How radiometric dating works and why it's wrong

[Robert the Pilegrim]

NO the 27000 year old dated snail was a freshwater aquatic snail in Texas if I remember where the carbon in the shell was from dissolved CO2 in an underground aquifer.

Yup.
There were land snail shells dated to 2000 years BP as well as the 700 year BP dates noted in link I gave earlier. Those got carbon from limestone as well.

You really need to learn what you are talking about or you're just confirming the commonly held conception that most if not all ardent creationists are scientific neophytes who don't know a darn thing about anything technical.

Prediction: you will shortly be accused of making a personal attack.

 

[Robert the Pilegrim]

Sunny Day, Cloudy Day, Clear Day, Snowy Day??
I've got layers like that in my back yard right now.

What are you doing there? that proved the layers you see in ice aren't anual layers.

The population of Mono-town consists uniformly of comfortably middle class, well adjusted Norwegians.

The population of Poly-town consists of a mix of Swedes, Japanese, Greeks, Indians, Massai, Mongols and French, from a mix of socio-economic classes ranging from a few pockets of deep poverty where chronic malnutrition is rampant, to those just barely making it, to the comfortably middle class, to the rich.

If you observed a male in Mono-town who was 5 foot tall you could say with fair certainty that he was between the ages of 8 and 12.

In Poly-town he might be anywhere from 8 to 80.

In the conditions of Mono-town height and sex is a reasonably accurate indicator of age.

In Poly-town it is far less useful.

 

[shernren]

Prediction: you will soon learn the agony of having a perfectly good post fly over someone's head.

 

[Deamiter]

I'm not so worried about my posts being too complex for others to understand -- I don't mind in the least going back to the basics and explaining myself.

But I do fear that this topic is dying as those who think that radiometric dating fails seem to have abandoned it...

I'm not naïve enough to think that they agree with my arguments, but I do hope that any lurkers will read the entire thread. I put a lot of work into my answers, and even learned a few things as I went along! It would be a shame for such a good thread to die simply because creationists ran out of questions for us to answer!

 

[Dannager]

It's good every once in a while to remind ourselves that it isn't always for our opponents that we argue. Even the most seemingly futile of debates can bring about some good if it catches the eye of a lurker.

 

[mark kennedy]

At the risk of possibly draging this off topic I wanted to respond to this.

Interesting how an article on creationism.org has led you to doubt ALL radiometric dating even though all we've discussed in this thread (up to your recent post) was C14 dating and dendrochronology. I guess your post is technically on the topic of the OP, but it hasn't got anything to do with the subject we've been debating for pages and pages...

I got that, the previous posts do seem to be going off in a much different direction.

To answer though, yes he GOT this date. Yet he totally failed to document the information necessary to show other professionals that the date is accurate. It's precisely the same issue as with C14 dating snail shells. Any scientist in that area could tell you WHAT you did wrong which makes the "date" invalid. As always, if you misuse a tool, you will OBVIOUSLY get data that doesn't make sense!

I still don't see what it is exactly that starts the radiometric clock ticking from zero.

In short (on the subject of argon-dating) the person who sent in samples of the Mt. St. Helens dome made no effort to prove that he went through the necessary steps to validate such a controversial claim. Even after criticism, he HASN"T published analysis of the samples proving that they are free of xenoliths (older crystals that are obviously included in many laval flows). He sent the samples to a lab that explicitly states, "We are not in a position to analyze samples expected to be younger than 2 M.Y." This by itself can easily cause statistical anomalies -- dating radioactive decay is NOT just like measuring a dropping water level.

Obviously this is going to create a problem for a young earth creationist since they don't consider any of them to be 2 m.y.

He also sent rocks that had extremely low potassium levels to START with. Since there was such low potassium and argon levels, there was not enough time for a statistically significant equilibrium to form! Without an equilibrium, you're relying on data from a sample with very little argon and very little potassium, and then trying to compare the two... There likely wasn't enough of EITHER to give a statistically significant ratio between the potassium and the argon.

Of course he totally failed to mention that the samples were so new to the lab, and he didn't have ANY scientist who specializes in the area (creationist or not) review his methods, his data OR his conclusions.

So at best, we can conclude that it's not too difficult for somebody to get a totally unsupported date if they reject all published guidelines for submission or preparation of lava flows. At worst this is an example of a dishonest (or uneducated -- given his failure to document his procedure) person who submitted an invalid sample with incomplete (or at least undocumented) preparation. He failed to follow the LAB'S submission guidelines. Then he cries about how the METHOD failed when he failed to follow the method to begin with!

The "failure" in this instance is in the person who poorly prepared, poorly documented, and made unsupported conclusions.

They tested samples from other sites and it allways came back the same, always dated as millions of years old. You might be right that these procedures were somehow faulty, but then again I'm not convinced of the validity of any of them. The radiometric clock is supposed to start ticking when the magna starts to solidify. The rate of decay is supposed to be a constant with not clear indication of how the clock gets set back to zero.

To be honest, radiometric dating never phased me one bit. Actually, I was just tossing my two cents into the discussion for what it's worth.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Robert the Pilegrim]

notto: To answer though, yes he GOT this date. Yet he totally failed to document the information necessary to show other professionals that the date is accurate. It's precisely the same issue as with C14 dating snail shells. Any scientist in that area could tell you WHAT you did wrong which makes the "date" invalid. As always, if you misuse a tool, you will OBVIOUSLY get data that doesn't make sense!​

I still don't see what it is exactly that starts the radiometric clock ticking from zero.

All radioactive materials continuously decay, in the case of potassium (if I am recalling how the K-Ar method works) when a potassium atom decays it turns into Argon gas atom(while also giving off a proton).

This goes on constantly. In fully liquified magma the Argon gas escapes through the magma into the atmosphere. When the magma is solid the gas is trapped within.

Since there is no other source of Argon gas the ratio of radioactive K to Ar gives you the ratio of undecayed K to decayed K since the magma was melted.

By careful examination of the rock one can generally determine whether the rock has gone through full melting or whether it includes chunks of older rock that did not fully melt the last time the rock melted.

Did that answer your question?

Edit: Ah maybe ...
Potassium 40 always decays at the same rate.
The decay rate never gets reset, it is the 40K/39Ar ratio that gets reset.

 

[Robert the Pilegrim]

The radiometric clock is supposed to start ticking when the magna starts to solidify.

Assuming the magma was completely liquified long enough for all gasses to escape.

The rate of decay is supposed to be a constant with not clear indication of how the clock gets set back to zero.

I get the impression you mistyped something here.