Other Radiometric Dating Methods

[AV1611VET]

From the Answers Book, by Ken Ham, pp. 81-82, by Jonathan Sarfati and Carl Wieland:

There are various other radiometric dating methods used today to give ages of millions or billions of years for rocks. These techniques, unlike carbon dating, mostly use the relative concentrations of parent and daughter products in radioactive decay chains. For example, potassium-40 decays to argon-40; uranium-238 decays to lead-206 via other elements like radium; uranium-235 decays to lead-207; rubidium-87 decays to strontium-87; etc. These techniques are applied to igneous rocks, and are normally seen as giving the time since solidification.

The isotope concentrations can be measured very accurately, but isotope concentrations are not dates. To derive ages from such measurements, unprovable assumptions have to be made such as:

1. The starting conditions are known (for example, that there was no daughter isotope present at the start, or that we know how much was there).
2. Decay rates have always been constant.
3. Systems were closed or isolated so that no parent or daughter isotopes were lost or added.

...


When a "date" differs from that expected, researchers readily invent excuses for rejecting the result. The common application of such posterior reasoning shows that radiometric dating has serious problems. Woodmorappe cites hundreds of examples of excuses used to explain "bad" dates.


For example, researchers applied posterior reasoning to the dating of Australopithecus ramidus fossils. Most samples of basalt closest to the fossil-bearing strata gave dates of about 23Ma (Mega annum, million years) by argon-argon method. The authors decided that was "too old," according to their beliefs about the place of the fossils in the evolutionary grand scheme of things. So they looked at some basalt further removed from the fossils and selected 17 of 26 samples to get an acceptable maximum age of 4.4 Ma. The other nine samples again gave much older dates but the authors decided they must be contaminated and discarded them. That is how radiometric dating works. It is very much driven by the existing long-age world view that pervades academia today.

 

[46AND2]

From the Answers Book, by Ken Ham, pp. 81-82, by Jonathan Sarfati and Carl Wieland:

There are various other radiometric dating methods used today to give ages of millions or billions of years for rocks. These techniques, unlike carbon dating, mostly use the relative concentrations of parent and daughter products in radioactive decay chains. For example, potassium-40 decays to argon-40; uranium-238 decays to lead-206 via other elements like radium; uranium-235 decays to lead-207; rubidium-87 decays to strontium-87; etc. These techniques are applied to igneous rocks, and are normally seen as giving the time since solidification.

The isotope concentrations can be measured very accurately, but isotope concentrations are not dates. To derive ages from such measurements, unprovable assumptions have to be made such as:

1. The starting conditions are known (for example, that there was no daughter isotope present at the start, or that we know how much was there).
2. Decay rates have always been constant.
3. Systems were closed or isolated so that no parent or daughter isotopes were lost or added.

...


When a "date" differs from that expected, researchers readily invent excuses for rejecting the result. The common application of such posterior reasoning shows that radiometric dating has serious problems. Woodmorappe cites hundreds of examples of excuses used to explain "bad" dates.


For example, researchers applied posterior reasoning to the dating of Australopithecus ramidus fossils. Most samples of basalt closest to the fossil-bearing strata gave dates of about 23Ma (Mega annum, million years) by argon-argon method. The authors decided that was "too old," according to their beliefs about the place of the fossils in the evolutionary grand scheme of things. So they looked at some basalt further removed from the fossils and selected 17 of 26 samples to get an acceptable maximum age of 4.4 Ma. The other nine samples again gave much older dates but the authors decided they must be contaminated and discarded them. That is how radiometric dating works. It is very much driven by the existing long-age world view that pervades academia today.

1. Scientists don't assume initial conditions. Using an isochron plotted on a graph, they can DETERMINE what the initial daughter amount was.

2. Decay rates give every indication that they were constant. We have attempted to vary them using all natural forces imaginable; pressure, heat, cold, magnetic and electric fields, etc. and no significant changes have been observed. Furthermore, to account for the HUGE change which would be necessary to account for a young earth, the decay rates would have had to speed up to points of making the heat and radiation lethal to all life on earth. Finally, decay rates would have to change just perfectly to align with other dating techniques that aren't based on radioactive decay. The idea is preposterous.

3. Isochron and concordia/discordia plots can identify potential open systems. We know that this sometimes happens. We don't assume that it never does.

 

[CabVet]

AV, you should forget Ken Ham's lies. Let it go. In case you are interested in the actual research that he criticizes, here is a direct quote from it:

"We have attempted to date several of the tuff units interbedded with the hominid-bearing sediments (Fig. 1) by the single crystal laser fusion 40Ar/39Ar method. Most of the feldspar grains separated for these analyses are contaminated by a dominant population of sanidine grains yielding an early Miocene age (~23.5 Myr). Volcanic rocks represented in the escarpment and plateau to the west are likely sources of these contaminant feldspars. One sample of the GATC (MA92-37), although showing this early Miocene contamination, yielded a dominant feldspar population providing a mean age of 4.387 =+/- 0.031 (s.e.) Myr on the basis of 17 individual crystals (Table 2). This age is viewed as the best estimate for the age of the GATC, and thus provides a maximum age for the hominid remains. The remaining nine grains from this sample represent contaminants, primarily of a Miocene population dated to 23.6 +/- 0.01 Myr. "

"The dated Gaala (GATC; 4.387 +/- 0.031 Myr) and undated Daam Aatu volcanic strata sandwich all but one of the hominid specimens."

