So how reliable are the C14 calibration methods?

[Jason]

Semlogo's doesn't really act like a scientist. He's more like a game show host.

[Zakuska]

This doesn't look too good how all this data was "cobbled together" like frankenstein! No wonders it give 3 matches with 99.9+% certainty rating!

4. Case: the gateway

In order to ensure that a tree-ring

match is reliable, it is typically

necessary for the tree being matched to

have at least 100 rings of overlap with

the master dendrochronology (see

further sections 5

[Zakuska]

So lets continue... How bad is the other data used by "Evolutionists" to "calibrate : C14 data:

6. General aspects

The shipwreck and the gateway are from two of many archaeological sites that are

claimed to have been dated in Anatolian tree-ring studies. How bad are the others? The

11

others have not been published in sufficient detail to be sure; indeed most have not

been published at all

[sethpayne]

I don't know about you but to me getting 3 different dates all with a 99.9 percent of certianty doesn't seem very accurate OR reliable!

I'd like to know the margin of error.

[TAO]

While I agree with you that it is the job of the scientific community to answer the claims of creationists, I can understand the frustration of some on this message board (or ones like it) when they feel like the claims of creationists have been answered but that creationist refuse to look for the answers.

I can understand their frustration as well. Yet creationists on this board so far have done a better job at looking at non-creationist points than non-creationists looking at creationist points. That's my problem - the non-creationist's have done a worse job so far than the creationist's have. I could understand frustration if it was the opposite way around, but it is not.

Many of these complaints made by creationists have been studied and the findings published in scientific journals. In a few cases, the finding may confirm some of the beliefs of the creationists. In most cases, at least from my experience, they don't.

Yet, the point of science isn't to say 'those in the past have failed, thus all must fail', the point of science is to examine every possibility. Including these ones.

Also, while I agree that there are still many, many things for us to learn about the universe, I think that we can't just discard the vast amounts of progress that have been made up to this point by science. Again, just because science doesn't know everything doesn't mean that science knows nothing.

Nevertheless, it doesn't make me give 'kudos points' to scientists simply because science has discovered so much. Science wasn't without err, and certainly isn't without err now. Science is meant to be something constantly improving by evaluating non-consistencies with what it's premises are, and if it doesn't do it here, it's not true science. Science doesn't use appeal to authority, it uses proof.

[Jason]

I see some claims that Zakuska is interpreting things wrongly, but I don't see any explanation of how he is interpreting the data incorrectly, or what the correct interpretation would be.

[semlogo]

I have noticed Tarski NOT doing this. I have noticed him citing "creationist ramble", rather than answer the points. Zak at least counter-points SOME of Tarski's points.

Very few - almost none.

[semlogo]

CFR.

CFR.

CFR.

I can provide plenty of examples of where you and Tarski say he's doing things, or dismiss his points for bad reasons. Can you provide examples for what you are saying?

Literally, it makes me SICK when people do this. Dont' just sit there and dismiss his points... provide counter-points for them!

That's an odd CFR request. All of it is in this thread - and all of Zak's other carbon-spamming threads. Apparently you don't mind Zak's lack of counter-points, though. Why is that?

Knock yourself out:

[semlogo]

Semlogo's doesn't really act like a scientist. He's more like a game show host.

I'm not a scientist, never claimed to be. Say, I thought you had me on ignore. Are you sure you didn't confuse the ignore button for the "obsess over" button?

[Zakuska]

I'd like to see the scientists on the board account for how poorly the tree ring databases where cobbled together by boards in buildings some of which had less than 50 rings to compare.

Thats like trying to match a finger print with only 3 points of reference.

[ERayR]

I'd like to see the scientists on the board account for how poorly the tree ring databases where cobbled together by boards in buildings some of which had less than 50 rings to compare.

Thats like trying to match a finger print with only 3 points of reference.

What is your problem? Have you no imagination?

[Zakuska]

What is your problem? Have you no imagination?

It gets worse than that. Some of the boards used to "fill in the gaps" in the record they have NO idea where they came from... they have no Idea if they even came from the same region.

[Vance]

It gets worse than that. Some of the boards used to "fill in the gaps" in the record they have NO idea where they came from... they have no Idea if they even came from the same region.

They don't need to know that stuff to fabricate a religion faith in C14 dating.

