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Author
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Topic: polonium halos
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Re: More Poppycock Palaver !
Thanks for the quotemine whatever.
whatever said: Any dog on the internet can post Poppycock if you have no peer reviewed evidence just admit it! razd said: Of course: I guess this proves you are a dog eh? Perhaps Gentry's dog? Was that a peer reviewed article you got that from? Or was it just some dog's posting on the internet?
According to Gentry: Briefly, to begin, those who are claiming to have found a natural explanation of polonium halos in granites are trying to hoodwink the unwary. They are misrepresenting the facts. Is this a peer reviewed statement? Or is it just someone posting dog scat.
The evidence clearly favors Gentry: basically, Gentry challenged them to step up to the plate and start a debate in a peer-reviewed SCIENCE journals (the rebuttal works on halos are published on the Internet (no review at all) or in education journals). Curiously evidence is evidence whether it is published or not. The evidence of uranium halos show that the rocks that contain them, including all the ones with polonium halos, are hundreds of millions of years old. Even Gentry admits it. Enjoy.
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| This message is a reply to: | | | Message 65 by johnfolton, posted 10-04-2008 2:41 PM | | johnfolton has replied |
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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The case against polonium halos and primal creation
Whatever, The reason, as I see it, that Admin is asking you to cease posting, is because you are repeating arguments that have been dealt with. Whether Gentry is right or not about other papers being published is irrelevant to the issues raise that he has not refuted.
I could not find anywhere that Gentry admits uranium halos are evidence rocks are hundreds of millions of years old. It's where he talks about accelerated decay. The case against primal polonium In summary, I would say that polonium halos are not evidence of either a young earth or a special creation because: (1) polonium halos are only found in rocks and in geological conditions where uranium decay produces radon and radon diffuses through the rocks. (2) so called polonium halos also show damage due to radon-222 decay as a darker wider blurred band than any of the other bands, evidence that a secondary process is involved in the formation of those bands. (3) the polonium halos cannot affect the age of the earth due to the uranium halos in the same rocks, so for that you need another explanation. (4) uranium halos also invalidate changed decay rates, because decay rates and alpha energies are linked, and if one changes the other changes, and the halos would not have formed in the distinctive pattern that exists in the rocks. (5) truncated uranium halos also exist that do not have any polonium rings, and this is evidence that the radon formed before the polonium in the decay series left the vicinity of the uranium inclusion. This proves radon mobility in the rocks and provides the source of the radon/polonium halos seen in the rocks. (6) there are no halos from other "short half life primal radioactive isotopes" - ones that do NOT have parent isotopes whose decay results in their replenishment. There are halos from other radioactive isotopes, of many varying half-lives, but not from any of the known past "short half life primal radioactive isotopes" - and the cutoff for these "timed out" isotopes is a half-life less than ~0.9 billion years. Enjoy.
we are limited in our ability to understand
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| This message is a reply to: | | | Message 67 by johnfolton, posted 10-05-2008 12:15 AM | | johnfolton has not replied |
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Re: More Polonium Poppycock Palaver ... no rebuttals of mobile Radon, just denial
Thanks AlphaOmegaKid
RAZD, you just fell of the mental balance beam by trying to discredit Gentry's credentials and his scientific publications.
My appeal to authrority fallacy detector just went off. Hey everybody, RAZD wants us to reject all of Einstein's work, because he wasn't a PhD. Curiously ad hominems are not an argument about the facts. The facts are that Gentry's credentials ARE questionable: "Polonium Haloes" Refuted
quote:
Gentry is a physicist, not a geologist. He doesn't follow accepted geologic reporting practice and consistently fails to provide the information that a third party would need to collect comparable samples for testing. For his research, Gentry utilized microscope thin sections of rocks from samples sent to him by others from various places around the world. Thus, he is unable to say how his samples fit in with the local or regional geological setting(s). He also does not provide descriptive information about the individual rock samples that make up his studies - i.e., the abundance and distribution of major, accessory, or trace minerals; the texture, crystal size and alteration features of the rocks; and the presence or absence of fractures and discontinuities. Gentry does not acknowledge that the Precambrian time period represents fully 7/8 of the history of the Earth as determined by decades of intensive field and laboratory investigations by thousands of geologists. Consequently, he does not recognize the wide diversity of geologic terranes that came and went over that enormous time span. His claim that his samples represent "primordial" basement rocks is patently incorrect. In Gentry's model, any rock looking vaguely like a granite and carrying the label Precambrian is considered to be a "primordial" rock. True granites are themselves evidence of significant crustal recycling and elemental differentiation (see for example, Taylor and McLennan, 1996), and cannot be considered primordial. A little detective work by Wakefield (1988) showed that at least one set of rock samples studied by Gentry are not from granites at all, but were taken from a variety of younger Precambrian metamorphic rocks and pegmatite veins in the region around Bancroft, Ontario. Some of these rock units cut or overlie older, sedimentary and even fossil-bearing rocks.
Or from Dr. Collins (University of Illinois in Urbana, Ph.D. degree in geology):
quote:
For your information Robert Gentry does not have a Ph.D. degree in physics, only a master's degree. But he is a competent physicist, and his laboratory experiments dealing with the amounts of radiation necessary to produce halos in mica and fluorite are accurate and acceptable to the referees for major journals. Hence, he has been able to publish in Major Journals and outside the creationists' sponsored journals. His science (at least the experimental part relating to radiation) is not at fault. It is his interpretations and applications of his results that err. As just one example of the problems with his interpretation, in some places polonium halos occur in granite that underlies some fossil-bearing sedimentary rocks and is older than the sedimentary rocks, but in other places polonium halos are found in granites that penetrate sedimentary rocks and are younger than the fossil-bearing sediments, impossible on Gentry's view. I suspect that Robert Gentry likely claims that he has refuted me. Generally, it has been my experience that no logic exists that will change the minds of the die-hard creationists that instantaneous creation during the Genesis Week is the real truth. There are five articles on my website on Creationism that provide direct or indirect evidence that the Gentry model is wrong.
In essence Collins says that Gentry's geology is wrong, and his conclusions based on that geology are wrong. And it is in his geology that his "theory" falls apart, where his claim of "primordial origin" does not hold up to the light of day. Furthermore we have a Ph.D. in physics here, Message 71:
cavediver writes: ... but this shows that Gentry is quite capable of being utterly mis-informed and ignorant of a subject he is supposedly critiquing. He appears quite unaware of the difference between the Special Theory of Relativity and the General Theory of Relativity. Either that, or he is deliberately conflating the two in the hope of deception. Either way, this is an appalling indictment on his status as a scientist. I find it very hard to believe this passed any real level of peer-review. Had it arrived on my desk for review, it would have made the 'nutter of the week' wall (and this purely on the bsais of his Relativity comments - nothing to do with his creationist stance) So that's questioning his credentials as a physicist.
I disagree, you have the problem, not I. I and Gentry only have a problem if the uniformitarian model assumption of constant radioactive decay is a correct assumption. The whole point of Gentry's work is that it calls into question the validity of the unformitarian assumption. And as you know, any dating method is only as good as its assumptions. And the substantial evidence that validates it. There is NO evidence that the natural processes, such as radioactive decay, we significantly different at any time in earth's past. There is SUBSTANTIAL evidence that it has remained the same for billions of years. In science, ALL of science, theory is based on observation of actual objective evidence, and then the theory is tested for validity by a number of various tests. The problem with asserting that this is just an assumption is that there is objective evidence that validates the uniform process of radioactive decay virtually unchanged for billions of years.
Science publications must hold up to the scrutiny of scientific peers. Gentry's has. Evo-babblers make assertions and don't publish them, because they know they will get demolished. Which still does not mean that his conclusions are correct. Nor does it mean that the evidence and arguments in the internet papers are wrong, particularly those by people with degrees in the field. It is just another version of the argument from authority, and it assumes that there are no other reasons for not being published. Did you email Ph.D. Geologist Dr Collins and ask him?
I and Gentry only have a problem if the uniformitarian model assumption of constant radioactive decay is a correct assumption. Translation: Gentry's model is (remotely) tenable IF AND ONLY IF all we know about physics is discarded, and we create a whole new physics based on imagination.
The whole point of Gentry's work is that it calls into question the validity of the unformitarian assumption. Only if we totally disregard the numerous and pervasive problems and errors in his "geology" part of the work and the evidence of old age all around us, as well as the evidence of natural processes occurring in the past just as they do today.
And as you know, any dating method is only as good as its assumptions. By your argument it doesn't really question anything, because it is ONLY based on ASSUMPTION. He uses the a priori ASSUMPTION of creation to explain the polonium halos (when a perfectly valid explanation exists), and then finds that it requires A FURTHER ASSUMPTION of changing physical processes in order to explain away the evidence of uranium halos. Then because the alpha particle energy is tied to the decay rate, he will need ANOTHER ASSUMPTION to form rings that, curiously, LOOK JUST EXACTLY LIKE NO CHANGE IN DECAY RATES OCCUR.
Gentry proposes the thoery of a maximum of three singularities to account for the U and T halos and other phenomena.
quote:
A creation model with three singularities, involving events beyond explanation by known physical laws, is proposed to account for these evidences.
Just as predicted: now we have THREE MORE ASSUMPTIONs. Assumptions for which there is NO EVIDENCE other that wishful thinking. Calling them "singularities" is just playing semantic "hide-the-pea" games, the kind of thing done to delude gullible people. He starts by assuming one miracle occurs, and now to explain the evidence that refutes that miracle he needs three more miracles. One wonders how long it will be before he needs three miracles for each of those new miracles ... until we end up with the old scenario that all the evidence was made by miracle but with complete and accurate in every way appearance of occurring purely by normal processes ... and we have the Loki creation theory.
Now you may not like this hypothesis, because known physics laws can be violated in a singularity. However, let me remind you that this is exactly what is promoted by mainstream science in the BBT (the uniformitarian creation model). A singularity in which the known laws of physics and quantum mechanics breaks down. Which, curiously, does not validate Gentry's claim in any way. Like I said, calling them "singularities" is word games - looks like you got suckered. Is this the new "explanation" for every little bit of inconvenient evidence? Trees rings 12,000 years old, caused by a singularity. Over 25,000 summer/winter varve layers in a lake, caused by a singularity. Please.
