SCIENCE: -- "observational science" vs "historical science" vs ... science.

Think on that a while with me. In your Flood model, much of the sediment on Earth was deposited in about a year at most - the early parts of the flood. That would mean that in order for radiometric dating to get "the order of thing" correct, its methods would have to be able to tell that Ordovician rocks are older than Cretaceous rocks, and to distinguish ages between those two. So 4301 years would have to be measurably older than 4300 years by one or more of those radiodating schemes.The problem is that radiometric dating isn't that good. The Tunnel of Siloam (ol' Hezekiah's work from 2 Kings) has been dated with very close attention to detail, and returned dates of 2823 +/- 13 years at their best accuracy. The destruction of Pompeii, similarly, was dated to an accuracy of +/- 94 years.So how would it be that a floodist age of 4300 years plus 360 days could return a old-earth radiometric date of 450,000,000 years, while 4300 years plus 300 days gives a Cretaceous date of 66,000,000 years? If radiodating can actually return the correct order of things, those things must be spread over more than one year of flooding.http://www.berkeley.edu/.../berkeleyan/1997/0924/dating.html
Radiometric dating of the Siloam Tunnel, Jerusalem | NatureEdited by Coragyps, : add refs

I mean, to expand on my point, are we really supposed to imagine a scene like this?"Welcome to the Twenty-Seventh International Geological Congress. First on the agenda, as you are aware there are some things we just can't find out about the past. I therefore propose that we make them up. I've invented this great fairy-story about this thing called the 'Mesozoic era', you'll love this, it's totally implausible ... yes, is there a question from the floor?""Wouldn't this involve lying?""Well, yes. I was assuming everyone here is evil. If anyone's not evil, could they leave now?""But ... but we're scientists. We've spent our whole adult lives in pursuit of the truth about geology.""Exactly. Your whole adult lives. You deserve a break.""And this fantastic, grotesque, implausible lie, what good will it do?""I'll bolster the theory of evolution.""What's that?""Beats me, it won't be invented for the next fifty years. Any more questions?""Um ... apart from the moral difficulties, aren't people going to notice that we're making claims for which there isn't a shred of evidence?""Well, there's this one woman called Faith I'm a bit worried about ... but apart from that, I'm sure we'll get away with it. In particular, no-one who actually studies the rocks and the fossils will ever question what we're saying, because for some inexplicable reason they'll all be really stupid."Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I have to assume some sort of systematic error, that's all, that really isn't about time at all. If I ever figure it out I'll let you know.

I've been puzzled all along why this distinction between interpretive and observational science isn't obvious to you all. What can I say. The conclusions of the sciences of the prehistoric past are determined by consensus, what makes sense to those who are in a position to make such determinations. That's how Hutton's ponderings were accepted. They were argued in the scientific societies and then championed by Lyell until the majority were persuaded. There is no way to subject such interpretations to tests or any objective standard, it's all persuasion. And there is no way at all to correct the interpretation if it's wrong once it's been accepted by the whole community.abe: Oh yes, I know: radiometric dating. Sigh. The funny thing is there is no way to test radiometric dating either. It's harder to see I suppose but it's the same situation. You have this method that supposedly tells you about the past and it's pretty consistent, but even with all that you cannot test IT either, so if there's some kind of error going on with it you'll never be able to find out. /abeIf the structure of DNA had been determined by consensus, eventually it would have been corrected by objective methods, but there are none possible in the case of a scheme of ancient scenarios. For instance if the strata were all laid down in the Flood and all their contents are just the accidental passengers within the sediments, then all this stuff about climate and type of landscape and other supposed characteristics of some former age would turn out to be pretty silly.You realty have no way of knowing. I would think you would have the ability to recognize this much, but perhaps I overestimate you. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Post it over on "Age Correlations and An Old Earth." RAZD has been waiting there seven and a half years for the first substantive suggestion as to what sort of error that would be.EvC Forum: Age Correlations and An Old Earth, Version 2 No 1And you won't figure it out, Faith, because the "systematic error" ain't. RAZD showed that already, right here in our little corner of the internet.

I'm sure that's a reasonable prediction under the circumstances, but it wouldn't be an easy thing to figure out. Somebody may, however. Even if it takes a hundred years.

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I'm sure that's a reasonable prediction under the circumstances, but it wouldn't be an easy thing to figure out. Somebody may, however. Even if it takes a hundred years.

