How Do We Know the Age of the Earth?

Earl Detra

First of all, observation and calculations are two different things. The latter may be based on the former, but that presumes both uniformitarianism and gradualism where the trenches are concerned.

Well, as far as I can see uniformitarianism is still valid. I mean how do you live in a world where you cannot be sure that the sun will 'rise' tomorrow? Why can we not assume that processes occurring today are no different from those of the past? Why call upon processes and mechanisms that have never been seen and really have no evidence in the geological record?

In addition, there are some real problems with the current explanations, as I presume you know. We are not seeing what we should see in terms of types of depositional layering under the current evolutionary model. If you need examples, I’ll ask Barry to come in on this a bit, as this is his field.

I am not aware of any significant problems with mainstream geological explanations of what happens at trenches.

If you have trouble with the idea of the Himalayas still rising slightly as opposed to the enormous amount of runoff which washes away topsoil from mountain valleys yearly, I don’t know what to tell you. They both happen. Erosion is far more prevalent and faster than either mountain rise or soil formation. And that is the point I was making.

Well, then according to you, there never should have been ANY mountains if erosion is faster than uplift. Do I understand you correctly on this? Do you understand that there are different rates of erosion and soil formation? As far as I can see, soil formation argues quite effectively for long ages rather than rapid formation of the earth's surface.

You asked when the last time a storm washed away soil in my yard. Since there is only a ten foot drop, ‘catty-corner’ in my one acre, and that all but the old paddock area is planted or compost heaps or house and patio, I would have to say it hasn’t happened to any appreciable degree. I’m not sure what this has to do with spring runoffs and glacial melt runoff through mountain valleys, however, which have steep drops and much more water going through them! We get about 17 inches a year…

Then erosion is not occurring very rapidly at your house. How long do you think it took for your present landforms to develop?

You then asked why I would assume erosion and uplift have been constant for so long and yet the speed of light is variable. I think you are totally confused regarding things I have been trying to present. First, I don’t assume erosion and uplift have been constant ‘for so long.’ I think the data and evidence point to massive catastrophes which would have had a lot to do with both. I also think the data and evidence point to a changed speed of light since the beginning. In both cases I am depending, however, on data and evidence, and not on presuppositions.

I believe in catastrophes also. I think they are largely responsible for what we see. My point is that there are long periods of little change in between the catastrophes.

And in the presence of data and evidence, hypotheses can be formed. Just-so stories are not needed.

I agree. That is why I cannot understand why you rely upon them.

And regardless of your red herring about argon and biotite, my point still stands that we do not know the original ratios of various elements in rocks.

Then you missed the point completely. We either know this information or we do not need it in some cases.

We presume when we see a daughter element that only exists as an isotope of radio-decay, that there was none to begin with.

I'm not sure why you have a problem with this. The evidence for this assumption is empirical.

And that is certainly a fair and data-backed assumption. But there are a number of other daughter elements which are indistinguishable from naturally occurring isotopes.

Still not a problem.

And that means very simply we must make presuppositions based on current models regarding the original state. Those presuppositions and current models may not be correct.

Except that we have independent evidence that they are correct. If you were right in you analysis there should be virtually NO dates that are concordant, but there are. Why is this? Could it be that the assumptions are correct?

I was taught, and I taught also, that challenging currently accepted theories was part of good science. That solid theories should be able to stand up to examination. Evolution has been accepted, examined, and found wanting.

By whom? There are plenty of people who do not feel this way.

What has happened, however, is that because it was accepted, the idea that it could be found wanting seems to be anathema.

Not at all. It is just that the tests have not shown evolution to be lacking. After so many years, it is time to move on. Accept the assumption and if it is incorrect we will know shortly.

Nor is it people ‘out of the field’ who are finding the radiometric assumptions currently prevailing to be wanting. There are experts in the field who have questions as well, and are examining the data with a mind to accepting what it might indicate rather than what presuppositions demand it indicates.

Oh, I have reservations about any date as well. I question every one. The problem is that this does not invalidate the message. We could pretend that the systematics mean nothing or we can use the data to advance science. Your choice.

That, by the way, in my personal estimation, takes a lot of nerve and a very determined person who is probably independently funded in some way to do that. It’s really hard to buck the system, even when you are sure you are right.

Sort of like Darwin, eh?

I had to laugh when you said, ”If there was evidence for creationism, the pressure to publish and obtain credit would be vicious.” What do you think has been happening in the past thirty years or so? GRI publishes its own material. Who else will? And they are quite respected professionally – strange thing! The two creation technical journals (CRSQ and TJ) both have come up with some interesting challenges, although I will admit with the rest of you that I think GRI holds itself to a higher standard for publication. Nevertheless, these journals and publications came into being for the express purpose of getting material refused by the evolutionist journals out on the table for discussion and consideration.

These reservations have been addressed in the mainstream. You have simply decided to ignore them.

My point here was that if there was credible evidence it would be recognized by mainstream scientists and published in mainstream journals. Mainstreamers would be fighting for the recognition to publish ground-breaking material. But there is no such evidence.

Nor does this have ANYTHING to do with your question “would you have an attorney conduct brain surgery?” The scientists challenging evolution are scientists working in their own fields who have been brave enough to finally say, “Wait a minute – this is not working!”

Actually, it does. Most proponents for creationism usually end up outside their field, making pronouncements that make no sense whatsoever.

Now, you said some interesting things in response to my questions regarding K/Ar dating in modern lavas. Here is the quote from above:

There were fewer methods.

Nevertheless, when you said that the argon differences makes young rocks un-datable, I would wonder how many ‘old’ lavas are not really old, but presumed that way because those dates are showing up with false ages…?

I think I said that the argon differences are too difficult to measure. This makes them undatable by current methods and any minor differences could be attributed to very miniscule contamination effects. But yes, I wonder too, how often my watch is off by several minutes. But I still use it because I am not an absolutist.

I think you are missing something. You asked for other methods to date recent lavas. I said to use artifacts or fossils. And yes, they can be found in volcanic rocks. I recently saw a picture of the remains of an elephant caught up in a basalt(?) flow and I have personally seen trees engulfed by lavas at Hawaii. And what do you think of the artifacts at Pompeii, for instance? Could they not be used to date the eruption?