According to the uniformitarian model and its assumptions, you are correct. That same model cannot account for the existance of polonium radia halos in granite. it's imposible. It explains the existence of polonium halos in the types of granite in which polonium halos are found. Curiously Gentry does not explain their absence in the other kinds of granite, the ones where radon and uranium intrusion did not or cannot occur. It explains why polonium halos are ALWAYS accompanied by uranium, another point that Gentry does not explain. Must be another miracle. It not only is possible, but it is verified by the simultaneous existence of uranium halos that are MISSING the radon through lead series rings. Given the difference in decay times and the absolutely huge number of atoms needed to form a single ring, the ONLY valid explanation (unless, of course, it's ANOTHER miracle) for the complete absence of radon through lead halos is that the radon migrated into the rock and decayed elsewhere: some of it making radon\polonium halos, complete with the blurred ring that is evidence of radon-222 decay.
In message 31 you show undocumented, unreferenced photographs and you claim they represent radon damage. This is nothing more than an unsubstantiated assertion. They were referenced, they came from Gentry. Message 31:
quote:
This is the predicted picture with a "clean" Polonium halo (top)and a "smudged" Radon-222 halo (bottom):
This is a Gentry photo
Here's another view of the same picture:
quote:
Figure 2. Concentric haloes in biotite mica considered by Gentry to be caused by polonium isotope decay (Gentry, 1992). Gentry, Robert V., 1992, Creation's Tiny Mystery, Earth Science Associates, Knoxville, TN, 3rd Edition.
Same wide dark rings for polonium-210 and radon-222 instead of the narrow clear rings for the other isotopes in the decay series after radon-222.
Hence the reason for a new hypothesis and model. One based on primordial granite which does explain the polonium halos as well as every other radiohalo. With the addition of a few miracles here and there to do away with the inconvenient evidence of simple normal processes without needing to invent a whole new physics.
Please provide documented, peer reviewed evidence that Radon222 is in the Polonium halos. There is none. CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 87, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2004 662.pdf | sep102004 | currsci | Indian Academy of Sciences
quote:
Radii of individual rings surrounding tiny radiocentres (< 2 mm) in diametral/near-diametral sections are consistent and the mean radii of 32.4 mm (outermost), 22.0, 18.3 and 15.2 mm (innermost) compare well with the experimentally determined, theoretically calculated and observed penetration depths of a-particles emitted by 214Po (the outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th (innermost ring) in biotite. Such ring structures can be assigned to the decay chain of 238U in which the above radioactive atoms correspond to daughters in the decay series and each of them emits a-particles of different energies. The radius of each ring will correspond in such a case to a step in the decay series. 238U is one of such radionuclides and it decays through eight alpha-decay steps (Table 1). The a- emitters in the decay chain of 238U are 238U, 234U, 230Th, 226Ra, 222Rn, 218Po, 214Po and 210Po. Accordingly, eight concentric rings are expected in well-developed radiohalos. However, as shown in Table 1, the energies of a particles in air (Ea) emitted by 234U, 230Th and 226Ra are very close. Similarly, Ea for 222Rn is close to that of 210Po. Consequently, characteristic rings of 234U, 230Th and 226Ra and those of 222Rn and 210Po cannot be distinguished in the resolution of common transmitted light microscope. Thus on microscopic examination, five distinct rings corresponding to 214Po, 218Po, 222Rn/210Po, 234U/226Rn/230Th and 238U are often visible in well-developed radiohalos. Best ring structures are developed when the radiocentre is extremely small in size. Larger radiocentres generally develop poor ring structure, partly because of overlapping thick shells/spheres produced by alphas emitted from the centre as well as those from the boundary of radioactive inclusion.
At least four clear rings are discernible in many halos. Typical concentric radiohalo rings in chlorite from the Turamdih U-ore are shown in Figure 4. The four rings (marked by solid curves in Figure 5 b and data in Table 1) from outermost to innermost, correspond to the penetration depths of alpha particles emitted by 214Po (outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th. The gaseous 222Rn can escape the micro-system related to each radiohalo through favourable conduits in the form of micro-fracture and cleavage. However, the presence of radiohalos related to the daughters (218Po 214Po, 210Po) of 222Rn indicates that radon loss was not pervasive, though part of it can escape the system. The suspected fifth ring, mentioned earlier, may correspond to 238U (innermost ring with dotted boundary in Figure 5 b). Strong radiation damage caused by 234U/ 226Rn/230Th resulting in dark discoloration surrounding the radiocentre might have smeared the fifth ring. The ring pattern as found in the present study can thus be assigned to the chain decay of 238U.
So you get blurring of ALL rings from large inclusions, because the source atoms are in different enough locations to cause have overlapping patterns, and you get blurring between 234U, 230Th and 226Ra because they are so similar in energy/radius, AND you get blurring from 222Rn and 210Po because they are so similar in energy/radius. What you end up with is wider rings for 234U/226Rn/230Th and 222Rn/210Po than you do for 214Po, 218Po, or 238U. Because the inclusion doesn't change size during decay - unless it has a gaseous isotope that escapes - it always has the same number of atoms involved in the decay series, the thickness of the rings should be consistent. Thus IF you have a halo with a wide 222Rn/210Po ring and thinner 214Po, 218Po rings, THEN you have radon-222 and polonium-210 overlapping each other exactly as they do in complete uranium halos. If you have the exact same pattern of thin 214Po, thin 218Po and thick 222Rn/210Po rings without the inner 234U/226Rn/230Th or 238U, then you have a radon ring. What it looks like is that geology scientists are doing geology, publishing papers that document the objective evidence that continues to refute Gentry, while ignoring him rather than answering his challenge. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : moved photo
we are limited in our ability to understand
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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If the shoe fits ... ?
An amusing diatribe, AlphaOmegaKid.
Curiously those ad hominen words are your exact metaphor from your skeptic/creationist dialogue..
RAZD writes: Creationist: boy the polonium evidence must be good or you wouldn't be working so hard to prove it wrong .... Skeptic: it amuses me to see the mental gymnastics that people use to avoid admitting that reality has shown certain beliefs to be invalid. I guess if you are feeling that this rather generic statement is an ad hominem then you must agree that Dr Gentry, and by extension you, are ignoring evidence. Otherwise it would not apply.
Now to credibility....
RAZD writes: The facts are that Gentry's credentials ARE questionable: "Polonium Haloes" Refuted
quote:
Gentry is a physicist, not a geologist.
Which is still true.
Yes let's look at those "credible???" credential facts. You quote an article by Thomas A. Baillieul who doesn't once challenge Gentry's credentials. The reason he doesn't do this is because "Thomas A Baillieul" doesn't seem to have any credentials himself. Looks like you are putting a lot of effort into discrediting the messenger and ignoring the message: Gentry is still not a Ph.D. and he still is not a geologist. On the other hand, with a little help you found your mysterious geologist:
msg 76 writes: His resume is here web page resume His resume makes no mention of geological experience except his MS in Geology. His claim to fame is clearly artistry not geology. Which is still more than Gentry's qualifications in either of those fields. It appears he is a retired geologist now doing art - all the awards are 2000 and later, which leaves some 25 years for a career as a geologist since graduation. As pointed out by Joe T he has several books to his name as a geologist listed on Amazon.com:
quote:
The Cascade Slide: A mineralogical investigation of a calc-silicate body on Cascade Mountain, Town of Keene, Essex County, New York (Contribution - Department ... of Massachusetts, Amherst ; no. 27) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1976) Uranium in the Glen Wild area, Woodbridge, New York, 7.5-minute quadrangle (GJBX ; 46) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1978) Scranton quadrangle, Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey (GJQ) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1980) National uranium resource evaluation, Charlottesville quadrangle, Virginia and West Virginia (PGJ/F) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1982) National uranium resource evaluation, Grand Canyon quadrangle, Arizona (PGJ/F) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1982) A vein-type uranium environment in the Precambrian Lovingston Formation, central Virginia (Virginia Division of Mineral Resources publication) by Thomas A Baillieul (Unknown Binding - 1982)
And a number of peer-reviewed articles as well, among the articles listed by Google scholar:
quote:
A reconnaissance survey of the cover sands in the Republic of Botswana, TA Baillieul - Journal of Sedimentary Research, 1975 Makgadikgadi Pans Complex of central Botswana: Summary, TA BAILLIEUL - Geological Society of America Bulletin, 1979 Airborne Geophysics: Application to a Ground-Water Study in Botswana,” by J. Bromley, B. Mannstrom .
TA Baillieul - Ground Water, 1994 Patterns of Uranium Mineralization in Reading Prong, GHP Popper, TA Baillieul - 1983 Uranium in the New Jersey and New York Highlands of the Reading Prong, TA Baillieul, GJ Indelicato - Economic Geology, 1981 - SecG RH-TRU Waste Shipments from Battelle Columbus Laboratories to the Hanford Nuclear Facility for . J Eide, TA Baillieul, J Biedscheid, T Forrester, B . - Conference: Waste Management 2003 Symposium, Tucson, AZ (US) . , 2003 - osti.gov
It certainly seems that he knows geology in general and radioactive rock geology in particular. He HAS done field studies in geology and published papers on that work, so that makes him qualified to talk about Gentry's lack of proper protocol in doing field work.
Next you quote Collins:
quote:
For your information Robert Gentry does not have a Ph.D. degree in physics, only a master's degree. But he is a competent physicist, and his laboratory experiments dealing with the amounts of radiation necessary to produce halos in mica and fluorite are accurate and acceptable to the referees for major journals. Hence, he has been able to publish in Major Journals and outside the creationists' sponsored journals. His science (at least the experimental part relating to radiation) is not at fault. It is his interpretations and applications of his results that err. As just one example of the problems with his interpretation, in some places polonium halos occur in granite that underlies some fossil-bearing sedimentary rocks and is older than the sedimentary rocks, but in other places polonium halos are found in granites that penetrate sedimentary rocks and are younger than the fossil-bearing sediments, impossible on Gentry's view. I suspect that Robert Gentry likely claims that he has refuted me. Generally, it has been my experience that no logic exists that will change the minds of the die-hard creationists that instantaneous creation during the Genesis Week is the real truth. There are five articles on my website on Creationism that provide direct or indirect evidence that the Gentry model is wrong.
Now RAZD, Collins does not call Gentry's credentials into question does he? He only calls his reasoning into question. Actually he does. Politely - notice that he does NOT say that Gentry is a competent geologist. He says, rather, that Gentry has the geology all wrong. Gentry is making statements about the geology that he is not qualified to say.
