What is the accuracy limit of radiocarbon dating for objects up to 2000 years old?

Question

Just the general range by the most widely accepted methods - ie is it +/- 10 years or 30?

Answer 1

The presently touted value is = or - 30 years.

Although I think RC dating is a gauge, it cannot be used to determine age accurately. Our usage of the radioactive decay of C14 makes some bold assumptions. First, we're assuming the C14 level has been the same in the last 60000 years, secondly, we're assuming that the rate of decay has been the same for the same time period.

Although, the case for using it is compelling, in my opinion, the accuracy, even on age-known specimens is no better than plus or minus 1000 years.

Answer 2

Bear in mind that radio carbon dating is no good for anthing that lived after the industrial revolution. Since factories have come into existance, we've been burning fossil fuels. The result for most of the last few hundred years, the balance of "dead" carbon to radioactive carbon has gotten much higher. We've been blowing the remains of long dead life into the air every time we burn coal or oial. Something that lived in say 1850 absorbed a lot of extra carbon from the dead dinosaurs and swamps that made up the coal that was burned for energy, and would carbon date as being much older.
Since the 1940's, the opposite thing has happened. Nuclear tests have blown radioactive carbon into the air. Now more radioactive carbon is being ingested by living things. You could theoretically pull and clam out of the sea and radiocarben date it. The date would be some time in the future because the test would detect a high level of radioactivity.