And, finally, what ON EARTH does body plan have to do with a faster light speed???

Well, being a dumb geologist, it would seem to me that a highly energetic environment where the speed of light is thousands (or millions?) of time faster than present, that the lifeforms would probably be very different from what we see to day. Can you imagine the energy/radiation released by radiometric decay if lightspeed varied that much? Seems kind of weird to me.

I really think you have not read the work on this at all. Why don’t you?

My time is limited. When respected scientists in the field verify that this is even possible, I will take the time. Until then, I really have more pressing matters

 

HELEN

Earl, here you claim uniformitarianism and later you admit catastrophes. Please make up your mind. Nor does either have anything to do with the red herring of the sun rising in the morning. We have geological evidence, as I think you know, of a massive asteroid or meteorite bombardment several times in the geologic record. Are you calling that uniformitarian? Have we see the like in our lifetimes?

Barry: The problem is that the sediments at the bottoms of ocean trenches are horizontal rather than being contorted, which you would expect to happen if they were being subducted.

Helen: I poked around on Google, as well, and found some other problems associated with ocean trench explanations in the current vogue:

http://members.tripod.com/~charles_W/trenches.html

http://www.expanding-earth.org/page_4.htm

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/lowman.htm

etc.

You then stated that "according to you, there never should have been ANY mountains if erosion is faster than uplift. Do I understand you correctly on this? Do you understand that there are different rates of erosion and soil formation? As far as I can see, soil formation argues quite effectively for long ages rather than rapid formation of the earth's surface."

First of all, I think the mountains were suddenly uplifted -- especially the younger ones, such as the Alps and Rockies. But if that uplift had happened millions of years ago through long slow years, then there indeed should be absolutely no soil left at the higher elevations. It should have all washed down by now, leaving the bare rock which, granted, could slowly erode away, but the detritus from the erosion would also wash downslope. This is not what we see, however. We see lovely mountain soils at very high elevations. These Alpine meadows are favorite areas for summer grazing of flocks of sheep in many areas of the world. Why are those Alpine meadows still there? The rate of soil deposition and formation is far exceeded by even the occasional catastrophic runoff after especially severe weather. By uniformitarian assumptions -- based on what we see happening today -- the mountain soils are indications of a very young system.

You then asked how long I thought it took for the landforms here in the hills of California to develop. This was asked in conjunction with your question about runoff from my property which is essentially a flat acre.

First of all, there is very little flat land around here, so my parcel is not representative. Secondly, if you fly above the California hills and look down, what you will see is drainage patterns with the hills as a result. That speaks to me of very rapid formation after either local or general flooding. HIGH flooding, or very violent tsunami action washing up and then running off, even to the Sierra Nevada foothills, where this pattern is strikingly evident. Therefore, I think the landforms around here were the result of some very rapid and violent processes.

You wrote: "I believe in catastrophes also. I think they are largely responsible for what we see. My point is that there are long periods of little change in between the catastrophes."

1. Catastrophes, some of which we have never seen the likes of, are evidenced in the geologic record, as I mentioned above. Therefore we cannot presume uniformitarianism where earth history is concerned.

2. Your belief in long periods between catastrophes is presumption not conclusion from facts in evidence. It is what evolution needs to survive, but there is no real evidence for it at all.

And since you are working on presumptions you need rather than looking at what simply is, I will ignore your comment about me using 'just-so
stories.'

I was quite astonished when you stated that we did not need to know original mother/daughter ratios in some instances where radiometric dating was concerned. That is one of the three presumptions that must be made for any radiometric dating! The only way you can avoid it is to work off of presuppositions instead of data!

And, contrary to your assertion that tests have not shown evolution to be lacking, I would submit that there is evidence in every field of science related to evolutionary theory that evolution is in major trouble where data and test results are concerned. Here are just a few:

1. abiogenesis. It had to start someplace and you cannot divorce evolution from naturalistic beginnings unless you are going to arbitrarily limit some outside intelligence to what you will 'allow' him/it to do in terms of evolutionary theory!

2. what mutations actually do vs. what evolution needs them to do.

3. the impossibility of de novo protein formation in a cell

4. the lack of evidence of any mutational process building upon itself to produce any new form or function

5. the real effect of natural selection vs. what evolution wants it to do.

6. evidence of sudden catastrophes in the geologic record, destroying first, the concept of gradualism and then challenging the concept of uniformitarianism.

7. quantized redshift

8. cellular irreducible complexity

and the list goes on.

Evolution is sadly wanting and being sustained now through propaganda and desperation and control of the monies used for funding. It is most certainly not being sustained by truth or data.

In the meantime, the reservations which have been addressed in evolutionist literature have been treated with arrogance, mocking, and distortions, -- this is not discussion; it is simply more propaganda. I would assume that propaganda and distorted and contorted arguments such as Rennie produced would not be needed if evolution really had much to stand on.

You wrote: "Mainstreamers would be fighting for the recognition to publish ground-breaking material. But there is no such evidence."

Oh dear, there is actually plenty such evidence, but you see the mainstream journals will not admit it for publication. This is why more of those scientists and researches who can afford to lose their funding or positions or who are so secure they don't need to worry are abandoning the current evolutionary ideas and pursuing other models instead. For those who object to creation, I think you will find that panspermia has gotten kind of big. Others, like Denton and Behe, who are working in their own fields are looking for ways for evolution to work despite all the problems they keep seeing with it!

You then made the accusation that "most proponents for creationism usually end up outside their field, making pronouncements that make no sense whatsoever. " I could say that about evolutionists, too, actually. Most people are not scientists, and therefore most people who believe in either are 'outside their field.' I have seen some pretty ridiculous pronouncements made by proponents of evolution, but I discount them and try to pay attention to what the actual scientists are saying. May I ask for the same consideration from you?