And finally you fallaciously appeal to Cavediver as your next authority against Gentry. Cavediver's credentials are nothing more than an assertion. He's an anonymous person with an anonymous occupation on his profile. Curiously the authority that Cavediver has on this forum is not based on his assertion of being a physicist, but on his actions: his words and his posts, together with those of others, form a cohesive whole that would not stand up to the scrutiny of others if he were a phony.
Why don't you admit that Gentry has good credentials, and he has met the hurdles of peer-review on multiple occations. Instead, you bring up fictitious Talk Origins writers, anonymous EVC forum authoritarians, and other non-credible unpublished geologists as evidence. Perhaps because the actions of Gentry speak louder than the words published, even those in peer-reviewed articles. He doesn't get the geology correct, and as far as I know he has taken NO measures to correct that oversight. Wakefield demonstrated that he made mistakes in his geology ("A little detective work by Wakefield (1988) showed that at least one set of rock samples studied by Gentry are not from granites at all, but were taken from a variety of younger Precambrian metamorphic rocks and pegmatite veins in the region around Bancroft, Ontario. Some of these rock units cut or overlie older, sedimentary and even fossil-bearing rocks."). Note that this article (The Geology of Gentry's "Tiny Mystery") was originally published in the May 1988 Iissue of the Journal of Geological Education, a peer-reviewed journal ("The Journal of Geoscience Education (JGE) is the premier peer-reviewed publication for geoscience education research at the undergraduate and pre-college levels."). These failings are listed in many places, and whether they are in peer-reviewed documents or not, they DO come from people qualified to talk about his shortcomings and his mistakes.
Whom should I believe? You, or Gentry. My money is on Gentry right now. Strangely, WHAT you should believe is the question not WHO. Creationists always seem to put more emphasis on WHO that WHAT, one of the reasons for their ever popular quote-mines and misrepresentations of what people said, rather that what the evidence says. WHAT you should believe is the evidence. Curiously you had your little rant defending the honor of Gentry (I'm sure he appreciates it), but you did not address the evidence that refutes Gentry at all. Enjoy.
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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The Mistaken Miracle Theology (not a theory)
I noticed AlphaOmegaKid that you did not address the evidence issues in my earlier post, choosing instead to go on a rant about qualifications. I'll break it down into smaller segments. From Message 73: First up, the "miracle" portion of Gentry's concept.
quote:
I disagree, you have the problem, not I. I and Gentry only have a problem if the uniformitarian model assumption of constant radioactive decay is a correct assumption. The whole point of Gentry's work is that it calls into question the validity of the unformitarian assumption. And as you know, any dating method is only as good as its assumptions. And the substantial evidence that validates it. There is NO evidence that the natural processes, such as radioactive decay, we significantly different at any time in earth's past. There is SUBSTANTIAL evidence that it has remained the same for billions of years. In science, ALL of science, theory is based on observation of actual objective evidence, and then the theory is tested for validity by a number of various tests. The problem with asserting that this is just an assumption is that there is objective evidence that validates the uniform process of radioactive decay virtually unchanged for billions of years.
Science publications must hold up to the scrutiny of scientific peers. Gentry's has. Evo-babblers make assertions and don't publish them, because they know they will get demolished. Which still does not mean that his conclusions are correct. Nor does it mean that the evidence and arguments in the internet papers are wrong, particularly those by people with degrees in the field. It is just another version of the argument from authority, and it assumes that there are no other reasons for not being published. Did you email Ph.D. Geologist Dr Collins and ask him?
I and Gentry only have a problem if the uniformitarian model assumption of constant radioactive decay is a correct assumption. Translation: Gentry's model is (remotely) tenable IF AND ONLY IF all we know about physics is discarded, and we create a whole new physics based on imagination.
The whole point of Gentry's work is that it calls into question the validity of the unformitarian assumption. Only if we totally disregard the numerous and pervasive problems and errors in his "geology" part of the work and the evidence of old age all around us, as well as the evidence of natural processes occurring in the past just as they do today.
And as you know, any dating method is only as good as its assumptions. By your argument it doesn't really question anything, because it is ONLY based on ASSUMPTION. He uses the a priori ASSUMPTION of creation to explain the polonium halos (when a perfectly valid explanation exists), and then finds that it requires A FURTHER ASSUMPTION of changing physical processes in order to explain away the evidence of uranium halos. Then because the alpha particle energy is tied to the decay rate, he will need ANOTHER ASSUMPTION to form rings that, curiously, LOOK JUST EXACTLY LIKE NO CHANGE IN DECAY RATES OCCUR.
Gentry proposes the thoery of a maximum of three singularities to account for the U and T halos and other phenomena.
quote:
A creation model with three singularities, involving events beyond explanation by known physical laws, is proposed to account for these evidences.
Just as predicted: now we have THREE MORE ASSUMPTIONs. Assumptions for which there is NO EVIDENCE other that wishful thinking. Calling them "singularities" is just playing semantic "hide-the-pea" games, the kind of thing done to delude gullible people. He starts by assuming one miracle occurs, and now to explain the evidence that refutes that miracle he needs three more miracles. One wonders how long it will be before he needs three miracles for each of those new miracles ... until we end up with the old scenario that all the evidence was made by miracle but with complete and accurate in every way appearance of occurring purely by normal processes ... and we have the Loki creation theory.
Now you may not like this hypothesis, because known physics laws can be violated in a singularity. However, let me remind you that this is exactly what is promoted by mainstream science in the BBT (the uniformitarian creation model). A singularity in which the known laws of physics and quantum mechanics breaks down. Which, curiously, does not validate Gentry's claim in any way. Like I said, calling them "singularities" is word games - looks like you got suckered. Is this the new "explanation" for every little bit of inconvenient evidence? Trees rings 12,000 years old, caused by a singularity. Over 25,000 summer/winter varve layers in a lake, caused by a singularity. Please.
According to the uniformitarian model and its assumptions, you are correct. That same model cannot account for the existance of polonium radia halos in granite. it's imposible. It explains the existence of polonium halos in the types of granite in which polonium halos are found. Curiously Gentry does not explain their absence in the other kinds of granite, the ones where radon and uranium intrusion did not or cannot occur. It explains why polonium halos are ALWAYS accompanied by uranium, another point that Gentry does not explain. Must be another miracle.
Science is not done by appealing to miracles. Especially when perfectly valid science can be done to explain the same evidence without a single miracle. This is not theory but theology. Enjoy.
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Back to the issue of "Primordial Polonium" being Primarily Poppycock Palaver
And again, AlphaOmegaKid, we have the issue of addressing the EVIDENCE that refutes Gentry. Here's the next unanswered segment from Message 73: the evidence FOR radon-222 diffusion, even in Gentry's own photographs.
quote:
In message 31 you show undocumented, unreferenced photographs and you claim they represent radon damage. This is nothing more than an unsubstantiated assertion. They were referenced, they came from Gentry. Message 31:
quote:
This is the predicted picture with a "clean" Polonium halo (top)and a "smudged" Radon-222 halo (bottom):
This is a Gentry photo
Here's another view of the same picture:
quote:
Figure 2. Concentric haloes in biotite mica considered by Gentry to be caused by polonium isotope decay (Gentry, 1992). Gentry, Robert V., 1992, Creation's Tiny Mystery, Earth Science Associates, Knoxville, TN, 3rd Edition.
Same wide dark rings for polonium-210 and radon-222 instead of the narrow clear rings for the other isotopes in the decay series after radon-222.
Hence the reason for a new hypothesis and model. One based on primordial granite which does explain the polonium halos as well as every other radiohalo. With the addition of a few miracles here and there to do away with the inconvenient evidence of simple normal processes without needing to invent a whole new physics.
Please provide documented, peer reviewed evidence that Radon222 is in the Polonium halos. There is none. CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 87, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2004
662.pdf | sep102004 | currsci | Indian Academy of Sciences
quote:
Radii of individual rings surrounding tiny radiocentres (< 2 mm) in diametral/near-diametral sections are consistent and the mean radii of 32.4 mm (outermost), 22.0, 18.3 and 15.2 mm (innermost) compare well with the experimentally determined, theoretically calculated and observed penetration depths of a-particles emitted by 214Po (the outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th (innermost ring) in biotite. Such ring structures can be assigned to the decay chain of 238U in which the above radioactive atoms correspond to daughters in the decay series and each of them emits a-particles of different energies. The radius of each ring will correspond in such a case to a step in the decay series. 238U is one of such radionuclides and it decays through eight alpha-decay steps (Table 1). The a- emitters in the decay chain of 238U are 238U, 234U, 230Th, 226Ra, 222Rn, 218Po, 214Po and 210Po. Accordingly, eight concentric rings are expected in well-developed radiohalos. However, as shown in Table 1, the energies of a particles in air (Ea) emitted by 234U, 230Th and 226Ra are very close. Similarly, Ea for 222Rn is close to that of 210Po. Consequently, characteristic rings of 234U, 230Th and 226Ra and those of 222Rn and 210Po cannot be distinguished in the resolution of common transmitted light microscope. Thus on microscopic examination, five distinct rings corresponding to 214Po, 218Po, 222Rn/210Po, 234U/226Rn/230Th and 238U are often visible in well-developed radiohalos. Best ring structures are developed when the radiocentre is extremely small in size. Larger radiocentres generally develop poor ring structure, partly because of overlapping thick shells/spheres produced by alphas emitted from the centre as well as those from the boundary of radioactive inclusion.
At least four clear rings are discernible in many halos. Typical concentric radiohalo rings in chlorite from the Turamdih U-ore are shown in Figure 4. The four rings (marked by solid curves in Figure 5 b and data in Table 1) from outermost to innermost, correspond to the penetration depths of alpha particles emitted by 214Po (outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th. The gaseous 222Rn can escape the micro-system related to each radiohalo through favourable conduits in the form of micro-fracture and cleavage. However, the presence of radiohalos related to the daughters (218Po 214Po, 210Po) of 222Rn indicates that radon loss was not pervasive, though part of it can escape the system. The suspected fifth ring, mentioned earlier, may correspond to 238U (innermost ring with dotted boundary in Figure 5 b). Strong radiation damage caused by 234U/ 226Rn/230Th resulting in dark discoloration surrounding the radiocentre might have smeared the fifth ring. The ring pattern as found in the present study can thus be assigned to the chain decay of 238U.
