Creationist problems with radiocarbon dating

Hi kbertsche, thanks for your input on this topic. As an interesting side note to this, there is a search on for pure "radiocarbon-dead" oil: I ran into this while looking into young dates for coal:Carbon-14 in Coal Deposits

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Dr. Gove wrote back the very next day, as did one of his colleagues. By sheer coincidence, they are currently studying this exact question. It turns out that the origin and concentration of ¹⁴C in fossil fuels is important to the physics community because of its relevance for detection of solar neutrinos. Apparently one of the new neutrino detectors, the Borexino detector in Italy, works by detecting tiny flashes of visible light produced by neutrinos passing through a huge subterranean vat of "scintillation fluid". Scintillation fluid is made from fossil fuels such as methane or oil (plus some other ingredients), and it sparkles when struck by beta particles or certain other events such as neutrinos. The Borexino detector has 800 tons of scintillant. However, if there are any native beta emitters in the fluid itself, that natural radioactive decay will also produce scintillant flashes. ... So, the physics community has gotten interested in finding out whether and why fossil fuels have native radioactivity. The aim is to find fossil fuels that have a ¹⁴C/C ratio of 10^-20 or less; below that, neutrino activity can be reliably detected. The Borexino detector, and other planned detectors of this type, must keep native beta emissions to below 1 count per ton of fluid per week to reliably detect solar neutrinos.

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So it is difficult to find oils etc that have not come into contact with other radioactive sources and cause a background level of ¹⁴C decay. The unscrupulous creationist only needs to look for radioactive contaminated samples and send them in to the various labs to get erroneous results.Enjoy.

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Hi Taq, There are actually three co-correlations in the Lake Suigetsu data: I've not seen a single creationist explanation of this relationship.Anyone want to correlate 11,000 years ago with major climate change that would alter the rate of deposition of sediment?Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : 11k

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Hi Coyote, Of course this is complicated by the minute information provided on his source: A source is rather indeterminate. Google got me to
http://www.ndt-ed.org/index_flash.htmand a site search for 'radiocarbon dating' gave three results, and this one matches the quotes: Home - Education Resources - NDT Course Material - Radiography: Carbon-14 DatingThis is material intended to teach science, most likely at the high school level, and it looks like we have some rather simplistic presentation as a result. For instance this does not discuss possible corrective measures at all.Not sure I would call the Non-Destructive Testing Resource Center an impeccable source for information.One reference that lists known causes of variations and the means to correct them is
Corrections to radiocarbon dates.This also has a link to " ... the Marine Reservoir Correction Database, a searchable database online ... " which is useful.Enjoy.

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Hi Flyer75, An excellent resource for information on all the various radiometric dating methods is: Radiometric Dating - A Christian Perspective on the ASA website.Enjoy.

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Hi Percy I took that stuff to be text character sets that appear on morningstar2008's text translator as russian. Not having access to his\her translator program means we see the background ascii text.Presumably, "" is the ascii text from the translation program for the russian word for Australia ... and that might make a fun start for attempting to decode the other text ... if one were really interested.The bigger problem I have is with the syntax and paragraph breaks.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : aussi

Hi morningstar2008, and welcome to the fray. You can deny evidence, but that denial is not disagreement per se, it is delusion. What debate? Facts are empirical objective information that is not open to debate, just denial or acceptance. The earth is old, get used to it.As noted by Coyote, there are a couple of threads discussing correlations between dating methods and other evidence (Age Correlations and An Old Earth, Version 2 No 1 and 14C Calibration and Correlations for instance, and there is also Are Uranium Halos the best evidence of (a) an old earth AND (b) constant physics?).The usual creationists attempts to discredit these and similar systems do not address the correlations, and this is where they fail spectacularly. There is no rational reason for all the correlations unless the data is either accurate or ALL illusionary (including that yesterday occurred).If you want to make the obligatory creationist attempt, I would be happy to answer your posts on one of those threads. Your job is not to whack down a bunch of creationist fallacies, but to address the issue of correlations: why do they occur if the dating systems are invalid? NO creationist has been able to explain this in the 8 years since I posted the first version. It is actually MORE typical of non-rapid deposition. What rapid deposition would normally look like is one mixed layer (with some grading of particles by size and density). There is NO mechanism to stop and start different layers in creationist rapid deposition models.Misunderstanding evidence doesn't mean you can debate or disagree on what it means.Enjoy Edited by RAZD, : ps tips added

Hello again morningstar2008From the Introduction To Geology thread Message 209 you posted:

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Hello. very interesting subject. But for me probably will be rather difficult. As I in physics am not so strong, but nevertheless there is a wish to understand . I will explain why. My purpose of visit of this forum was to find the expert who has skills in definition of radio-carbon dating. And this interest is chosen not casually. At some stage I noticed that the radio-carbon method shows not those data. And if to understand in essence that can be found places where cretaceous layers are shifted by the coal. Though by natural definition it is possible to call with confidence 100% cretaceous prime, and then have to be coal. But radio-carbon measurements for any reason show on a turn. Especially as chalk in itself has to stand as the coal which has faded from time.
Other aspect. Oops!
To us this photo it is noticed as limestones any breed blocks still. But in my opinion it is sandstone hardened. I approximately calculated as the hardened breeds of sandstones were formed. And for me big surprise began to see and understand that before sandstones were formed there could be still any life on a planet. Moreover and in such quantity. I certainly don't say goodbye but that more while I won't be able to tell about it. After all I couldn't finish the author at all the picture to show on this district.