Now, as far as the speed of light and Barry's work is concerned, you admitted you do not have the time to read up on it, and yet you are more than willing to criticize it from very faulty knowledge both in physics and in his work in particular. May I then suggest that you not comment in this field, as it is clearly outside your field and you have not even tried to understand what is going on? I looked up the trenches and subduction on the net and I read the articles linked above. I have tried to make sure I am reasonably familiar with the areas I am talking about. May I suggest, again, that you grant me the same courtesy about whatever you choose to discuss? I remind you again that some very respected scientists in the field of physics in mainstream science have been publishing about changing light speed in time. It was discussed very heavily during the first 40 years of the 20th century until Birge declared the atomic constants to be constant with no more discussion of variability allowed! This despite the fact that he was the one who had been charting the changing atomic constants up until that time! However the subject exploded onto the scientific scene again starting with the two articles in Physics Review D in January of 1999 and continuing since. This is not even considering Barry's work, which first began being published in the early eighties.

As far as the variable light speed material is concerned, the math shows that the energy is what is held constant in Einstein's equation. This should help your concept a little.

And as far as radioactive heat release is concerned, I am sure you are aware of the data that indicates that the early earth did not have radioactive materials on the surface, but only buried very far down. Therefore the rapid decay of both long and short half-life elements with a rapid speed of light would have been the process by which the early earth heated up so tremendously inside. This would later affect life in the form of the giant Flood of Noah's day, later volcanism and massive earth movements, and the subsequent mountain uplifts. It is also quite possible that man's sudden exposure to this radiation was precisely what caused the dramatically shortened lifespans after the Flood.

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

Greetings, all who read these posts, and a special thanks to Helen for continuing the discussion! May God give you strength to meet the challenges you face in ways that are pleasing to Him.

You made this interesting comment:

There you go again - accusing scientists of being uniformitarians. This must be your latest buzz word. Too bad for your side that the results of the assumptions wind up with viable explanations.

Setterfield material is incomplete at this time. One of the fundamental bases he has not touched in his home run attempt is to commit himself to a specified acceleration of gravity in the days of Adam, with numbers, along the lines of 32 feet per second per second, or the equivalent in metric, of course.

Regardless of your research into the style of construction, it remains a matter of personal interpretation to say they just how different they are. If the style of construction implies differences, then they could still both be angels - with the emphasis on the different classes of angels! And if the poet is thinking truly of the stars - which he could, poetically, be thinking of - then the singing is no more literal than the skipping with joy of the mountains we read about elsewhere. And if the days in Genesis 1 give every sign of being strictly literal days, the "day" here in Job does not bear such signs. Instead, it appears to hark back to another passage:


Gen 2:4-5
4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.

Thanks, but that won't be necessary. We all know that professionals in the fields of bible study hold hundreds and hundreds of contradictory opinions. Let's just stick with letting the Bible speak for itself.

?? nothing from your suggested key words in MSN search.

I'm sorry, but your words here mean nothing without numbers to back them up. Layman that I am, I can tell Barry's theory is incomplete as long as he is unable to specify a definate amount for the acceleration of gravity in Adam's time. Perhaps something along the line of 32 feet per second per second? Or whatever?

Thats all very tantalizing and it also seems to confirm that Barry's work, after all, remains incomplete. I keep wondering why you think we should take an incomplete theory seriously. A question for you based on your strange assertions above. If the astronouts in space, seemingly weightless but actually pulled around the earth by gravity, were to examine a subatomic particle for evidence of being effected differently by gravity from the rest of the space station, what particles do you reccommend they evaluate?

Your words seem out of synch with what I read. I read about ever more refined attempts to test and verify and/or disprove Einstein's proposal that acceleration exactly mimics gravitation field effects with ever greater and greater verification of their identity to the limits of testable precision. I read about Einstein's predictions of gravitational lensing being spectacularly confirmed, predictions based in part on this assumed identity.

Let me explain more precisely why getting a specified figure from Barry for the acceleration of gravity is so important. It is a trivial matter to make up properties of the universe in a world where light is faster, if we merely, in our own minds, re-define the second. Say we define an adamic second to be two of our seconds, for example. Now, we can say light travels twice as far in a second. We can also say the sun shines twice as many photons in a second. We can say radioactivity happens with twice the amount of decay events in a second. We can say the uncertainty of quantum mechanics - related to the plank constant - is reduced by half, and so forth. Does any of this sound familiar? If, in developing his theory, Barry developed some of the necessary consequences of faster than light theory along that line - using this mental technique - and then allowed some understandable confusion to mix the discussion between the two kinds of seconds in a way that verbally appears to make his case - that might explain how he arrives at some of his conclusions. Yet it would, in reality, mean nothing had changed. But the acceleration of gravity in THAT scenario could not remain 32 feet per second per second.

Specifying the numerical value for the acceleration of gravity at earth's surface at the same time as the numerical value for the speed of light is specified will go a long way towards showing that, indeed, Barry remains perfectly clear about what kind of second he is talking about for Adam to live and walk around with.

 

HELEN

There you go again - accusing scientists of being uniformitarians. This must be your latest buzz word. Too bad for your side that the results of the assumptions wind up with viable explanations.

I suggest you get together with Earl and decide whether or not you folks are uniformitarians, OK? He says yes; you say no. Or at least I presume that is what you are saying above.

Setterfield material is incomplete at this time. One of the fundamental bases he has not touched in his home run attempt is to commit himself to a specified acceleration of gravity in the days of Adam, with numbers, along the lines of 32 feet per second per second, or the equivalent in metric, of course.

1. Of course it is incomplete! He’s still alive and working. And I hope he stays that way for a good long time!

2. I have said so many times – gravitation and atomic processes are two entirely different things. If you will look at Genesis 1:14, you will find that God gave us gravitationally based phenomena for time-keepers. The sun, moon, and stars are for marking time. They stay steady – or at least steady in the short amount of time we have been around since creation. Atomic processes are something else entirely. Barry is NOT dealing with gravitation, but with atomic processes. Please, please understand that if nothing else!

And, since you are not interested in scholastic material regarding Genesis and I am, we should quit that part of the discussion now. I am fascinated by the work that is currently being done regarding the Tablet Hypothesis and would love to actually discuss it instead of defending it against someone who will not even read the material.