So you get blurring of ALL rings from large inclusions, because the source atoms are in different enough locations to cause have overlapping patterns, and you get blurring between 234U, 230Th and 226Ra because they are so similar in energy/radius, AND you get blurring from 222Rn and 210Po because they are so similar in energy/radius. What you end up with is wider rings for 234U/226Rn/230Th and 222Rn/210Po than you do for 214Po, 218Po, or 238U. Because the inclusion doesn't change size during decay - unless it has a gaseous isotope that escapes - it always has the same number of atoms involved in the decay series, the thickness of the rings should be consistent. Thus IF you have a halo with a wide 222Rn/210Po ring and thinner 214Po, 218Po rings, THEN you have radon-222 and polonium-210 overlapping each other exactly as they do in complete uranium halos. If you have the exact same pattern of thin 214Po, thin 218Po and thick 222Rn/210Po rings without the inner 234U/226Rn/230Th or 238U, then you have a radon ring. What it looks like is that geology scientists are doing geology, publishing papers that document the objective evidence that continues to refute Gentry, while ignoring him rather than answering his challenge. Enjoy.
You will notice that the picture in question is indeed a Gentry picture, and you will notice that indeed radon-222 and polonium-210 blend into a wider ring than polonium-214 and polonium-218 make when they are all formed as part of the uranium-238 halo (and complete decay series). You will note that this widening is the same as seen in Gentry's photo, thus demonstrating that radon-222 was necessarily involved. You will also notice that the evidence of uranium halos that are missing the radon-222 and down through the rest of the decay series, demonstrates unequivocally that radon gas does indeed diffuse in the rocks in question. Thus the evidence says the cause of the halos is continuation of uranium decay through displacement of radon gas in the rocks, and that there is no need to postulate "primordial polonium" to explain the halos, NOR do we need to invent whole new magical miracle physics to change decay rates.
Message 79 RAZD hasn't produced any scientific evidence. Curiously, ignoring the mountains of evidence, from Wakefield to India, does not make it go away. Evidence documented by scientists IS scientific evidence. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : end. Edited by RAZD, : moved photo
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Re: Back to the issue of "Primordial Polonium" being Primarily Poppycock Palaver
Hey AlphaOmegaKid, No problem, take all the time you need, learning processes do take time, gathering information does take time: I do not expect instant replies (in fact I suspect instant replies of not being well thought out or researched - and I appreciate the time you've taken). More on Gentry Credibility While you are working on your replies consider this little complication on the peer-reviewed issue: Frome Wakefield's (peer reviewed) article, The Geology of Gentry's "Tiny Mystery":
quote:
In the papers he has published in scientific journals, Gently has avoided making creationist statements, but his other publications on the matter give the distinct impression that he is trying to link the rocks of the Precambrian to the rocks that existed right after Earth's formation (or creation). For example, Gentry states in one publication (1974, p. 63) that.
"It is also apparent that Po halos do pose contradictions to currently held views of Earth history." "The Question is, can they be explained by presently accepted cosmological and geological concepts of the origin and development of Earth?" (1974, p· 56) and
"Do Po halos imply unknown processes were operative during the formative periods of the Earth?" (Gentry and others, 1974, p. 564) Gentry’s book, however, is far more bold and less cryptic than his refereed papers. Comments like
"Were tiny polonium halos God's fingerprint in Earth's primordial rocks? Could it be that the Precambrian granites were the Genesis rocks of our planet." (Gentry, 1986, p. 32) and
"...polonium halos in Precambrian granites identify these rocks as some of the Genesis rocks of our planet - created in such a way that they cannot be duplicated without intervention of the Creator." (p. 133) are common.
(bold in the original) So he is not entirely candid on what is and is not published in peer-reviewed journals regarding his more contentious claims. Can you show where he claims in a peer-reviewed article that the earth is only 6000 years old or that the "...polonium halos in Precambrian granites identify these rocks as some of the Genesis rocks of our planet - created in such a way that they cannot be duplicated without intervention of the Creator." Now it seems to me that he has conflated his {freely stated} book position with his {carefully worded to pass peer review} articles to imply that his creationist position is supported by the peer review process. It isn't, he just left big questions hanging on the peer reviewed articles, questions that, typically are open to several solutions. That he does NOT distinguish between these two distinct positions calls his credibility into question imh(ysa)o. More on Missing "Primordial" Halos As noted previously, there are a number of isotopes that no longer exist on earth in a natural state because they all have short (less than ~9x10^8 years) half-lives ( Wiens, 2002, p11-12): they have time-out; decayed below detectable levels; gone extinct. It certainly seems reasonable that IF we were dealing with "Primordial" rocks, as Gentry (in his book, not in his peer-reviewed articles) claims are "the Genesis rocks of our planet," that THEN we should see halos from some of these now extinct isotopes. Notice that some of the halos in his samples are Thorium-232 halos (as big a problem for him as the Uranium-238 halos for the same reason), and they have all their decay chain rings from Th-232 on down. In this case Radon-220 has a half-life of less than one minute, and that the daughter Polonium isotopes -212 and -216 do NOT make isolated halos. This article HYDROTHERMAL URANOTHORITE IN FLUORITE BRECCIAS FROM THE BLUE JAY MINE, JAMESTOWN' BOULDER COUNTY, COLORADO talks about these Thorium halos and the associated Po-212 ring (there is a picture near the end). Where are these missing Polonium-212 and -216 halos? But also notice that Thorium-232 is a daughter of several of those extinct isotopes:
quote:
252Cf :: :: 2.645 a :: 6.1181 MeV
248Cm :: :: 3.410^5 a :: 6.260 MeV
244Pu :: :: 8107 a :: 4.589 MeV
244Cm :: :: 18 a :: 5.8048 MeV
240Pu :: :: 6561 a :: 5.1683 MeV
236U :: :: 2.3x10^7 a :: 4.494 MeV
And putting those together with all the ones we do know about from Thoriu-232 decay, we can arrange them by alpha particle energy = halo diameter (orange ones are the extinct isotopes):
quote:
232Th :: :: 1.40510^10 a :: 4.08 Mev
236U :: :: 2.310^7 a :: 4.49 Mev
244Pu :: :: 810^7 a :: 4.59 Mev
240Pu :: :: 6561 a :: 5.17 Mev
228Th :: :: 1.9116 a :: 5.52 Mev
224Ra :: :: 3.6319 d :: 5.79 Mev
244Cm :: :: 18 a :: 5.80 Mev
252Cf :: :: 2.645 a :: 6.12 Mev
212Bi :: :: 60.55 m :: 6.21 Mev
248Cm :: :: 3.410^5 a :: 6.26 Mev
220Rn :: :: 55.6 s :: 6.40 Mev
216Po :: :: 0.145 s :: 6.91 Mev
212Po :: :: 299 ns :: 8.96 Mev
For reference the Radon-222 and Polonium-210 ring diameters are for
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV A delta of 0.18 MeV. If we use 0.20 MeV as the cut-off, several of these are near enough to other ring diameters that they would likely be blurred like the Radon-222 and Polonium-210 rings, however we have a couple that should show up as additional rings if we had "primordial" Thorium: a ring at 4.5 MeV, and one at 5.2 MeV, so there should be a total of 8 distinguishable rings corresponding to 4.0, 4.5-4.6, 5.2, 5.5, 5.8, 6.1-6.4, 6.9 and 9.0 MeV, with one of them, 6.1 to 6.4 MeV showing a very wide blurred ring. Where are these missing Thorium-232 parent isotope rings? There are four (4) basic decay chains:
quote:
Three main decay chains (or families) are observed in nature, commonly called the thorium series, the radium series (not uranium series), and the actinium series, representing three of these four classes, and ending in three different, stable isotopes of lead. The mass number of every isotope in these chains can be represented as A=4n, A=4n+2, and A=4n+3, respectively. The long-lived starting isotopes 232Th, 238U, and 235U, respectively, of these three have existed since the formation of the earth. The plutonium precursor 244Pu has also been found in minute amounts on earth[1]. Due to the quite short half-life of its starting isotope 237Np (2.14 million years), the fourth chain, the neptunium series with A=4n+1, is already extinct in nature, except for the final rate-limiting step, decay of bismuth-209 (209Bi). The ending isotope of this chain is now known to be thallium-205 (205Tl). Some older sources give the final isotope as 209Bi, but it was recently discovered that 209Bi is radioactive, with half-life of 1.91019 years.
Where are these missing Neptunium series halos from any of these extinct isotope parents to Bismuth-209? Not only does the "Primodial Polonium" concept not explain the missing Po-212 and Po-216, but there are Po-211 and Po-215 isotopes from the Actinium series that are missing. Why do the "Primodial Polonium" halos only come from ONE out of four main decay chains? By the way: if you want to explore the numbers of isotopes of different elements, and see how many have extinct radioactive versions, an interesting website is this: http://ie.lbl.gov/education/isotopes.htm Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : added end
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Still Fuzzy on the Concepts of Primal Polonium Poppycock
Thanks, AlphaOmegaKid,
A prediction from ntskeptics . of course. This prediction is your evidence? Now let’s begin to unravel this strawman argument that only exists on evo-babbler websites. None of this talk of Radon halos is in any kind of scientific literature. No, a prediction from Wakefields peer-reviewed article, which happens to be posted by ntskeptics. Here's another version of The Geology of Gentry's "Tiny Mystery", where he lays out the evidence that is the basis for his theory, and where he develops his prediction from the theory:
quote:
Gentry has described his work on halos and his interpretations of the significance of the halos in a series at papers and in a recent book Creation’s Tiny Mystery (Gentry 1986). How these halos form is not difficult to understand. They are formed by alpha particles released during the decay of radioactive nuclides. As an alpha particle nears the end of its path and slows, it causes disruption of the crystal structure and leaves a small damage track. Over time, repeated decays from the parent nuclide will leave a spherical halo of discolouration. The distance that an alpha particle travels depends on the energy of the decay and that, in turn, is a function of the particular nuclide that decays. Theoretically, then, the radii of a series of halos that surround a radioactive inclusion permit identification of the specific decaying nuclides.
