Alright. I'm moving on.
Before we can start investigating how we might reliably detect the age of something for which we only have one sample for, we need to point out that the sample size was just one part of the problem. There are assumptions that are going to be involved in any attempt to get an age for something, and even the above examples alluded to it. For example, when we talk about determining the age of a normal looking person we presume that we are looking at... a normal looking person, with no interesting diseases or genetic defects, etc.
More easily to grasp, though, are post-mortem estimates of age. How long ago did a person die? Because of the large sample of people observed dying under various circumstances, our pathologists are able to get a good handle on many of the processes that kick in when a human has died. Many, if not all, of these processes are irreversible. Given certain, clearly defined conditions, its possible to generate a reliable estimate (with a margin for error, of course) of how long ago a person has died. The problem is those 'conditions.' Contaminated conditions can give inaccurate estimates, and you cannot always know that there were contaminated conditions. For example, if a person dies far enough outside a certain temperature range, this could accelerate or decelerate the processes mentioned above.
For a very helpful site that helps you sort through how these various factors can affect a time of death estimate, check out this site:
http://www.pathguy.com/TimeDead.htm Off of that page is a pretty cynical view of time of death estimates in general that covers the same idea:
http://org.catholic.or.kr/chrc/rights/forensic2.htm. The point is that even when you understand the processes involved, there are factors that can undermine your dating estimate.
This, again, is an example from the real world. As we explore some of the other methods that are out there, we will see that in many cases these assumptions are brushed past in a way that we'd never allow when the chips are down, as in a court case, or something of that sort. Evolutionists don't think these dynamics ought to apply to their situations.
To summarize my position thus far, if we do not feel constrained by a certain biological theory that requires a certain amount of time, when we do turn to the question of directly measuring the age of the earth we are faced with two fundamental problems: Sample Size and Sample Contamination. We only have one earth, so how do we know that the dating methods we use for it are 'normal'? Perhaps if we had 100,000 earths or planets to examine, we'd find that our own planet is actually abnormal. On the other hand, when we turn our attention to the assumptions, how can we be sure that our method is free from the various sorts of contaminations that are possible that can cast doubt on those assumptions?
And yet, before we can explore that, we need to address the question of which methods should we select. Up until the beginning of the 20th century, the options were all of the same sort. In most methods, you picked some observable phenomena, calculated how much change you saw in a certain amount of time, and then extrapolated your findings backwards. This process is based on uniformitarian principles, and can be traced, more or less, to Charles Lyell, c. 1830 AD.
Before this, as evolutionists like to snidely remind us, our ignorant ancestors thought the earth was fairly young. Using uniformitarian principles, there were methods that could generate much older dates. However, one could oppose the uniformitarians without necessarily signing up as a young-earther. You could be, for example, a catastrophist. To my surprise, Wikipedia actually has a pretty balanced description of catastrophism:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catastrophism Of note from that article:
"One of the key differences between catastrophism and gradualism is that to function, gradualism requires the assumption of vast timelines, whereas catastrophism can function with or without assumptions of long timelines."
Once again, we see that we are face to face with a POV- gradualism- which positively DEMANDS a certain time frame, that is, a very long one, in order for it to be believable. In contrast, catastrophism does not require an attitude about time. So, I've got two hypotheses running now that not only stand on their own but are not time-dependant, catastrophism and 'multiple common ancestry' (Polyphyly).
The wiki article goes on and states the obvious: "Today most geologists combine catastrophist and gradualist standpoints" and the reason for that is because catastrophism is an empirical reality that forces itself in. The wiki article does a good job of highlighting the repulsion to catastrophism in the early days, since they were often (but not always) associated with aspects of divine intervention, and scientists really don't like the idea of having to account for such things. Nonetheless, of the two views, catastrophism is certainly supported by the evidence.
