C-14 dating mechanism itself. He then produced a graph showing C-14 decay rates over a particular timeframe, representing the half life decay of the isotope. Mindspawn responded by going back to the tree rings and lake varves.
Yes, but his mistake is not following what Coyote has done. That's a bit easier to forgive than linking rain fall to decay rates.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
Richard P. Feynman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by Diomedes, posted 11-13-2013 3:27 PM Diomedes has not replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1395 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 29 of 305 (710993)
11-13-2013 6:39 PM
Reply to: Message 8 by RAZD
11-12-2013 7:35 AM


Re: Great Debate Message 6 and evidence correlations
In Message 6 of the GD Coyote lets an important issue slide, imho:
Your main objection to radiocarbon dating, that is, tree-rings, is out the window, gone, and radiocarbon dating still produces ages far in excess of what it would take to falsify your beliefs.
This is virtually accepting mindspawns objection as reason to stop using\considering this information as valid objective evidence of age. Certainly it allows mindspawn to think he can just throw out some objection to any form of evidence and Coyote will roll over on it.
The issue is correlation -- why do the tree rings correlate with the C14 ages if either are wrong. You have 3 separate tree ring chronologies that correlate with each other, including one chronology with living trees over 5,000 years old, and these correlations show the validity of the dating method with an error of less than 0.5% between them.
They correlate on climate data contained in the width of the rings for over 8,000 years of record. Extra rings would not have this correlation.
These chronologies also correlate with the C14 ages with a difference of ~10%, with a lack of scatter in the C14 data: this is not a "best fit" mathematical correlation but a raw data correlation that shows a strong consistency of C14 data along a curve. The lack of scatter in the data shows how strong the correlation is.
In addition to the strong correlation of the tree ring data and the C14 data, there is an additional correlation of the C14 data along that curve with the 11 year solar cycle that causes distinct patterns of peak and valley cosmic ray production that is the cause of C14 in the atmosphere.
These correlations are not explained by handwaving comments about extra tree rings and the false claim of circular reasoning.
Enjoy.

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
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This message is a reply to:
 Message 8 by RAZD, posted 11-12-2013 7:35 AM RAZD has replied

Replies to this message:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1395 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 30 of 305 (710994)
11-13-2013 6:48 PM
Reply to: Message 29 by RAZD
11-13-2013 6:39 PM


Re: Great Debate Message 7 and Gish Gallop, accuracy v precision
In Message 7 mindspawn -- perhaps thinking he has succeeded in discrediting tree rings moves on:
All you used to make your point is one graph with a few labels on it.
I challenged the Suigetsu dates on that graph, if you give me more information, I will challenge all the other dates on that graph.
for example the Bahamas Speleothem data...
In other words, he will continue to challenge every bit of evidence on it's own standing, something creationists are fairly adept at (it is easy to make up challenges), amounting to a Gish Gallop of challenges if Coyote is not careful.
The failure here is ignoring the issue of correlations, something creationists have to date been unable to challenge.
Its entirely possible that the consensus in radiocarbon dating is obtained merely through misunderstanding rainfall sensitive data as representing annual/seasonal data.
The tree ring annual and climate data correlate with known history for over 2,000 years without any such misrepresentation due to rainfall. For over 4,000 years you have 3 Bristlecone Pines on different mountains in the Sierra Nevada that correlate on climate, and two Oak chronologies, one in Ireland, one in Germany, that correlate with each other on climate and also with the three Bristlecone Pines. In addition the "year with no summer" is correctly identified in the tree ring data -- it shows up as a winter portion of the ring that is twice as wide as the normal winter portions. This alone is sufficient to show his claim of "misunderstanding rainfall sensitive data" is superfluous hand waving.
Another issue here is confusing accuracy, precision and calibration:
Accuracy means your ability to hit the target. If we take a bow and arrow and shoot 50 times at a target, and all the arrows average out to a bull's eye, then the average result is accurate, even though there may be significant error in any one shot and there may not be a single bull's eye in the whole group. There could be a fairly large degree of scatter in the data and still have an accurate average result.
Precision means the ability to replicate exactly the same results. With our bow and arrow example we now have 50 arrow all clustered very close together, but they may or may not be located near the bull's eye. There is very little scatter in this case
Calibration means taking a precise system and determining what needs to be done to correct the precise result to be an accurate result.
Notice that the age of the tree ring chronologies extends back to 12,460 years before the present day (2010), thus we can certainly compare the tree rings to the 14C data for precision and accuracy
To do this we do not need to actually calculate the 14C age but just measure the ratio of 14C to 12C in the tree rings.
Precision:
The measurement of the 14C to 12C ratio is highly precise, with different labs repeatedly getting the same results from samples from the same tree ring.
The error of less than 0.5% between the three chronologies shows a high degree of precision (99.5%), as each one produces the same results. There is also a high degree of precision in the 14C to 12C ratio data compared to the three dendrochonologies, as is demonstrated in the curves showing very little scatter in the data along the correlation curve.
  • each ring formed captures the 14C/12C ratio of the atmosphere for the year the ring was formed.
  • trees anywhere on earth, in Germany, in Ireland and or high in the Sierra Nevadas, all have the same atmospheric 14C/12C ratio to absorb into the growth rings in the same year.
    :. tree rings for the same age from each of the chronologies should have the same proportion of 14C/12C: not surprisingly, they do.
Accuracy (1)
When we look at the correlation graph we see that the C14 data is consistently off the actual age by ~10% ... ie it is 90% accurate.
How can we check the accuracy of the tree rings by other data?
Because 14C is produced in the atmosphere by cosmic rays, and the incidence of cosmic rays from the sun varies on an 11 year (sunspot) cycle, we can look for this pattern in the 14C/12C data in the tree rings. This pattern consistently shows up in the data from each of the three dendrochronologies.
Now when we compare those estimated ages with the known ages for the tree ring samples we can see that the 14C/12C data, while being highly precise, is not quite accurate, being off the bull's eye by about 10% for actual age ... but that it accurately picks up the 11 year cycle:
Thus we see that the correlation between the tree ring count, the climate\season pattern and the 14C/12C proportions within the tree rings for the three different chronologies, even without using 14C to measure the age, shows the system is 90% accurate with a high degree of precision.
It is because of the high precision of the system that the accuracy of the system can be improved by calibration.
Enjoy.
Edited by RAZD, : ...
Edited by RAZD, : accuracy and precision
Edited by RAZD, : subT
Edited by RAZD, : wording
Edited by RAZD, : egls

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.


Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 29 by RAZD, posted 11-13-2013 6:39 PM RAZD has replied

Replies to this message:
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