Evidence the Universe is WAY more than 6000 years old.

MattShizzle
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Evidence the Universe is WAY more than 6000 years old.

Carbon/radiometric dating (claims against this are just stupid and need some real evidence.)

We can see stars that are millions or billions of years old (if God faked this to test our faith, that would demonstrate a malevolent god.)

Fossils (see above.)

Continental drift.

any others?

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- Dendrochronology or

- Dendrochronology or tree-ring dating (there are some samples that date back to more than 10,000 years -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrochronology)

- Ice cores (the longest (3,81km) reaches back 730,000 years

-> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_cores)

- Sedimentation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varve)

- Lichenometry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lichenometry)

Another thing would be the biodiversity, but that argument won't satisfy someone who believes in creation.

The science about the age of the earth is called Geochronology

so you might want to check that out (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geochronology) Smiling

 

 

 

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The Speed of Light

This is my first post, but I had to add to this thread!  Sorry it's so long winded, but this one just kills me...

The Speed of light.

Due to the finite nature of the speed of light, namely the known speed of 299,792,458 meters per second or 186,282 miles per hour (or slightly less if travelling through a medium instead of a vacuum), we can gauge the antiquity of the visible universe.

The Sol system in which the Earth resides is know located approximately 26,000 light years from the Galactic core.  We can see the galactic core on a dark night and the vision of the Galactic core is the reason that the Galaxy was called the Milky Way.  So if we can see the Galactic Core, then the universe has to be at least 26,000 years old.  

The Milky Way Galaxy in which we live is huge, approximately 80,000 to 100,000 light years in diameter.  This means that it takes light emitted on one side of the galaxy about 100,000 years to reach the other side.  This increases the KNOWN age of the universe to at least 100,000 years.

Now lets look at our closest neighbor in Galactic terms, the beautiful Andromeda Spiral Galaxy.  The massive Andromeda galaxy is about 20% larger than the Milky way and is on a long collision course with our galaxy. 

More importantly to the topic of discussion here, Andromeda is clearly visible to the naked eye and can be seen in more detail in a telescope from our tiny rock of a planet, meaning that the light emitted from it has already arrived at our eyes.  But here's the kicker:  Andromeda is approximately 2,500,000 light years away. 

To be able to see Andromeda on a dark night, the universe would have to be at least 2,500,000 Million years old.

But take the local Galactic Neighborhood in which we live, the Virgo Super cluster.  Now we're talking MASSIVE SCALE that again lies within our direct ability to observe in visible light should anyone care to look.

The Virgo Super cluster contains approximately 100 star clusters and galaxies of which the Andromeda and Milky Way Galaxies are the largest internal structures.  It's also about 200,000,000 light years in diameter.

Because we can measure, via VISIBLE LIGHT, the size and scope of our local galactic neighborhood, the age of the universe has to be at least 200,000,000 years.

But that's not the end of our story.  Over the course of several months in 2004, the Hubble Space Telescope collected the visible light of the most distance known objects into it's mirrors.  The resulting "Hubble Ultra Deep Field" (image) collected light from an area of the sky that has been traveling approximately 13 BILLION years.  Yes, objects over 13,000,000,000 light years from the earth have been imaged.  That puts the VISIBLE age of the Universe at about 13 Billion years...

Which brings me to the conclusion of the story.  Science has observed in ALL wavelengths.  From visible to X-rays...  The end result is an estimated age of the universe between 13.7 Billion years and 15.6 Billion years.

Does this mean there is no "first cause" or "Creator God?"  No.  Does this mean that the Bible is wrong?  You bet your ever-loving mind...

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Yes! But would you think

Yes! But would you think deluded young-earth creationists would believe the obvious? Nope. So I guess it's easier to let them count the tree-rings of a tree that's more than 10,000 years old... (they seem to have enough free time anyway, coming up with all that...).

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The emerging field of

The emerging field of cyclostratigraphy: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclostratigraphy)

 It uses Milankovitch astronomical cycles as a dating reference; these cycles are the combined effect of the Earth's spin precession and various orbit oscillations, which produce variations in how much sunlight different parts of the Earth receive over a year.

So far, it has been used to correct the dating of the Brunhes-Matuyama magnetic reversal from its K-Ar value of 750 Mya to 780 Mya, which agrees with some Ar-Ar values, and the International Commission on Stratigraphy now uses it as a time reference for the last 23 million years and a partial time reference for earlier times all the way to the Cretaceous.