Stephen Jay Gould even once went so far as to say: *"In fact, the catastrophists were much more empirically minded than Lyell. The geologic record does seem to record catastrophes: rocks are fractured and contorted; whole faunas are wiped out (see my column of October, 1974). To circumvent this literal appearance, Lyell imposed his imagination upon the evidence. The geologic record, he argued, is extremely imperfect and we must interpolate into it what we can reasonably infer but cannot see. The catastrophists were the hardnosed empiricists of their day, not the blinded theological apologists." Natural History February 1975 pp.16-17
Catastrophists can claim to be the hardnosed empiricists of today, too. Nothing has changed. For one thing, even given uniformitarianistic assumptions (read: evolutionary), you've got the catastrophe (allegedly) of some massive meteor wiping out much of the planet's life forms 65 myas, and of course you had the 'ice age' which isn't exactly a uniform phenomena for the planet. Then you throw in modern origin of life theories require that the earth at one time had been really really hot without any oxygen (anaerobic) in the atmosphere, even though that's not the way it is today and there is nary a sign it was ever anything else- except that abiogenesis NEEDS an oxygen-depleted atmosphere and various 'special conditions.' (See:
http://www.iscid.org/encyclopedia/Abiogenesis. See if you can spot the assumptions). So, even a uniformitist cannot be a pure-bred uniformitist. Now factor in modern day observations like hurricanes hitting New Orleans or tsunamis in the Indian Ocean and volcanos like Mount St. Helen's you get the idea that catastrophes are the rule, rather than the exceptions. If you care about extrapolating based on the observed rules, that will be important to you.
If you want evidence of catastrophism, just follow the news.
I will be returning to catastrophism as we go. We still need to talk about the dating methods we might choose from, even as a uniformitarian.
As I mentioned earlier, leading up to the 20th century, with uniformitarianism carrying the day, you had a wide variety of methods available, and these had a wide range of dates that they yielded.
One of my favorite stories is that of Lord Kelvin. Once again, Wikipedia had the best go of it. You can read it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_the_Earth This quote is grand:
"In 1862, the physicist William Thomson of Glasgow published calculations that fixed the age of the Earth at between 20 million and 400 million years. He assumed that the Earth had been created as a completely molten ball of rock, and determined the amount of time it took for the ball to cool to its present temperature.
Geologists had trouble accepting such a short age for the Earth. Biologists could accept that the Earth might have a finite age, but even 100 million years seemed much too short to be plausible."
Note the basis in which Thomson's dates were rejected (Thomson became named Lord Kelvin). Was it because his numbers were wrong? No, his calculations were correct. Granted, he had made an assumption about the earth as a ball of rock, but it is not as though it was disputed by anyone that there was a fixed 'high range' representing the very hottest the earth could have been, compared to what it was then currently observed to be. The earth gives off heat, mind you, that does not come from the sun. Why were his calculations rejected? Wiki sums it up well. Its because geologists didn't like it and "100 million years seemed much too short to be plausible." Plausible for what? Their theory of evolution, that's what.
When radioactivity was discovered finally and used to calculate the age of the earth, Lord Kelvin's numbers were not so much refuted as they were simply set aside. In other words, you might say that one set of measurements based on assumptions was simply set aside in favor of another set of measurements based on assumptions because these other measurements were 'more plausible.'
That's the sort of thing you do when you NEED to get a certain age of the earth.
There were still other methods. The wiki includes one more: "In 1899, John Joly of the University of Dublin calculated the rate at which the oceans should have accumulated salt from erosion processes, and determined that the oceans were about 90 million years old."
Alas, that is not enough time, either. In the case of Lord Kelvin's numbers you might say that he didn't take into account the unique nature of some of the heat sources in the core (radioactive ones, for example), but its hard to see how Joly's assumptions could be thwarted by radioactivity, especially since he himself was well aware of such things. Why not use his date of the earth (90 million years)? Can it be shown to be wrong, or is it simply assumed to be wrong, because 'its not enough time'?
