Originally posted by RJHinds
I have already said that we know something about the recent past and we can make reasonable predictions about the near future. However, millions of years in the past or future can not be known by scientists.

That is just the opinion of your religious dogma, since you don't know jack about the real sciences involved, where you can accept the scientific method in something like atmospheric sciences or medicine but that same scientific method all of a sudden fails when it comes to your belief system and the successful refutation of such beliefs.

Since you know zero about the scientific method you are in no way able to reject that which you know nothing about.

So you are just spouting opinion and that based not on the bible but on inferences made by other people which suits your MO since you can't think for yourself.

Originally posted by sonhouse
That is just the opinion of your religious dogma, since you don't know jack about the real sciences involved, where you can accept the scientific method in something like atmospheric sciences or medicine but that same scientific method all of a sudden fails when it comes to your belief system and the successful refutation of such beliefs.

Since you know ...[text shortened]... e but on inferences made by other people which suits your MO since you can't think for yourself.

I am spouting opinion on scientific matters of interest. Isn't that what the Science Forum is for? My opinion is that many scientists seem to ignore the scientific method when it comes to the grown-up fairy tale of evolution over millions and even billions of years.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I am spouting opinion on scientific matters of interest. Isn't that what the Science Forum is for? My opinion is that many scientists seem to ignore the scientific method when it comes to the grown-up fairy tale of evolution over millions and even billions of years.

But you don't know much about science? The only 'science' you are interested in is evilution, because it is created by creationists. You deny geology, astronomy... what else? Ah, yes, the science of evolution.

Originally posted by FabianFnas
But you don't know much about science? The only 'science' you are interested in is evilution, because it is created by creationists. You deny geology, astronomy... what else? Ah, yes, the science of evolution.

Don't forget the science of origins.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Don't forget the science of origins.

There is no science of origins.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I have already said that we know something about the recent past and we can make reasonable predictions about the near future. However, millions of years in the past or future can not be known by scientists.

So then,

1. ... at what point is an amount of time t no longer "near" past or future and instead "distant" past or future? Why? If you can assume that gravity will behave predictably 10 minutes from now, why not assume that it will also behave as we expect 100 minutes from now? 10,000 minutes? 100,000,000 minutes? Tell me when you draw the distinction, and why.

2. ... what are the "unknowns" you claim that scientists cannot predict? For example, I have explained how changes in temperature, pressure, and other variables, have been shown not to alter the half life of a given element. So what variables do you believe scientists have not given consideration to, that they should?

Originally posted by wittywonka
So then,

1. ... at what point is an amount of time t no longer "near" past or future and instead "distant" past or future? Why? If you can assume that gravity will behave predictably 10 minutes from now, why not assume that it will also behave as we expect 100 minutes from now? 10,000 minutes? 100,000,000 minutes? Tell me when you draw the disti ...[text shortened]... . So what variables do you believe scientists have not given consideration to, that they should?

Assumption 1: Daughter Isotope IS ZERO When Rock Formed

No geologists were present when most rocks formed, so they cannot test whether the original rocks already contained daughter isotopes alongside their parent radioisotopes.

Lava flows that have occurred in the present have been tested soon after they erupted, and they invariably contained much more argon-40 than expected.

For example, when a sample of the lava in the Mt. St. Helens crater (that had been observed to form and cool in 1986) was analyzed in 1996, it contained so much argon-40 that it had a calculated “age” of 350,000 years.

S. A. Austin, “Excess Argon within Mineral Concentrates from the New Dacite Lava Dome at Mount St. Helens Volcano,” Creation Ex Nihilo Technical Journal 10.3 (1996): 335–343.

Similarly, lava flows on the sides of Mt. Ngauruhoe, New Zealand, known to be less than 50 years old, yielded “ages” of up to 3.5 million years.

A. A. Snelling, “The Cause of Anomalous Potassium-Argon ‘Ages’ for Recent Andesite Flows at Mt. Ngauruhoe, New Zealand, and the Implications for Potassium-Argon ‘Dating,’” in Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Creationism, ed. R. E. Walsh (Pittsburgh: Creation Science Fellowship, 1998), pp. 503–525.

