SCIENCE: -- "observational science" vs "historical science" vs ... science.

The point is if you aren't going to explain things then you can't object if I ignore your assertions.

A good clear explanation about how absolute dates are used, if in fact they are, is exactly what is needed here.

Typical edge retort. And you wonder why I stop reading your posts? You clearly have no interest in communicating anything so why waste my time? Yet now you are complaining that I dismiss your explanations. Rarely, yes, you have explained a few things, but rarely. The rest of the time, back to the beginning of your posts to me, nothing new, you have contented yourself with making meaningless put-down remarks, or explanations that are so cryptic nobody could follow them, and I'd guess that half of your posts are simply incomprehensible, and very likely not only to me. And then if I say they are incomprehensible you make your usual retort implying that's my fault. Then you complain that I dismiss your noncommunications. As in this post. Well, we could take a survey I suppose, how about we go out on the sidewalk and poll the passersby? But just as a matter of observable objective fact there is NOTHING in that post that clearly demonstrates a need for Old Earthist time frames. And since you don't point out where it does I conclude my observation is correct. Fine, then don't complain when I call it as I see it without your help. Oh this is no discovery you have made, you've treated me like this from the very beginning, it's your M.O. apart from anything I've done.You've said nothing anywhere to prove that absolute ages have anything to do with the usefulness of the well data, so I conclude that relative ages are really what's important. Cute but just the usual cuteness with no substance. One cannot prove an untestable interpretation false, haven't I said that enough yet? All one can do is offer alternative interpretations. It's a war of plausibilities. I find yours implausible, you find mine implausible. Well, this is an intriguing assertion, but that's all it is until you come off your high horse and explain it in clear English, and don't get all huffy if I come back wondering if relative dates aren't really the important thing rather than the absolute dates. Archaean rocks are just the deepest oldest ones (sorry, except for the Hadean). If you hate me so much then don't explain it for me. HBD would like to know too.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Yes you do use those terms that way. And no, they are not open to just any random interpretation that comes wandering in off the street.Whenever I bring up radiocarbon dating you say something to the effect, "That's just based on assumptions." Your meaning is that the method is totally unreliable because assumptions are junk.Likewise for "interpretive." You believe that you can come up with alternative interpretations that are just as good as scientific ones. And because there are two interpretations, you are free to choose either one.That's abject nonsense! Not all interpretations are of equal value as any but the most feeble- and slow-witted students soon learn. The interpretation "The moon is made of green cheese" soon gives way to more realistic interpretations.The same holds for "theory." Creationists use that term to mean any idea, no matter how silly. And, as with "interpretations," if there are two theories you feel free to choose the one that suits you better no matter how little evidence there is for it. Or, one of the more recent creationists tactics, is to claim, "It's just a theory!" In other words, don't pay any attention to that, it's not anything substantive--it's just a theory.This is far from the use of "theory" that scientists have. To a scientist, a theory is the single best explanation for a given set of facts, one which explains all of the relevant facts, and which is contradicted by no relevant facts. And, a good theory makes successful predictions. This is far different from the bastardized use of the term favored by creationists.But you know all of this, as it has been explained to you before.And the fact that you refuse to accept scientific terms, methods, and evidence just shows you are not doing science, but apologetics. Apologetics is (or are) the exact opposite of science.You really need to end all of your posts here with, "Amen!" as preaching is what you are really doing (and in the Science Forum, no less).What you are really doing here is showing how silly your positions really are. You are certainly not making any converts with specious arguments.

The real point is that I don't really want to waste too much of my time repeating facts to you. I gave you numerous examples of volcanic rocks being deposited during the period that you would call the flood on another thread and you completely ignored every example. Here you want me to prove the absolute ages are always necessary for oil exploration. That is a strawman argument, completely irrelevant except in your own distorted logic.

I gave you an example and you ignored it. Then you moved the goal posts to require an explanation of how absolute ages are (always) necessary.

I put things out there. If you are interested, you could ask questions. If not, then you can just complain. As it is, I don't see much use in putting out the effort to a dogmatist who is adamant about denialism.I have used absolute ages in oil exploration, mineral exploration and in Archean stratigraphy. I'm not really concerned whether that is a good enough explanation for you.

Yes I want to know if absolute ages are necessary for oil exploration, that is what I want to know, if they are always necessary or ever necessary I would like to know. That's what I'm asking. So far I have examples of how they are not necessary at all. You claim you've give others but as usual don't bother to tell me what those are.If you don't want to take the time to explain something you claim you've already explained you could at least give a hint what you are talking about. So for instance if the proof that you need absolute ages was your example of the well, you could just SAY "the example of the well" without too much exertion.Thanks for at least mentioning the volcanic rocks. What you may not understand is that I may not answer a post if I don't understand it or need to ponder it or look things up and so on, and then being barraged by others on other subjects can throw me off too. The volcanic rocks need a lot of thought and I don't even remember what all you said or what you think was so telling about what you said. The Cardenas was part of it and I thought that was amply acknowledged.But now we're onto this issue and I only remember you mentioning one example, the walls of a well, and it wasn't very clear what about it was supposed to be the answer. You DO assert things and expect me to accept them, but I want your reasoning about it, and yes, MAYBE I WON'T ACCEPT IT as you want me to, so instead of berating me about dismissing this or that just ignore me back. I prefer that to your barbed comments.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I do not move goal posts. What happens is that you misread what I say or I didn't say it fully enough, and then I have to explain it after you give an answer to the misreading, but you stick to the misreading stubbornly anyway so my explanation gets called moving the goal posts.. Well, that's not an explanation, it's an assertion, but it's a good place to start IF you won't get all pushed out of shape if I question anything you have to say about it. I don't doubt that you have used the absolute ages, I'm sure you have, but I'd be looking for whether that's really necessary or if relative ages wouldn't work as well for your purposes. Which may not sit well with you.And since you do tend to write cryptically, leaving out all kinds of necessary information, I may have to ask you to expand your explanation just in order to get a picture of it. Which also may not sit well with you.Maybe it would be better if you had this discussion with HBD. But I hope you will be willing to flesh out these assertions, I'd really like to see how you use absolute ages in oil and mineral exploration and stratigraphy.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Well yes, of course. Historical science works by interpreting the evidence in the present by means of events in the past. This is exactly what petrophysics did which you approved of so much. This is what we do when we interpret (as you agreed we could) the fossil of a stegosaurus as the bones of a once-living animal. This is what we do when we ascribe a footprint to a foot or a gunshot wound to a gun. This is all fine by you until historical science tells you stuff you don't want to hear.You will, therefore, have to come up with some criterion for ignoring the facts other than the word "interpretive", since that also describes the method for discovering facts that you don't wish to ignore.