I am aware of many non-radiometric uniformitarian dating methods, and they yield a wide variety of dates. Some are even in the thousands of years, and others are in the millions, while others are in the hundreds of millions, etc. I found the perfect site to document this. Its a Christian that believes in an old earth. Check it out:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html#page%2019 I can't be accused of citing a creationist source.
As you read it, you will see that he is more than happy to report different manners of non-radiometric dating methods that yield all sorts of different dates. They all 'agree' in the sense of demonstrating that the earth must be very old. This completely and utterly misses the point, though. By way of example, let's say that you had 5 different methods and they yield dates like this:
A 20,000 years old B 50,000 years old C 1,000,000 years old D 20,000,000 years old E 4,500,000,000 years old.
In this gentlemen's book, the fact that these all register as 'very old' at least establishes that the earth is 'very old.'
Yet, the man seems to do pretty much what so many others are willing to do, and that is to make the issue black/white. That is to say, the only two options are "Old" or "Young." "Young" is anything, say, 10,000 years and down. "Old" is anything above 10,000 years old. If you've got a 100 methods that all yield tremendously different dates but are all 'old,' that settles it. The earth is old. But all of the methods above can't be right. If one dating method gives you 20,000,000 years old while another gives you 4,500,000 years old, it surely matters which one is really accurate.
The logic is that the earth cannot be older than its 'oldest' rock. But if the earth is uniformly 4.5 billion years old, why don't all the dating methods yeild a uniform 4.5 billion years? If some method yields 20 million years, it is not compelling to argue that this date indicates that the earth must be AT least 20 million years, but then have you set it aside as soon as another date is offered that is older. Surely the presence of an older one indicates that the one you just set aside is flawed somehow, and if it is flawed even though it was good enough a moment ago to prove an 'old earth,' why should we think the method replacing it is any better?
In fact, it really seems that the situation is exactly as the wiki quote indicated... it comes down to 'plausibility.' Some dates are chosen out of the basket because they are consistent with other theories which rely on them. Evolution and uniformitarianism RELY on these older dates, or else the phenomena they wish to account for using those gradualistic processes are implausible. They can't be treated independantly. So, they pick the older dates, and simply set aside the younger dates. And by younger I don't mean the 'young earth creationism' dates. Even a radiometric date that yields only 200 million years ought to throw a crimp in both evolution and uniformitarianism, and such dates do exist, but since they are not consistent with the gradualistic theories which rely on older ones, they are set aside, their only purpose being to establish that the earth is, at the very least, older than 10,000 years.
In my book, that's a pretty crappy methodology. I found an explicit example here:
http://www.tim-thompson.com/radiometric.html Boo-ya.
Here is another anti-creationist link:
http://gondwanaresearch.com/radiomet.htm The reason why I cite this one is because he provides a number of different dating methods which all yeild a particular range of dates (concordant) which he thinks shows that radiometric dating is reliable. The dates in one example range from 513 mya and 633 mya (taking into account the +/-). He is very pleased with this 'concordant' range. My interest, however, focuses on one dating method used in this sampling, the Rb-Sr isochron method. In this case, it yields a date of 570-590 Mya. However, when using the same method, as recorded on this page:
http://www.gate.net/~rwms/AgeEarth.html the Sand River gneisses sample yields a date of 3.5 billion years.
Its the same dating method, but one date is 580 million years and the other is 3.5 billion years. ASSUMING that the sample are, pardon the pun, rock solid, so that no seepage of any kind has happened (and evolutionary geologists assure us that they are smart enough to factor that in), surely it should follow that our Fen sample and our Sand River sample, both coming from the same earth would GIVE US THE SAME DATE? So, you know, I have questions. What was going on in the rubidium in the Fen sample for 4 billion years? Where was it? Why wasn't it decaying during this time? Of course it was decaying! If the rubidium was suddenly trapped, I guess floating around like a rebel teenager for all that time, hitting the bars, sowing his seeds, how do we know that the lead that the rubidium decays into got sliced out in the trapping, throwing off the whole thing?
