Sanctifying the age of the earth/universe

[USincognito]

There have even been published secular papers that claim radioactive decay rates have been directly observed to fluctuate.

Yes, but none of those papers has withstood scrutiny over time.
Is decay constant? - ScienceDirect

The hypothesis of neutrino-induced decay is highly speculative and has been contradicted by experiment for α, β-, β+ and EC decaying nuclidesalike. There is no indication that neutrinos from the Sun influence beta decay, hence all speculative solar science deduced from variations in decay rates should be regarded as unsubstantiated. The exponential-decay law remains the solid foundation of the common measurement of radioactivity and requires no amendment for its application.​

 

[USincognito]

...violated evolution religion)

Just going to give you a heads up that as long as you continue posting garbage like this, don't confuse our responding to your myriad errors with taking you seriously. That sort of histrionic hyperbole makes you seem like a foot stomping five-year-old.

 

[tas8831]

[ citation needed ]

There are no citations available for rhetoric.

 

[tas8831]

But never dinosaurs. In fact, if the Earth is only 6,000 years old, we should be able to find DNA in just about anything we find.

Don't you just love how creationists, generally being quite ignorant of science (and quite often the very scientific things they pretend to be 'owning' us on), so often stab themselves in the back by not thinking their "arguments" through? I do.

 

[46AND2]

Give me a break. Using decay rates to infer upper-limits or maximum ages of something is certainly a dating technique. That's literally what you're doing when you look for a maximum age, or latest time of death, etc. You are increasing understanding of the approximate date or age of a thing.

You say "even in forensics, the time of death is uncertain so it's not a real dating technique" ....

By your own standard you apparently just made up out of thin air to try and win an argument, even radiometric dating isn't an actual dating technique because there are typically margins of error +/- millions of years.

Decomposition rates and radioactive decay rates are not even remotely related. Decomposition rates are demonstrated to fluctuate wildly, while radioactive decay rates are demonstrated to be remarkably consistent. Which is why, when we determine the age of a fossil, we don't measure the decomposition of the fossil, we measure the accumulation of radioactive decay byproduct in the rock in proximity to it.

Error margins in radioactive dating is due to limitations of the measurement techniques, not any inherent uncertainty in the rate of decay itself.

 

[carlv_52]

Why should we believe that the same institutions that still can't figure out where the Earth's oceans came from (among countless other features and phenomena), have also irrefutably demonstrated that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old.

1. Nothing is "irrefutable", but that being said, the radiometric dating technique shows consistent ages across a variety of methods.

2. There's almost no rational universe that would have a YOUNG earth that has the FEATURES we see on earth.

Only recently has the geologic community rejected uniformitarianism as an unjustified limitation on scientific inquiry into Earth's history

Do you mean 'recently' in a geologic sense? Because uniformitarianism was first proposed over 300 years ago.

, as it constrains past geologic rates and conditions to those of the present.

Are you trying to tell us that you don't know much geology? Yes uniformitarianism does hold sway most of the time, but there ARE known examples of catastrophes (like the Scablands in Washington State, or various volcanic eruptions, etc.)

We know a LOT about the structures we see in rocks because we see them forming in soft sediments in real time today. We see how ripple marks are made in ocean edges and we see ripple marks in the rock records. Why assume there is some difference in how the rock-based ones got there? We know how long it takes for clay-sized particles to settle in calm water, why assume that shales are anything but representatives of massive stretches of long times of calm depositional environments?

So why can't today's evolutionists and old-earth believers accept the possibility that radioactive decay rates may have been different in the past as well? Why must the radioactive uniformitarian assumption to be removed from questioning? Why is this particular uniformitarian assumption regarded as a sanctified truth of the universe?

We know of vanishingly few things that can alter the rate of radioactive decay. The last time I heard anything that even marginally looked like it might be a change in radioactive decay rate was an article (that wasn't even in peer review as I recall) from about a decade ago about neutrino-flux alteration of decay rate of a rare Si isotope but it was due to solar neutrino flux which was seasonal so it evened out in the course of a year if I recall. I know of no other means of altering the rate of radioactive decay on earth. I could be wrong, but without any evidence for such a change, why hypothesize it? Unless one has some INVESTED REASON for a young earth?

