Age of mankind, dating, and the flood

While we wait to see if any creationists join the discussion I thought I'd mention that I just finished the novel The Bone Prophet about an alternative universe where the scientific community has banned books by Darwin, Huxley, Simpson, etc., and teaches that the world is only 6000 years old. Churches control politics and politicians control science which is highly compartmentalized to prevent anyone from putting too much together. Dating methods other than radiocarbon are banned, and Libby is given credit for proving the world is only 6000 years old. Genetic analysis rules in determining whether ancient bones are human or "other", but access to genetic analysis is restricted. The book's hero discovers that some ancient bones are "other" but have a point of divergence with humanity older than the Earth itself, prompting efforts to bring him in dead or alive.This thread is about evidence. Efforts to nullify evidence usually invoke a "worldview" or distort it or just consider some of it or even just ignore it, but this novel describes a world where a scientific community using genuinely scientific methods has managed to suppress the truth about reality and what the evidence really indicates. Interesting to contemplate.--Percy

Hi Kofh2u,We all understand that there is an inherent religious nature in man, but the degree to which it is expressed individually varies widely. Most who possess little religiosity will concede that yours is a perfectly valid faith-based position for those who possess a great deal, thinking it fine to argue that science is wrong because your faith tells you so. No one's arguing that your faith is wrong in this thread.But this is a science thread, and I think Coyote is more interested in hearing from those who believe the dating is wrong because they have the scientific evidence proving it is wrong.--Percy

I don't recall anything about your views, sorry. In my moderator role opinions and positions are of no consequence. Only behavior matters as measured against the Forum Guidelines. And if we've had discussions then I don't recall those either. Again, sorry.I was only explaining that Coyote is interested in discussion with people who think they have scientific evidence against dating methods and the age of modern humans, because you were raising unrelated issues.--Percy

In that case the next 7 paragraphs were unnecessary.--Percy

I think you mean the pseudo-scientific literature. Information about radiocarbon dating is easily found (check Wikipedia), and there are many threads here at EvC that have discussed radiocarbon dating. I guess if that's what you really want to discuss then you could propose another one over at Proposed New Topics, but this thread carries with it the expectation that people are already familiar with the methods and evidence. Those who are aware of evidence against current views on dating methods or the age of modern humans are invited to bring that evidence forward.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar.

Hi Mindspawn,You seem to be teaching yourself the details of radiocarbon dating one little step at a time, which is what we hoped to avoid in this thread. Yes, ¹⁴C production rates vary over time, this has been discussed in every thread we've ever had here about carbon dating. But we know those rates over time quite a ways back by calibration with varves, tree rings and ice cores, among others. Here's the calibration curve from the Wikipedia article on radiocarbon dating: Notice that what is considered significant variation in ¹⁴C production causes only small dating variations, generally between 10% and 20%. Were no calibration performed we would think that a Bibilical-era dig might date to 5000 years old when it is actually 5700 years old. That isn't the degree of error you need. You need errors of hundreds of percent before the ages would become acceptable to you.Consider this hypothetical. Let's say some ancient organic material is found at an archeological dig that possesses so little ¹⁴C that it is dated to 40,000 years ago. If the world is only 6000 years old, and if ¹⁴C production rates were greater in the past than they are today, how could that have ever happened?Again, this is not the discussion I thought we'd be having in this thread, but I guess it's the only one we're going to get.--Percy

Well, in that case the words "accurate" and "distortion" must be synonyms, as must "honest" and "dishonest". What's worse, Baumgardner *is* a skilled and knowledgeable geologist and knows he is misdefining uniformitarianism. As soon as he begins, "Uniformitarianism assumes..." he's already wrong because uniformitarianism is based upon the available evidence.But he's wrong in an even more direct way when he says it assumes that "the vast amount of geological change recorded in the rocks is the product of slow and uniform processes operating over an immense span of time, as opposed to a global cataclysm of the type described in the Bible and other ancient texts." There *is* a term that has the definition Baumgardner claims and it is gradualism. Modern geology definitely does not accept gradualism as an explanation of the evidence, and gradualism is not a synonym for uniformitarianism.Uniformitarianism, as others have already informed you, holds that the same array of forces and processes at work today have been at work all during Earth's history. That means it accepts the slow accumulation of limestone layers for millions of years, but also earthquakes, volcanoes, and the cataclysmic strikes of asteroids. Ask yourself how uniformitarianism could include all these things and yet be synonymous with gradualism?And now ask yourself how Baumgardner could define uniformitarianism the way he does yet still be considered a reliable source?Are you looking for only what supports what you already believe, or for what is true? If the latter then listen to the universe, for it doesn't lie. Religion has a history of wonderfully noble goals combined with miserably constructed rationales for the ugly acts it employs to achieve those goals. Your religion teaches that salvation depends upon believing that the Earth is young and that science is lying. Salvation depends upon no such thing.--Percy