In order to save the Fen sample's reliability, the arguments used will likely go against the Sand River sample. That is to say, how do we know that despite it constantly and reliably decaying since its initial creation, extra lead had gotten trapped along with it? Is every element on our crust the result of atomic decay? Couldn't the processes that created the rubidium have also created extra lead, and this whole lot got trapped together in this sample? Or whatever. There are a host of questions I could lodge against all of the dating methods, but here is what it reduces to:
I could grant the reliability of every dating method, and this still wouldn't mean anything. In fact, I do grant it. I can grant it while still pointing out that what geologists are suggesting is that over billions and billions of years, our planet has a hosts of rocks that managed to somehow escape contamination. How are they to demonstrate this? As evolutionists point out, 500 million years is a long time. Its long enough, they say, for 'evolution to happen.'
In a strange lapse of judgement, while 500 million years was a long enough time to allow all sorts of otherwise implausible things to happen, the evolutionists (sorry, the geologists) wish us to think that their various radiometric samples were kept nice and safe over that same 500 million years. Given the nature and rate of observed catastrophes, that's practically mind-boggling.
In order to escape the problem of having radiometric dates yield dates other than a uniform 4.5 billion years, they have to allow for environmental processes to constantly be shifting things around and tossing rock this way and that, forming new rock here and new rock there. This 'escape' from feeling like one ought to expect to see a uniform date from EVERY sample creates the very sort of processes which they know without me telling them would be otherwise cause for concern around a given sample. Its talking out of both sides of their mouth.
Thus, I can still grant the reliability of radiometric processes without accepting that they provide actual direct measurements of the earth.
In part, I can do that because we now face the other question. Given we only have one earth to examine, and one planet to explore, despite our many radiometric dating methods, there is ultimately only one 'sample.' Don't we actually need to examine a host of other planets to ensure that our methods are not all simply abnormalities particular to our planet, or even our solar system?
On what grounds can we pluck ANY date out of the literally hundreds of thousands of dates of 'earth rocks' that are out there as well as non-radiometric dates, too?
It seems to me that if one does not have any bias that insists on either a young date or an old date or a really really old date so that my other philosophies work (aka, gradualism) then the actual reasonable conclusion is to throw one's hands up and confess that the physical data is too ambiguous to be allowed to serve as direct measurements.
By way of comparison, if you obtained 5 different measurements for how long it was since a person died, say, 4 hours ago, 10 hours ago, 15 hours ago, 20 hours ago, and 40 hours ago, the conclusion is NOT that it is now established that the person died at least 40 hours ago. What is established is that you have conflicting measurements and that you cannot in fact provide a rational estimate for when the person died. Perhaps the person really did die only 4 hours ago, and some other factors account for the other data. Unless you had some objective, external reason for selecting one of those measurements against the others, you'd have to be agnostic. But we are IN the sample. Where are we going to go to get our 'external reason'?
Rather than acknowledge these problems, since the evolutionist NEEDS the oldest measurement, that's the one he takes.
I don't need any particular measurement, so I see the situation as it is, and realize no number can be ascertained... unless you find some external reason for doing as I said, selecting one measurement over another.
Re-iterating, then, I suggest that from a physical data POV, that external reason would have to be derived on the same sort of pattern that we apply to other situations. We would need a large sample size in order to know what is 'normal' and consequently, whether or not our assumptions in regards to 'contaminants' really are valid.
As such material is not forthcoming in the near future, I suggest the following proposition:
No direct measurement of the earth can be reliably gained. Once again, I have a proposition that covers the facts while simultaneously keeping open the idea that the earth could be very old or very young. As I have no other theories that REQUIRE me to go out and pluck the dates that I like, I can see the situation as it really is: hopelessly murky.
I think it might be time to talk about catastrophism in more detail.
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Topic: In Defense of Young Earth Creationism (Read 12067 times)