So it is logical to conclude that if recent lava flows of known age yield incorrect old potassium-argon ages due to the extra argon-40 that they inherited from the erupting volcanoes, then ancient lava flows of unknown ages could likewise have inherited extra argon-40 and yield excessively old ages.


Assumption 2: No Contamination

The problems with contamination are already well-documented in the textbooks on radioactive dating of rocks.

G. Faure and T. M. Mensing, Isotopes: Principles and Applications, 3rd ed. (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, 2005); A. P. Dickin, Radiogenic Isotope Geology, 2nd ed. (UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005).

Because of such contamination, the less than 50-year-old lava flows at Mt. Ngauruhoe, New Zealand, yield a rubidium-strontium “age” of 133 million years, a samarium-neodymium “age” of 197 million years, and a uranium-lead “age” of 3.908 billion years.

A. A. Snelling, “The Relevance of Rb-Sr, Sm-Nd and Pb-Pb Isotope Systematics to Elucidation of the Genesis and History of Recent Andesite Flows at Mt. Ngauruhoe, New Zealand, and the Implications for Radioisotopic Dating,” in Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, ed. R. L. Ivey, Jr. (Pittsburgh: Creation Science Fellowship, 2003), pp. 285–303; Ref. 4, 2005.

Assumption 3: Constant Decay Rate

Physicists have carefully measured the radioactive decay rates of parent radioisotopes in laboratories over the last 100 or so years and have found them to be essentially constant (within the measurement error margins). Furthermore, they have not been able to significantly change these decay rates by heat, pressure, or electrical and magnetic fields. So geologists have assumed these radioactive decay rates have been constant for billions of years.

New evidence, however, has recently been discovered that can only be explained by the radioactive decay rates not having been constant in the past.

For example, the radioactive decay of uranium in tiny crystals in a New Mexico granite yields a uranium-lead “age” of 1.5 billion years. Yet the same uranium decay also produced abundant helium, but only 6,000 years worth of that helium was found to have leaked out of the tiny crystals. This means that the uranium must have decayed very rapidly over the same 6,000 years that the helium was leaking.

L. Vardiman, A. A. Snelling, and E. F. Chaffin, eds., Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth: Results of a Young-Earth Creationist Research Initiative (El Cajon, California: Institute for Creation Research; Chino Valley, Arizona: Creation Research Society, 2005).

Originally posted by RJHinds
[b]Assumption 1: Daughter Isotope IS ZERO When Rock Formed

No geologists were present when most rocks formed, so they cannot test whether the original rocks already contained daughter isotopes alongside their parent radioisotopes.

Lava flows that have occurred in the present have been tested soon after they erupted, and they invariably contained ...[text shortened]... ornia: Institute for Creation Research; Chino Valley, Arizona: Creation Research Society, 2005).

1. I specifically explained that I intended to address (for the time being) only your concern with the constant decay rate assumption, not the others. Thus the eagerness with which you seem to want to change the subject and throw as much information as possible at me concerns me.

2. Does the source of the study "refuting" the constant decay rate assumption not give you any pause whatsoever? I mean, sure, you're inevitably going to find one or two scientists anywhere who go into a study with preconceptions, but not many have the guts to broadcast their preconceptions right on the titles of the article and journal.

3. Back to the actual science...

http://apps.usd.edu/esci/creation/age/content/creationist_clocks/helium.html

"The conclusion reached by the RATE project as to the reason for the increased amount of Helium is that sometime in the past few thousand years there was a period of increased radioactivity (DeYoung, 2005, 78). A fundamental problem with this hypothesis, however, is that the amount of energy released during the accelerated decay proposed by RATE would potentially be enough to evaporate the oceans and melt the Earth's crust (Ross, 2004, 179)."

I do find it especially interesting that the study casting doubt on the YECs' conclusions was actually published before the publication of the YEC study, anyway.