[ERayR]

It gets worse than that. Some of the boards used to "fill in the gaps" in the record they have NO idea where they came from... they have no Idea if they even came from the same region.

I repeat where is your imagination?

[Zakuska]

And what do you know... They are trying to sure things up, because its "KNOWN" how problematic Juniper trees are to dendrochronological studies .

And Tarski was saying how well the Tree ring data cooberates the C14 dating.

Material and methods

Since juniper species are known to be problematic for dendrochronological studies (Esper

2000, Sigl et al. 2005), we mainly worked with whole stem sections from fallen trees or

remains of recently cut trees: 11 stem discs were collected in Adaba-Dodola, from which two

were planted at a known date. 11 stem discs and 26 increment cores from 13 living trees

were collected in Menagesha-Suba. The stem discs were taken from stumps with a known

felling date, between 30 and 50 cm above the ground; the two cores per tree were collected

at breast height. The diameters of the sampled trees ranged from 16 to 46 cm.

All samples were air-dried. The stem discs were sanded until grit size of 800 and the 26

increment cores were mounted on wooden holders and hand-trimmed with a Stanley knife.

From a first macroscopic inspection, distinct concentric growth bands were visible.

Tree ring widths were measured with a precision of 0.01 mm along four radii of the stem

sections, using LINTAB (RinnTec) associated with TSAP (Rinn 1996). The time series were

visually and statistically cross-dated to obtain mean tree-ring series for each juniper tree

(Cook & Kairiukstis 1990, Stokes and Smiley 1996). We estimated the age of single trees

after correction for missing rings due to sampling height. From this estimation and the

measured ring widths, we developed diameter-age relationships for each individual. Linear

regression was fitted to each of the accumulated growth curves to calculate mean growth

rates for each tree. Tree-ring chronologies for the two sites, Adaba-Dodola and Menagesha-

Suba, were constructed following a standard dendrochronological protocol: a 30-year spline

was fitted to the single tree-ring records to remove any age-related trend in the series. Treering

indices were then produced by dividing each of the original tree-ring widths by the value

of the fitted spline (Cook 1985, program ARSTAN http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/

res/fac/trl/public/publicSoftware.html). Subsequently, the 11 and 24 index series were

averaged into two single site chronologies for Juniperus procera in Adaba-Dodola and

Menagesha-Suba forests, respectively.

To evaluate the signal strength of both sites we calculated the Expressed Population Signal

(EPS) for both chronologies, based on the average correlation between each site

[semlogo]

They don't need to know that stuff to fabricate a religion faith in C14 dating.

Science is religion! Religion is science!

Such is the topsy turvy, funhouse world of creation scientologists.

[Vookman]

So I am late to this party, but let me see if I understand what the creationists are asserting...

The contamination of data of radioactive decay from predicted rates of decay is denounced because another predictable contaminator, the sun's radiation, predictably accelerates decomposition? So the values appear much older if the sun contamination is not accounted for?

Now we are to consider ALL carbon 14 evidence as unreliable? Even samples which have excellent provenance and corroboration, and appear accurate or very close? That seems logical why? I recall that C14 initial densities are localized around the planet, and therefore are always stipulated within a margin of error, given a know reference correction to those densities. This science is less than 70 years old, and has been adapted repeatedly as new discoveries are made, including in the past 20 years. It has been a couple of years since I read the original paper on C14 dating, which I think was from the 1940's. Evolution of approach as facts are determined is the scientific method. I do recall how ecstatic the Biblical literalists were when C14 dating seemed to support Jericho's supposed dates in a timeline for the Israelite invasion. Now that it has been corrected, you hear the condemnations flow, since it makes the Biblical account of the walls coming down untenable.