 For a more comprehensive source, and rebuttals of YEC arguments, check out the talkorigins.org Age of the Earth FAQ's


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Genesis is Poetic, so to

Genesis is Poetic, so to look at it rationally would be irrational


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stephenmarkjackson

stephenmarkjackson wrote:
Genesis is Poetic, so to look at it rationally would be irrational

They are an awesome band, much better WITH Phil Collins.

 


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Greetings!  This is

Greetings!  This is officially my first post and i promise not to mention the G word so as not to offend anyone, so here goes... 

 

MattShizzle wrote:

Carbon/radiometric dating (claims against this are just stupid and need some real evidence.)

We can see stars that are millions or billions of years old (if God faked this to test our faith, that would demonstrate a malevolent god.)

Fossils (see above.)

Continental drift.

any others?

1)   The Carbon dating technique is rather controversial mainly because it is based on the assumption that C-14 deteriorates in a consistently fixed rate.  Unfortunately, it is affected by many factors such as CO2 in the atmosphere which can be caused by the explosion of volcanoes and industrial fumes.  Multiple errors in dating have been documented, such as fossils having different ages in each side.  One only has to google it to find records of such.

2 )  Isn't it possible that the universe was created mature?  Just as Adam and Eve were mature adults when they were created, the universe could have been created mature as well.  Thus, when the stars were created, they were created with their light already reaching the earth.  So to answer the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?", The chicken was created, which laid the egg.

3 )  The continental drift is still an ongoing theory, and not quite universally accepted as scientifict fact.  So one cannot really use it as a proof for anything cuz how can one prove something with another which is not even proven yet?

 

Of course it would be morally presumptous of me to assume that you guys would believe me.  Evidence for both sides is readily available for those willing to look for it.  I just wanted to show a few ideas which you might find plausible, and look forward to interesting theories which might come up during the discussion. 


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Care to cite any

Care to cite any credentials or journals? I suppose that now would be a good time to point out I have both.

curiousgeorge050476 wrote:

The Carbon dating technique is rather controversial mainly because it is based on the assumption that C-14 deteriorates in a consistently fixed rate. Unfortunately, it is affected by many factors such as CO2 in the atmosphere which can be caused by the explosion of volcanoes and industrial fumes. Multiple errors in dating have been documented, such as fossils having different ages in each side. One only has to google it to find records of such.

Absurd. The error in the spectrum of radiometric dating is normal experimental error. Radioactivity, after all, is a completely random process. However, the use of multiple isotope tests is not designed to establish a precise age. It is meant to establish the magnitude. If you have three tests, one which says 50 million years, another says 70 million and another says 92 million, then that is your age range. Radiometric errata does not help creationists, because it is used only to establish the magnitude of age. Even with such error, we would notice if the Earth was 6000 years old because the spectrum would bluntly stop between 2000 years and 12000 years. Radiometric errata is not an argument for creationism. The magnitude of age always comes up on the order of millions and billions.
Your argument rings of Uniformitarianism. Firstly, this argument is self-defeating. To assume anti-uniformitarianism (a legitimate scientific debate) one must assume the Earth is millions or billions of years old. We can measure the conditions of the last 10 000 years so accurately now that we can be certain that the cataclysm of the conditions necessary to increase radioactivity that much could only have existed long before advanced life, as such bombardment would have inevitably shut down any evolutionary projects. Anti-uniformitarianism only calls into question the accuracy of ultra-slow isotopes like U238, which halves in over 4.5 billion. years. It does not affect fast isotopes like C-14, which we can measure only to the past 60,000 years. Going back this recently, radioactivity could not have increased at all in such a short time span unless our Neanderthal ancestors were performing atomic blast tests.

a carbon-14 isotope. 99.999% of all carbon is stable carbon-12. but carbon-14 isotopes are not stable and make up 1ppt (part per trillion) of all carbon. They release beta radiation to correct the nucleon instability by firing off an electron. This causes it to decay into Nitrogen-14. The great thing about radioactive decay is that it is a random process that obeys probability laws. The other good thing about it is that you can dip a radioactive material in molten lead, in acid, shoot it, burn it, fire particles at it, try to irradiate it again, pass a current through it...and none of these things will change the isotope clocks. They are fixed.

curiousgeorge050476 wrote:

Isn't it possible that the universe was created mature? Just as Adam and Eve were mature adults when they were created, the universe could have been created mature as well. Thus, when the stars were created, they were created with their light already reaching the earth. So to answer the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?", The chicken was created, which laid the egg.

