Earth science curriculum tailored to fit wavering fundamentalists

Hi ThinAirDesign and welcome to the fray, Let me apologize for America letting you down. Glad you were able to work your way out. If you would like I can take material from my thread Age Correlations and An Old Earth, Version 2 No 1 (which Tempe 12ft Chicken referred to) and tailor it to small increments along with some suggested experiments.Do you have any trees you can cut down where you know or have some idea when they were planted (or when they could not have been planted, such as a former field to set a known age limit)? Cool idea. I'm interested.

Another topic you might want to investigate is BioGeographySee Alfred Russel Wallace and Biogeography for startersAnother resource isThe Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction
Paperback — April 14, 1997
by David Quammen (Author)

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David Quammen's book, The Song of the Dodo, is a brilliant, stirring work, breathtaking in its scope, far-reaching in its message -- a crucial book in precarious times, which radically alters the way in which we understand the natural world and our place in that world. It's also a book full of entertainment and wonders.

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In The Song of the Dodo, we follow Quammen's keen intellect through the ideas, theories, and experiments of prominent naturalists of the last two centuries. We trail after him as he travels the world, tracking the subject of island biogeography, which encompasses nothing less than the study of the origin and extinction of all species. Why is this island idea so important? Because islands are where species most commonly go extinct -- and because, as Quammen points out, we live in an age when all of Earth's landscapes are being chopped into island-like fragments by human activity.

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Through his eyes, we glimpse the nature of evolution and extinction, and in so doing come to understand the monumental diversity of our planet, and the importance of preserving its wild landscapes, animals, and plants. We also meet some fascinating human characters. By the book's end we are wiser, and more deeply concerned, but Quammen leaves us with a message of excitement and hope.

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This would serve as a good introduction to Alfred Russel Wallace -- the "other Darwin" who came to the same conclusions independently from the evidence he found. A lot of creationists think only Darwin is the problem\cause\instigator, but in reality science is built on the shoulders of those that came before, and thus when you reach a certain point of knowledge in a field discoveries will be made that change how we look at the world -- and those discoveries will be made (and often by several people at about the same time), whether a certain person exists or not.Enjoy

Do you have any areas that were logged? Perhaps the landowner will allow you to cut trees in return for cutting and stacking it for firewood or some other task. I am going to assume you have some areas that were logged and can find some historical data on when it happened. I would also assume that the field was replanted with one species ...You can probably find dates for when those areas were cleared. It would be cool to then approach the question from trying to date when the area was logged, what evidence you have and how reliable is it.Cut a small tree (6"-8" diameter) and discuss why there are rings (better if deciduous trees are used as it should be pretty obvious that it is difficult for the tree to grow when it has no leaves).So you can approximate the age of the tree when cut from the rings, you know when it was cut: can you approximate when it sprouted?Then take a cloth tape (sewing tape) and measure circumferences of the tree at different heights and see if they can predict what they will find when you cut 10 ft up and 20 ft up, are the rings thinner or are there less of them? What if they are fewer -- why would that happen?Can you tell you how old the tree was when the tree reached those different heights?If there are less of them which ones are missing, the innermost or the outermost? How can you tell? Where does a new ring form?Draw a line through the center and discuss taking cores along the line to count and measure the rings.Lay a piece of paper along the line and mark off the outer edges of the dark part of the ring. Discuss why these are more distinct than other edges.Start at the center and measure the thickness, if the next one is thicker mark a + over the edge tik, if narrower mark a - over the tik, if the same mark it 0. Compare the next one to this ring (not the center one). Continue for whole radius. Do the same for the 10 and 20 ft heights. You should have a pattern something like Can you match the patterns for the different heights?Take a five tik pattern and a 10 tik pattern of the bottom section and match that against the upper rings. Are there multiple places you can match the patterns? Is the number of multiple matchups affected by how many tik marks are compared? Can you use the patterns to verify that the outer ring is the same at each height?Discuss what causes these patterns to form -- would the same patterns be in other trees in the field?Discuss why you can't use the actual ring thickness for comparisons. How would you improve the data to reflect smaller variation in widths?Draw a line that misses the center and discuss how that affects the data, what you know and don't know from a core along that line. Discuss the concepts of minimum age vs actual age.Measure the circumference of various trees and see if you can decide which trees should be older.Do you have Boy Scouts? I worked with some SDA troops in Michigan. They have techniques for estimating the heights of trees. What would finding the tallest tree tell you about the relative age of the tree? Does height correlate with circumference?It would be cool to estimate the height of a tree by two different methods, cut it down and check the estimate, and then discuss the relative accuracy of the estimates.What would finding the oldest tree in the field tell you about when the field was cleared?I would expect trees from a logged area to be ~100 years old, maybe 200 if you are lucky, so you won't be challenging the 6,000 year age with this work, and you can be up front with that, especially if you can get historical data of when the field was last clearedEnjoyA good resource is: http://web.utk.edu/~grissino/
Henri D. Grissino-Mayer, Department of Geography, The University of TennesseeDr. Grissino-Mayer is very approachable and has exchanged emails with me.btw -- should have done this last time