I will say, though, that the Bible does speak for itself. Quite eloquently, too. Six day creation. One day rest. Recent creation. Reality of Noah’s Flood. Continental division in the lifetime of Peleg. All manner of things. And the hills skipping may not be quite as metaphorical as you think given these events.

Water droplets in the thermosphere:

The man who has done the most work in this area is Louis Frank:
http://www-pi.physics.uiowa.edu/~frank/LAF_presentations.html

"Louis Frank" water will give you 522 hits on Google. There is a lot of material there.

And finally, you were trying to stretch time in your “adamic” idea. That is not what is being done at all. Barry, in the meantime, has worked extensively with equations concerning Planck’s constant.

 

EARL DETRA

Just a quick note regarding some statements in you latest post.

Earl, here you claim uniformitarianism and later you admit catastrophes.

So, catastrophes happen. Millions of them in the geological record, and many going on right now. You can't get much more uniform than that...

Please make up your mind.

I have. You need to look up the real meaning of uniformitarianism.

Nor does either have anything to do with the red herring of the sun rising in the morning. We have geological evidence, as I think you know, of a massive asteroid or meteorite bombardment several times in the geologic record. Are you calling that uniformitarian?

Certainly. Catastophes are part of uniformitarianism. It has obviously happened numerous times, and on the moon the evidence is clear.

Have we see the like in our lifetimes?

I thought it was you guys who needed absolute, empirical evidence. I can accept what the evidence shows me.

Earl: I am not aware of any significant problems with mainstream geological explanations of what happens at trenches.

Barry: The problem is that the sediments at the bottoms of ocean trenches are horizontal rather than being contorted, which you would expect to happen if they were being subducted.

But they have not yet been subducted. The sediments fill a local basin that unconformably overlies the abyssal plain sediments. I do not see this as a problem. Someone has misled you.

Helen: I poked around on Google, as well, and found some other problems associated with ocean trench explanations in the current vogue:

http://members.tripod.com/~charles_W/trenches.html

http://www.expanding-earth.org/page_4.htm

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/lowman.htm


Okay now tell us why these references indicate a problem. I can't just go out and read every website that you bring in here.

1. Catastrophes, some of which we have never seen the likes of, are evidenced in the geologic record, as I mentioned above. Therefore we cannot presume uniformitarianism where earth history is concerned.

Actually we have no problem doing just that, for the reasons I have mentioned.

2. Your belief in long periods between catastrophes is presumption not conclusion from facts in evidence. It is what evolution needs to survive, but there is no real evidence for it at all.

Okay then, you tell us how long it has been since the last catastrophe at your house. Tell us also about the length of time between comet impacts or volcanic eruptions at MSH.

I was quite astonished when you stated that we did not need to know original mother/daughter ratios in some instances where radiometric dating was concerned. That is one of the three presumptions that must be made for any radiometric dating! The only way you can avoid it is to work off of presuppositions instead of data!

Then I guess you haven't heard of isochron methods which do not require a daughter element composition. I guess you also have not heard that we know the the daughter composition of some minerals. It seems to me that we have been over this ground a few times. I am surprised that you have forgotten.

Oh dear, there is actually plenty such evidence, but you see the mainstream journals will not admit it for publication.
This is why more of those scientists and researches who can afford to lose their funding or positions or who are so secure they don't need to worry are abandoning the current evolutionary ideas and pursuing other models instead. For those who object to creation, I think you will find that panspermia has gotten kind of big. Others, like Denton and Behe, who are working in their own fields are looking for ways for evolution to work despite all the problems they keep seeing with it!

Except that Behe is actually an evolutionist!

I looked up the trenches and subduction on the net and I read the articles linked above. I have tried to make sure I am reasonably familiar with the areas I am talking about. May I suggest, again, that you grant me the same courtesy about whatever you choose to discuss?

I will do so when there is some evidence that c decay is a viable theory. I don't have the time that you apparently do to read outside my field.

And as far as radioactive heat release is concerned, I am sure you are aware of the data that indicates that the early earth did not have radioactive materials on the surface, but only buried very far down.

I am not aware of this. Do you have some evidence to support this statement?

You then made the accusation that "most proponents for creationism usually end up outside their field, making pronouncements that make no sense whatsoever. " I could say that about evolutionists, too, actually. Most people are not scientists, and therefore most people who believe in either are 'outside their field.' I have seen some pretty ridiculous pronouncements made by proponents of evolution, but I discount them and try to pay attention to what the actual scientists are saying. May I ask for the same consideration from you?

Only if you (all) do not quote people like Brown or Humphreys or Plaisted, etc., regarding geology....

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

For Helen:

I found articles by Louis Frank, and thereby learned he's the guy who proposes the very interesting idea that earth is regularly struck by a few comets per hour, small ones. His thought is that these being mostly ice they presumably have, over geological time, provided the oceans of the earth. I'm so glad you agree with his ideas. Does this mean you've decided to accept the current geological notions as to the age of the earth? <ggggg>

There's nothing there to support the idea of a vapor canopy being sustained over the earth at any time. Louis Frank never says anything like that. Not having much time to peruse a whole lot of web sites, I didn't find anything about liquid water drops in the thermosphere, either.

And if Barry cannot specify a value for the acceleration of gravity in the time of Adam, that's fine. No doubt he has some interesting calculations to do, based on his tweaking of the mass in the Adamic era, as well as his tweaking of the Newtonian gravitational constant G. Of course, I never took calculus even, but I think I could work out what his statements about G and mass would imply for the earth's gravitational acceleration at the time of Adam. Would you like for me to do that for him?

I fear, however, he would not like the result and therefore would want to revise his statements about mass and the varying of G over time as c varies. If I am right about this, his theory is way to incomplete to be seriously considered at this time. Am I right about this, or does Barry have a definate value for the acceleration of gravity in the Adamic era? He has one, really, and you're just teasing me by holding back, right?