But why do you leave out the crucial point that everything he said is testable and verifiable by others, which edge agreed is the case? THAT's what makes the difference between the untestable interpretive sciences of the prehistoric past, pure theory, and the observational testable sciences of the present, which are practiced daily in the field. But there is no mystery about the basic anatomic structure of even the most unfamiliar animal since you can make inferences galore from known animal structures that others can verify along with you.Again this is not the untestable interpretation of the prehistoric past which is about events that nobody witnessed and that may have no referents in the present at all so no way to verify them. EVENTS is probably the operative word here. HOW the strata were laid down and when, the claim that the fossils within a given layer represent life in that time period and so on. Those are the things you can't verify, that you can only hypothesize about. The TIME factor essentially. Not stegosaurus bones which are real physical things. That is NOT how I arrived at this understanding of the difference between the different kinds of science. What you can never prove is the timing of ancient events or all those dramas about what life was like in some hypothetical time period. All you can do is guess and interpret and weave imaginative scenarios about them, you CANNOT test them, you CANNOT prove them. You can reconstruct fossils but you can't prove when or how they lived, or that they really did live in that era you claim they lived in, without the company of all those higher in the strata. You CANNOT prove that. All you've got is a slab of rock with the mineralized skeletons of creatures in it. You can reconstruct the creature, you can analyze the sediments in the rock, but you CANNOT prove anything about the time period you claim for it or how it got there or anything of those fanciful scenarios about life during this or that era. NO YOU CANNOT. The operative word is "ONLY" interpretive, that is, UNTESTABLE AND UNVERIFIABLE, leaving you with nothing but your interpretation and no way to prove it.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : last few edits typos, punctuation etc.

I'll return tomorrow afternoon, to explain what you have to do to determine the way something was deposited. I have too much to do right now. I am supposed to be working.

This is the case whenever we do historical science. When petrophysics tells me the order in which the strata were laid down, I can test and verify this for myself by looking at the structure of the rocks. When he tells me the dates at which the strata were laid down, I can test and verify this for myself by looking at the isotopic composition of the rocks. Sure, the bones are real physical things. So are the sedimentary structures in a rock. So is the isotopic composition of a rock.However, when we infer a living stegosaurus from the bones, we are making an inference about something we've never seen --- a living stegosaurus --- about events we've never seen --- a stegosaurus dying and decaying --- we are talking about HOW the fossil came to be: that a stegosaurus lived, it died, its soft parts decayed, its skeleton was mineralized, etc. Assertion is not argument.So far you have not managed to express any principle that would divide the facts you're prepared to admit from the facts that you want to deny. Until you can do so, the fact that you deny only those facts that contradict your religious dogmas suggests to me that this is the basis on which you're operating, and that the confused and self-contradictory verbiage that you offer up as a rationale is a smokescreen to conceal the actual basis of your practice. In saying so, I am not implying that you are insincere, I imagine that the first (and last and only) person you've deceived with this nonsense is yourself. But how is that distinct from things you're prepared to admit? I see the fossil of the stegosaurus, I interpret it as being the lithified relics of a living stegosaurus (which you admit). I would say that seeing the fossil is the test and the verification of this proposition; if not, then there is certainly nothing else I can look at.In the same way, I look the sedimentary structure and composition of aeolian sandstone and interpret it as being the lithified relics of aeolian sand dunes (which you deny). I would say that seeing the rocks is the test and the verification of this proposition; if not, then there is certainly nothing else I can look at.Now on what conceivable principle can you distinguish between the two cases? Well, the actual principle is plain: one contradicts fluddism, so you don't like it and you're going to close your eyes, stick your fingers in your ears, and talk nonsense. But can you think of a rationale that distinguishes between them and which is not based on your whims and prejudices?(If anything, the advantage is with the geological inference over the paleontological one. No-one's ever seen a living stegosaurus, but we've seen lots of aeolian sand dunes.)

Exactly. There's no such thing as "Old Earthism"; there's just normal science. My point is not that you "need" to know the origin of the rocks. My point is that when you do know the origin of the rocks, that origin had to be a long time ago. The processes that created the rocks take a long time. Old age is a byproduct of geology, not a prerequisite.

You are right that I need to come up with a principle that will say what I want to say so I'll try to do that Meanwhile I do not make up things to support my beliefs, but certainly if I see something that does support them I'm going to hold on to it, and that's the case with the idea of "historical" or interpretive science. There is a clear distinction but it's hard to articulate.I don't reject Aeolian sandstone JUST because it conflicts with the Flood scenario but because the only way it resembles dunes is in the crossbedding; otherwise you are cramming a hilly wavy mass of sand into a square flat block of rock with a straight flat cliff front and straight flat bottom and top, not at all a duney sort of thing.