Then throw in some clay, diatomaceous earth and fine silt. Take pictures every hour or so with consistent lighting and a white background and see if you can discern different degrees of turbidity. (look up tubidity meter)How long does it take for the clay to settle into a noticeable layer?What happens when you add salt?What would happen to the clay layer formation if sand and gravel kept being added?Enjoy

See messaging for personal information

Hi christianguy15 and welcome to the fray. This forum may be somewhat different from others you are used to. There are many (sub) forums that divide up general categories of interest, and there is a general 3-way divide into faith based categories, science based categories, and general social categories.Each forum has many topics that are up for open discussion, but one general rule of thumb is to stick to the original topic as much as possible. So don't feel upset if asked to take your comments to another thread, it's just housekeeping to keep each thread neat and topically consistent.You can either search for a topic where this comment would be part of the discussion or start one yourself. In the science forums this is regarded as non-relevant -- science is agnostic, and it welcomes people of all faiths in doing the process of science to discover the wonders of the world and universe, as is evidenced by the large numbers of people of faith doing science.So feel free, as ThinAirDesigns says, to suggest scientific experiments that would be educational.btw -- many new people get "ganged-up" on and feel they need to reply to every post. Feel free to pick and chose your battles and not feel overwhelmed.Enjoy

A couple of quick notes -- first, according to what is available (such as you've posted below) it appears that Lammert grew the seedlings in a greenhouse with no seasonal variations. Most pines will grow continuously in such environment building up layers of "summer" cells.Second, false growth rings can be identified by how the growth rings terminate. See Dendrochronology Fact and Creationist Fraud for discussion of another creationist attempt to discredit the Bristlecone pines.Third, it is one thing to induce a false ring in the lab, it is an entirely different thing to show that the conditions for false ring formation could have occurred in such a way as to perfectly mimic an annual ring in general width and detail - how would the climate suddenly go to a double growth season of generally equivalent length? How about 3 growth seasons? This is actually an excellent question to ask our budding scientists, once the basics of dendrochronology are covered (including how to identify both missing rings and extra rings, and how to pick a good species for making extended chronologies).This would be like DrA's "How do we know" sections of his excellent geology book.One way would be to do independent tests of the Bristlecone chronology.btw -- I am in the process of rewriting my age correlations thread to include new information and to use a slightly different approach, more like what you are asking for, so this may be the impetus I need to get this doneHere is an excerpt from the new version:

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There are several factors that go into both the extreme age of Bristlecone pines and the confidence we have in the rings being accurate annual rings.

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Accuracy of tree ring dating of Bristlecone Pine for calibration of the radiocarbon time scale⁽¹⁾

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Further evidence of the nature of the growth ring comes from the study of ring development during the growing season. Dendrographic measurements of tree diameter and cambial samples for cell study were obtained from bristlecone pines in the White Mountains during three consecutive summers [Fritts, 1969]. Cambrial activity and resultant ring growth were found to occur in a relatively brief and well-defined growing season, At the elevation of Fritts' study area (3100 meters), ring growth began in mid-June to late June and ended in late July or early August. Cell size decreased more or less regularly from the beginning to the end of the growing season,and there was no pronounced response to the soil moisture replenishment that resulted from a midseason storm during one of the summers. That is, the trees studied formed only one growth ring in each year and did not form intraannual bands, even under presumably favorable conditions.

