Teen Forums - Teen Chat, Teen Help, Teen Advice & Support

"It says it in the bible, therefore it must be true!" - Some Fundamentalist.

Not all of them are like that, though. But that's the mine idea. lol.

Rational thinking alone does not reveal that the Earth is more than 6,000 years old; rational thinking combined with evidence suggests that this is the case ;D

Anyway, I'm not going to argue for a young Earth, because I agree that that doesn't appear to be the case. However, I do have a few things to say.




Source source source! I want citations for these pieces of research! Otherwise you (or, indeed, the place at which you found them) could have just made them up!



-Carbon dating is useless for dating things greater than ~60,000 years.[1][2][3][4]
-It relies upon knowledge of the atmospheric levels of CO2 at the alleged date of the sample - "knowledge" which is in no way irrefutable itself. The atmospheric levels of carbon-14 varies considerably with time and location.[5]
-Constant production of carbon-14 is (somewhat unjustifiably[5][6]) assumed.
-Carbon-12 and carbon-13 levels also vary hugely (more so than carbon-14; chemicals reactions produce more than nuclear reactons) with time and location. This is important, as it is the ratio of different carbon isotopes that is used to date, and not just the carbon-14 presence.

We also need to remember that smaller samples necessarily cause proportionally larger uncertainties.


"In the light of what is known about the radiocarbon method and the way it is used, it is truly astonishing that many authors will cite agreeable determinations as "proof" for their beliefs...
Radiocarbon dating has somehow avoided collapse onto its own battered foundation, and now lurches onward with feigned consistency. The implications of pervasive contamination and ancient variations in carbon-14 levels are steadfastly ignored by those who base their argument upon the dates.
...[Some authors have said] they were "not aware of a single significant disagreement" on any sample that had been dated at different labs. Such enthusiasts continue to claim, incredible though it may seem, that "no gross discrepancies are apparent". Surely 15,000 years of difference on a single block of soil is indeed a gross discrepancy! And how could the excessive disagreement between the labs be called insignificant, when it has been the basis for the reappraisal of the standard error associated with each and every date in existence?
Why do geologists and archaeologists still spend their scarce money on costly radiocarbon determinations? They do so because occasional dates appear to be useful. While the method cannot be counted on to give good, unequivocal results, the numbers do impress people, and save them the trouble of thinking excessively. Expressed in what look like precise calendar years, figures seem somehow better--both to the layman and professional not versed in statistics--than complex stratigraphic or cultural correlations, and are more easily retained in one's memory. "Absolute" dates determined by a laboratory carry a lot of weight, and are extremely useful in bolstering weak arguments...
No matter how "useful" it is though, the radiocarbon method is still not capable of yielding accurate and reliable results. There are gross discrepancies, the chronology is uneven and relative, and the accepted dates are actually selected dates. This whole blessed thing is nothing but 13th century alchemy, and it all depends upon which funny paper you read."[7]




It would appear that much of your arguments rely upon radiocarbon dating, which is most certianly not "fool proof", as you put it. Obviously there are other radiometric and non-radiometric dating methods, but they all have their flaws. Don't be sure of what you "know" as "fact".



The interesting thing about this argument is that it goes against our common sense, and yet is still logical to a certain extent. Given that they usually believe in an omniscient and omnipotent being, it is perfectly reasonable for them to consider that God has placed all this "evidence" here for reasons that are incomprehensible for us (transcendent, remember ).

We must take into account the probability of all this Old Earth evidence existing, given that the Earth is "new". Otherwise we are being shoddy, and not analysing our evidence appropriately- making our much-loved "rational thinking" irrational and therefore invalid.



Yes, there are many. Biblical texts are often almost considered axioms by religious people; truths that are necessarily and self-evidently true. Obviously they aren't but, if we pretend for a moment that they are, we can understand these views precisely: if the Bible is necessarily true, then anything that directly contradicts it must not be true! They see an old Earth as directly contradicting the Bible, and therefore it cannot be true.


