Posted on 09/25/2003 2:46:02 PM PDT by HalfFull
Evolutionists generally feel secure even in the face of compelling creationist arguments today because of their utter confidence in the geological time scale. Even if they cannot provide a naturalistic mechanism, they appeal to the "fact of evolution," by which they mean an interpretation of earth history with a succession of different types of plants and animals in a drama spanning hundreds of millions of years.
The Bible, by contrast, paints a radically different picture of our planet's history. In particular, it describes a time when God catastrophically destroyed the earth and essentially all its life. The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event is to understand that fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global Flood that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year. This Biblical interpretation of the rock record implies that the animals and plants preserved as fossils were all contemporaries. This means trilobites, dinosaurs, and mammals all dwelled on the planet simultaneously, and they perished together in this world-destroying cataclysm.
Although creationists have long pointed out the rock formations themselves testify unmistakably to water catastrophism on a global scale, evolutionists generally have ignored this testimony. This is partly due to the legacy of the doctrine of uniformitarianism passed down from one generation of geologists to the next since the time of Charles Lyell in the early nineteenth century. Uniformitarianism assumes that the vast amount of geological change recorded in the rocks is the product of slow and uniform processes operating over an immense span of time, as opposed to a global cataclysm of the type described in the Bible and other ancient texts.
With the discovery of radioactivity about a hundred years ago, evolutionists deeply committed to the uniformitarian outlook believed they finally had proof of the immense antiquity of the earth. In particular, they discovered the very slow nuclear decay rates of elements like Uranium while observing considerable amounts of the daughter products from such decay. They interpreted these discoveries as vindicating both uniformitarianism and evolution, which led to the domination of these beliefs in academic circles around the world throughout the twentieth century.
However, modern technology has produced a major fly in that uniformitarian ointment. A key technical advance, which occurred about 25 years ago, involved the ability to measure the ratio of 14C atoms to 12C atoms with extreme precision in very small samples of carbon, using an ion beam accelerator and a mass spectrometer. Prior to the advent of this accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) method, the 14C/12C ratio was measured by counting the number of 14C decays. This earlier method was subject to considerable "noise" from cosmic rays.
The AMS method improved the sensitivity of the raw measurement of the 14C/12C ratio from approximately 1% of the modern value to about 0.001%, extending the theoretical range of sensitivity from about 40,000 years to about 90,000 years. The expectation was that this improvement in precision would make it possible to use this technique to date dramatically older fossil material.1 The big surprise, however, was that no fossil material could be found anywhere that had as little as 0.001% of the modern value!2 Since most of the scientists involved assumed the standard geological time scale was correct, the obvious explanation for the 14C they were detecting in their samples was contamination from some source of modern carbon with its high level of 14C. Therefore they mounted a major campaign to discover and eliminate the sources of such contamination. Although they identified and corrected a few relatively minor sources of 14C contamination, there still remained a significant level of 14C—typically about 100 times the ultimate sensitivity of the instrument—in samples that should have been utterly "14C-dead," including many from the deeper levels of the fossil-bearing part of the geological record.2
Let us consider what the AMS measurements imply from a quantitative standpoint. The ratio of 14C atoms to 12C atoms decreases by a factor of 2 every 5730 years. After 20 half-lives or 114,700 years (assuming hypothetically that earth history goes back that far), the 14C/12C ratio is decreased by a factor of 220, or about 1,000,000. After 1.5 million years, the ratio is diminished by a factor of 21500000/5730, or about 1079. This means that if one started with an amount of pure 14C equal to the mass of the entire observable universe, after 1.5 million years there should not be a single atom of 14C remaining! Routinely finding 14C/12C ratios on the order of 0.1-0.5% of the modern value—a hundred times or more above the AMS detection threshold—in samples supposedly tens to hundreds of millions of years old is therefore a huge anomaly for the uniformitarian framework.
This earnest effort to understand this "contamination problem" therefore generated scores of peer-reviewed papers in the standard radiocarbon literature during the last 20 years.2 Most of these papers acknowledge that most of the 14C in the samples studied appear to be intrinsic to the samples themselves, and they usually offer no explanation for its origin. The reality of significant levels of 14C in a wide variety of fossil sources from throughout the geological record has thus been established in the secular scientific literature by scientists who assume the standard geological time scale is valid and have no special desire for this result!
