Of course it doesn't exist as a single object. That's not what the geological column is. There's no uninterrupted sequence of layers - but the layers exist. No tree is 10,000 years old, but dendochronology can stack these trees up and align them according to very particular patterns of rings, thus creating a sequence that stretches back very far indeed.
This however is not about the age of the earth.
Basically, TalkOrigins has an extensive list of refutations for these various Creationists arguments ("layers of strata are missing", "dates and index fossils were plucked out of a hat 150 years ago", etc), and I won't bother repeating them. The article is
here, and it serves as a specific refutation of Hovind's arguments (particularly apt, since you cited Hovind himself), and a general refutation for these sorts of arguments.
Anytime someone mentions the geological column, fossil dating methods or out of place fossils, either the age of the earth or Noah's Flood is rung up with very little material dedicated to the essential argument.
The TalkOrigins page is replete with arguments countering Noah's flood despite the fact that whether the Flood was global or not, whether the earth is old or not, the geological column is a Darwinian argument. Those who point to "out of place" fossils or wrong dates are not necessarily addressing Noah's flood or the age of the Earth but the Cambrian-Bunny party and the Seamless-Chronology-proves-Darwinism buffs.
The TO article starts off by immediately creating an age-centric atmosphere ("How Good Are Those Young-Earth Arguments?") Then the aforementioned references to Noah's flood
"If most of the geologic column were created during Noah's flood, would it really matter whether a zircon crystal was found in Cambrian strata or Cretaceous strata, in Jurassic strata or Tertiary strata? Noah's flood might just as easily deposit the same crystal in one place as another."
"For those who believe that each of the geologic periods were laid down in days or weeks by Noah's flood, the mystery has no intelligent answer. For the rest of us, the answer is as plain as daylight."
"For instance, there are many boundaries (unconformities) in the geologic strata that exhibit a sharp change in radiometric age. Thus, zircons that are formed at about the same time in Noah's flood (from intruded magma close to each side of an unconformity, if such quick formation were even possible) would exhibit impossible differences in the decay of their uranium."
And so forth...
How Fossils are Dated, by Glen Kuban
The age of a fossil may be specified in both relative terms (how old it is in relation to other fossils or rock units) and in absolute terms (approximately how many years old it is). One principle of relative dating is called superposition, which holds that in any one place, the lower rock layers (and fossils in them) are older than higher ones, unless there is evidence that the layers have been overturned.
Simple and easy. If you find a Cretaceous fossil (according to the "appropriate" timeline) at Cambrian depth, the earth overturned. There's also intrusive burial where Darwinists arguing for a young age of an old fossil try to show that it's simply a case of the fossil seeping into the wrong strata. But that's not even the most important part.
Absolute dating complements relative dating by providing a specific (not necessarily precise) chronological age for a given specimen, such as "50 million years before present." In recent years reliable forms of absolute dating became available through the development of radiometric dating methods. These methods are based on the known, regular decay of certain radioactive elements (isotopes) into other isotopes or "daughter products." By measuring the amount of "parent" and "daughter" products in a rock sample, its approximate age may be calculated.
Yet, it doesn't matter if decay shows 20 trillion years here. It's what happens when a 20 trillion year old fossil is determined to be 2 million years old. Or the reliable dating methods are still subjected to bias.
It's not until you get to the near end of the the lengthy TO article, past Noah's-Flood and Earth-age references, do you actually get to substance relevant here. Quoted,
Ernest Conrad goes on to inform us that in 1965 collagen tests demonstrated "that the Castenedolo materials were intrusive burials into the Astian clays." Radiocarbon dating in 1969 by the British Museum placed the cranial fossils in the Holocene. We're dealing with relatively recent fossils and they present no problem for evolution.
But the bones had been switched with another,
ANOMALOUS HUMAN SKELETAL REMAINS
In 1889, an additional human skeleton was discovered at Castenedolo. This find introduced an element of confusion about the discoveries of 1880.
Ragazzoni invited G. Sergi and A. Issel to examine the new skeleton, which had been found in an ancient oyster bed. Sergi reported that both he and Issel believed this new 1889 skeleton to be a recent intrusion into the Pliocene layers because the almost intact skeleton lay on its back in a fissure of the oyster bed and showed signs of having been buried.
But in his own paper, Issel went on to conclude that the 1880 discoveries were also recent burials. In a footnote, Issel claimed that Sergi agreed with him that none of the skeletons found at Castenedolo were of Pliocene age. For the scientific community, this apparently resolved the ongoing controversy.