References
[1] Plastino et al, 2001, Cosmic Background Reduction in the Radiocarbon Measurements by Liquid Scintillation Spectrometry at the Underground Laboratory of Gran Sasso
[2]Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 2011, NOSAMS Radiocarbon Data and Calculations
[3]http://archserve.id.ucsb.edu/courses/anth/fagan/anth3/Courseware/Chronology/08_Radiocarbon_Dating.html {-->August 2011}
[4]http://www.c14dating.com/int.html {-->August 2011}
[5]Hessel de Vries et al, 1958, Carbon-14 Activity during the past 5,000 Years
[6]Ramsey and Bronk, 2008, Radiocarbon Dating: Revolutions in Understanding
[7]Robert Lee, 1981, Radiocarbon: Ages in Error

^ that's pretty good haha.

Fine ill go with plate tectonics. How the same fossils are found in different parts of the world. Such as west Africa and east south america. Using relative estimates from differences in rock at the oceanic trenches. Earth should be older than 6k years. And really as long as its accurate over
that amount of time it doesn't matter to much, because we are trying to prove the world is older than that.



THAT is science =P. Science in all never says it is RIGHT, it is just as close as we can get right now. If an alien landed and told our scientists that what we all know is WRONG, well damn ok we are wrong haha. Then we would listen to what he has to say and try to figure out what is RIGHT. Ok i think that is enough science talk. This thread isn't about that.


My question is how can the earth be younger than 6k years old? You need answers to discredit already accepted answers.

Oh words, even FROM god need direct accreditation. I say look at this halflife of this carbon atom, yea its not that accurate. But it is much better than me just saying it is RIGHT.




oh and this is YET ANOTHER religion bashing thread. I mean hell look at the title. Its not a debate when the title isn't a question, its a statement. And thus most of these posts are states as facts. Which is not how a debate works. Its how a lecture works. This is VERY MUCH a i am right type thread. So if i want to entertain myself later, i might wanna try to prove the world is 6k years old by my own means =D.

Forgive the crappy grammar!
"The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world and the world at large. " - Confucius
"The guy in the back always has something to say"

Most of the evidence that you give is the "age" of so-called "evolutionary proof". Your "evidence", however, has a fatal flaw: Carbon Dating.

For those of you who don't know what carbon dating is, it is the process of attempting to find the age of things based upon the amount of naturally-occurring radioisotope carbon-14 in an item. This is a good idea, however, it has not authority to place an age on things.

I will now attempt to explain why.

When evolutionists were first starting to use carbon dating, they used the rocks as a standard for their dating methods. They, for instance, said that a certain fossil(Fossil #1) was found in the Cambrian layer of rocks, so it must be 500 million years old. Then, they measured the amount of carbon-14 in the fossil and said that that amount of carbon-14 is the amount in a 500 million year old fossil.

Boiling this down, I find that...

The rocks dating the Carbon Dating. Then, they used Carbon Dating to date rocks.

Thus, rocks date the system, and the system dates the rocks.

This is a logical fallacy called Circular Reasoning.

Huh? I am a Christian and even i think that this is a stupid argument. I probably would have done the same thing. Fossils were not put there by God to make people think that the world is older. Fossils are plants and animals buried quickly during the Great Flood described in the Bible.

I could give many arguments against an old earth, but I will just mention one for now.

The sun is slowly decaying at a standard rate. If you were to increase the sun's power at the rate it is decreasing, and find out how powerful it would have been, say, 10 million years ago, the sun would be much to hot and have such a strong gravitational pull that life on earth would have been impossible.

There are also proofs in the Bible as to how old the earth is. If anyone is familiar with the Bible, they have to know about the long lists of genealogies(this guy begat this guy begat this guy). Those genealogies tell the age of each person when they had their first child. If you add the ages together, you can figure out how old the earth is.

Once again, I will recommend any readers of this article to Ian Juby. He is a member of MENSA and goes around the USA giving proof for Creation. His profile name on YouTube is "wazooloo".

Seriously, you should look him up. He gives overwhelming evidence for Creation.