Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site psivax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!mtuxo!mtunh!mtung!mtunf!ariel!vax135!petsd!pesnta!hplabs!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen From: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: The Scientific Case for Creation: (Part 31) Message-ID: <537@psivax.UUCP> Date: Fri, 5-Jul-85 18:27:34 EDT Article-I.D.: psivax.537 Posted: Fri Jul 5 18:27:34 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 9-Jul-85 05:48:51 EDT References: <385@iham1.UUCP> Reply-To: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) Distribution: net Organization: Pacesetter Systems Inc., Sylmar, CA Lines: 83 Summary: In article <385@iham1.UUCP> rck@iham1.UUCP (Ron Kukuk) writes: > > THE SCIENTIFIC CASE FOR CREATION: 116 CATEGORIES OF EVIDENCE > >II. (Astronomical Sciences): THE UNIVERSE, THE SOLAR SYSTEM, AND LIFE > WERE RECENTLY CREATED. > > B. TECHNIQUES THAT ARGUE FOR AN OLD EARTH ARE EITHER ILLOGICAL OR > ARE BASED ON UNREASONABLE ASSUMPTIONS. > > 57. Any estimated date prior to the beginning of written > records must necessarily assume that the dating clock has > operated at a known rate, that the initial setting of the > clock is known, and that the clock has not been disturbed. > These assumptions are almost always unstated or > overlooked. Actually, this is false, you simply must look at papers written on this subject, not papers on other subjects! When you look at the clock at work do you question its accuracy? After all it is not *your* job to set the clock. Why should a paper on, for instance, a newly discoverd fossil be expected to discuss the assumptions and details of radiometric dating? All it need do is provide on or two references as a key to the relevant literature! > > 58. A major assumption that underlies all radioactive dating > techniques is that the rates of decay, which have been > essentially constant over the past 70 years, have also > been constant over the past 4,600,000,000 years. This > bold, critical, and untestable assumption is made even > though no one knows what causes radioactive decay. > Furthermore, there is conflicting evidence that suggests > that radioactive decay has not always been constant but > has varied by many orders of magnitude from that observed > today [a,b]. We don't know what causes radioactive decay!?!? Please! Talk to a quantum physicist sometime! What evidence do you see for variable rates of decay? I would like to see it, or at least some references to some articles in *refereed* journals, right now I do not believe it. > > a) Robert V. Gentry, ''Radiohalos in Coalified Wood: New > Evidence Relating to the Time of Uranium Introduction > and Coalification,'' SCIENCE, Vol.194, 15 October > 1976, pp. 315-317. This is not really germane, since it does not really question any of the basic assumptions of radiometric dating. All it does is propose a revision of the model of when Uraniium gets incorporated into coal during its formation. This *would* require a revision of certain age estimates, if it is validated by other researchers. > > 59. The public has been greatly misled concerning the > consistency, reliability, and trustworthiness of > radiometric dating techniques (the Potassium-Argon method, > the Rubidium-Strontium method, and the Uranium-Thorium- > Lead method). Many of the published dates can be checked > by comparisons with the assumed ages for the fossils that > sometimes lie above and below radiometrically dated rock. > In over 400 of these published checks (about half), the > radiometrically determined ages were at least one geologic > age in error--indicating major errors in methodology. An > unanswered question is, ''How many other dating checks > were NOT PUBLISHED because they too were in error?'' [a,b] > Wow! Talk about geting things turned around backwards! The age estimates of fossils are for all intents and purposes *based* on radiometric dating! If the older age estimates disagree with new ones this is a reason to revise the estimates on the basis of the new data! Really! Many original fossil age estimates are only very indirectly based on radiometric dating via a chain of correlations. Such a method is intrinsically imprecise, so when radiometric data becomes available for a new set of formations, it is the fossil age estimates that are likely to be wrong. In fact all you are doing is comparing the accuracy of interpolation to the accuracy of direct measurement, with the expected results that one is less accurate than the other! -- Sarima (Stanley Friesen) {trwrb|allegra|cbosgd|hplabs|ihnp4|aero!uscvax!akgua}!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen or {ttdica|quad1|bellcore|scgvaxd}!psivax!friesen