 

HELEN

Paul, I had mentioned that any vapor canopy may have been in the thermosphere. The evidence I offered was that water droplets had been photographed there. When asked for a reference, I gave the New Scientist article. When asked for more about this I gave you the link to Frank whose work was discussed there. The reason Frank postulates the icy cometary bombardment is because of the water droplets seen in the thermosphere which they have no other reasonable explanation for. Unless, of course, they are left over from the collapsed canopy – but that is biblical and therefore that is religious and therefore that is not to be considered….

Barry does not need to specify anything regarding gravity as he is not working with gravity. He is working with atomic constants and the speed of light in particular. Why are you not getting this?

Earl, please talk to Paul here about uniformitarianism, OK? Thanks. However, if catastrophes of ALL SORTS are part of uniformitarianism, then the word has lost all meaning aside from “what happened, happened.”

You missed Barry’s point; read it again. Nor has anyone misled him; he has done his research himself – geology and physics were his primary areas of study at university years ago.

Now, regarding the ocean trench problems, I located three links IN YOUR FIELD and you refused to read them, saying “I can’t just go out and read every website that you bring in here.” I took the time to read them. You are not only refusing to read anything regarding material OUT of your field which you want to argue, such as Barry’s work, but you are now refusing to read material IN your field which might actually help give you some idea of why some see problems in this area.

I am getting the distinct feeling that you are embodying, here, the idea, “My mind is made up; don’t disturb me with the facts.”

I might also mention that likening what might be a ‘catastrophe’ at my house and a world-wide catastrophe is one of the worst analogies I can imagine. The definition of catastrophe changes radically between the two and there is no connection at all.

Yes, I know some about isochron dating. But that is exactly why I stated what I did above in the terms that I stated it. Read what I wrote again.

Read again, also, where you quoted me that I already said Behe is an evolutionist. Earl, it seems all I am getting out of you now is knee-jerk reactions. You are not bothering to read my posts very well and refusing referenced material altogether. You don’t want others who oppose evolution to say anything outside their individual fields of expertise, but you apparently have quite a double standard where you are concerned, for you are feeling quite free to comment on areas you not only don’t know much about, such as the Setterfield work, but areas you also refuse to read about! How, then, can we take your arguments seriously – especially when you refuse to even read material referenced regarding your own field (non-creationist articles, by the way…)?

 

EARL DETRA

Yes, I know some about isochron dating. But that is exactly why I stated what I did above in the terms that I stated it. Read what I wrote again.+

Okay, let's see what you said:
"I was quite astonished when you stated that we did not need to know original mother/daughter ratios in some instances where radiometric dating was concerned. That is one of the three presumptions that must be made for any radiometric dating The only way you can avoid it is to work off of presuppositions instead of data!"

Hmm, doesn't seem that you accounted for isochron dating. Perhaps you can explain what you mean here.

Read again, also, where you quoted me that I already said Behe is an evolutionist. Earl, it seems all I am getting out of you now is knee-jerk reactions.

Well, most of the time I can't spend a lot of time reading arguments that seem like I've heard them before. Nevertheless, my point still stands. Behe believes that evolution best describes how we ended up with the kind of diversity that we presently have on earth. I believe that you misrepresent his viewpoint when you state that he is "...looking for ways for evolution to work despite all the problems they keep seeing with it." You make him sound like he's a fool on a fool's errand. Why would he continue to try and force an evolutionary solution if he keeps seeing such large problems? Why would he remain an evolutionist? Perhaps he does not see the problems as you do.

I might also mention that likening what might be a ‘catastrophe’ at my house and a world-wide catastrophe is one of the worst analogies I can imagine. The definition of catastrophe changes radically between the two and there is no connection at all.

Well, this was partly to be humorous. Since you once lived in California (I believe), you certainly know that at one time there were major volcanic eruptions and earthquakes, etc. in the past. Have you noticed that there is usually a long time between eruptions and earthquakes? After all, it has been a long time since the last one. The events themselves are of relatively short duration compared to the intervals in between. This time must be accounted for in the geological record. I have found that creationists tend to ingore this and it has become a pet peeve of mine.

You missed Barry’s point; read it again. Nor has anyone misled him; he has done his research himself – geology and physics were his primary areas of study at university years ago.

Well, maybe Barry missed a lecture or two. Anyway, let's see what Barry said:

"Barry: The problem is that the sediments at the bottoms of ocean trenches are horizontal rather than being contorted, which you would expect to happen if they were being subducted."

The problem here is that sediments actually in the trench have not yet suffered any deformation because the trench usually forms outboard of the actual subduction zone. In other words. plate tectonics EXPLAINS the reason for undisturbed sediments in the trench. They are not a "problem" for plate tectonics.

Now, as I have implied before, if you want to see what the disturbed sediments look like, just check out the Fransiscan Formation in the coast ranges of California. This subduction complex is made up of Cretaceous rocks that include pelagic and terrestrial sediments, sea floor basalts, and even peridotites from beneath the crust. You don't get much more deformed than this. The point is that these deposits are in the accretionary wedge, or forearc, inboard of the actual trench in which they were originally deposited. If you want to see a modern, active forearc, just look at the string of islands off the SW coast of Sumatra. Also, then, note where the Java trench is. As the magmatic arc and the forearc (in this case emergent) are eroded they dump terrigenous clastics on top of pelagics sediments which have been down-warped as hey approach the actual trench. Hence, the unconformity between the ocean crust/deep sea sediment load and the trench deposits (including turbidites). That is why the trench deposits are relatively undeformed. As they are compressed against the forearc, they will be first folded and then highly sheared before subduction or accretion. This can be seen in seismic data.

Earl, please talk to Paul here about uniformitarianism, OK? Thanks. However, if catastrophes of ALL SORTS are part of uniformitarianism, then the word has lost all meaning aside from “what happened, happened.”

Heck, Paul can use the term any way he wants. The point is that you do not understand what uniformitarianism is to either one of us. Simply put it means that the present is the key to the past. It does not mean that the present IS the past. In the ocean trench example, we can record and measure earthquakes that give us the direction of motion on the Benioff Zone. This is then assumed to be the way that trenches formed in the past. There is nothing wrong with this assumption until someone shows it to be wrong. This has not happened.