Absolutely not. Totally impossible. You are contradicting every single known piece of cosmological data. I am a scientist, albeit not a cosmologist. But I was present to see the printouts on that historic day when George Smoot revealed the CBR fluctations from the COBE instruments in the WMAP probe.

To educate yourself in basic cosmology (I'm a biologist, but I did physics in university, so I am versed in quantum law) you should read this:

http://www.rationalresponders.com/forum/yellow_number_five/science/6990

Your theory is clearly absurd. Even creationists know it is absurd.

Observed in reverse order, the universe history looks like this.

1. Consciousness
2. Eukaryotic life
3. Prokaryotic life
4. Terrestrial planets
5. Galactic clusters
6. Stellar formation
7. Plasma gas cooling
8. Hydrogenous ionization
9. Atomic organization
10. Universal expansion
11. Singularity collapse
12. Singularity state (literally ex nihilo)

So, no, the universe could not have been born mature. That is utterly ridiculous. The universe was born of a singularity collapse from extremely simple origins. The fact that we can photograph the primordial universe should be evidence enough. I present to you the most historic photo ever taken, one which Stephen Hawking called the discovery of the century, nay, the whole of human history. This is the Cosmic Background Radiation of the primordial universe. We have photographed the univese 380,000 years after its birth. And this is what it looks like. YOu are wrong. Also, your statement about light being created in transit is absurd and contradicts the iron laws of photonic physics dictated by Maxwell's equations (because light is a rotating, oscillating, alternating switch-field between a magnetic and an electric field, which means it can only be generated by a radiative body, such as a stellar cluster.

I beleive Carl Sagan summed up this absurdity best here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOJPprykkrI

COBE

curiousgeorge050476 wrote:

3 ) The continental drift is still an ongoing theory, and not quite universally accepted as scientifict fact. So one cannot really use it as a proof for anything cuz how can one prove something with another which is not even proven yet?

Again, geology is not my field, but plate tectonics has been proven for years now. It is set in stone, I assure you.

 

"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.

-Me

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curiousjorge050476
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  1) sorry.  no

 

1) sorry.  no credentials or journals to boast of.  Just an ordinary layman curious about atheism.

2) Wha!!  "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.." - Dread Pirate Roberts, the Princess Bride. (man, i love that movie!).  Seriously.  You lost me there.  Again, i'm sorry that i can't respond to your post on carbon dating since i can't quite absorb it.

3) Of course its reasonable for you to consider a mature universe as totally impossible.  You don't believe in a Being who could do something like that in the first place!  It would be also simple to say that the universe was created mature in a way that one can photograph the primordial universe. 

Besides, how did you know that creationists think that particular theory is absurd?  Can you name one?  And even if he/she did think it, its not surprising since creationists don't necessarily agree on everything, in the same way atheists don't really agree on everything.

I wouldn't go so far as to call it absurd though.  Illogical, Improbable, "Inconcieveable!" - Vicini, the Princess Bride would be a more apt description in my opinion.  The reason i'm not quite convinced with your explanation is that other than the fact that i really couldn't absorb most of what you wrote, the truth is, no one was really there in the beginning to record and measure with instruments and important looking gadgets to see how everything started.  So in truth, everthing is purely theoretical at this point, no matter how logical or intelligent the theories may sound.

I have to say though deludedgod that i'm flattered that you actually took the time to answer my queries and again am thankful that you didn't stoop to the level of namecalling, cussing and the like.  I'm sorry if i may have dissapointed you in not being able to reply to all your posts, but i've gone as far as my level of comprehension can take me.

Its been surreal and i may have to take a few days off on this cuz i'm not quite used to conversing in your level, although i might comment on other forums where the discussion would not be as mentally taxing for me.

Thanks again! 


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Wow. I just learned more in

Wow. I just learned more in that post than I did in a whole semester of physics and natural science.