Notice that there are five (5) halos depicted even though there are eight (8) alpha decay events in the decay chain from U-238 to Pb-206, one for the Po-210 plus Rn-222 combination ring and another for the Ra-236 plus Th-230 plus U-234 combination ring. Notice that in Message 81 I gave you additional information from a published scientific journal article on uranium halos that showed this same information and a picture of a typical uranium halo with 4 of the 5 rings visible (the inner one is usually hard to find due to the accumulated damage to that area by all the decay events):
msg 81 writes: CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 87, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2004 662.pdf | sep102004 | currsci | Indian Academy of Sciences
quote:
Radii of individual rings surrounding tiny radiocentres (< 2 mm) in diametral/near-diametral sections are consistent and the mean radii of 32.4 mm (outermost), 22.0, 18.3 and 15.2 mm (innermost) compare well with the experimentally determined, theoretically calculated and observed penetration depths of a-particles emitted by 214Po (the outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th (innermost ring) in biotite. Such ring structures can be assigned to the decay chain of 238U in which the above radioactive atoms correspond to daughters in the decay series and each of them emits a-particles of different energies. The radius of each ring will correspond in such a case to a step in the decay series. 238U is one of such radionuclides and it decays through eight alpha-decay steps (Table 1). The a- emitters in the decay chain of 238U are 238U, 234U, 230Th, 226Ra, 222Rn, 218Po, 214Po and 210Po. Accordingly, eight concentric rings are expected in well-developed radiohalos. However, as shown in Table 1, the energies of a particles in air (Ea) emitted by 234U, 230Th and 226Ra are very close. Similarly, Ea for 222Rn is close to that of 210Po. Consequently, characteristic rings of 234U, 230Th and 226Ra and those of 222Rn and 210Po cannot be distinguished in the resolution of common transmitted light microscope. Thus on microscopic examination, five distinct rings corresponding to 214Po, 218Po, 222Rn/210Po, 234U/226Rn/230Th and 238U are often visible in well-developed radiohalos. Best ring structures are developed when the radiocentre is extremely small in size. Larger radiocentres generally develop poor ring structure, partly because of overlapping thick shells/spheres produced by alphas emitted from the centre as well as those from the boundary of radioactive inclusion.
At least four clear rings are discernible in many halos. Typical concentric radiohalo rings in chlorite from the Turamdih U-ore are shown in Figure 4. The four rings (marked by solid curves in Figure 5 b and data in Table 1) from outermost to innermost, correspond to the penetration depths of alpha particles emitted by 214Po (outermost ring), 218Po, 210Po/222Rn, and 226Ra/234U/230Th. The gaseous 222Rn can escape the micro-system related to each radiohalo through favourable conduits in the form of micro-fracture and cleavage. However, the presence of radiohalos related to the daughters (218Po 214Po, 210Po) of 222Rn indicates that radon loss was not pervasive, though part of it can escape the system. The suspected fifth ring, mentioned earlier, may correspond to 238U (innermost ring with dotted boundary in Figure 5 b). Strong radiation damage caused by 234U/ 226Rn/230Th resulting in dark discoloration surrounding the radiocentre might have smeared the fifth ring. The ring pattern as found in the present study can thus be assigned to the chain decay of 238U.
So you get blurring of ALL rings from large inclusions, because the source atoms are in different enough locations to cause have overlapping patterns, and you get blurring between 234U, 230Th and 226Ra because they are so similar in energy/radius, AND you get blurring from 222Rn and 210Po because they are so similar in energy/radius. What you end up with is wider rings for 234U/226Rn/230Th and 222Rn/210Po than you do for 214Po, 218Po, or 238U. (Color added for empHAsis) So this validates Wakefields information. Now we move on to his theory that the Rn-222 halo is obscured by the normal blurriness of alpha particle decay evident in ALL halo rings (Wakefield, 2004): First the theoretical Polonium halo with Radon included:
quote:
Then the theoretical blurring of Po-210 and Ra-222 to the same degree as is seen in the outer halos (where there is no known duplication of sources):
quote:
Because the normal amount of blurring overlaps and fills the space between Po-210 and Ra-222, only one wider than normal ring would be visible -- no matter how much you magnify the picture or increase the accuracy of the instrument making the pictures - because the blurring is in the rocks. This is also seen in the Uranium halos noted above, thus confirming that such overlapping blurring occurs. From this basis Wakefield predicted that the Polonium halos will show these wider bands for the overlapped Po-210 plus Rn-222 naturally blurred rings. Then he went out and tested his prediction against the rocks that Gentry (supposedly) used. We will come back to what he found later.
Now I am going to go slow, so all the audience can understand this slight of hand strawman. When scientists talk about radiohalos they refer to them by the emitting particles (the parent element) at the center of the halo. When you have a U238 halo, there are uranium elements emitting the alpha decay from the center of the halo. The rings around the center identify the alpha decay chain that proceeds after the parent material decays into each successive decay chain ion. With a Po218 halo, Po218 must originally be at the center. When you look at mature uranium halos you will see a Po210 and Rn222 decay rings. The alpha decay energies of these two ions is very close, and one is a solid(Po210) and one is a gas (Rn222). The reason you have “fuzzy” rings where the Po210 ring and the Rn222 ring are is simply because in a mineral encapsulation the mineral damage from the alpha decay energy is about the same for the Rn222 as it is for the Po210. And as demonstrated above, in a mature uranium halo you see five (5) rings, not eight (8), and you cannot distinguish a Rn-222 halo from a Po-210 halo - they are blurred into one wider ring. Because of this, the evidence for Radon in the halo is not a separate ring from Po-210, but a wider ring than seen on the other halos. So Wakefield went on a quest to find the source of Gentry's rocks (Wakefield, 2004):
quote:
Before learning the locations of two of the sites, I suspected that Gentry had used samples from the Superior Province of Archean age in northern Ontario because this Province has some of the oldest rocks in North America. Thus, I was surprised to find that his sites were located in the much younger Grenville Province. This is a major blunder an Gentry’s part. Louis Moyd made this very point to Gentry in person, when Gentry visited to get samples (Moyd, personal communication, February 1987). It is apparent that Gentry knows next to nothing about Precambrian geology because he lumps all Precambrian rocks into one unit -- the created one.
(Color added for empHAsis) Oops, there's that nasty credibility thing again.
quote:
From this description it is clear that this is a small calcite vein-dike, a rock body containing mostly large crystals of calcium carbonate and other minerals like mica. Gentry's sample came from the vein lining. The biotite grew outward from the syenitized wall rock, replacing the calcite, (see Figure 13) as a result of reactions between the wall rock, the calcite core and volatile fluids. (Moyd, personal communication, August 1987).
So the samples come from a secondary formation, after the granite had formed and cooled, and not from primordial precambrian rock as Gentry claimed.
quote:
The vein-dike is small in length and width, it cuts metasedimentary rocks which still retain bedding planes, and radioactive minerals abound. In another mineral-collecting guidebook (Sabina,1986, p. 79), it was noted that at this site "Uraninite was found in cavities in pegmatites with magnetite, mica or calcite-fluorite intergrowths." Clearly, radioactive minerals are common at this locality. Percolating water from the hill the deposit occurs within is strongly radioactive and was sold in the 1920s for therapeutic purposes. Hornblende crystals 2 m long, biotite 0.3 cm across, apatite 0.3 cm long, feldspars 1 m long, and zircons 5 cm long have been found in this deposit. Also mentioned are pegmatites completely surrounded by metasediments and derived from partial melting of those metasediments during metamorphism.
And the rocks were saturated with radioactive minerals.
quote:
The geology of the Silver Crater Mine site is similar to the geology of the Fission site, and the calcite vein-dike is part of the same group of calcite vein-dikes that dot the countryside near Bancroft. ... Let me make one thing very clear at this point. The Silver Crater and the Fission Mine dikes are not granites at all. The composition and mode of origin is totally wrong for a granite and Gentry has made a major error in identifying the source rocks of his biotite as granites. In his book Gentry erroneously criticizes Dalrymple for comparing the textures of basaltic lava and granite (Gentry, 1986,p. 130), yet Gentry can't tell the difference between granite and calcite vein-dike rock. Recently a consensus has emerged among geologists as to the origin of the calcite vein-dike material, the biotite, and the other large mineral grains in the dikes. Because of the presence of rounded calcite within the biotite, it is thought that the biotite grew as a replacement within the solid calcite vein-dike matrix. This process occurs when vein-dike, which was hydrothermally deposited or injected as a molten liquid, is reheated enough to cause the evenly distributed biotite, hornblende, betafite, apatite, and so forth, in the wall-rock in the calcite vein-dike to start to migrate and form larger crystals in the calcite vein-dike. Gentry claimed that "Halos occur in many mica samples which have not undergone metamorphism of any kind' (1986. p- 299). In fact, however, these micas were indeed formed during metamorphism at moderate depth (10-15 km), and overburden has since been removed by erosion. To put it simply and directly, the biotite was metamorphically derived.
(Color added again for empHAsis) Wakefield found similar discrepancies for the other sites listed by Gentry:
quote:
In other words, material was eroded from some preexisting rock, deposited as a sedimentary rock (probably in a volcanic island arc setting (Windley, 1986)), then deformed and recrystallized by high-grade metamorphism (referred to as the Grenville Orogeny (Lumbers, 1982)) which altered this rock to paragneiss. The paragneisses were in turn intruded by the gabbro, which later underwent a metamorphic episode during the latter stages of the orogeny. Finally, the rocks were intruded by the granite pegmatite. Gentry’s biotite came from this pegmatite. The Faraday Mine pegmatites have been dated at between 992 Ma and 1088 Ma by several methods (Easton, 1986a,c). The Faraday Batholith, just to the north, was dated at 1190 Ma. Though no dating of the Faraday gabbro has been done, other gabbros of similar composition, (like the Tudor Gabbro just to the south) in the area have been dated at 1180 Ma (Easton, 1986a). The Silver Crater deposit has been dated at 1000 Ma (R. Gait. Mineralogist, Royal Ontario Museum, personal communication, February 1987), and the Fission mine is closely related to the Silver Crater in age.
So Gentry has the wrong age and the wrong type of rocks, and he has the formation of those rocks wrong, and we haven't even gotten to the evidence yet.
It is important to emphasize at this point that the alpha decay always emits from the center portion of the halo. From the central inclusion or concentration area, which can vary in size, and the best halos (ie having the most distinct rings) are from small inclusions, whatever the radioactive parent source.
That means that when Rn222 forms at the center, the Rn222 gas is not migrating, or being transported by any fluid mechanism. It is locked or encapsulated and it is undergoing alpha decay. Yet this assertion is false, Radon is well known for penetrating rocks by the smallest of avenues -- it is an inert gas, so it is not chemically attracted to any other atoms and just needs the space for an atom to pass -- so, no, it is not encapsulated with the solid parent material, but free to roam by whatever avenues are available.
Now we know this for a fact, because if the Rn222 was allowed to escape from the center, then you would not have the subsequent decay rings of Po218, Po214 and Po210. Which is why the evidence of Uranium halos that are missing the Rn-222 and all daughter isotope emission rings, is evidence that in fact Radon moves freely into the rocks.