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Another argument for the annual character of growth rings in bristlecone pine depends on recognition of time-synchronous internal markers in growth ring sequences. These include 'critical' rings, which are much narrower than average, and frost damage zones within certain rings. The identification and matching of growth rings constitute a well-established technique known as cross dating. Introduced by A. E. Douglass in the early 1900's [Douglass,1914], it has since been applied to the dating of a large number of tree ring specimens. Comparison of tree ring sequences obtained from living trees in the same area in different years gives a measure of the number of rings formed per year, provided that the sequences can be cross-dated. ... Schulman collected bristlecone pine samples in 1954 and presented ring width measurements for dated series ending in 1953. Plotted ring width measurements from samples obtained in 1971 can easily be matched with Schulman's series, the indication being that most trees have formed exactly 18 rings in the period 1954 - 1971. In a few cases only 17 rings were formed, this result being attributable so the local absence of the ring for 1960 on some of the sampled radii. However, in no case has any of the sampled trees formed more than one ring per year since 1953.

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Three things to note: (1) that two independent Bristlecone pine chronologies were compared; (2) that the interval between the chronologies was 18 years and 18 rings were found in most samples in the new chronology, but some of the samples were missing one ring, and (3) none of the samples had an extra ring.

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There are more tests we can make that show that we can have high confidence in the accuracy and precision of the chronology independent of false or missing rings.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : correct link

Interesting. Hadn't heard that before -- who was asking for the raw data (access to pieces of wood)? I know that some was exchanged with the German Oak chronology people and some with the IntCal people. See also IntCal04University of Arizona Libraries Indeed, data taken from different radial lines from the center will have different widths, and so you should have a set process, perhaps taking the longest radius and the shortest radius and averaging them. Cores are usually duplicated for cross-checking as well.But I would think that you would need to review the whole data set not any specific subsets, preferably all by one person to reduce process inconsistencies.He may also have some rare and therefore important links that he doesn't want to lose control over.Now I will also say that I don't think it would involve any fudging of data, because of the work with the German Oaks and the consilience of data between those two sets.Enjoy.

What has he done with the evidence?Was he looking to check Baillie's chronology or was he looking for climate data (dendroclimatology is another facet of tree ring data as it shows patterns of warm wet dry and cold weather)?Were the test he wanted to do destructive of the evidence?Baillie's work was not by one person but a lab with technicians with strict protocols to protect the evidence. Letting specimens dry out can change their ring widths.I remain unconvinced that there was any deception or intent to hide information.Enjoy

They also are the home of the Radiocarbon Journal and make all back issues open to public accesshttp://www.radiocarbon.org/We will get into 14C later when we start looking into other evidence that confirms the tree rings are old, but in a simple way that doesn't involve accepting radioactive decay rates being constant.Enjoy

Indeed. What you can compare are the actual ratio of 14C/12C in the tree rings to the actual ratio of 14C/12C in the samples -- these measurements are actually the raw data that 14C ages are calculated from, but without the calculations they are still objective empirical data.If the rate of decay has varied in the past then - as you say - the ratio of 14C/12C in the sample and the appropriate tree ring will decay by the same amounts regardless of what that variation or rate actually is. Here is some additional info you can use that I have gathered for my rewrite:

Christian Geologists on Noah's Flood: Biblical and Scientific Shortcomings of Flood Geology, part 4⁽³⁾

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We will employ tree rings and carbon-14, but not in the way readers may be accustomed to seeing. We will not use carbon-14 to determine an age at all. We will simply measure how much carbon-14 is currently found in each tree ring. Carbon-14 decays with time, so if each tree ring represents one year of growth, we should see a steady decline in the carbon-14 content of each successive ring. Figure 5 shows tree-ring carbon-14 data from living trees extending back 4000 rings.[2] ...

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If additional confidence in this data is desired, it may be helpful to note that the amount of carbon-14 found in a timber from a tunnel in Jerusalem thought to have been built by Hezekiah is approximately the same as the amount found in tree ring number 2700, which places its ring-counting age where expected from Biblical records if each ring equals one year. Even better, consider the Dead Sea Scrolls — the book of Isaiah in particular. ... The amount of carbon-14 in the Isaiah scrolls is equal to or less than the amount in tree ring number 2100, meaning carbon-14 confirms its before-Christ historicity.[3]

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This graph appears to start with year 2000 CE (rather than 1950). This adds 2050 BP (100 BCE) and 2650 BP (700 BCE) to the list.

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Then there is Egyptian history and the dating of various finds:

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Radiocarbon-Based Chronology for Dynastic Egypt⁽⁵⁾

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... Radiocarbon dating, which is a two-stage process involving isotope measurements and then calibration against similar measurements made on dendrochronologically dated wood, usually gives age ranges of 100 to 200 years for this period (95% probability range) and has previously been too imprecise to resolve these questions.

