Buz's refutation of all radiometric dating methods

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if your argument is correct please shwo me a source made BEFORE the tests were taken stating that they knew the dating method would not work- if they stated that afterwards then i would be very suspicious.

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Actually, it doesn't happen that way. If a method will not work for some known reason, usually one does not utilize that method. Sometimes, however, we will analyze a questionable sample because that's all we've got.Often, we simply know that, based on the rock type, radiometric methods might be difficult. This was the case with the KB Tuff. As I understand it, they knew that dating this material was going to be very difficult and spent some time trying to find the proper method to date it. Several early analyses, though published, simply conflicted with the fossil evidence and were eventually discarded in favor of better methods. Now, the KB Tuff is shown by YECs as a prime example of how radiometric dating is undependable, even though the procedure was very carefully conducted and the explanations make perfect sense.Another way that incorrect methods might be intentionally used is when YECs use them in an attempt to refute radiometric methods. For instance, Steve Austin is known to have sampled and analyzed recent lava flows by the K-Ar method. Clearly this is a misapplication of radiometic analysis used to deceive laymen, but it sure gets a lot of mileage in creationist circles. He KNEW that the results would be bogus long before they became available.

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Yes, of course it can be younger than the stone it's buried in. At the time it was buried the stone wasn't stone, but was much older than the organism which was buried in it.

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Then you need to show us how the fossil animal burrowed into the rock or sediment without leaving a trace of evidence for bioturbation. I am crushed that you have no faith in geologists being able to determine this in the field. I also would like for you to show us any fish, for instance, that burrows into the ground to die there. Just where do you get this stuff?

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The fact that the inorganic material compacted and hardened doesn't make it any younger when the organism was buried in it.

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Actually, they would be about the same age anyway. Burrowing animals don't usually dig thousands of feet into the sediments across major bedding discontinuities and into unusual chemical environments. There is absolutely no need to do so.

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If you used your sophisticated dating methods on the inorganic material at the time of burial, it'd likely show much age. Right?

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I have no idea what you are talking about. Usually, we don't date the actual sedimentary material. Often we date the diagenetic minerals that can form after deposition, but it would be meaningless to date the sediment itself since it is often derived from older rocks.

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Mark, would you like to comment on this statement?

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The K/T boundary is, by definition a time when life forms present on earth changed dramatically. Why do you think we call them Paleozoic and Mesozoic, etc.? Radiometric dating simply gives us an absolute date for this boundary. Harris' statement is not surprising or mysterious at all. It is a simple statement of fact.

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Ar-ar dating is contaminsted from the earth's mantle so as to render it unreliable.

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Read Schraf's post carefully and then explain to us why there are ANY concordant dates at all. If your source were correct, it should be virtually impossible to have any concordance at all much less concordance between the different radiometric methods. Is this just one huge coincidence?

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Concordance with itself, I would say quite possible if the contamination is consistent for three attempts. Consistent with the other methods? I suppose that depends on whether its a hit n miss problem and it made a hit here. I don't know.

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So, is it true that you live in a world of simple coincidences? Do cause and effect have any meaning to you? Are all phenomena in the universe hit-or-miss? Are you saying that everything is subject to the whim of an omnipotent being who plays tricks?

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To me, this problem is indicative of my statement to Rocky, that there's just too much time involved in these dating games for unknowns to exist, such as this problem until it was discovered.

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Personal incredulity is not evidence, Buz.

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The same problem with carbon dating can be true with these other methods. How much carbon and nitrogen, etc was in the atmosphere in previous ages? Who knows about the other elements used in dating also. How much or how little of these elements existed and how did they relate to factors involved in the dating processes? No body was around millions or billions of years back to sample and test the data. What other factors contaminated what elements at which age period? How can they assume factors present today to be close enough to being consistent at any given age of the past to know for sure.

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So, you are saying that scientists using radiometric dating over the last century didn't think of these problems until YECs came along to enlighten them?

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In summary, I've now got mixed feelings. It appears to me that the critics are looking out for their own agendas on the cup in coal, the footprints and the hammer, but Carl is not squeeky clean on some stuff either. So the controversy goes on. Of course the majority are going to side against him simply because of majority positions on the issues at hand. Personally, all I want is for the truth to prevail and surface in all this.

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Actually, there is no real controversy here. Anything resembling controversy is dreamt up by creationists, desperate to destroy their enemy. There is absolutely no reason to give credibility to Baugh's stories. He cannot validate a single one of his specimens.

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The critics are contending that Carl's hammer head was a 19th century hammer by style, but my rebut to that is that a hammer is a hammer is a hammer.

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Archeologists, look out! Buz is going to revolutionize your field. I'll try this when I try to trade in my car next year. Hey! A car is a car is a car!

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The point I was trying to make is that if the chemical makeup and/or quantity of certain elements in the atmosphere or soil were different than is understood and thought by those using these dating methods were different, this difference would affect all methods, causing all to err. My other thing, of course, is that we who believe things were created believe nobody knows how that would affect the readings. My position has always been that the earth itself is not necessarily young, but that all living creatures were created about 6000 years ago. None of us, nor anyone else was actually around way back when, so nothing can be set in stone in this debate, imo.

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What you are saying is that we should base a theory on what we DON'T know rather than the available evidence. Well, I guess that works for you, but most scientists think that theories should explain the existing data.