This is why no real scientist is even suggesting Rn222 halos. That would mean that a cavity large enough to encapsulate the Rn222 would be present and observable. Another false assertion. All that is needed is a volume larger than the micro-fissures common to crystals such as biotite. Because it is a gas it is subject to the physics of gasses, and this means that the partial pressure is equalized in the total volume occupied by the gas. Thus wherever you have more volume you will have more Radon gas. Consider this analogy: water is dripped onto a filter at the rate of one drop per day; the filter hold four drops of water before one falls off the bottom, also at the rate of one drop per day. Thus the average time spent on the filter is four (4) days. The four (4) drops do not have a large volume, just more than the volume along the supply line Now we compare this to Radon gas flowing through a crystal lattice along micro-fissures where it finds a place that is a small void, just large enough that the radon - on average - stays in the void space for four (4) days. If the flow rate is one atom in per day, the void does not need to be very big at all. If it takes one or two days for the Radon gas to reach this void from the source U-238 to Radium-236 decay chain source, and the void is just large enough to keep the Radon atom for an average of four (4) days, then the probability is extremely high that half of the atoms will decay to Po-218 while in that void space (half-life = 3.8235 days). Double the volume and you now have 3/4ths of the atoms likely decaying while in the void, and anything larger just increases the likelihood of decay (and also the volume from which the halo forms). Smaller is better for distinct halos, and it ie EASY to have very small void spaces big enough to delay Radon gas for short periods of time.
It also means that this cavity would be substantially larger than the current observable radio centers, because Rn222 gas takes up much more space than the subsequent decay chain solids. An atom is an atom, and the Radon-222 atom is only slightly larger than the Po-218 atom. The polonium is also capable of forming a chemical bond with the crystal lattice around the void area, thus it could easily be incorporated into the shell of the void, leaving the stage open for the next generation of Radon atoms to pass through and stay for the show.
That means that evidence of a cavity would be available in a Rn222 halo. It also means that the Rn222 gas must have been encapsulated in a very short time period also. But just what would that encapsulation mechanism be if the minerals weren’t molten? Simple physics of gasses and chemistry of chrystals. Strangely, it may actually be the short half-life of the Radon-222 isotope that is responsible for the concentration of enough atoms to form a halo.
Now all of this is obvious to the evo-babblers, but they try and trick you with their slight of hand. I will demonstrate this by quoting from your citation . .. Like calling people names? Next we'll have "evo-goggles" and the world wide conspiracy of all scientists to misrepresent reality.  (gratuitous smiley for CTD's benefit).
Now unfortunately we have a logical bait and switch, which most people won’t catch. Note the underlined sections. The first paragraph is correct in saying that the Po218 can fall out of solution. What it doesn't say is that by the time it falls out, it decays. Then he switches in paragraph 2 and says Rn222 falls out of solution. No he says that at the moment it decays the atom falls out of solution, and we have ~3.10 min +/- (the half-life of Po-218) for it to end up on the crystal lattice or still be hanging around in the void volume. The next decay chain product is Pb-214 which has a half-life of 19.9 min and decays by β- decay to form Po-214 (alpha decay, 0.1643 ms half-life).
Then the author switches again and he is back to Po218,214,210 taking up lattice positions and concentrate in the biotite and fluorite crystals. Well if that is true, then you will have Po218,Po214, and P210 halos. On top of the Radon-222 halos, caused by the decay of Rn-222 while inside the void volume.
And the Po218 would not have time to "gather" in a lattice structure. Not all of it has to be incorporated, some may get flushed out of the void by the incoming flow before it gets a chance to set up house-keeping. All you need is enough to form the next halos, and once that occurs all those halos will have the same density.
The possibility of Rn222 halos doesn’t have a logical solution unless there is evidence of inclusions at the center. The mobility of the Rn222 must be constrained by the mineral to create a halo.
So the only scientific logical conclusion is that these are Po218 halos and not Rn222 halos. And yet, as just demonstrated above, there is a very simple, very scientific, very logical explanation that relies on nothing more than the physics of gassed, the chemistry of crystals and the physics of the known decay chain, to cause the concentration of atoms sufficient to form Radon-222 halos together with the remaining α decay isotopes of the U-238 decay chain, Po-218, Po-214, and Po-210 (which overlaps the Rn-222 ring), resulting in three (3) rings, one wider than the others.
This also means that there cannot be a “predicted” picture/drawing of a Radon222 halo. The problems with this are that (a) this is already invalidated by the above argument, and (2) this is invalidated by the evidence of complete Uranium halos that show this same fuzzy wider ring for the Po-210 plus Rn-222 decay and we KNOW that Radon was involved in those. The argument AND the evidence show your assertion is false.
Now lets go to the “fuzzy” halo logic which is basically what you are arguing . Now at first glance, I must admit that this is an impressive display of “EVIDENCE” . Do you see how ntskeptics purposesly altered the image to make this argument. And you rest on this evidence? The reason I asked for the actual citation of where the photos came from was because photos must be explained in context. Here is the original photo from Gentry . . It seems to me that the evidence still holds up - we've gone from three (3) halos to eight (8) halos all showing the same pattern. Can you point out which ones of all those halos does not have a wider third-in ring? As far as I can see, every one of those eight (8) polonium halos in your picture show the same faint to really faint outer rings and wider, darker inner ring.
If you look there are eight Po218 halos in this photograph. TalkOrigin’s gif image is a cropped image of this fuzzy photograph which is then blown up. The cropping comes from the lower group of three halso together. No wonder your “EVIDENCE” is a little fuzzy. No wonder you and the other evo-babblers (non scientific) are promoting this stuff on the web. They know they can’t get it published, because the EVIDENCE shows it is a scam. Now if you want to look at really good photos of Po218 halos, just go here: Creation's Tiny Mystery: Radiohalo Catalogue, Index Here are some good ones from biotite mica: Again, I still see wider more defined inner rings than the outer ones. Of course density is also a function of the inverse square law (the "rings' being spheres cut across a major diameter), but the difference from Po-210/Rn-222 to Po-218 ring is more than that. We should see about an 80% drop, and it looks more like half (to me).
Now those aren’t so “fuzzy” are they? You see, in the seventies, photographic abilities with microscopes were horrible compared to today’s. By Gentry’s 1986 2nd edition book, the photo capabilities were much better. Strangely the fuzzyness does not come from the photographic technology, but from the physics of radiohalo formation. No matter how precise you make those photos you will still have blurring of all the rings
Now keep in mind that Gentry didn’t just use a microscope and ring measurements to identify these halos. He used several other scientific techniques which I will discuss later in this forum. So in conclusion, your “EVIDENCE” isn’t evidence at all. These are not the improbable (if not impossible)Rn222 halos that evo-babblers claim. And Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn’t very fuzzy, was he? Sadly, much to nobody's surprise (certainly not mine), the pictures still show blurred edges and different width rings, they still show wider, denser, innermost rings, and nothing here has ruled out the probability of Radon-222 being involved in every Polonium halo.
And even if you could show problems with the Po218 halos, you still couldn't explain why there are Po210 halos with no possibility of Rn222 precursor. Actually I can. We go back to that small void pocket with the four(4) day delay for the flow of radon by partial pressures. Now we make the pocket smaller, shorten the delay period, with the delivery time closer to the peak decay time, say centered on the fourth day, and keeping the delay long enough to increase the probability of decay in that location enough to form a single decay ring, and then the flow of water flushes out the Po-218 before it bonds to the crystal lattice. You are left with a Rn-222 halo misidentified as a Po-210 halo (remember these are the ones that are about the same size). There are other explanations as well.
Gentry presents evidence of Po218,214, and 210 halos in the same mica sections. Your problems don't go away, so please stop invoking MAGIC! form the evo-babblers as your evidence. Curiously I am not the one invoking magic physics and chemistry to explain the evidence. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : clarity Edited by RAZD, : Po not P0 Edited by RAZD, : moved photo
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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The Uranium Decay Chain
Thanks again AlphaOmegaKid.