Perhaps you are confused by the scale of time. While I accept catastophes as a major part of the geological record, a long string of them can be seen as causing gradual change. This is just the same as a long string of PE events results in an overall picture of gradualism. It is simply a matter of scale of observation. Does this help?

Now, regarding the ocean trench problems, I located three links IN YOUR FIELD and you refused to read them, saying “I can’t just go out and read every website that you bring in here.” I took the time to read them. You are not only refusing to read anything regarding material OUT of your field which you want to argue, such as Barry’s work, but you are now refusing to read material IN your field which might actually help give you some idea of why some see problems in this area.

Hmm, who said that I did not read these particular links? I think you are confusing different parts of my post. I did look at them and they did not particularly make a big impression. Nor did they make convincing arguments in your favor. And no, I do not see any particular problems in my area of expertise. Sure there are some issues to be resolved, but basically nothing to militate against an old earth or evolution. Please describe such a problem and I hope it is better than the one about trench sediments.

How, then, can we take your arguments seriously – especially when you refuse to even read material referenced regarding your own field (non-creationist articles, by the way…)?

Well, I guess that is the point. At this time I cannot take the cdk theory seriously. There is no scientific evidence for it.

And any non-creationist material about my area has not really presented me with any challenges or problems. These seem to form only in the minds of creationists who do not understand geology

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

In reply to Helen: Thank you for continuing to respond. I know this is hard for you. May God give you strength to endure the race. Please be sure to give priority effort where priorities lie, and feel no pressure for rapid responses for me. We literally have all the time in the world. Of course, once we get to heaven, the discussion will be over, because you'll then see I was right all along . . .

I read the article and several others also by and about Frank and what I read was about SPOTS in the satellite pictures. In my mind, considering these to be satellite images taken hundreds of miles from the location of the spots, these spots then would be huge clouds, and would be, in fact, the vapor from the miniature comets Frank discusses. Each spot caused by one comet, of about the size of a house. That vapor, of course, would have been instantly created when the comet struck atmosphere and would rapidly become part of the lower atmosphere. Let me hazard a guess and suppose that what you are referring to as drops are these spots they found in the images. I think that if I'm right, you could carefully go over the articles and see they never call them drops.

I'm sorry, but Barry's theory is most definately incomplete as to faster than light speed theory unless he is able to specify the acceleration of gravity on earth at the time of Adam. You want to have a clock that will measure the speed of light being faster, don't you? You have proposed that gravitational based clocks might serve that function, haven't you? So you can't get out of this being the case.

Let me help make it very easy for you (said the spider to the fly . . . ) - consider a grandfather clock today. The parts are all rigid, nothing actually needs to flex to make it work, we can completely ignore any elasticity of the members making it up, all that matters is, the clock is really a fancy machine for counting the beats of the pendulum. So would a grandfather clock keep the same time (more or less, within one percent, say . . . ) in Adam's time as it does today? Because the timing is controlled by (a) the length of the pendulum, which we won't change and (b) the acceleration of gravity at earth's surface! Merely tell us all that Barry's theory requires the clock to keep the same time, realizing that we can imply that the acceleration of gravity was the same then - and its done! You've told us the acceleration of gravity was the same! But I want you to not do this glibly, but in full realization that to specify the one is to specify the other.

Is this a trap? Of course it is! Its got T-R-A-P painted all over it in big bold letters. But you can't weasle out of it by claiming Barry's theory has nothing to do with gravity, because it has to. But if you insist you can't, I'll give it a try based on Barry's already rendered statements about mass and G the gravitational constant. Then you can challenge my math, if you like, or Barry could take back some of what he's posted in this forum, whichever suits you better. Have courage. Remember how Einstein's theory was falsely accused of allowing a self-contradictory thing to happen in relation to traveling twins. Proper application of the theory showed there was no contradiction after all. Barry's theory might turn out to be that sustainable, right?

Now about uniformitarianism: You wrote this:

I think that the word "uniformitarianism" has in fact outlived its usefulness. In the history of the science of geology there was a period when flood geology was rejected by the majority as not being sustainable by the evidence; those who did this were said to be rejecting "catastrophe" theory and instead embracing your word "uniformitarianism". But since that time mainstream geologists have postulated several ice ages and several mass extinctions, each mediated perhaps by a catastrophe, as well as the early solar system bombardment that left crators on every body, still in evidence on the airless bodies of the solar system. It's just that there is no evidence for the global flood.

In the light of the current understanding as to evidence for catastrophics, some scientists might get their feelings hurt if you accuse them of being uniformitarians, because they would think that word meant you were accusing them of being old-fashioned.

So catastrophies are there, after all. But there is an apparant uniformity of the working of the laws of physics. But the specific biblical catastrophe of a world wide flood is considered to be without any sign or evidence in the geological record.

You could get the same idea across, then, by accusing us of disbelieving in a global flood and disbelieving in a young earth. This forms a more accurate picture than using the word "uniformist" as a perjorative against us. Historically, I believe it really meant nothing much beyond the idea of rejecting Noah's flood as a viable explanation for major geologic features.

 

HELEN

Earl and Paul,

My apologies for taking so long to get back to you both. Thank you for your patience.

I only want to make a few points in general, as this thread is getting terribly long and no one but us is going to be reading after this point anyway, I don’t think!

The title of this thread is “How do we know the age of the earth?” We have discussed a number of areas where dating is involved, and disagreed on a good many issues.

Evolutionary conclusions depend, as one of you mentioned, on the concept of the present being the key to the past. I don’t think this is a good concept, although I used to. I think the better way to see it is that we are the results of the past and that, in order to understand the present, it is necessary to know the past – for the past is the key to the present.

In other words, we can look at a result and postulate a number of causes. And the fact that a majority of educated people, at any different time in history, espouse one of those causes does not make it right – it only makes it accepted at that particular time. And we have all had enough education to know that the accepted paradigms have undergone radical shifts through time.