I am currently reading a book called "Why Evolution is True". The scientist is not interested in disproving faith. He is interested in truth. He finds young earth creationism false from a scientific perspective, and so he makes the case why. He goes through hundreds of evidences which support evolution. He also addresses the supposed explanations offered by Creationists, pointing out how they fail to connect the dots. Carbon 14 dating may not be the most accurate tool. But that is not the only tool used for determining dating. But it is certainly more accurate, IMHO, than trying to place an ANE creation account about God's involvement with his children in the scientific field as if it had any tenable support. To me, attacking carbon 14 dating is sort of the equivalent of saying that we cannot trust a police officer's post accident investigation because we don't have all the data on cross winds, tire friction and humidity to allow us a perfect calculation of the actual auto speed as determined by the skid marks. It might be 25% off in either direction if those factors are not taken into account. But whether they are going 75, 100 or 125, we can still know for sure they were not going 25 mph. I get the feeling from reading these entries that what is being attempted here is to encourage us to ignore the evidence completely, and simply accept the young earth creationist views, which, as I believe, do not accurately reflect the philosophical and cultural understanding of those who wrote the scriptures.

I find such an approach to just lack adequate interaction with the real world evidence of the age of the earth and human kind.

Is Carbon 14 dating 100% reliable? No. But it is not 100% unreliable either. It is a tool to be used in context.

Peace,

[ERayR]

Is Carbon 14 dating 100% reliable? No. But it is not 100% unreliable either. It is a tool to be used in context.

Peace,

Herin lies the problem. It is not always possible to know how reliable certain dating is and it is being touted as being foolproof by Tarski and company. I would be satisfied with a presentation alon the lines of: It is believed to be... or It is possible...

[semlogo]

Herin lies the problem. It is not always possible to know how reliable certain dating is and it is being touted as being foolproof by Tarski and company. I would be satisfied with a presentation alon the lines of: It is believed to be... or It is possible...

CFR

[Jason]

If Carbon 14 dating is unreliable no, it doesn't mean that the Earth was really created in seven days a mere 6,000 years ago.

But some on the board seem to act as if this is so, and its the believers in Carbon 14 dating, not any young earth creationists.

[ERayR]

CFR

Go back through Tarski's posts in this thread alone.

[semlogo]

Go back through Tarski's posts in this thread alone.

I've read all of them. None of them resemble your assertion. Please withdraw your statement and apologize for misrepresenting Tarski. Thanks.

[Zakuska]

Semlogo might I remind what he said on the other thread?

Isolated papers by individual scientists, especially relatively obscure ones, are only significant in the long run after scrutiny by other scientists (and the test of time). That is why it will always be easy for creationists to hunt down isolated paper that seem to help their cause. Of course, if you want to know what kind of science is worthy of our strong but tentative belief, you should look for what has been established by multiple investigations etc.

He seems to forget that the very thread he posted that on included just such an instance.

Several decades ago, strange fluctuations were observed in several radioactive decay systems. These systems have unstable nuclei that emit various particles and radiation until they stabilize. It was finally established that these seasonal fluctuations corresponded to the distance between the earth and the sun. When the earth is closest to the sun, solar neutrinos evidently accelerate nuclear decay.¹

Now, Italian research shows evidence that a process called

[semlogo]

Semlogo might I remind what he said on the other thread?

He seems to forget that the very thread he posted that on included just such an instance.

Of multiple peer reviewed investigation showing decay rates being effected by atomic earthquakes.

This experiment was originally done in 1956-1958. Then repeated agian by Italian Scientists in 2009. It was peer reviewed again...

No honest person would ever try to construe that as a claim of it being "foolproof"

[FutureTwitBlog]

I can understand their frustration as well. Yet creationists on this board so far have done a better job at looking at non-creationist points than non-creationists looking at creationist points. That's my problem - the non-creationist's have done a worse job so far than the creationist's have. I could understand frustration if it was the opposite way around, but it is not.

Yet, the point of science isn't to say 'those in the past have failed, thus all must fail', the point of science is to examine every possibility. Including these ones.

Nevertheless, it doesn't make me give 'kudos points' to scientists simply because science has discovered so much. Science wasn't without err, and certainly isn't without err now. Science is meant to be something constantly improving by evaluating non-consistencies with what it's premises are, and if it doesn't do it here, it's not true science. Science doesn't use appeal to authority, it uses proof.

I would say that, in brief, while what you said is true, the burden of proof still lies with the creationists on the ineffectiveness of C14 dating, if only because so many in the scientific community apparently have wrong ideas about it. If science is wrong on this point (which they could be), how are they wrong? How do they need to correct the model to compensate for previous errors? How would compensating for these previous errors change the conclusions that have been drawn to this point from C14 dating? These are the questions I'm interested in at this point.

Lets get some papers published and show the community how they are wrong!