I'm doing research for a book on the origin of civilization, and I'd like some assistance on what dating techniques I should cover in summary in my book. Let me explain what I need.
After being raised by two parents who are both Christian but come from completely different perspectives (one is Catholic and the other one is part of a Sabbath-keeping group), I've come to the conclusion that just because someone says they're right, doesn't make them right. One of the main issues I've questioned over the years is the fundamentalist view that the earth is 6,000 years old, or the common alternative that there was a worldwide flood 6,000 years ago, before which the dinosaurs existed.
Because of my background, and because I've done a LOT of research into ancient history and comparative religion, I've come to the conclusion that Genesis 1-3 was never meant to be literal. (Other creation literature wasn't meant to be taken literally either, such as the creation literature of ancient Egypt or Sumer/Babylon.) I have a very good idea of what it *was* supposed to mean, but that's a topic for a different forum and another time.
My book is intended to take modern social issues, like terrorism and peace in the Middle East, etc., and look at them from the perspective of 6,000 years ago, at the dawn of civilization, and before the concept of the monotheistic god got split up into the three main monotheistic religions -- Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The first thing I'll discuss about in my book is what Genesis 1-3 actually meant. But then I want to go on to explore what happened *before* Genesis, in order to give a good, solid background for exploring the two contemporary cultures that existed at the time of the Garden of Eden: Sumer and Egypt. Afterwards, I'll tie it all together and examine the social issues I started off the book with, in the context of a very simple but profound view of God and of ethical behavior vs. moral confusion, as espoused by the biblical Creation story.
In any case, in order to do this second part of the book justice, I need to be able to briefly address the issues that YECs have with the various dating methods commonly used.
One of the aspects I'd like to cover is how astronomy and astronomical events/synchronisms can be used for dating purposes. For instance, according to "The Cycle of Cosmic Catastrophes" by Richard Firestone, Allen West, and Simon Warwick-Smith, there's abundant evidence for a supernova that exploded only about 200 light years from earth around 41,000 years ago. This event caused major damage and both directly and indirectly affected life on earth, climate, etc., when the initial radiation burst hit around 41,000 years ago, again when the shock wave hit around 33,000 years ago, and finally when the debris cloud from the supernova hit the solar system around 13,000 years ago. I'd like to explore synchronizing astronomical events like this one to more common dating methods like radiocarbon dating.
I've already looked through some of the material that's already been written on this forum to explain how C-14 dating works, dendrochronology, varves, etc., and it's all really good stuff. My question isn't so much *how* each dating method works (although that will eventually be helpful as well), but rather *what* would be best to cover.
Finally, my hope is that my book will be able to bridge the gap between those of a religious perspective (mainly geared towards the monotheistic religions, though) and those of a scientific perspective, as I think science and religion have been needlessly set against one another when there are much more important issues to focus on.
{I've used the [blockcolor=white] code to white out a big chuck of text. This material is pretty much all background information that I believe to be outside of the real topic theme. Certainly, read that whited out material via highlighting it (dragging your mouse cursor across it), but be very cautious about commenting on that content. - Adminnemooseus}
Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Added the "Research for a book -" part to the topic title. Also [blockcolor=white]ed a big chunk of material and added related comment.