Originally posted by wittywonka
1. I specifically explained that I intended to address (for the time being) only your concern with the constant decay rate assumption, not the others. Thus the eagerness with which you seem to want to change the subject and throw as much information as possible at me concerns me.

2. Does the source of the study "refuting" the constant decay rate assump ...[text shortened]... on the YECs' conclusions was actually published before the publication of the YEC study, anyway.

All scientists go into a study with preconceptions, not just one or two. However, those preconceptions are not always supported by the data of the studies and everyone will have a way of dealing with that because all people have a worldview that will influence their interpretations.

I understand that you want to concentrate on the decay rate assumption, however I thought it wise to go ahead and list the other two main concerns of the YEC scientists while i had the reference material available.

I did not throw in as much information as possible, for I could have noted that old earth scientists have assumed that oil, coal, stalactite, and fossil formation, as well as the laying down of sedimentary rock, takes long periods of time. In recent times all of this has been proven to be untrue.

Sure we can take one concern at a time. However, my point is that this could drag out for years and we still will not have a statisfactory answer to the problems of the assumptions unless there is a way to test them to see that they always hold up in all ages.

I already quoted the admission by the YEC scientists that the decay rates have been tested for about the last 100 year and appears to be realatively constant, but that does not automatically mean it has always been constant. We can't go back in time and test it. We are assuming it has always been constant even at the beginning of creation.

Originally posted by RJHinds
All scientists go into a study with preconceptions, not just one or two. However, those preconceptions are not always supported by the data of the studies and everyone will have a way of dealing with that because all people have a worldview that will influence their interpretations.

I understand that you want to concentrate on the decay rate assumption, ...[text shortened]... ime and test it. We are assuming it has always been constant even at the beginning of creation.

good luck in your vain attempt to create a loophole in dating techniques.

Originally posted by sonhouse
good luck in your vain attempt to create a loophole in dating techniques.

We are taliking about assumptions in the radiometric dating techniques. If there are any loopholes, then they were already there before I came along.

Originally posted by RJHinds
We are taliking about assumptions in the radiometric dating techniques. If there are any loopholes, then they were already there before I came along.

The part you refuse to acknowledge is the results from many different techniques using completely difference science produce similar results.

They are not all wrong. When ten different lines of research all converge on the same rough date, you can be very confident of the result.

The fact YOU have no confidence in such results matters not in the slightest except for the desire you and your ilk have to destroy science and the scientific method which works for every science, there is no difference in the scientific method for geology or evolution or DNA research, it is the same methodology as any other science and the results can be as trusted as any result in medicine or computer science or mathematics.

Originally posted by sonhouse
The part you refuse to acknowledge is the results from many different techniques using completely difference science produce similar results.

They are not all wrong. When ten different lines of research all converge on the same rough date, you can be very confident of the result.

The fact YOU have no confidence in such results matters not in the sligh ...[text shortened]... and the results can be as trusted as any result in medicine or computer science or mathematics.

If wrong assumptions are made then you are most likely going to get wrong results even if they are similar. Sometimes they are selective in which results they use. That is, they use a result that agrees with their preconceived notion and reject all others. We really don't have any way to test ages estimated in the billions or millions of years because we can not travel back in time.

Originally posted by RJHinds
If wrong assumptions are made then you are most likely going to get wrong results even if they are similar. Sometimes they are selective in which results they use. That is, they use a result that agrees with their preconceived notion and reject all others. We really don't have any way to test ages estimated in the billions or millions of years because we can not travel back in time.

There are ways to test whether things were the same in the past:

http://scitechdaily.com/supernova-observations-show-strength-gravity-unchanged-cosmic-time/

Originally posted by sonhouse
There are ways to test whether things were the same in the past:

http://scitechdaily.com/supernova-observations-show-strength-gravity-unchanged-cosmic-time/

I am waiting for them to do all the tests and have them all peer reviewed by scientists that believe in creation.