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Here, we combine several classes of data to overcome these limitations in precision: measurements on archaeological samples that accurately reflect past fluctuations in radiocarbon activity, specific information on radiocarbon activity in the region of the Nile Valley, direct linkages between the dated samples and the historical chronology, and relative dating information from the historical chronology. Together, these enable us to match the patterns present in the radiocarbon dates with the details of the radiocarbon calibration record and, thus, to synchronize the scientific and historical dating methods. ...

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... We have 128 dates from the NK, 43 from the MK, and 17 from the Old Kingdom (OK). The majority (~75%) of the measurements have calibrated age ranges that overlap with the conventional historical chronology, within the wide error limits that result from the calibration of individual dates.

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The modeling of the data provides a chronology that extends from ~2650 to ~1100 B.C.E. ...

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This figure shows the distribution of uncalibrated radiocarbon dates against the modeled age. For each measurement, we show the mean and 1σ of the radiocarbon and modeled calendar dates: ... The calibration curve is shown as two black lines (1σ ). ...

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The results for the OK, although lower in resolution, also agree with the consensus chronology of Shaw (18) but have the resolution to contradict some suggested interpretations of the evidence, such as the astronomical hypothesis of Spence (24), which is substantially later, or the reevaluation of this hypothesis (25), which leads to a date that is earlier. The absence of astronomical observations in the papyrological record for the OK means that this data set provides one of the few absolute references for the positioning of this important period of Egyptian history (Fig. 1A).

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Note that this conversion does not depend on the calculation of 14C 'age' -- that is a purely mathematical conversion of the measured amounts of 14C and 12C in the samples, and then comparing those 14C/12C values to ones found in the tree rings to find the best match to the tree rings, but it does introduce an error due to the number of rings that match those levels inside the +/-1σ margins of error.

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So we have another historical calibration date of 2660 BCE with 99% agreement (consilience) between history and European oak chronology.

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This results in very high confidence for the accuracy and precision of the dendrochronologies.

Would you mind providing me with refs and transcript and a way to reference that in my rewrite?Enjoy

I have been giving some thought to this, so I thought I would lay out a rough outline here, see what you think, and get some input from others (like Coyote and kbertsche).