But what the Bible, and other very ancient texts tell us is that the beginning was not a slow evolution, but a rapid creation. To say that these people were creating mythologies based on primitive ways of looking at things is to depend on evolution and long ages as a presupposition to the interpretation of these texts. But that is not only circular, that is poor scholarship from the get-go. We should examine what these texts say in their own terms, not on terms forced on them by modern acceptance of certain ways of looking at things.

And when we do that – when we take a look at what these most ancient of writings are saying – and then we take a look at what results would be expected if they were true, then we come up with exactly the world we have now in terms of everything but our understanding of the actual dating itself.

That means we need to examine our methods of dating very closely to see if something is wrong there in either the methods used or the interpretation of the results. And this is what a number of folk in creation science are doing, whether it be the RATE group or my husband or any one of a number of other folk who are interested in this area of study. In other words, when everything else is lining up on the side of the ancient texts being correct in so many areas, we need to take a very close look at those areas which seem to disagree and find out what is going on.

Modern science resents this thoroughly, and I understand that. Reputations, life work, funding, education, publication rights – all of them depend on accepting the current old-age evolutionary paradigm. So of course no one in that camp wants to rock the boat!

But a number of us are convinced that boat is leaking badly. In fact some of us think it has already sunk and, like the naked emperor in the parade, only some of the unsophisticated are noticing out loud.

Earl, you seem to have gotten out of discussing a lot of the material by claiming you don’t have time to read things I have referenced for this discussion. I am wondering why you are taking the time for this discussion at all, then, since you are so short on time. It seems to me that continued reading – especially of what the other person or people in the discussion reference – would be imperative to intelligent continuation of the subject being discussed. So unless you have the time perhaps it is better not to continue here. Obviously your choice, but if you are not reading anything from either of our sides mentioned here in any depth (which I cannot believe you did with the articles I presented whose main purpose was to show problems with some of the work regarding ocean trenches), then we have probably read all you have to say.

Paul,
You keep harping on the gravity thing. And I keep telling you Barry is working on atomic processes in his research. I don’t think we are going to reach any common ground here. There is no reason to assume gravity was accelerated in the past based on the material Barry is working on. In fact, there is every reason to assume gravity has stayed the same because it is the gravitational clock God has given us (Gen. 1:14) by which we are to keep time. Van Flandern has shown that the atomic and gravitational clocks run at different rates.

In addition, the reason Frank is postulating the icy meteorites is BECAUSE of the water droplets photographed in the thermosphere. That was the first New Scientist article I referenced.

I wish you both the best, but for me this thread has definitely run its course.

 

EARL DETRA

First of all, I think you are a bit confused. There is no such thing as 'evolutionary' conclusions regarding the age of the earth. There are only scientific conclusions and non-scientific conclusions. Evolution really has nothing to do with it. As to the rest of this, I have no problem with saying we are the results of the past. This does not conflict with uniformitarianism or with the present being the key to the past. However, I would suggest that it is not possible to know the past without being scientific and using our powers of reasoning to deduce it. In fact, You have actually just stated one of the powers of historical sciences since they do make it possible to make predictions about both the present and the future.

In other words, we can look at a result and postulate a number of causes.

So then, you seem to agree that the present (results) give us an idea what happened in the past (causes). This does not support the point you made above.

And the fact that a majority of educated people, at any different time in history, espouse one of those causes does not make it right – it only makes it accepted at that particular time. And we have all had enough education to know that the accepted paradigms have undergone radical shifts through time.

Correct. It is the robustness of those arguments that make a certain 'causes' viable and acceptable. Not the number of adherents.

But what the Bible, and other very ancient texts tell us is that the beginning was not a slow evolution, but a rapid creation.

So are you saying that you accept the presuppositions of a literal translation of the bible? Isn't this a rather large assumption?

To say that these people were creating mythologies based on primitive ways of looking at things is to depend on evolution and long ages as a presupposition to the interpretation of these texts.

Not at all. There are many myths out there that can be easily refuted. We know that myths exist. Evolution has nothing at all to with thinking that the bible is mythological. Or do you think that it takes some presupposition to think that a man cannot live in the stomach of a fish?

But that is not only circular, that is poor scholarship from the get-go. We should examine what these texts say in their own terms, not on terms forced on them by modern acceptance of certain ways of looking at things.

We have been over this before. Remember? There was a time when evolution was NOT an assumption. We simply discovered evidence to the contrary and then built upon those facts. Using evolution as a premise now, does not constitute circular reasoning, because it can be safely assumed as correct. If it were not so, then we would know it immediately. This is one of the ways that evolution is tested every day. As I have also tried to suggest to you, no one is trying to 'prove evolution' or 'disprove creationism' any more so the conclusion you think we find has nothing to do with the premise that evolution is true. Not circular at all...

And when we do that – when we take a look at what these most ancient of writings are saying – and then we take a look at what results would be expected if they were true, then we come up with exactly the world we have now in terms of everything but our understanding of the actual dating itself.

Then why do you not take other myths at face value. Seems to me that those ancient texts could be just as valid. And as far as comparing results, I have no problem reconciling what I see today with evolution.

That means we need to examine our methods of dating very closely to see if something is wrong there in either the methods used or the interpretation of the results.

Do you really think that your reservations are anything new to geochronologists? Do you really think they simply made up up these methods in bar someplace, saying 'Here's how we'll prove evolution'?


And this is what a number of folk in creation science are doing, whether it be the RATE group...

What about Humphrey's latest article?


... or my husband or any one of a number of other folk who are interested in this area of study. In other words, when everything else is lining up on the side of the ancient texts being correct in so many areas, ...

So, all ancient texts are scientifically reliable? I think you'll have a tough time showing this to be the case.

...we need to take a very close look at those areas which seem to disagree and find out what is going on.

This has been done. The analogical part of the bible has been rejected as a literal truth. Why go back to it?

Modern science resents this thoroughly, and I understand that.

I hate to rain on your parade, but modern science doesn't really care. Sure, some of us are offended when our sciences get butchered, but really, this is not an important matter in the world of science any more.

Reputations, life work, funding, education, publication rights – all of them depend on accepting the current old-age evolutionary paradigm. So of course no one in that camp wants to rock the boat!