So, as you can see from the above, the rocks and various samples contain two things, older sand grains identified to be from a nearby area, and the younger parent clay derived material dated at 4.4 Myrs old.

Sand blows around and moves. Mud and clay stay in place. Still want to believe Ken Ham?

 

[AV1611VET]

What about this part?

So they looked at some basalt further removed from the fossils and selected 17 of 26 samples to get an acceptable maximum age of 4.4 Ma.

I suppose you're going to deny this too? or demand evidence for?

 

[CabVet]

What about this part?

I suppose you're going to deny this too? or demand evidence for?

Did you read my post above?

 

[AV1611VET]

Did you read my post above?

Yes, it QED'd my OP.

The other nine samples again gave much older dates but the authors decided they must be contaminated and discarded them.

 

[CabVet]

Yes, it QED'd my OP.

So, you have 17 samples saying one thing, 9 saying another, and you want to follow the 9? Good...

 

[Eight Foot Manchild]

From the Answers Book, by Ken Ham

Stopped reading right here. I get my science from scientists, not braying jackasses.

 

[AV1611VET]

I get my science from scientists,

Depends on which side of the door you're on though, doesn't it?

You may find your science coming from a rigged vote; or you may get it from consensus of opinion, while one woman in one country demands further study; or maybe it will come from tripled tuition; or maybe it'll come from hindsight, at the expense of seven dead astronauts?

 

[Eight Foot Manchild]

Depends on which side of the door you're on though, doesn't it?

No.

 

[CabVet]

You may find your science coming from a rigged vote; or you may get it from consensus of opinion, while one woman in one country demands further study; or maybe it will come from tripled tuition; or maybe it'll come from hindsight, at the expense of seven dead astronauts?

What you are describing is your caricature science, not actual science, please don't mix up the two.

 

[SkyWriting]

What you are describing is your caricature science, not actual science, please don't mix up the two.

I believe that's a good description for the YE Creationist movement. They take certain aspects of science uncertainty and use it to allow for a YE option for scientific results. It's the fault of science for not allowing for actual spiritual options that forces them to defend a YE interpretation when none is needed. This is why the YE idea is new.

 

[Radagast]

What about this part?

I suppose you're going to deny this too? or demand evidence for?

The most charitable explanation is that Ken Ham misunderstood the material quoted above.

 

[SkyWriting]

The most charitable explanation is that Ken Ham misunderstood the material quoted above.

I've met him and talked. He has a single purpose to reach people with a message that non-believers are not a valid source of spiritual support and he offers an option for people who have turned away from Christianity just because of "science" conflicts. Because of that mission, he is single minded about seeing secular science education as a hostile threat.

 

[46AND2]

I've met him and talked. He has a single purpose to reach people with a message that non-believers are not a valid source of spiritual support and he offers an option for people who have turned away from Christianity just because of "science" conflicts. Because of that mission, he is single minded about seeing secular science education as a hostile threat.

So that makes it okay for him to completely misrepresent something he doesn't understand?

 

[SkyWriting]

So that makes it okay for him to completely misrepresent something he doesn't understand?

I'm sure the Pope is clueless on a number of issues.
But I understand a bit of where he's coming from
so I don't complain about what he says.

Here, look at this guy "some say you need to speak
in tongues, some say you just have to believe, some
say you have to believe and repent, some say good
works are required"

He doesn't have much experience with churches,
but he get's to say what he thinks anyway.

 

[46AND2]

I'm sure the Pope is clueless on a number of issues.
But I understand a bit of where he's coming from
so I don't complain about what he says.

Here, look at this guy "some say you need to speak
in tongues, some say you just have to believe, some
say you have to believe and repent, some say good
works are required"

He doesn't have much experience with churches,
but he get's to say what he thinks anyway.

Nothing in that quote is patently false, though, is it? It's a true statement. It's certainly much more factual than the first half of your last sentence.

And if Ham is wanting to bring people back who left the church because of science, it hardly makes sense to do so by making false statements about science. I know if I were somebody who left due to science, his statements would only help to confirm my decision.

 

[Split Rock]

Depends on which side of the door you're on though, doesn't it?

You may find your science coming from a rigged vote; or you may get it from consensus of opinion, while one woman in one country demands further study; or maybe it will come from tripled tuition; or maybe it'll come from hindsight, at the expense of seven dead astronauts?

Or you may find that most professional creationists (like Ken Ham) are snake oil salesmen and liars using sanctimonious appeals to religion and scientists as scapegoats for all the world's ills, just so they can sell their products and increase their power over 'the flock."

 

[AV1611VET]

Or you may find that most professional creationists (like Ken Ham) are snake oil salesmen and liars using sanctimonious appeals to religion and scientists as scapegoats for all the world's ills, just so they can sell their products and increase their power over 'the flock."

Sounds like my kinda people!

 

[Split Rock]

Sounds like my kinda people!

In all seriousness, you are way more honest than Ken Ham.