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There also appears to be a language barrier, and that your translator to english is imperfect and incomplete. The usefulness of 14-C dating is limited to 50,000 years at best. This means that coal and cretaceous layers cannot be dated by this method, as they are too old. This doesn't mean anything in english as translated, sorry. Curiously, your opinion is strangely incapable of changing one type of rock into another. Limestone is determined by the chemical content of the stones, and sandstone is determined by the chemical content of the stones. Sandstone hardened (solidified?) is still sandstone.Enjoy.

Hi again morningstar2008, thanksI see your efforts at providing information in english are improving, but that translation is still a problem, particularly with syntax and sentence structures. I hope it does not affect the replies you translate as much as we see on this end. A common claim by creationists, however further study of specific instances has always (so far) shown these claims to be false for various reasons.Neither sandstone nor limestone are dated by 14C (radiocarbon) dating, because 14C dating only applies to organic matter, and it is only good for samples that are less than 50,000 years old (resolution becomes too small at that point). Any organic sample older than 50,000 years can only be dated as "older than 50,000 years" ... which covers a lot of ground while saying little.Sandstone contains no organic matter. Limestone/chalk contains to organic matter. Thus 14C dating cannot be used ... properly (anyone trying to will get false data) ... to date these materials.Coal is substantially older than 50,000 years, and attempts to properly date it with 14C invariably show resolution too small to accurately date as anything more than "older than 50,000 years" ...... except where the coal has been contaminated by the presence of uranium or other radioactive material, causing the new formation of 14C via secondary radiation effects. This happens in nuclear reactors, and is a known, documented, effect of uranium\radiation on 14C production, and certain creationists take advantage of this to create a false impression of 14C dating by intentionally using contaminated samples. That this kind of contamination is documented and available to the general public such that unscrupulous people can appear to create false data is part of the process of science in determining and controlling sources of error.For instance, I can refer to documentation of upwelling currents in the antarctic and the 14C reservoir effect on their dates, and tell you where you can take a sample of a living seal or clams and send it for 14C dating and get an apparent age of several thousand years -- because that is the age of the carbon being taken up via the food chain from the upwelling current.Not surprisingly, creationists have done this, and then published it so that gullible people think 14C dating is erratic or false, when in fact the data can be corrected by the known reservoir effect (a simple process) to accurately reflect modern dates.Enjoy.

Hi Morningstar2008 From 14C Calibration and Correlations

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Now the accumulated counting error between the two oak chronologies was 41 years over 8,000 years of cross-linked data comparisons - an error of 0.5% - and between the bristlecone pine chronology and the is off from the combined oak chronolgy by 37 years in 7,600 years of cross-linked data comparisons (younger than the oak average values) - also an error of 0.5%.

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Not only was there a strong correlation between the three dendrochronologies, there was also a strong correlation in each one with the actual amount of 14C left in the tree rings. When calculated for radioactive decay and compared to the dendrochronology they showed this calibration curve:

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Note that the curve has almost continuous small jagged variations around a smooth curve.

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The production of 14C is related to cosmic ray emmisions from the sun:

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Those jagged variations also serve as another correlation in the data -- all the dendrochronologies show the jags in the same patterns for the same years.More ... Lake Suigetsu (Japan) and varves:

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This is a single chronology formed by alternating biological deposition (diatoms in summer) and sediment deposition (clay in winter). The clay is being deposited all year, but settles slower than the diatoms, so in the summer (when a lot of diatoms grow and die) there are more diatom shells than clay, while in the winter (when diatom growth is halted) there is more clay deposited than diatoms.

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... it is over 29,000 years long, and it overlaps and lines up perfectly with the dendrochronology above. The annual varves run for a period of 29,100 years (from 8,830 back to 37,930 cal yr BP when aligned with the tree chronology).

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The varve layers continue down below the limits of C-14 dating to ~100,000 years, however the data below 37,930 cal yr BP level uses an estimated rate of sedimentation rather than actual layer counts. Using only the actual layer counts we end up with either of these two scenarios:

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1. This chronology does not overlap the one from the tree-ring data (in spite of several thousand years of matching Carbon-14 levels), and the minimum age of the earth is 12,460 + 29,100 (+/-) = ~39,560 (+/-) years old (and likely more depending on the length of the gap), OR
   
2. These chronologies do overlap, as determined by matching the "C-14 age" curves, and the minimum age of the earth is 37,930 (+/-) years BP (1950) = ~35,980 (+/-) years old in 2010.