Thanks, that is useful. Just for information purposes, this is the Radium/Uranium Decay Chain unsorted (ie in chronological order)):
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234Th :: - :: 24.10 d :: 0.27 MeV to 234Pa
234Pa :: - :: 6.70 h :: 2.20 MeV to 234U
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98% to 214Pb
218Po :: - :: 3.10 min :: 0.27 MeV 0.02% to 218At
218At :: :: 1.5 s :: 6.87 MeV 99.90% to 214Bi
218At :: - :: 1.5 s :: 2.88 MeV 0.10% to 218Rn
218Rn :: :: 35 ms :: 7.26 MeV to 214 Po
214Pb :: - :: 26.8 min :: 1.02 MeV to 214Bi
214Bi :: :: 19.9 min :: 5.62 MeV 0.02 % to 210Tl
214Bi :: - :: 19.9 min :: 3.27 MeV 99.98 % to 214Po
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Tl :: - :: 1.30 min :: 5.48 MeV to 210Pb
210Pb :: - :: 22.3 a :: 0.06 MeV to 210Bi
210Bi :: :: 5.013 d :: 5.98 MeV 0.00013% to 206Tl
210Bi :: - :: 5.013 d :: 1.43 MeV 99.99987% to 210Po
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Tl :: - :: 4.199 min :: 1.53 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
Notice that some are listed twice with alternate decay paths, but it all ends up in the same place. Where there are two paths of decay, α and β-, %frequency of the α decay and β- is given. In the majority of the decay events 214Bi and 210Bi will decay by β- decay rather than α decay, so these are not likely to contribute to ring formation (and their α decay events would also likely be interpreted as 222Rn and 218Po α decay events respectively due to energy proximity). If we just use the main paths (assuming that the minor paths don't contribute significant α decay events to affect the formation of rings\halos) we can cut this down to:
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234Th :: - :: 24.10 d :: 0.27 MeV to 234Pa
234Pa :: - :: 6.70 h :: 2.20 MeV to 234U
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98 % to 214Pb
218Po :: - :: 3.10 min :: 0.27 MeV 0.02 % to 218At
218At :: :: 1.5 s :: 6.87 MeV 99.90 % to 214Bi
218At :: - :: 1.5 s :: 2.88 MeV 0.10 % to 218Rn
218Rn :: :: 35 ms :: 7.26 MeV to 214 Po
214Pb :: - :: 26.8 min :: 1.02 MeV to 214Bi
214Bi :: :: 19.9 min :: 5.62 MeV 0.02 % to 210Tl
214Bi :: - :: 19.9 min :: 3.27 MeV 99.98 % to 214Po
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Tl :: - :: 1.30 min :: 5.48 MeV to 210Pb
210Pb :: - :: 22.3 a :: 0.06 MeV to 210Bi
210Bi :: :: 5.013 d :: 5.98 MeV 0.00013% to 206Tl
210Bi :: - :: 5.013 d :: 1.43 MeV 99.99987% to 210Po
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Tl :: - :: 4.199 min :: 1.53 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
Then we can strike the ones that decay by β- events as these don't seem to be involved in halo formation (though this is not ruled out):
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234Th :: - :: 24.10 d :: 0.27 MeV to 234Pa
234Pa :: - :: 6.70 h :: 2.20 MeV to 234U
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98 % to 214Pb
214Pb :: - :: 26.8 min :: 1.02 MeV to 214Bi
214Bi :: - :: 19.9 min :: 3.27 MeV 99.98 % to 214Po
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Pb :: - :: 22.3 a :: 0.06 MeV to 210Bi
210Bi :: - :: 5.013 d :: 1.43 MeV 99.99987% to 210Po
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
This gives us the common decay events that can cause halos to form:
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98 % to 214Pb
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
Here is the list of α decay events sorted by MeV/radius, where I've added a column for the MeV squared (to indicate relative surface area affected):
quote:
common &alpha decay events, sorted by decay energy
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 Mev :: 18.23 to 234Th
230Th :: :: 75380 a :: 4.77 Mev :: 22.75 to 226Ra
234U :: :: 245500 a :: 4.86 Mev :: 23.61 to 230Th
226Ra :: :: 1602 a :: 4.87 Mev :: 23.73 to 222Rn
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 Mev :: 29.24 to 206Pb
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 Mev :: 31.25 to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 Mev :: 37.39 (99.98%) to 214Pb
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 Mev :: 62.14 to 210Pb
The energy/ring proximity of 230Th, 234U and 226Ra is even more striking in the squared (ie relative surface area) column, as are the 210Po and 222Rn energy/ring proximities, clearly showing a breakdown of Uranium decay events into five ring/halo forming groups, where the decay bands overlap and blend together. CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 87, NO. 5, 10 SEPTEMBER 2004 662.pdf | sep102004 | currsci | Indian Academy of Sciences
quote:
There are four (4) clear rings in this picture. Here is one of Gentry's Uranium halos from your site:
Here we have 5 distinct rings (as commonly noted in the various articles), as do his other "mature" Uranium halo pictures. Because we can clearly see the inner rings we KNOW that radon was produced. Because we can clearly see the outer rings we KNOW that radon-222 decay occurred in that location. Because the five rings need to include all 8 α decay event energies, and because of the energies of these events we KNOW that: - The innermost ring is formed by the 238U (4.27 Mev), this ring is yellow in the above picture.
- The next ring is formed by 230Th (4.77 Mev), 234U (4.86 Mev) and 226Ra(4.87 Mev) - average 4.83MeV +/-0.93% (smaller than the width of the ring observed), this ring is white, and thicker than the orange ring
- The next ring is formed by 210Po (5.41 Mev) and 222Rn (5.59 Mev) - average 5.50 MeV +/-1.66% (also smaller than the width of the ring observed), this ring is white as well, and thicker than all the other rings,
- The next ring is formed by 218Po (6.12 Mev), this ring is faint compared to the previous one and thinner than the previous two rings, about the same as the inner ring.
- The outermost ring is formed by 214Po (7.88 Mev), and this ring is very faint compared to the others
The delta between 238U (4.27 Mev) and 230Th (4.77 Mev) is 0.5 MeV, or about 10%, which is much more than the delta between 210Po and 222Rn. Likewise the other differences are greater than this amount, thus confirming the grouping given for the rings in question. This also matches the observed widths of these rings caused by (a) the natural width of the decay ring and (b) the overlap between the grouped events making the combined ring denser and wider. The natural blurring together of these eight decay events into five rings is not due to picture quality, but to the natural variations in where the decay events end within the crystal formations. To make a claim for Polonium halos that are not a result of Radon-222 mobility and subsequent decay, one needs to establish two things: (1) That Radon cannot move through these crystals. (2) That the decay in the rings does not include Radon-222 decay combined with the Polonium-210 decay. The first is negated by his own pictures of "embryonic" and "overexposed" uranium halos:
These pictures are missing most or all of the Rn-222 and subsequent daughter isotope decay events in spite of robust decay down to that point for isotopes with much longer half-lives. There can be little doubt that Rn-222 was produced, and that it did not stick around to develop the full uranium halo pattern, but left to set up housekeeping elsewhere with the rest of the family. The second is negated by his own pictures that show the same pattern as seen in the Uranium halo for the 3 rings involved
Here the inner ring is clearly both thicker and denser than the other rings, clear evidence of the overlap and blending together of the decay from Rn-222 and Po-210. This typical pattern shows Radon-222 decay followed by the daughter isotope decay chain. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : Po not P0 Edited by RAZD, : moved photo
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| Replies to this message: | | | Message 89 by RAZD, posted 10-12-2008 10:33 PM | | RAZD has seen this message but not replied |
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Message 89 of 265 (485908)
10-12-2008 10:33 PM
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Reply to: Message 88 by RAZD
10-11-2008 9:50 PM
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Uranium Halo Addendum
These are drawings I made using the α particle energies listed for each of the decay series: (1) a theoretical "pure" uranium halo, with a single uniform radius for each decay type:
The order are:
238U Red
230Th Brown
234U Yellow
226Ra Green
210Po Cyan
222Rn Blue
218Po Magenta
214Po Purple Notice it is very difficult to distinguish the yellow from the green, as the decay energy for 234U and 226Ra are almost identical. The other 6 are relatively easy to see (although the blue is dark). (2) a theoretical "scattered" uranium halo, with the same average radii, but scattered randomly over a distance ±1.5% of the radius, using random dots to model the individual impact characteristics of decay (changed to better picture showing the color rings with the scatter, and including the scatter due to a small 0.1Mev equivalent inclusion 1):
In this picture you can only count 5 rings even though you can see 7 of the 8 color bands:
- 238U
- 230Th, 234U and 226Ra
- 210Po and 222Rn
- 218Po
- 214Po
The space between the inner 4 halo rings is not quite the width of the 1st and 4th halos (the ones that aren't overlapped decay rings). Compared this picture to one of a Gentry Uranium halo, and you can see that these rings are proportionally thinner than the real halos:
Here is the above view with complete rings and all in gray (so you can't tell from the color where they overlap):
Here the space between the inner rings is definitely less than the width of the rings, with the inner 2 rings being about twice the width of the gap between them. This shows that the model is conservative in modeling the amount of scatter that occurs from natural variations in α particle distance covered during the decay events and due to the size of the inclusion and random location of decay from anywhere inside that particle. This shows that normal scattering of the α decay is more than modeled, and even with this minimal amount of natural scattering of the α decay, that the radon-222 and polonium-210 halo rings cannot be distinguished by pictures no matter how detailed and carefully they are taken - it is physically impossible. With this minimal scattering there is a visible width difference between the third ring and all the others, and this is observed in both mature 238U halos and Gentry's purported 218Po Halos. With increased scattering this difference becomes less as the 210Po and 222Rn decay events overlap compared to single decay event rings. However, with greater natural scattering of the α decay events from the theoretical radius the halo rings for 210Po and 222Rn, this increasing overlap will cause more discoloration/damage in the ring zone than occurs in rings where only single isotopes contribute. We see this additional discoloration/damage in the uranium rings for both the second (3 isotope overlap) and third rings. We also see this additional discoloration/damage on the inner rings of Gentry's purported 218Po Halos.
Here is the above model with just the 222Ra and Polonium rings:
Based on this information it is not possible (proper, logical) to conclude that the three ring halos are only due to Polonium, as the possibility (probability, likelihood) that 222-Radon also contributes has not been eliminated. Enjoy. 1 - the scattering from inside the inclusion is modeled by using 7 origins, 6 evenly spaced on the circumference of the 0.1Mev diameter circle and one in the center Edited by RAZD, : added 2 pictures at end Edited by RAZD, : upgraded pictures deleted added material (incorporated above) Edited by RAZD, : added footnote Edited by RAZD, : move photos
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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changing the rules as we go?
Thanks AlphaOmegaKid,
Yes it is peer reviewed as you stated earlier: Which is what you asked for.
This journal is a teacher's educational journal. It is not a professional science journal by any means. Don't you think the issue about getting the facts right is critical? Your original request was peer reviewed period, are we moving the goal-posts now? I understand where you are coming from, but you have not been completely honest about what is - and more importantly what is not - in Gentry's peer reviewed articles. None of his radical ideas are in those articles, and thus they are not peer reviewed. We also know he made mistakes in his geology, and the geology is critical to his radical interpretations.
So let me summarize... Gentry is a professional scientist with a BS, MS in Physics and honorary doctorate who served thirty years as a scientist, and has been published in all the major peer reviewed science journals multiple times. But none of those published peer-reviewed articles talk about "primordial polonium" or "genesis rocks" they just leave big questions on their origins, questions that are equally answered by the known physics of Radon and Uranium. This is a perfectly valid comment in a peer reviewed article:
"The Question is, can they be explained by presently accepted cosmological and geological concepts of the origin and development of Earth?" (1974, p· 56) While this would most likely be rejected:
"Were tiny polonium halos God's fingerprint in Earth's primordial rocks? Could it be that the Precambrian granites were the Genesis rocks of our planet." (Gentry, 1986, p. 32) His "solutions" to those questions are not peer reviewed. His claims of "primordial polonium" and "genesis rock" are just as much a part of the internet ballyhoo as all the evidence against these claims.
I will spend my next posts detailing Gentry's work and showing that it is not based on microscope images. Those are mostly for his book and readers. Please do. If you have some real evidence that shows that 222-Radon could not possibly be involved, then please bring it forward (and why have you wasted so much time getting to it?) But if it is NOT part of any peer reviewed articles, then we have a different story. Once you leave the comfort of what is in the peer reviewed scientific journals, then you are on the same field as you have put Wakefield and everyone else that has ever criticized Gentry. This is called the old bait-and-switch game, or hide-the-pea, whichever you prefer. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : fixed ending (was cropped off) Edited by RAZD, : toned
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Re: Just a question?