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curiousjorge050476

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

1) The Carbon dating technique is rather controversial mainly because it is based on the assumption that C-14 deteriorates in a consistently fixed rate. Unfortunately, it is affected by many factors such as CO2 in the atmosphere which can be caused by the explosion of volcanoes and industrial fumes. Multiple errors in dating have been documented, such as fossils having different ages in each side. One only has to google it to find records of such.

Carbon dating is not controversial.  The level of carbon in the atmosphere throughout history can be verified by ice core samples and the rate of decay is constant.  Any sample which shows variance is due to the accepted standard of error that is in any sample but it's in such a small range that it's meaningless. 

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

2 ) Isn't it possible that the universe was created mature? Just as Adam and Eve were mature adults when they were created, the universe could have been created mature as well. Thus, when the stars were created, they were created with their light already reaching the earth. So to answer the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?", The chicken was created, which laid the egg.

Adam and Eve?  WTF are you talking about?  Light already created?  You are making no sense.  Did someone in a lab create the universe last week?  Your comment doesn't even deserve a response. 

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

3 ) The continental drift is still an ongoing theory, and not quite universally accepted as scientifict fact. So one cannot really use it as a proof for anything cuz how can one prove something with another which is not even proven yet?

 Technically all theories are "ongoing" because they are theories and data is always added.  To say that makes a theory useless is as bad as saying that since you are always getting older that you really don't exist since you are different than you were a minute ago.

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

Of course it would be morally presumptous of me to assume that you guys would believe me. Evidence for both sides is readily available for those willing to look for it. I just wanted to show a few ideas which you might find plausible, and look forward to interesting theories which might come up during the discussion.

Why would anyone believe you, you haven't provided anything that actually presents anything worthy to think about.  Come back when you actually develop an argument outside of "If I can think of it then it's plausible and so a magic man did everything." 


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And even if the absurd idea

And even if the absurd idea that the light was created much of the way to Earth was true, again, that would show God was malevolent, as he was trying to trick people into not believing in him, and therefore going to hell.

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curiousjorge050476

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

 

1) sorry. no credentials or journals to boast of. Just an ordinary layman curious about atheism.

2) Wha!! "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.." - Dread Pirate Roberts, the Princess Bride. (man, i love that movie!). Seriously. You lost me there. Again, i'm sorry that i can't respond to your post on carbon dating since i can't quite absorb it.

An ability to comprehend information is not a prerequisite for its accuracy.

Quote:

3) Of course its reasonable for you to consider a mature universe as totally impossible. You don't believe in a Being who could do something like that in the first place! It would be also simple to say that the universe was created mature in a way that one can photograph the primordial universe.

So you believe god is trying to trick us? Then you don't believein in a benovolent god? Do you believe in a trickster that hopes to get us burning in hell? Are you a gnostic?

Quote:

Besides, how did you know that creationists think that particular theory is absurd? Can you name one? And even if he/she did think it, its not surprising since creationists don't necessarily agree on everything, in the same way atheists don't really agree on everything.

That's a good point - they really may be unable to comprehend the lunacy of their denial of blatant evidence.

Quote:

I wouldn't go so far as to call it absurd though. Illogical, Improbable, "Inconcieveable!" - Vicini, the Princess Bride would be a more apt description in my opinion. The reason i'm not quite convinced with your explanation is that other than the fact that i really couldn't absorb most of what you wrote, the truth is, no one was really there in the beginning to record and measure with instruments and important looking gadgets to see how everything started. So in truth, everthing is purely theoretical at this point, no matter how logical or intelligent the theories may sound.

You are wrong, the information is still there to measure, that is what that image is showing. The cosmic microwave background radiation (the stuff that photo is showing) is the remenants of the early inflation of the universe that are still visible. It is quite litteraly a snap shot back in time of the early universe. The colors are showing density of mass and those masses went on to form galactic clusters, galaxies, stars, planets, plants, animals, us..computers..this conversation.

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curiousjorge050476 wrote:

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

1) The Carbon dating technique is rather controversial mainly because it is based on the assumption that C-14 deteriorates in a consistently fixed rate. Unfortunately, it is affected by many factors such as CO2 in the atmosphere which can be caused by the explosion of volcanoes and industrial fumes. Multiple errors in dating have been documented, such as fossils having different ages in each side. One only has to google it to find records of such.