In view of the profound significance of these AMS 14C measurements, the ICR Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth (RATE) team has undertaken its own AMS 14C analyses of such fossil material.2 The first set of samples consisted of ten coals obtained from the U. S. Department of Energy Coal Sample Bank maintained at the Pennsylvania State University. The ten samples include three coals from the Eocene part of the geological record, three from the Cretaceous, and four from the Pennsylvanian. These samples were analyzed by one of the foremost AMS laboratories in the world. Figure 1 below shows in histogram form the results of these analyses.
These values fall squarely within the range already established in the peer-reviewed radiocarbon literature. When we average our results over each geological interval, we obtain remarkably similar values of 0.26 percent modern carbon (pmc) for Eocene, 0.21 pmc for Cretaceous, and 0.27 pmc for Pennsylvanian. Although the number of samples is small, we observe little difference in 14C level as a function of position in the geological record. This is consistent with the young-earth view that the entire macrofossil record up to the upper Cenozoic is the product of the Genesis Flood and therefore such fossils should share a common 14C age.
Percent Modern Carbon
Applying the uniformitarian approach of extrapolating 14C decay into the indefinite past translates the measured 14C/12C ratios into ages that are on the order of 50,000 years (2-50000/5730 = 0.0024 = 0.24 pmc). However, uniformitarian assumptions are inappropriate when one considers that the Genesis Flood removed vast amounts of living biomass from exchange with the atmosphere—organic material that now forms the earth's vast coal, oil, and oil shale deposits. A conservative estimate for the pre-Flood biomass is 100 times that of today. If one takes as a rough estimate for the total 14C in the biosphere before the cataclysm as 40% of what exists today and assumes a relatively uniform 14C level throughout the pre-Flood atmosphere and biomass, then we might expect a 14C/12C ratio of about 0.4% of today's value in the plants and animals at the onset of the Flood. With this more realistic pre-Flood 14C/12C ratio, we find that a value of 0.24 pmc corresponds to an age of only 4200 years (0.004 x 2-4200/5730 = 0.0024 = 0.24 pmc). Even though these estimates are rough, they illustrate the crucial importance of accounting for effects of the Flood cataclysm when translating a 14C/12C ratio into an actual age.
Percent Modern Carbon
Some readers at this point may be asking, how does one then account for the tens of millions and hundreds of millions of years that other radioisotope methods yield for the fossil record? Most of the other RATE projects address this important issue. Equally as persuasive as the 14C data is evidence from RATE measurements of the diffusion rate of Helium in zircon crystals that demonstrates the rate of nuclear decay of Uranium into Lead and Helium has been dramatically higher in the past and the uniformitarian assumption of a constant rate of decay is wrong.3 Another RATE project documents the existence of abundant Polonium radiohalos in granitic rocks that crystallized during the Flood and further demonstrates that the uniformitarian assumption of constant decay rates is incorrect.4 Another RATE project provides clues for why the 14C decay rate apparently was minimally affected during episodes of rapid decay of isotopes with long half-lives.5
The bottom line of this research is that the case is now extremely compelling that the fossil record was produced just a few thousand years ago by the global Flood cataclysm. The evidence that reveals that macroevolution as an explanation for the origin of life on earth can therefore no longer be rationally defended.
It's absurd to try to pretend that mainstream science does the kind of selective editing of its data that ICR or that Creation-Evolution Headlines site of bondserv's routinely does. Creationists, who do essentially no research of their own, parasitize upon on how science puts all the data out there, allowing the creationists to pick and choose from a sea of contrary data a few things here and there (like the 14C noise floor) to try to spin.
The situation is not symmetrical at all. Science routinely demands high levels of scholarship and punishes failure to meet the standards. Creationism and ID continue to assume a right to distort as needed. Gish and Morris with their reputations for dishonesty can never dream of being published in a real peer-reviewed journal. (Not to mention goodseed's favorite, "Dr. Dino" Hovind.)