I still say you are wrong. I know a number of bomb-throwers out there who would be glad to rock the boat. The problem is that, even as critical as they are, they cannot find adequate data to overturn the evolutionary paradigm.

But a number of us are convinced that boat is leaking badly. In fact some of us think it has already sunk and, like the naked emperor in the parade, only some of the unsophisticated are noticing out loud.

If you said 'untrained' I would have to agree.

Earl, you seem to have gotten out of discussing a lot of the material by claiming you don’t have time to read things I have referenced for this discussion.

I have discussed trenches and plate tectonics with you as much as you pleased. You have not responded.

Obviously your choice, but if you are not reading anything from either of our sides mentioned here in any depth (which I cannot believe you did with the articles I presented whose main purpose was to show problems with some of the work regarding ocean trenches), ...

I thought we went over this ground before. I have reviewed your links on ocean trenches and not found them at all compelling. Do you have some arguments regarding them or do you want to play duelling links? I have completely deconstructed your argument that undeformed sediments should be found in the trenches.


... then we have probably read all you have to say.

Oh no, I have much more to say. I am waiting for an appropriate response from you. I do not understand why you have not responded to any of my points, but continue to attempting to simply dismiss what Paul and I have said.

Paul,
...
I wish you both the best, but for me this thread has definitely run its course.

I understand why you would want to end this discussion. Since you have not been able to debate our points, the discussion is over.

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

Well, for the sake of tying up the loose end of gravitational acceleration, here goes. I'm not sure if this post should properly be appended to "how do we know the age of the earth" OR to "Setterfield discussion continued" which is still down there, now more than 100 days old, so I ask the editors to use their discretion as to which place to append this post.

In any case, I am going now to use Barry Setterfield's own values to establish that life under his faster than light scenario makes for an unliveable physical universe in the days of Adam.

To begin with, Setterfield theory definately establishes that light traveled more than a million times faster than in our day in the days of Adam. This is necessary in order to achieve the desired result of making galaxies billions of light years away visible to us by light that travels from there to here within the postulated 6000 years of history for the entire universe.

Now in the forum 'Setterfield discussion continued" Barry Setterfield himself posted that the quantity Gm remains conserved as a constant through all the changes he postulates. G in this case is the universal gravity constant in Newton's equation for determining the force of gravity; m is the mass of any given object, such as the earth, that endures throughout the time frame from Adam until today.

A little internet browsing reveals that the formula for the acceleration of gravity at the surface of any planet is simple: g=(Gm)/r^2, where G is still the universal gravity constant and m is the mass of the planet. r is the radius of the planetary sphere. Nobody has suggested that the earth changed size from Adam's day until now, so it is apparant that if GM is the same - as Barry asserted so definately - then the acceleration of gravity must have been the same as well.

M by itself, however, is not the same in Setterfield Adamic physics. In his post dated 3/20/02 he asserts that mass has increased from the days of Adam by a factor of about 1.7 - which means, alternatively, the mass in Setterfield Adamic Physics was approximately .58 the mass of things today.

Now we shall do a calculation for the amount of energy in a one pound rock. Imagine a rock that was around in the days of Adam and is still around today. Today it weighs one pound. In Adam's day, it weighed .58 pound.

Today, we calculate the amount of energy in one pound rock as follows, using e=mc^2:

c = 186282 miles per second. This translates to 5280 x 186282 = 983,568,960 feet per second. We will be using this figure for the speed of light.

We square this and find c^2 = 9.67408 x 10^17 feet^2 per second^2.

Multiplying by the one pound gives a raw energy amount of 9.67408 x 10^17 pound feet^2 per second^2.

Dividing by the acceleration of gravity at the earth's surface which is 32 feet per second^2, we derive 3.02315 x 10^16 foot pounds of energy. Every pound of matter, today, contains that much energy in foot pounds, defined as the amount of energy it takes to lift one pound one foot.

We shall now duplicate the calculation under Setterfield Adamic Physics. We are able to do this with confidence because Setterfield has given us enough translation factors to procede.

The speed of light is arbitrarily defined as being one million times faster, or 983,568,960,000,000 feet per second. We square this and find 9.674 x 10^29 feet^2 per second^2.

Multiplying this by the adamic mass of the rock (.58) we derive the energy to be 5.61 x 10^29 pound feet^2 per second^2.

Dividing this by the acceleration of gravity at earth's surface, 32 feet per second^2 we obtain the foot pounds of energy in this same rock in Adam's day: 1.75 x 10^28 foot pounds.

Now let us compare these two numbers, the amount of energy in this rock in Adam's day and the amount of energy in this rock today.

(1.75 x 10^28)/ (3.02 x 10^16) = 5.81 x 10^11 or 581,000,000,000.

Setterfield Adamic Physics requires that this rock weighing one pound that I hold in my hand represented 581,000,000,000 times as much energy in Adam's day as it does today. This is underestimated to the extent that Setterfield actually postulates light was moving at a speed GREATOR than one million times faster.

This is violation of the law of conservation of energy with a vengence!

It is only natural to raise the question of what happens to atomic fusion processes in the sun and radioactive decay processes within the earth if the energy available to all processes becomes multiplied by 581,000,000,000. We leave that as an exercise for the reader. Let us merely consider Adam exercising his muscles as he takes a step. His foot propels him upward with an energy 581,000,000,000 times greator than a human foot can currently achieve and he leaves the planet. This process is somewhat worsened by the fact that his mass is less by a factor of .58, but hey, who worries about little things like that?

Folks, I trust you will understand why I do not consider Setterfield Adamic Physics to be viable!

 

EARL DETRA

Before this thread disappears, I would like to have clarified for me once again, just what the problem is with undeformed sediments in the deep sea trenches. Since Helen did not respond, I really don't know if my explanation was received or not.

And while we are at it, will any creationist admit that, just possibly, geochronologists might have thought about the potential sources of error inherent in radiometric dating?

[Administrator's Note: Nothing disappears here. It just gets buried in the sediments waiting to be found again. ]