The reason that we "assume" that Carbon-14 (and every other atom in existence) deteriorates at a fixed rate, is because every time we measure it, it maintains the same half-life.  To say that is was different in the past would be an assumption, not saying it is same as every time we measure it.  Also, most of the claims of error that you can google are complete bunk.  I've seen many of them, and they have always been either based on a poor understanding of radioactive dating (like claims of C-14 in diamonds, which creationists like to claim is evidence of a young universe, because they think C-14 doesn't last more then 25,000yrs, which is completely wrong), a poor understanding of what they are measuring (like some species of mollusks, which seem to show a date thousands of years old, however this is because they get CO2 directly from the limestone they live upon, so they show an age much older then they really are), or are outright lies.  I guess it is a good thing I don't use Google to do real research.

And while Carbon-14 dates can vary based on things like the level of Carbon-14 currently in the atmosphere, it is never enough to give an error of more then a few decades (which is nothing compared to what creationists would need to support their claims).  Besides, for dates older then about 100,000yrs, we don't even use Carbon-14, we use other elements/isotopes that aren't subject to the criticisms of creationists.  Also, the dates given by Carbon-14 are supported by things like Dendrochronology (the counting of tree rings), Archeological support, etc, which are usually given with Carbon-14.

Quote:

2 ) Isn't it possible that the universe was created mature? Just as Adam and Eve were mature adults when they were created, the universe could have been created mature as well. Thus, when the stars were created, they were created with their light already reaching the earth. So to answer the question "which came first, the chicken or the egg?", The chicken was created, which laid the egg.

Oh sure it could have been, but just as it is possible that the sun is really a giant massive fire-breathing bunny rabbit.  There is absolutely no evidence for a maturely created universe, and it flies in the face of everything we know about how the universe really works.  Besides, there is a fundamental problem with this.  When we see something that is 500,000 light-years away, we are not seeing it is as we are now, we are seeing it looked 500,000 years ago.  In other words, that object (as we see it) HAS to be 500,000 years old, otherwise it would not have that light to show us.  Besides, how do you explain the existence of supernova and supernova remnants?  If the universe was only 6,000 years old, there shouldn't be a single one.  Also, the size of many objects in the universe prove that the universe is over 6,000 years old.  A good example (of which there are thousands) is the shock waves around the black-hole inside the galaxy M87 (http://chandra.harvard.edu/press/06_releases/press_100506.html), and also a filament that comes out of the black-hole that is at least 100,000 light-years long.  So even if matter was shot out at the speed of light, and kept going that fast (which is impossible, it would have to slow down) it would mean that the black-hole in M87 is at least 100,000 years old.  Of course, the matter isn't going that fast (it's actually pretty easy to measure its speed, we use spectroscopy to do it, and then just take into account for the angle that it is to us, and that will give you a very accurate measurement of speed).  Based on how fast the matter appears to be going (and taking into account for deceleration from the black-hole) it gives a date of about 70 million years ago (and again this is a minimum age, the stream that is coming out is probably much, much longer, but the stream spreads out and becomes too dim for even our greatest telescopes).  Also, you have to add in the fact that black-holes like this are most likely created from the death of a massive star, so now you also have to add on the millions or billions of years that star existed as well.

What you are suggesting, would be like suggesting that not only did God create Adam and Eve mature, but he also included their dead parents in the ground as well.  In other words, what you are suggesting is nonsense, and there isn't even scriptural support for this (in case you are implying a literal interpretation of the bible) let alone scientific support.

Quote:

3 ) The continental drift is still an ongoing theory, and not quite universally accepted as scientifict fact. So one cannot really use it as a proof for anything cuz how can one prove something with another which is not even proven yet?

Wow, you apparently have a few hundred years of scientific catching-up to do.  Continental drift is VERY widely excepted among scientists and for a very good reason; We can see it happening in real time.  We've been able to measure the exact position of places on the Earth for a very long time.  Originally it was by measuring the position of stars in the sky (which could give an accuracy a few feet), and now we can do it with satellites that can give it down to just a fraction of a centimeter.  Because of this (especially with satellites) we can clearly see the position of the continents change over time.  For example we were able to measure the fact that the India Plate slid a whopping 15 meters (50ft) along the India-Burmese fault line during the 2004 Boxing Day Earthquake that set off the tsunami that killed more then 200,000 people.

Saying that continental drift hasn't been proven, is like saying that we can't measure the temperature of a cup of water even if we have a thermometer in it that says 15°C.