Prove He doesn't.
While you go about doing that you'llpleasantly discover He does. McDowell started out with that premise and quickly became a believer. I'll look up the book he wrote stating how he started out being an atheist and after reviewing the evidence knew beyond a doubt that God exists, created all we see and don't see and controls what's going on.
I'll run over to amazon and post the url for you. Yeah, I know, you won't read it but it's worth a try.
Luckily, we don't need to go back that far. Since you KNOW they would be refuted (by these pre-19th century people you cite), care to simple tell us how they would refute the the C14 findings stated in the article. We are waiting, oh' clairvoint one.
Like I said, the dishonesty is amazing.
The Poster known at Free Republic as Prodigal Son wins, by default, one aspect of the Creation versus Evolution debate on the Free Republic.
Stipulations:
The Bible, by contrast, paints a radically different picture of our planet's history. In particular, it describes a time when God catastrophically destroyed the earth and essentially all its life. The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event is to understand that fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global Flood that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year. This Biblical interpretation of the rock record implies that the animals and plants preserved as fossils were all contemporaries. This means trilobites, dinosaurs, and mammals all dwelled on the planet simultaneously, and they perished together in this world-destroying cataclysm.
Hereby declare that the particular aspect of the debate of Creation versus Evolution dealing with the Biblical Flood has been won by myself, pending no other logical explanations for the questions I have raised.*
I further proclaim that this article will be bookmarked and archived in my personal records and will be referred to when needed in future debates and that any other members of Free Republic may make use of my arguments when needed.
Today- as designated by my post time:
Prodigal Son
*I define that the point is won by myself not in the sense that I have offered any sensible alternative to how the Biblical Flood might not have happened. Only that defenders of the point "The Biblical Flood Occurred" have offered no reasonable response or explanation to entirely practical questions as to how Noah and his offspring might have complied with the Biblical version of the Flood.
Brazen, yes. But what can you do if you're trying to prove the earth is 6K years old and the evidence has pointed solidly and continuously to a much older figure since Lyell's day (1830s)?
Prove He doesn't.
Here's the book I have. He has a newer one out but this one should suffice.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0785243038/qid=1064536751/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/103-0426552-1388667
Evidence That Demands a Verdict: Historical Evidences for the Christian Faith (Volume 1 - Super Saver Edition) by Josh McDowell
Read the reviews as well.
Must be good to be you, i guess.
As far as your off-topic question (that has been discussed endlessly), I'm still waiting for that freepmail.
No! You were supposed to never mind that the premise was silly. There's a non-zero carbon-14 noise floor here to be lawyered upon and you're supposed to be distracted when people try to distract you!
I see with a complete lack of supporting evidence, you just make stuff up. You prove my point. Your statement above is unsupported nonsense.
The situation is not symmetrical at all. Science routinely demands high levels of scholarship and punishes failure to meet the standards. Creationism and ID continue to assume a right to distort as needed. Gish and Morris with their reputations for dishonesty can never dream of being published in a real peer-reviewed journal. (Not to mention goodseed's favorite, "Dr. Dino" Hovind.)
More made-up nonsense. History is full of men of "science" faking the results to achieve their predefined outcome. Evolutionists seem to be the worst and the laziest. In many an evolutionist’s mind – we already know it all and no further testing or experimentation is needed.
Unless you want to present some serious supporting evidence for you claims, please don't post this crap. It wastes your time and our time.
Evidence?
500 years ago, men of science thought they had it all figured out too. They were wrong.
Now think rather than recite.
This is now archived. I have stated earlier in the thread that anything you wished to say to me could be said on the open forum for all to see. You did not respond. My questions stand, pending logical explanation. In effect, you can view my decree as a legal document. My identity can be established if it should have to come to that and you were given sufficient warning to respond.
You lose. Your article is bunk.
Already been done.
The Embedded Muse
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Volume 2, Number 2 Copyright 1997 TGG July 2, 1997
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You may redistribute this newsletter for noncommercial purposes. For commercial use contact info@ganssle.com.
EDITOR: Jack Ganssle, jack@ganssle.com
...
