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Author Topic:   Radioactive Potassium Demands Ancient Earth?
PaulK
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Posts: 17825
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 46 of 53 (191612)
03-15-2005 3:52 AM
Reply to: Message 39 by sfs
03-14-2005 10:31 AM


Accelerated Radiometric Decay during the Flood
YECs don't agree on exactly how much of the fossil record has to be attributed to the Flood.
However since the geological column can be constructed without reference to age they are stuck with accepting that the order of deposition is about right.
This leads to the problem that they cannot attribute much of the fossil record to their Pre-Flood era since they run into the obvious problem of the lack of modern organisms in the very oldest deposits.
Nor can they attribute much to the post-Flood era since that rapidly bumps into even their shortened histories.
So the difference in radiometric age between the "oldest" and "youngest" rock formed during the Flood period must be due to accelerated decay during the Flood (or, rather in the equivalent period between the two rocks cooling to the point where the radiometric "clock" starts ticking - but I don't think that this is an issue that creationists have adequately considered). Given that most fossils must be attributed to the Flood period creationists typically assign about 500,000,000 years worth of radioactive decay to the Flood period.

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NosyNed
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Posts: 9003
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 47 of 53 (191674)
03-15-2005 11:08 AM
Reply to: Message 46 by PaulK
03-15-2005 3:52 AM


When was it accelerated?
Perhaps TheLiteralist needs to specify just how long the decay was accelerated for then. The calculations could then be examined in that light.
As to other radioactive materials. This thread is limited to Potassium. To bring in any others is moving the goalposts.

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TheLiteralist
Inactive Member


Message 48 of 53 (192198)
03-17-2005 8:58 PM
Reply to: Message 31 by NosyNed
03-12-2005 11:00 AM


Re: The dating debate?
Ned et al.,
In regards to my comment about "winning" a debate with you and RAZD, I was joking; that's why I put a winking smilie at the end of it, but I can understand my joking comment being misunderstood as being serious. I did NOT consider myself winning that debate at all. I apologize for the confusion on that point.
TheLit

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TheLiteralist
Inactive Member


Message 49 of 53 (192200)
03-17-2005 9:01 PM
Reply to: Message 32 by JonF
03-12-2005 1:23 PM


Re: The dating debate?
Yes, I did NOT win. (See my previous msg to Ned).
TheLit

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TheLiteralist
Inactive Member


Message 50 of 53 (192201)
03-17-2005 9:06 PM
Reply to: Message 37 by RAZD
03-13-2005 12:25 PM


Re: Radiometric Dating Threads
Hi RAZD,
That comment was supposed to be so obviously wrong that it'd make you and Ned chuckle. I do not consider myself to have won that debate. Sorry for the confusion.
TheLit

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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1426 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 51 of 53 (192211)
03-17-2005 9:57 PM
Reply to: Message 50 by TheLiteralist
03-17-2005 9:06 PM


Re: Radiometric Dating Threads
s'okay, just checking.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 9003
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 52 of 53 (192225)
03-17-2005 11:37 PM
Reply to: Message 48 by TheLiteralist
03-17-2005 8:58 PM


Winning the dating debate?
Ned et al.,
In regards to my comment about "winning" a debate with you and RAZD, I was joking; that's why I put a winking smilie at the end of it, but I can understand my joking comment being misunderstood as being serious. I did NOT consider myself winning that debate at all. I apologize for the confusion on that point.
TheLit
And I think I should apologize for a knee jerk reaction. You have shown yourself to me different from the "typical" visitor here. I reacted as if you were more like the typical short term visitor who is unable to tell if they have lost a debate or not.
I don't think you actually "lost" it since you are reserving the chance to bring more information to bear in the future. I think you should stop and think just how unlikely it is that the information will ever be able to help support your views.
There have been centuries of work now and decades by some pretty fanatical nay sayers but there is nothing to be of much use in supporting a young earth. When does one decide that the future isn't going to bring any new surprises?
FBE
think not thing
This message has been edited by NosyNed, 03-17-2005 11:37 PM

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Harlequin
Inactive Member


Message 53 of 53 (196577)
04-03-2005 11:11 PM
Reply to: Message 8 by PaulK
03-10-2005 5:24 AM


Re: A more accurate explanation
I think we can put we can generalize the various YEC "explanations" for radiometric dating in the millions of years into several classes from which we can expand on your explanation.
1) Geologist are just making it up.
That would be stupid to think and thus is not very common.
2) Geologists just toss out results which don't imply a young-earth.
That not much better. That would be fraud. And it would be very expensive fraud at that given that the tests are not all that cheap to do.
3) Geologists just assumed no initial daughter when they don't now that.
4) The rock has lost and/or gained atoms related to the dating method and thus screwing up the result.
Both of these can avoided by the various methods use age-diagnostic diagrams. These include the various isochron methods, Ar-Ar dating, and U-Pb concordia-discordia dating. Since most current published research uses these methods, these "explanations" are not very viable. That methods using different radioisotopes tend to agree also makes
this explanation unlikely.
5) The rate of radioactive decay varies.
This is the last possiblity. Just as for the last explanation, the fact that methods agree make it seem unlikely. This is of course is where the heat and radiation come in. There is a bunch of fun things we can look at.
We could look at the rock itself. Given the age implied by the radiometric date one can easily compute just how many atoms must have decayed to get that result. Multiple that by the amount of energy each decay would have released and we know how much energy has been released. Now divide by the number of years the YECs think this decay took and we would have how much energy the rock was generating. If that number is greater than what it takes to melt the rock (or indeed do anything that would be obvious to notice) then the explanation would be ruled out. Or we could look at the Earth. If the entire Earth did not have this increased rate of radioactive decay the radiometric dates would not be consistent. If the entire Earth did see the same large increase in the rate of radioactive decay then we can use the known quantity of parent isotope existing now and easily compute how much must have decayed as before. These calculations have certainly been done and the consequences are rather dire.
I don't recall the bit about applying it to potassium in the body. But it is fairly obvious that that would work. The human body needs x amount of potassium to survive. Given the rate of decay the YECs ask for, one can calculate how much radiation will be given off by that potassium and determine how that would affect a person. And as it is, a banana is VERY detectable by a Geiger Counter. Lets see 4.55 billion years divided by 10 thousand years is a bit under a half million. So I think we can be VERY generous and say that the YECs will have that Geiger Counter detecting a 100 thousand times the radation from that banana.
The YECs might try to avoid these calculations by pulling another trick: they can suggest that not only the rate of decay was different, but that the amount of heat given off per decayed atom was also different. If they do that then we should mention that they often claim that the universe had very exact physical laws and physical constants required for life to exist. These two arguments are in severe contradiction. One can suggest that some form of "life" could exist with different physical laws and or physical constants, but cannot suggest that any particular person could survive with these being different. Indeed changing the nature of physical reality is going to have profound implications all over the place. Think about the Sun which runs by nuclear processes. If change in decay constants changes other constants then the rules of chemistry will change. I suspect I would rather try to keep Noah & Co. alive in the heat and radiation.
And again, such agreement of methods is unlikely with such an "explanation."

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