Evidence for an Old Earth

In that case, you've come to the wrong place. All we can do is gather evidence around which we build theories. Science is tentative, always open to change in light of new information or improved understanding. There is no such thing as proof in science. However, there is such a thing as theory strongly supported by evidence, and such is the case with radiometric dating. So even though you don't even know how the half-lives of radiometric elements are measured, you nonetheless know that dating methods based upon these half-lives are unreliable? Hmmm.Someone so certain that today's dating methods are unreliable must have fairly detailed knowledge about those methods and their weaknesses. Why don't you tell us about them?While you're thinking about that, why don't you address Coragyps's question about the absence of naturally occurring isotopes with half-lives longer than 80 million years? If the earth were truly only 6,000 years old then these isotopes would still be with us, but they're not.--Percy

You're a bit difficult to satisfy. Your lengthy cut-n-pastes drew a nearly equally lengthy point-by-point rebuttal from John, but you blew it off in a few sentences claiming what you really wanted was evidence. What a great strategy! Win the debate by exhausting oppenents by raising issues that take an hour to address, then blow them off in a one minute reply. If you didn't want a reply to the points raised by your cut-n-pastes then why did you post them?To give you an idea of the degree to which radiometric dates are confirmed experimentally by multiple researchers using a variety of methods, here are a couple tables from Brent Dalrymple's book, The Age of the Earth. This one is for dating rocks in Greenland: And these are for moon rocks: These tables are evidence of wide agreement between the various dating methods of the great antiquity of the earth and moon.--Percy

If we're speaking scientifically, this is where you go wrong. The only valid reason for questioning the evidence is because of conflicting evidence. But you are questioning the evidence not because of conflicting evidence, but because of your interpretation of Genesis. Does Genesis contain evidence?To answer this question, not just about Genesis but about any evidence, ask yourself if it would be possible, given time, money and any essential expertise, for you to verify the evidence yourself. Taking the fossil record as an example, would it be possible for you to examine the evidence yourself. The answer is yes, because you can not only examine the evidence in museums and at universities, but you can even go into the field and participate in digs and extract the evidence first hand. If fossil grasses truly existed in the fossil record much deeper than yet found, could you go out in the field and find them. The answer is yes? Has anyone ever found them? No.Now lets examine the basis for your own viewpoint. Can you examine the evidence for Genesis yourself? Hypothetically, yes. If there had been a world-wide flood 5,000 years ago then the evidence for it should be out there somewhere. Do you have any evidence? No. And if your viewpoint has no evidence, then you have no scientific basis for challenging the existing viewpoint.Concerning the fossil record possibly being a result of the flood, if this were the case then one would expect a jumble. Pick a certain type of animal and you should find it throughout the fossil record, but we instead find it in just a range of layers. You can't argue that animals of a certain size and shape and type must be confined to certain ranges of layers, because other animals of very same size and shape and type appear in other ranges of layers. What's more, the deeper the fossil is found in geological layers, the more it differs from modern forms. A flood couldn't do that, either. This is an admirable admission, but unless you can come up with some evidence supporting your position, it essentially ends the debate for you.--Percy