But Sergi later wrote that Issel was mistaken. Despite his view that the 1889 skeleton was recent, Sergi said he had never given up his conviction that the 1880 bones were Pliocene. But the damage had been done, and Sergi was not up to fighting a new battle to rehabilitate the 1880 discoveries. Thereafter, silence or ridicule became the standard responses toward Castenedolo.
The switcheroo is not an isolated incident either, as seen in the Calaveras discovery
A Case for the Calaveras Skull
One of Dr. Hudson's purposes was to investigate the accusations made by those who opposed Whitney by saying the Calaveras Skull was a deliberate hoax. The information regarding this "hoax" interpretation is convoluted. The varying accounts conflict as to who perpetrated the hoax and upon whom the supposed hoax was played. What emerges from all these conflicting accounts is that a joke-not a hoax-was played on someone (certainly not Whitney) at a later date. The joke involved a different skull from the famous Calaveras Skull found by Mattison.
The later joke apparently was an idea hatched when someone read a humorous poem written by Bret Harte entitled "The Pliocene Skull" which made fun of the skull. The poem was first published July 28, 1866, only 12 days after Whitney first officially alerted the scientific world at the California Academy of Sciences of the Calaveras Skull find.
Some believed the "joker" skull-not the Calaveras Skull found by Mattison-originally came from a cave burial before being planted in the mine. In reviewing the circumstances of the Calaveras Skull and the later "joker" skull, John C. Merriam (1910, p. 157) writes:
If the Calaveras skull came from a cave, it still remains to show how it finally passed into Whitney's possession as a relic from the auriferous gravels. In this connection several interesting items of information have come to light. One of these seems to show that even if a joke had been played upon the miner, Mattison, this particular joke had failed to reach the geologist Whitney. Some years ago Professor F. W. Putnam exhibited a small photograph, showing the skull in nearly the condition in which it was first seen by Whitney, to residents of Angels Camp who claimed to have been concerned in putting the joker skull into Mattison's mine, and was informed that this was certainly not the skull which they had put in the shaft [emphasis ours]. In this connection Dr. Sinclair has recently shown that skulls from the locality at which the jokers were supposed to have obtained the specimen used to fool Mr. Mattison are buried in a matrix quite unlike that which covered Whitney's specimen
The real skull was even encrusted,
But, further, when the skull was found a mass of gravel indistinguishable from the surrounding material adhered firmly to it and remained thus attached until, long afterwards, Dr. Jeffries Wyman removed it in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hence the miners must have found it, if at all, in a formation similar to or identical with the auriferous gravels. The supposed joke would therefore be quite without point
And these weren't even the only fossils discovered,
Another matter often overlooked by those seeking to discredit the Calaveras Skull is the fact that numerous other human remains have been reported as having been found in the auriferous gravels. Whitney in 1880 makes mention of numerous human, fossil remains in his book The Auriferous Gravels of the Sierra Nevada of California. It now bears repeating Whitney's reports of some of these finds. The Calaveras Skull was only one of many human remains found in the gravels during last century's digging by gold miners. Numerous "jokes" or outright lies would have to be involved in these other cases, and there is no basis for such a conclusion.
Even when all is shown to be in line with the dates, or even superposition of strata, there is still something wrong. Whether it's the earth flipping upside down, jokes, or choosing a date (usually consonant with Darwinian chronology) when dating methods show different dates. This isn't about the verity of radiometric dating in determining the age of the earth.
The TO article finally attempts to address this in the final section and uses a bit of a sleight-of-hand.
If you test an old sample with a radiometric method geared to young samples, you would find that all the "parent" radioactive atoms have decayed. Your conclusion would be that the sample has a minimum age which corresponds to the smallest amount of the "parent" nuclide you can detect. You would not conclude that the sample was "young."
If you test a young sample with a radiometric method geared to old samples, you would find that none of the "parent" radioactive atoms have decayed. Your conclusion would be that the sample has a maximum age which corresponds to the smallest amount of the "daughter" nuclide which you can detect. You would not conclude that the sample was "old.
But it's not about testing a young sample with an old radiometric method. While there are different methods which can only be used when the sample is within a certain range, the range of the method is significant.
The article addresses what would happen if you were to date a very old fossil with lichenometry for example, but not what happens when you date a fossil with the correct method, and from the different ages garnered, one closest to the evolutionary scheme is chosen. Or when a fossil is switched with another, and the correct date of the impostor which is obtained by using the correct method, is used to determine the age of the original. But it will more or less break off into a lengthy article showing how Uranium and Noah's Flood are incompatible or how that same method shows that the earth is old.