I don't think that's an accurate characterization of Baumgardner. He's published more in the peer-reviewed literature than probably any other creationist. He really has no excuse, and particularly not lack of talent or knowledge, for his creationist efforts.--Percy

You concluded with, "Not much training in Geology at all." The overall result was a characterization of Baumgardner as not having the necessary training and not being knowledgeable about geology, and I don't believe that's accurate. I think he's extremely well trained and knowledgeable. His success in publishing in the peer-reviewed literature where some of his better papers have collected a fair number of citations reflects this.If we're going to be the side that embraces truth and accuracy then we have to give our rivals their due.--Percy

Hi Mindspawn,Your arguments are all almost self-evidently wrong, and one of them makes no sense whatsoever. They require only the barest amount of evidence to rebut, and much of that evidence has already been presented in this thread, leading me to wonder whether there's a problem in understanding, or if maybe you're just trying to waste as many people's time as possible.Summarizing your arguments, the historical dates could have been incorrect, the dating methods chosen for calibration could have been cherry picked, the varve layers could have been deposited 12 times a year instead of once, and mistakes could have been made in dendrochronology.Do you have evidence that any of these coulda-woulda-shoulda's have ever happened? Any evidence of incorrect historical dates? Any evidence of dating methods being cherry picked? Any evidence of varve layer deposition 12 times in a single year ever? Any evidence of mistakes in dencrochronology?Since to you these incredibly poor arguments must have seemed cogent and effective, and since you made them in the face of sufficient evidence showing them wrong, it seems a pretty sure bet you don't comprehend the information you've been provided. There's not much point explaining evidence to someone who thinks "You could be wrong" is legitimate rebuttal. You, too, could be wrong. Everyone could be wrong. That's what evidence is for, to tell the difference between who's right and who's wrong, but you don't seem to understand that.Anyway, against my best instincts I'm going to address you're "arguments", which I'll paraphrase.

• "Carbon dating has been correlated against some recent incorrect historical dates."
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  Tell us which recent historical dates are incorrect and the evidence that they're incorrect. Even better, tell us how such a thing could ever happen to any significant degree for anything recent.
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  AbE: I later realized that you must have been referring to Rohl's revised chronology. For you ancient Egypt is halfway back to the dawn of time, so I didn't expect you to refer to historical dates from ancient Egypt as "recent". The differences between Rohl and more generally accepted dates is relatively small, and carbon dating calibration was never done with historical dates from ancient Egypt anyway.
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• "If recent historical dates are wrong then older radiocarbon dates could be exponentially wrong."
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  The error would be proportional, not exponential.
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• "The other dating methods were cherry picked. Only those in agreement with radiocarbon dating were used for correlation and calibration."
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  The dating methods with which radiocarbon dating agrees are dendrochronology, deep ocean sediment cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples, and speleothems (cave deposits). Which dating methods were conveniently left out?
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  Radiocarbon dating has also been correlated with known historical dates and events, such as the fall of Masada or volcanic eruptions.
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• "Lake varves are laid down twelve times a year in the past."
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  Each varve layer contains seasonal debris, seeds and pollen. It is analysis of this type of data that allowed the varves of Lake Suigetsu (because many layers cannot be visually delineated) to be properly interpreted. If twelve varve layers were ever laid down in a single year due to spring tides they would be interpreted as twelve layers in a single year, not as twelve years.
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  Such a huge discrepancy as 12.2x would be easily amenable to radiocarbon analysis, even if it were anywhere near as uncalibrated as you claim. Take two layers that are separated by a thousand layers and date each. We know the decay rate of ¹⁴C, and it would be simple to establish that the thousand layers did not represent 1000/12.2 or 82 years, but roughly a thousand years. And you can repeat this experiment for each group of 1000 layers back 50,000 years and find that each 1000 layer grouping corresponds to a thousand years.
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  Even if you can claim we've got the decay rate of ¹⁴C wrong for dating purposes by a factor of 2 (a ridiculously large and impossible error), that's still 500 years, not 82 years. In other words, your claim isn't even self consistent.
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  By the way, since there's a spring tide roughly every two weeks, there are around 26 spring tides every year, not 12.2. Where'd you get this crazy spring tide argument for Lake Suigetsu, I can't find it anywhere on the Internet. Did you make this one up yourself?
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  Also, the elevation of Lake Suigetsu's surface above sea level is 54 meters, and the average depth is 34 meters. It's an irregularly shaped lake whose shoreline approaches the ocean no closer than a half mile, but whose furtheset extent is 4 or 5 miles from the ocean. How is it, exactly, that you imagine salinity from spring tides influencing Lake Suigetsu varve layers?
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  The varve layers were taken by drilling "into the mud at the center of Lake Suigetsu" (A New Radiocarbon Yardstick from Japan), so just pick a random point in Lake Suigetsu around 3 miles from the ocean and explain to us how salinity from the ocean is going to encroach 3 miles inland and rise 20 meters and form a varve layer, especially one that doesn't give away its salty origin with elevated salinity content.
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• "No one's constructed a convincing argument that dendrochronology is accurate."
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  Convincing arguments for the accuracy of dendrochronology supported by copious evidence have been made here at EvC Forum many times and appear at many places on the Internet, including some very accessible webpages like Wikipedia (Dendrochronology). If you have a specific objection then raise it.

--PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar.Edited by Percy, : Correct the value of the distance above sea level of the average depth of Lake Suigetsu, 34 => 20.Edited by Percy, : AbE.

I can understand the reluctance to research arguments you mistrust, but you must take at least some of the initiative. If we have to spoonfeed you data that you continually question with "but it could be wrong" forcing us to present even yet more detailed data, at some point you're going to begin questioning whether the ship's cook might have snuck down to varve storage and contaminated them.Varve layers contain characteristic seasonal data from debris, seeds and pollen. Multiple layers laid down in a single year would not go undetected. If it somehow did go undetected then scads of extra layers per year would be violently in disagreement with radiocarbon dating and other forms of dating and would be detected in that way.These silly objections you keep raising tell me you think scientists must spend no time at verifying and cross-correlating their work, or even that they do no work at all and just make it up. But if you enter "varve dating" into Google Scholar you'll get "about 12,900 results". There is decades and decades and decades of research on varve dating.This is from the Wikipedia article on varves: You see, this information is out there and very accessible. Why don't you avail yourself of some of it, otherwise you might end up telling us again that salinity changes caused by spring tides causes varve layer formation. Uh, no MindSpawn, we can neither see the irony nor understand the argument. It looks like the beginning of a poorly thought out idea that you couldn't think through to an argument based upon actual evidence. Gee, just as I predicted, once again you're telling us about varves being caused by spring tides.The only place the phrase "daily tidal varves" appears on the Internet is at EvC Forum. In your message.The only place the phrase "spring tide varves" appears on the Internet is at EvC Forum. In your message.The only place the phrase "bi-annual rainfall varves" appears on the Internet is at EvC Forum. In your message.The only place the phrase "annual rainfall varves" appears on the Internet is at EvC Forum. In your message.You are seriously just making things up. All you've been doing is casting unwarranted aspersions, and mighty weak and dopey ones at that. Scrutinizing would mean actually informing yourself about the research, something you have yet to do.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Typo.

That's your statement, here's mine: "Mindspawn is simply making this up."Prove me wrong.--Percy

Gee, that doesn't sound familiar, let me take a look...Okay, here's what I said in Message 350 over at the Which animals would populate the earth if the ark was real? thead: The reason I made that request was so that claims wouldn't be made up. The relevance to this thread is that we think you're making up your claims, for one example, that spring tides can cause lake varves, which you said was the case with Lake Suigetsu. Do you have any evidence of this? Or for any of the other of your claims that I addressed in Message 77?--Percy

Hello?MindSpawn?Are you still here?You probably think we're trying to give you a hard time, but you keep exhibiting a very real and profound error in logic. You apparently believe that, "It is possible that this could have happened," is valid rebuttal. Usually there are many things that might have happened, so we look for evidence of what actually *did* happen. You need evidence of what actually *did* happen.We figure out what happened by finding positive evidence, not by finding evidence against everything else that might have happened. I don't prove I drove all the way to your house by proving I didn't take a plane, bus or taxi. I prove it by pointing to my car in your driveway. If you're still doubtful then I show you it's not a rent-a-car by showing you my car's registration. Proving that everything else that might have happened didn't happen would be a ridiculous exercise, but that's what you keep asking us to do.--Percy

Sorry for the taking so long to respond, I've been very busy. Yes, of course it's well known. No one ever denied this. No one ever said that saltwater intrusion doesn't happen. That you are issuing a rebuttal of a claim never made is yet another indication of your comprehension issues.You claimed that varve layers would form from spring tides. I responded that the cores were taken from the center of lake Suigetsu around 3 miles from the ocean where the bottom is 20 meters above sea level. You were asked for evidence that tides could cause varve layers 3 miles from the ocean and 20 meters above sea level. You instead replied with the non sequitur, "Saltwater intrusion into the water table is well known." Well, duh.By the way, you rebutted yourself in your own response when you quoted from Transient groundwater dynamics in a coastal aquifer: The effects of tides, the lunar cycle, and the beach profile: It's a mere footnote that fiction has a greater influence on your beliefs than facts - we see this here all the time. What is truly perplexing is why you expect to convince anyone else with barely a single fact on your side.--Percy