1. Definitions
   1. accuracy: Accuracy Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com
   2. precision: Precision Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com
   3. concordance: Concordance Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com
   4. correlation: Correlation Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com
   5. calibrate: Calibration Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com
   6. consilience: Consilience - Wikipedia
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2. Introduction to tree rings, dendrochronology
   1. Field trip to cut down trees and count rings (see Message 31 above) - be "tots cool" to have Dr Henri G-M along ... or part of the trip
   2. Are the tree rings anchored in time by their known cut-down date? Can this be used to determine the date the tree sprouted?
   3. Compare tree rings at different heights - what is the same what is different?
   4. Accuracy in comparing different length sections of tik marks -- how long an overlap do you need to have confidence in the accuracy and precision of the match?
   5. Can you match one tree to another with the tik patterns?
   6. How does this affect the accuracy and precision of the data?
   7. Are they detectable annual layers of growth?
   8. What does the oldest living tree in a forest tell you about the forest?
   9. What information can dead trees provide? Are those rings floating in time because we don't know when it died?
   10. Can you match rings from the dead tree to a living tree with the tik patterns? Does this anchor the dead tree rings with the same accuracy and precision as the living tree? How does this affect our confidence in the data?
   11. Information on missing rings and false rings, how does this affect accuracy? precision? the confidence we have in the data?
   12. Making a dendrochronology from multiple samples using the tik mark patterns
   13. What is the accuracy, precision and confidence for this chronology?
   14. How could you improve it? Replication of data and cross-checking methodology
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3. Information on known dendrochronologies
   1. The "Methuselah" Bristlecone pine chronology
   2. The Irish oak chronology,
   3. The German oak chronology,
   4. The Campito Bristlecone pine chronology
   5. The German pine chronology
   6. Are these anchored chronologies or floating chronologies?
   7. What do they tell us about the age of the earth?
   8. What do they tell us about a world wide flood in that time?
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4. How accurate are they, how can we test them
   1. Does adding new data to old chronologies correctly count the intervening time?
   2. Comparing Methuselah and Campito chronologies
   3. Comparing the oak chronologies
   4. Can we compare the oak chronologies to the Bristlecone pine chronologies with tree rings? Why not?
   5. Comparing the chronologies to historical events
   6. What can measurements of raw 14C levels in the wood tell us -- is matching raw 14C levels like matching tree rings?
   7. Can we compare the oak chronologies to the Bristlecone pine chronologies with raw 14C levels?
   8. What do the comparisons tell us about accuracy? about precision? about the confidence we have in the results?
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5. Basics of 14C
   1. How does it form in the atmosphere
   2. Why causes it to vary from year to year (why hasn't it reached equilibrium?)
   3. What does decay mean for age - do we need to know the decay rate?
   4. Does the decay rate have to be constant to provide useful information?
   5. What do regular periodic cycles of peaks and valleys in production of 14C in the atmosphere show (the "heartbeat" of the sun - compare to EEG)?
   6. Do steady periodic multi-year patterns show consistency in the tree ring data? Can the "heartbeats" be used as a secondary check on the tree ring data?
   7. Are there other sources of 14C?
   8. What does this tell us about 14C accuracy? precision? the confidence we have in the data?
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6. Lake Suigetsu varves
   1. What are they?
   2. How are they similar to tree rings? How are they different?
   3. How do we know they are annual layers?
   4. What are the differences and similarities between the 1st core set and the 2nd core set?
   5. How does the missing anchoring information affect the precision and accuracy of the data?
   6. What do volcanic layers tell us?
   7. What confidence to we have in the data?
   8. Even as a floating chronology, what do they tell you about the age of the earth?
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7. Wiggle matching 14C values
   1. Review 4(g) above using raw values to compare dendrochronologies
   2. The mathematical wiggle matching process to find a "best fit"
   3. The similarity to matching rings when building a dendrochronology
   4. The added constraint on wiggle matching due to 14C decay - the time window
   5. Wiggle matching the German Pine floating chronology to the German Oak anchored chronology to "tether" the floating chronology to the anchored chronology
   6. Wiggle matching the Lake Suigetsu varve chronology to the combined German oak and pine chronology
   7. How does the tethering process affect the accuracy and precision of the combined chronology?
   8. How much confidence can we have in the age of these layers?
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8. Cave Paintings
   1. How are they dated?
   2. What animals are depicted?
   3. What does this tell us about the animals and environment at the time the paintings were made?
   4. What does this tell you about a world wide flood after they were drawn?

And I was thinking about a section on Creationist estimates of the age of the earth

1. How many different estimates are there?
2. How do they compare?
3. How accurate are they?
4. How precise are they?
5. How much confidence can we have in them?

Would you put that at the start (after definitions)?Just for starters. (nap now)Enjoy

An excellent resource on all forms of radiometric dating systems is: Radiometric Dating
A Christian Perspective
Dr. Roger C. WiensSee page 12 in particularA good easy to understand explanation of the formation of 14C to how it is used for dating can be found hereHow Carbon-14 Dating Works | HowStuffWorksI include information from this site in my age dating threadEnjoy

How good are you at identifying tree species?I ask because if you want to compare trees it is better with the same species.But yes, a good place to start.The kids may be interested in making stools with sections, and that is a good excuse to polish the surfaces for easy counting and for souvenirs to remember the exercise.What are the parameters you know?

1. when the trees died (in effect they were all "cut" on the day of the tornado).
2. they grew under the same basic ecological conditions
3. they grew under the same basic climate conditions.

What things can you test for?

1. the number of rings for different trees
2. the ring width with age pattern (the tik mark strips)
   1. at different heights of the trees
   2. between different trees of the same species
   3. between different trees of different species
3. the correlation between number of rings and truck circumference and diameter
4. how many rings different is one tree at different heights (near ground, +10ft, +20ft)
5. do multiple or false rings form in some trees
6. do missing rings occur in some trees

What things can you NOT test for?

1. that the rings measure age.

If you could cut down some still living trees nearby you could compare the tik strip patterns and see if they properly record the time since the tornado (4 years should be 4 rings, but the outer ring could be problematic if partially formed -- they are usually discarded because the thickness is not dependable data).Assuming they show annual data over the 4 years

1. can you extrapolate the germination dates of the downed trees?
2. how can you measure the accuracy and precision for the ages from the extrapolations
3. how much confidence can you have in the data

Are there other older such events?Are any of the trees of known age? (street or house trees planted at a known time)Enjoy

deletedEdited by RAZD, : No reason given.