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Here's the combined calibration curve:

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Where the green line is the calibration curve from the tree rings shown previously, and the blue circles are the data from the lake varve samples (from organic matter deposited in the layers).

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Now the problem for you is not just the correlations between the dendrochronologies and the lake varve chronology, but with the rate of sedimentation - the deposition rate of the layers - with the 14C concentrations:

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http://radiocarbon.library.arizona.edu/...bon/GetFileServlet

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This graph shows the varve and 14C chronologies as a function of depth. As shown, the sedimentation or annual varve thickness is relatively uniform (typically 1.2 mm yr-1 during the Holocene and 0.62 mm yr-1 during the Glacial). At the end of the glacial period the rate of deposition changed, as would be expected when less water is tied up in ice and the climate warms.

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This is just part of the scientific data that correlates 14C/12C ratios with actual ages of samples, however these parts are countable annual layers\rings, and they cover the major times of use for 14C dating -- over 37,000 years.

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To say that this system is inaccurate means you need to provide reasons for the correlations between the 14C data and the other data:

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• between each of the oak chronologies for age and climate changes and patterns,
• between the bristlecone pine and the oak chronologies for age and climate changes and patterns,
• between the irish oak and 14C age,
• between the bristlecone pine and 14C age,
• between the german oak and 14C age,
• the 14C ages between each of these sets,
• the correlation between each dendrochronolgy, 14C age, and the solar cosmic ray cycle.
• between the varve age and 14C age,
• between the varve age and deposition rate change with climate,
• between the 14C age and the deposition rate change with climate

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There is no rational reason for the 14C curve to make the same change in slope at the same time as the varve age curve, unless it measures the same thing that the varve counting does - age.

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This is another example of internally consistent correlations of three sets of information from the same basic data source: age, depth and 14C/12C radiometric age.

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Summary

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This is just a small sampling of the objective data that shows a consistent and intercorrelated pattern of age. This data does not extend back to the extreme age of the earth, but it does extend back to well beyond any creationist YEC age known.

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Curiously, the actual age of the earth does not need to be proven to be extremely old to falsify the typical YEC assertion, it just needs to be sufficiently old that the YEC position is untenable.

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This data does that.

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Once you accept that the YEC age is false, then we can move on to other information on how old the earth really is.

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Not one creationist has been able to explain one of these correlations.Radiocarbon dating is accurate enough to show that the earth is significantly older than any young earth creationist model.The earth is very old: get used to it.Enjoy.

Hi Morningstar2008, Explain the correlations.Making ad hominum comments and insisting on your point of view, your opinion, does not explain the correlations.Enjoy.

Hi again morningstar2008, a little clarification:(1) the annual layers are not catastrophic, they are normal annual events occurring over many days,(2) the correlations between the different data needs to be explained.Anything that "violates" or "stops" one system would need to violate or stop the others in precisely the same pattern.This is unlikely to occur by random chance in one correlation, and it becomes astronomically unlikely in the several that have been given, to occur at the same time measurement in all of them.Nor have you proposed any cause for a single system to be violated or stopped.Opinion does not suffice here: either you explain all the correlations together with a mechanism to cause a massive error in each different system simultaneously or you have failed.For instance: what would cause a change in radioactive decay of 14C at precisely the same time as the rate of deposition of the annual layers changes?The 14C data are on an exponential curve, while the annual layer deposition is a linear function.How do you explain that?EnjoyEnjoy.

Hi morningstar2008, I'm going back to basics here to possibly find some resolution. 14C Calibration and Correlations

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When you realize that one is a linear system of varve counting and the other is a mathematical model based on actual measurements that are along an exponential distribution:

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Graph of actual 14C content versus actual time intervals from time "X"

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There is no rational reason for the 14C curve to make the same change in slope at the same time as the varve age curve, unless it measures the same thing that the varve counting does - age.

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The graph shows the decay for 14C. The reason that 14C dating can only be used up to 50,000 years ago is because at that age the amount of 14C left to measure becomes to small. easier to read with comma delimiters: 20,000,000,000 ... or say 20 billion or 20x10^{^9} or 20e+9. Enjoy.

Hi morningstar2008 ... not be dated with radiocarbon dating, the topic of this thread. The Mariana Trench is not an impact crater, it is a subduction wrinkle\fold\crease in the mantle. YOU have work to do. The science side is pretty well settled.Enjoy.

Hi Morningstar2008 To add to what Taq said: If we look again at the curve (from 14C Calibration and Correlations ): IF the background level were 0.04, for example, then wherever that horizontal line intersects the curve would be the limit to the method, in this case it would be around 22,500 years.Enjoy