The Engineering Mind
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Comics mock us. Spouses get frustrated with us. Yet most of us take great pride in the way we approach problems (yeah, and even life). Engineering is all about problem solving, and we engineers tend to excel at finding ways to make things work.
Non-engineers are often baffled when presented with a problem, especially one involving numbers, having little clue where to start looking for a solution. Engineers, though, seem to have an innate sense of the right way to go about finding a solution. Problem solving is a **process**, one which engineers have mastered more so than most other folks.
Two recent incidents brought this to mind. The first occurred recently while watching a class of 10 year olds listening to the story of Apollo 11. The lecturer asked the class if they knew how long it took the astronauts to fly from the earth to the moon. "14 years", "6 months", and a dozen other baseless answers came back from the youngsters. One, though, said "well, they left July 16 and arrived July 20, so I guess it was 4 days."
Hearing this I sat bolt upright. That's what it's all about! This youngster somehow had that instinctual ability to assimilate data, to solve a math problem, and come up with a reasonable answer. That's exactly what we engineers do all day. Once I thought we were trained to think this way. Now, hearing this wisdom from a 10 year old, I can't help but wonder if it's in our makeup. Do we gravitate to an engineering career because of the way we think? Is it nature or nuture?
The second incident was a response made by Bill Swan to an earlier issue of this newsletter where I made an off-hand remark about the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin. His remarks use the engineering method to shed a bit of quantitative light on this pressing subject. Here is his analysis (and, I'm humbled by his analytical treatment of this subject):
Sorry, but this one turns out to be an estimable quantity given the original form, which was how many angels could _dance_ on the head of a pin. The maximum number is easily worked out.
Given that the angels are _dancing_ upon it, it's clear that it must present something like a danceable surface. So, just to put us into the ballpark let us posit that the pin manufacturer is able to produce pinheads even to one atom's variation. The pinhead surface is thus uneven to approximately the size of an iron atom (I presume pins are generally still made of steel). Quantum mechanics doesn't allow us to assume a surface of smaller size...
For simplicity's sake, let us assume that angels are versatile dancers and can deal with an unevenness in the floor roughly approximate to their own size. (Me, I have trouble with even perfectly smooth floors...) This factor can conceivably vary widely with the skill of the dancer and the style of the dancing: the Highland Fling can be performed on surfaces that would be impossible for ballroom dancers. The style of dancing also determines "angel-packing" factor, but we'll assume they're not attempting a space-consuming Irish-style Riverdance stage stepdance. All of this is rough, but it should put us within an order of magnitude or so.
So... A pinhead (I just went and measured one) is roughly 0.1" in diameter. According to my _Reference Data for Radio Engineers_ (1972), the radius of an iron atom is 1.17 angstroms.
Applying the conversion: 1 in = 2.54 cm, we find that the area of the pinhead is roughly 3.14 * (0.05*2.54)^2 = 0.05 cm^2, or 0.05*(10^-4) m^2, or 5*(10^-6) m^2 or simply 5E-6 m^2 -- I happen to like the simpler notation. (And if there are errors here, well, I'm having my Pentium do the calculations... :-)
Using the conversion: 1 angstrom = 0.1 nm, we find that the "area" of the pinhead covered by an iron atom is roughly (0.117E-9)^2 m^2 = 1.37E-20 m^2. (I am assuming a rectangular lattice of iron atoms here; even if that is wrong we are still in the ballpark.)
Therefore, the maximum number of angels able to dance upon the head of this pin is in the neighborhood of 5E-6/1.4E-20 = 3.6E14 or 360 million million angels. (I am avoiding any use of "billion" because that term has different values dependent upon one's nationality.)
If one knows in what fashion our angels are tripping the light fantastic, and if one knows something about their surefootedness, this number can be refined. But in any event we can at long last estimate the number of angels which can dance upon the head of a pin.
Yeah. That stuff men of science are supposed to provide to support their hypothesis. Maybe that is the problem, you don't know what evidence is. You provided us a diatribe about the how right you are and how wrong the other guy is without providing a single piece of supporting evidence.
Maybe you are one of those that assumes Orthodox Darwinism is the be-all end-all ("we don't need no stink'n supporting evidence")
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