And if the rate was DRAMATICALLY different it would have fried all the life on the surface of the earth in order to get the amount of decay we see recorded in the rocks today.

(substantive responses only please. If all you have is emotional hand-waving or a snide flippant comment then please just move along)

Here's the biggest question for YOU: If all the data lines up (both from what we see in structures on the earth that indicate massive time passage, eg the Green River Varves etc.) and shows an OLD EARTH (much older than Young Earth) and radiometric dating ALSO shows an old earth with spans of time that make sense. AND we have no reason to assume an altered rate of decay of radioactive materials, why propose them?

The ONLY reason is to justify a YOUNG EARTH, and the ONLY reason the Earth has to be young is to justify a small subset of Christian theologians/believers.

That is not a sufficiently compelling reason to toss all we know about physics, chemistry and radioactive decay.

 

[SLP]

Here's the biggest question for YOU: If all the data lines up (both from what we see in structures on the earth that indicate massive time passage, eg the Green River Varves etc.) and shows an OLD EARTH (much older than Young Earth) and radiometric dating ALSO shows an old earth with spans of time that make sense. AND we have no reason to assume an altered rate of decay of radioactive materials, why propose them?

The ONLY reason is to justify a YOUNG EARTH, and the ONLY reason the Earth has to be young is to justify a small subset of Christian theologians/believers.

That is not a sufficiently compelling reason to toss all we know about physics, chemistry and radioactive decay.

And then he disappeared..

And then he came back months later starting a new thread on 'branching trees'....

 

[SkyWriting]

Why should we believe that the same institutions that still can't figure out where the Earth's oceans came from (among countless other features and phenomena), have also irrefutably demonstrated that the Earth is 4.5 billion years old.

Only recently has the geologic community rejected uniformitarianism as an unjustified limitation on scientific inquiry into Earth's history, as it constrains past geologic rates and conditions to those of the present. After bitterly resisting the widespread evidence of past earth catastrophe, geologists finally came around to realizing their prior assumptions were wrong.

So why can't today's evolutionists and old-earth believers accept the possibility that radioactive decay rates may have been different in the past as well? Why must the radioactive uniformitarian assumption to be removed from questioning? Why is this particular uniformitarian assumption regarded as a sanctified truth of the universe?

One knee-jerk response might be "because different data agree with each other" ... but that is simply not true. There are countless features or phenomena in the universe that do NOT agree with conventional age estimates and these are simply explained away as unreliable, or when all explanation fails.... anomalous.

Now for a question I think the evolutionists know the answer to, whether they want to admit it or not:

IF radiometric dating methods generally returned ages that could not possibly accomodate the time required for an evolutionary narrative, would you accept it as a disproof of Evolution (universal common descent).... OR... would you simply assume that the dating method is unreliable? (due to past fluctuations in decay rates, contamination, or some other anomaly)

Are you doing this very thing for any phenomena that might demonstrate evidence of a younger earth/solar system, etc. ? (e.g. when we find original undecayed protein in dinosaur fossils, or likewise discovering features of a planet in our solar system which should have decayed a long, long time ago if the body were that old)

(substantive responses only please. If all you have is emotional hand-waving or a snide flippant comment then please just move along)

Scripture says the world is quite old. "Everlasting" in one place.
Adam was old, Eve was old, the garden was old, the fruit trees were at least as old as dirt. Dirt is pretty old. Everything about creation week describes an old, established earth. Even man was "re-made" into the image of God.

 

[tas8831]

See? Predictable. And never changing...

If history is a guide, the creationist will eventually start being grotesquely condescending to hide his ignorance when he has run out of phony witticisms and the repeated unsupported or erroneous assertions no longer slow down the critics, then he will split. Only to come back a few weeks or months later, having concocted yet another pre-fabricated anti-evolution series of lies and nonsense to prop up his failing 'faith.'

It is very cyclical.​