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To call it desperately clutching at straws would be an understatement. We have multiple independant methods and you need a massive and consistent error in all of them useful to geology, and large and consistent errors even in those useful to archaeology, and not geology.

Because I'm familiar with the scientific method. I'm sure you've been posting on this forum for long enough to have noticed that very often the things that seem "obvious" to you seem ridiculous and nonsensical to people who actually know stuff. What you have said is that you yourself can't think of a principle which makes the distinction that you want to make.Good luck with that. Insofar as this means anything, it is obviously false.Again, how do you imagine this going down? How do you create a consensus in the first place? Archaelogist 1 : I've just made up this thing called the Mesozoic era, and I want you to believe in it. All the other archaelogists : Why should we believe in it? Archaelogist 1 : Because ... uh ... there's a scientific consensus that there was a Mesozoic era. All the other archaelogists : No. No there isn't. That's why none of us believe it, or have heard of it 'til you mentioned it just now ...If conclusions were "determined by consensus", which is the seventeenth dumbest thing you've said all week, then in that case it would be impossible to create a new conclusion. Well, again I would like to invite you to distinguish between this and the case where we infer living stegosauruses from their fossils. Every conceivable difference is to the advantage of radiometric dating ... And if the fossil stegosauruses were sneezed out of its beak by a giant purple chicken made of custard, then all this stuff about living stegosauruses would turn out to be pretty silly. "You really have no way of knowing."What you need, let me remind you again, is a method for denying the facts that you want to deny that wouldn't also allow anyone else to deny pretty much anything at all. You have admitted your inability to think of one. Until you can, I suggest that you either adopt the scientific method or shut up about epistemology.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I'm puzzled as to why this is such a big deal to YECs. When you understand that their science is constrained only by biblical myth, they hardly have a complaint about sciences that collect and analyze hard evidence from past processes and events.You can make all of your comparisons about 'hard' and 'soft' sciences, but they are both hard as diamonds compared to YEC.

It's a real distinction that you all keep glossing over.

It's a "distinction" which, when pressed, you cannot actually make, and the importance of which you are unable to explain. Which makes it hard to ascribe any particular importance to it.If a new prophet appears among us crying "Woe unto the pruntipators, let all who pruntipate be cast into the sacred fire", then it is reasonable to ask him what pruntipation is and what's so wrong with it. If he replies that he hasn't figured that out yet, but he's working on it, then it is hard to take him seriously. If, moreover, we find that the people he denounces as "pruntipators" are all black or Jewish, we would begin to suspect that the real basis of his animus against these supposed pruntipators is not actually that they engage in an activity which he is confessedly unable to define or recognize.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

A distinction without relevance to this discussion, as shown here by your inability to address the evidence.

And how would you test for such a systematic error, Faith?Science tests for it with correlations to other systems, preferably ones that have known values ...For instance tree rings ...There are three Bristlecone pines, two living and one with a known date when it was cut down for the purpose of counting the tree rings.Tree rings have varying thickness for different years due to the variations in climate, Thus we can compare these three trees to see if they have the same patterns year\ring after year\ring ... and they do.Tree rings are observational evidence, the cores and sections are preserved so that others can count them and verify the results.This confirms that the three trees precisely match each other, but we don't know (at this point) how accurate they are: could there be a systematic error that produces extra rings in each tree at the same time? Could there be a systematic error that produces no ring in each tree at the same time? How do we test those errors? There are several ways.There is more, a lot more, should you wish to actually pursue this. If you want I can start a new thread on it.Enjoy

There are white chessmen and black chessmen, it's a real distinction between them, but both are used to play chess ... in fact it is hard to play chess without both, because they interact.Enjoy

It's an arbitrary distinction.What you define as "operational science" is still just historical science of more recent events using indirect evidence. All experimental results are gathered by scientists after an actual event, and rarely are they actual direct measurements of the process under question.For example, if I treat mice with a drug and I want to see how that affects gene expression of genes A and B, I would collect blood after treatment. As of that moment, I am now doing historical science, according to your definitions. The evidence I am gathering was evidence produced by a past event, the drug interactions in the mouse. For gene expression, I would harvest RNA, turn it into cDNA, and then use qPCR to measure relative levels of cDNA's using fluorescent dyes. I am indirectly measuring cDNA's using dyes, and those cDNA's indirectly represent mRNA's harvested from cells, and those harvested mRNA's indirectly represent the state of the mice in the past. All historical science, according to you.In fact, I would challenge you to describe an experiment that isn't historical science.