Thanks again AlphaOmegaKid,
Your doing great work making your strawman images which aren't EVIDENCE of anything. But the picture below is.... Curiously I don't see you showing how they do not model what you see in the pictures, that my assumptions are false, or that there is something incomplete in my images. Until you do so, calling them a "strawman" does not make it so. FACT: mature 238U halos show 5 rings FACT: the decay chain of 238U has 8 α decay events before reaching 206Pb, a stable isotope FACT: three of those decay events are hidden by scattering of decay events FACT: as you broaden the bands of all decay rings, the first overlap is for 234U and 226Ra. FACT: as you continue to broaden the bands of all decay rings, the second overlap is for 230Th combining with the 234U and 226Ra band. FACT: as you continue to broaden the bands of all decay rings, the third overlap is for 210Po and 222Rn. FACT: this results in 5 bands around the central inclusion. FACT: the space between these bands is larger than seen in any pictures of 238U halos. FACT: natural scattering is more than enough to blend the 210Po and 222Rn decay events into one wider band around the central inclusion. The pictures just depict these simple facts. They are evidence that just a minimal amount of scattering is needed to blur the 222Radon and 210Polonium rings into one visible ring, and that - no matter how carefully you make your pictures or choose your samples - you will not distinguish individual bands for 222Rn and 210Po decay. In the pictures of actual halos the rings are blurred wider than they are in my pictures, therefore the natural scattering that occurs is more than what is modeled, and this proves that no matter how carefully you make your pictures or choose your samples you will not be able to distinguish separate rings for 222-Radon and 210-Polonium. This means you cannot conclude that 222Radon was excluded from the three ring halos.
Do you see the three halos that I told you were cropped, and then blown up larger to make them look fuzzy. It's the only group of three halos in the picture. And every three ring halo in that picture matches the pattern shown in my model - with a WIDER inner ring narrow outer rings: the logical conclusion is that these are 222Radon halos.
Do you see that faint halo to the right of them? That happens to be a Po210 halo. Or a 222Radon halo, who can tell? The faintness would be explained by the rarer occurrence of the 222Ra decay in the scenario discussed previously. The fact that all these halos seem to be at the same exact depth in the crystal, rather than randomly distributed, is evidence that they all formed along the same plane within the crystal lattice. Obviously a path for 222Radon penetration along such a plane would account for every one of those halos.
Gentry has many pictures of these also. Which could just be more evidence of how much the radioactive material was being moved before the recrystallization occurred.
They are the best evidence for primordial Po210 being encapsulated in the crystals as they solidified. Can you explain that one with your Rn222 fuzzy halo/hydrothermal U238 flow? I already have. See the end of Message 87:
And even if you could show problems with the Po218 halos, you still couldn't explain why there are Po210 halos with no possibility of Rn222 precursor. Actually I can. We go back to that small void pocket with the four(4) day delay for the flow of radon by partial pressures. Now we make the pocket smaller, shorten the delay period, with the delivery time closer to the peak decay time, say centered on the fourth day, and keeping the delay long enough to increase the probability of decay in that location enough to form a single decay ring, and then the flow of water flushes out the Po-218 before it bonds to the crystal lattice. You are left with a Rn-222 halo misidentified as a Po-210 halo (remember these are the ones that are about the same size). We still have the three ring halos matching the three outer rings of 238-Uranium halos in width and density, rings where we are POSITIVE that radon was involved. The match between them says that the three ring halos ALSO involved 222-Radon. No magic or mystery physics is needed to explain their existence: they are products of Uranium decay. And still we only have short-half life halos from daughter isotopes of 222-Radon, a gas notorious for penetrating rocks. We still have them in rocks that are misidentified by Gentry, and we still have them in rocks that formed and recrystallized through secondary processes. There are no other "primordial" isotope halos. Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : clarity
we are limited in our ability to understand
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Let's clear up your form before the admins do.
Now I honestly wish Mr. W(F)akefield success in his long arduous task of gaining his BS. And I wish him much enjoyment as an amateur geologist. My son had a sandbox in his earlier days. These and similar comments are not becoming of mature debate. It is childish, emotional and petty. Is that the image you want to convey? Enjoy.
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Re: Let's clear up your form before the admins do.
Lol.
RAZD msg 37 writes:
Hello whatever, If you hover over JohnFulton's same you will see some of the many aliases he has used, usually adopting a new one when the current one is banned for bad behavior. The first name I knew him as, several years ago, was "whatever" ... we go way back, and the banter is normal on both sides. Curiously none of the quoted statements reaches your level of calling people liars and frauds, as you do with "W(F)akefield", nor the implication that evolutionists are all babbling children incapable of independent thought. Most of what you list are facts: Gentry is not a Ph.D and not a geologist, and stating that is therefore NOT an insult. Gentry has been refuted. Oops, there's that nasty credibility thing again. Then there are comments like "Skeptic: it amuses me to see the mental gymnastics that people use to avoid admitting that reality has shown certain beliefs to be invalid." It amuses me that you object to this, as the only way this can be taken as an insult is if you admit that you are doing mental gymnastics, it's the old if-the-shoe-fits saga. Certainly, as a comment, it can apply to anyone, from Nobel scientist to ill-informed high school drop-out. And some are clearly responses to previous insults. But yes, everyone can run a tighter ship. It is part of the guidelines. I'll let you set the pace. Enjoy.
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.
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1436 days) Posts: 20714 From: the other end of the sidewalk Joined: 03-14-2004
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Groundwork
Thanks AlphaOmegaKid,
Even, as I showed, ntskeptics agrees that Gentry easily dismissed the uranium ion "flow" hypothesis of Henderson even though they incorrectly identified who originated this hypothesis. Yet we are not talking about "ions" - rather it is the well known habit of radon gas to penetrate through various materials. Certainly Collins does not see this as an invalid explanation.
I will present Gentrys work one publishing at a time. I think this is important to present this information in a way that the readers can understand, so be patient. Excellent idea.
These comments display your entire ignorance on this subject. Or an open but skeptical mind, especially of any concept involving a young earth that doesn't explain all the evidence for an old earth.
Again, I will discuss this in detail, but for now just rest assured that Gentry debunked this argument by analyzing the center of the Halos with the ion microprobe. He showed conclusive evidence that the centers showed Pb206 which is absolute evidence that Rn222 was not one of the rings. Well, you're going to have to do a lot better than that. From the decay chain for 238Uranium (see Message 88):
quote:
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234Th :: - :: 24.10 d :: 0.27 MeV to 234Pa
234Pa :: - :: 6.70 h :: 2.20 MeV to 234U
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98 % to 214Pb
218Po :: - :: 3.10 min :: 0.27 MeV 0.02 % to 218At
218At :: :: 1.5 s :: 6.87 MeV 99.90 % to 214Bi
218At :: - :: 1.5 s :: 2.88 MeV 0.10 % to 218Rn
218Rn :: :: 35 ms :: 7.26 MeV to 214 Po
214Pb :: - :: 26.8 min :: 1.02 MeV to 214Bi
214Bi :: :: 19.9 min :: 5.62 MeV 0.02 % to 210Tl
214Bi :: - :: 19.9 min :: 3.27 MeV 99.98 % to 214Po
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Tl :: - :: 1.30 min :: 5.48 MeV to 210Pb
210Pb :: - :: 22.3 a :: 0.06 MeV to 210Bi
210Bi :: :: 5.013 d :: 5.98 MeV 0.00013% to 206Tl
210Bi :: - :: 5.013 d :: 1.43 MeV 99.99987% to 210Po
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Tl :: - :: 4.199 min :: 1.53 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
If we just use the main paths (assuming that the minor paths don't contribute significant α decay events to affect the formation of rings\halos) Then we can strike the ones that decay by β- events as these don't seem to be involved in halo formation (though this is not ruled out): This gives us the common decay events that can cause halos to form:
quote:
238U :: :: 4.468x10^9 a :: 4.27 MeV to 234Th
234U :: :: 245,500 a :: 4.86 MeV to 230Th
230Th :: :: 75,380 a :: 4.77 MeV to 226Ra
226Ra :: :: 1,602 a :: 4.87 MeV to 222Rn
222Rn :: :: 3.8235 d :: 5.59 MeV to 218Po
218Po :: :: 3.10 min :: 6.12 MeV 99.98 % to 214Pb
214Po :: :: 0.1643 ms :: 7.88 MeV to 210Pb
210Po :: :: 138.376 d :: 5.41 MeV to 206Pb
206Pb :: - :: stable ::
Thus the existence of 206Pb does not prove that 222-Ra was not involved. I trust his other arguments are based on more sound evaluation of the evidence than this.
evo-babble I'll just point out that one of the characteristics of cognitive dissonance is trying to demonize any and all critics, to belittle them, rather than deal honestly with the material. The next level is to explain all the thousands of people involved by some conspiracy theory (they must all be lying for a reason). This is how people normally react initially to contradictory information.
I suggest you do your homework now and read Gentrys actual work that was published in peer reviewed publications. You're going to have to come up with some new arguments other than Henderson's. We'll see eh? Just so we are clear - what I am working from is the evidence as follows: FACT: mature 238U halos show 5 rings in even the best pictures and evidence. FACT: each of those rings shows scattering of decay impacts with wide bands for each halo. FACT: the decay chain of 238U has 8 decay events before reaching 206Pb, a stable isotope. FACT: the outer two rings show the radius characteristic of 218Po and 214Po, daughter isotopes of 222Ra in the 238U decay chain. FACT: three of the decay events are hidden by the observed scattering of decay events. FACT: as you broaden the bands of all decay rings, the first overlap is for 234U and 226Ra. FACT: as you continue to broaden the bands of all decay rings, the second overlap is for 230Th combining with the 234U and 226Ra band. FACT: as you continue to broaden the bands of all decay rings, the third overlap is for 210Po and 222Rn. FACT: this results in 5 bands around the central inclusion. FACT: at the earliest point where 210Po and 222Rn combine into one wide band, the space between these bands is larger than is observed in any pictures of 238U halos. FACT: natural scattering is more than enough to blend the 210Po and 222Rn decay events into one wider band around the central inclusion. FACT: the natural scattering can be due to a percentage variation in penetration depth versus decay energy, in which case each ring will be wider the further it is from the center. FACT: the natural scattering can also be due to the variation in point of origin within the radioactive inclusion, in which case each ring will be the same width regardless of distance from the center. FACT: combining these results in bands that still increase in size with distance from the center. Do you disagree with any of those facts? Enjoy. Edited by RAZD, : Po not P0
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) • • •
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