[IYAAYAS]

WOW! Where was that taken?

So your talking natural catastrophism then. Excelent, I'm not sure the two types are mutualy exclusive though.

A general question for anybody: Considering most if not all of our absolute dating methods involve measurement of radioactive decay. Are there ANY conditions that can alter decay rates, such as magnetic fields or gravity or anything else?

[RightWhale]

Are there ANY conditions that can alter decay rates

You can speed it up by concentrating a lot of the material in a small space. Half-life is dependent on each atom by itself, though, and represents the lowest rate of natural decay.

[blam]

"WOW! Where was that taken? "

Suprise. Those are called Carolina Bays, there are 500,000 of these along the east coast of the USA.

Carolina Bays

[Ten Megaton Solution]

No. Nothing alters decay rates except relativistic velocity. Melting a rock will reset the radiologic clock to zero, though, by remixing the isotopes.

Earth's history, and that of all planets, is one of slow geologic events interspersed with eruption and impact and flood. Neither the model of "all change is caused by catastrophe" nor the "gradual changes are all that happens" model acurrately depicts all of geolgoic history. It's a superposition of the two.