Quote:

Of course it would be morally presumptous of me to assume that you guys would believe me. Evidence for both sides is readily available for those willing to look for it. I just wanted to show a few ideas which you might find plausible, and look forward to interesting theories which might come up during the discussion.

There is definitely evidence for evolution, continental drift, and a universe billions of years old, but believe me, there isn't and real evidence for a universe that's only 6,000 years (and yes, I have looked at the "evidence" that creationists have tried to put forward, and it is all garbage).


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I have to say, being a deist

I have to say, being a deist creationist would make some sense if they believed some powerful being[s] created the universe as is at any point in time (even last thursday) and everything was an illusion. You know, just for giggles. Then they moved on to make a mustard and zuchinni sandwich universe, just because they can. I'd like to think that such a random creative force exists in the manifold of all that is; that'd be really funny.


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We also have the Sumerians,

We also have the Sumerians, the Indians, and other civilizations
 that are older than 6000. Hell, Hinduism itself is older than 6000.

 

Oh, and my grandmother. She's pretty fucking old. 


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curiousjorge050476

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

I wouldn't go so far as to call it absurd though.  Illogical, Improbable, "Inconcieveable!" - Vicini, the Princess Bride would be a more apt description in my opinion.  The reason i'm not quite convinced with your explanation is that other than the fact that i really couldn't absorb most of what you wrote, the truth is, no one was really there in the beginning to record and measure with instruments and important looking gadgets to see how everything started.  So in truth, everthing is purely theoretical at this point, no matter how logical or intelligent the theories may sound.

Clearly you have to do a few hundred years of versing in basic Maxwell photon physics. When you are looking at yourself in the mirror or this computer screen, you are looking backwards in time about six picoseconds, since that is the length of time required for the light to reach your eyes. Likewise when you look at the sun, you are literally looking back in time about eight minutes. Since the c limit is the absolute frame of reference in the universe for information, it's prescence dictates what we are observing.

So yes, we are "there to measure it with important gadgets". Please don't pretend you know what you are talking about when you say "this is all theoretical". When we look past the quasar engines with the spectroscopes, we are, in essence watching something that happened 13.7 billion years ago. That photograph was captured with light that is 13.7 billion years old. We are literally watching it happen right before our eyes.  

"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.

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The first written records

The first written records are in Sumeria and Egypt and are about 5000 years old. And though Hinduism, like most old-time, "pagan" religions, is older than recorded history, that history does not go as far back in India.

That being pointed out, C14 dating is confounded by the fact that the amount of C14 in the Earth's atmosphere varies, due to variations in solar activity that produce varying amounts of blockage of interstellar cosmic rays. But one can calibrate C14 dating by comparing to dendrochronology: tree-ring dates. So far, it has been possible to look back 11,000 years, and it may soon be possible to look back 1000 years more by that method, or 12,000 years. Like consider this paper (big PDF).

 Of course, no tree gets even close to 12,000 years old, so one does have to use data from several trees. Their growth rate varies as climate varies, allowing correlation of different trees' rings, a correlation that can be checked by C14-dating the wood. And the oldest trees used so far are oak and pine trees from European bogs.


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curiousjorge050476

curiousjorge050476 wrote:

1)   The Carbon dating technique is rather controversial mainly because it is based on the assumption that C-14 deteriorates in a consistently fixed rate.  Unfortunately, it is affected by many factors such as CO2 in the atmosphere which can be caused by the explosion of volcanoes and industrial fumes.  Multiple errors in dating have been documented, such as fossils having different ages in each side.  One only has to google it to find records of such.

Others already explained why the above statement is wrong. I have an idea as to why this faulty argument is even used. It's because the idea of a constant decay rate contradicts the common everyday experience we have evolved in. The likelyhood of humans dying, or any other animal, is indeed greater the older you are. The likelyhood of things breaking also. People, animals and macroscopic things are quite numerous around us, so it's quite natural to develop this gut feeling that deterioration depends on how old things are. But for radioactive decay, this isn't the case. I can imagine that this was quite a surprise to the pioneers of radiation physics to measure the decay rate and finding it constant!

Moral of the story: you can't be sure that your "common sense" reaction to concepts is right. When it comes to quantum mechanics (and relativity) it's most likely wrong. The measurements trumps the preconcieved notion.