Since carbon dating proves that the earth is less than 35,000 years old why are there still old earthers?

Question

The sun converts carbon 12 into radioactive carbon 14 at a constant rate.

The half life of carbon 14 is right around 5735 years.

After a few half lives it can't be measured, so it's estimated that after around 35,000 years the atmosphere would reach a state of equilibrium with the same amount of carbon 14 being created as is losing its radioactivity.

In actuality, the radioactive carbon 14 concentration in the atmosphere is increasing every single year its measured.

This means it has not yet reached equilibrium.

This means either the earth is less than 35,000 years old, or there used to be a reason why carbon 12 wasn't converted into radioactive carbon 14 some time in the relatively recent past.

So why are there still people who belive the earth is "millions of years old" when sound science places the earth's age at less than 35,000 years old?

Answer 1

I see your point. This is why c-14 is not used to date very old artifacts.- its just not reliable over about 30,000 years. One guy said the limit was about 65,000 years-and most may argue with that number, but no one uses it-its just too far off.
Actually I think c-14 is fairly reliable-some people just try to make it do something it can not, that is to yield old dates.
Scientist use the geologic column and the index fossil to date very old stuff. This was figured out around 1830. This is the old method. And, there is no way to test it. All of the modern radio-metric methods have to be calibrated to the geologic column before they can be used , and this makes the date system circular. So, .....the c-14 method is the only stand alone method available today. But it can not be used-because scientist require dates beyond the range of the method in order to support their theories. If this were not such a serious topic-I could laugh.

Answer 2

You probably have seen or read news stories about fascinating ancient artifacts. At an archaeological dig, a piece of wooden tool is unearthed and the archaeologist finds it to be 5,000 years old. A child mummy is found high in the Andes and the archaeologist says the child lived more than 2,000 years ago. How do scientists know how old an object or human remains are? What methods do they use and how do these methods work? In this article, we will examine the methods by which scientists use radioactivity to determine the age of objects, most notably carbon-14 dating.
Carbon-14 dating is a way of determining the age of certain archeological artifacts of a biological origin up to about 50,000 years old. It is used in dating things such as bone, cloth, wood and plant fibers that were created in the relatively recent past by human activities.



Dating a Fossil
As soon as a living organism dies, it stops taking in new carbon. The ratio of carbon-12 to carbon-14 at the moment of death is the same as every other living thing, but the carbon-14 decays and is not replaced. The carbon-14 decays with its half-life of 5,700 years, while the amount of carbon-12 remains constant in the sample. By looking at the ratio of carbon-12 to carbon-14 in the sample and comparing it to the ratio in a living organism, it is possible to determine the age of a formerly living thing fairly precisely.
A formula to calculate how old a sample is by carbon-14 dating is:


t = [ ln (Nf/No) / (-0.693) ] x t1/2
where ln is the natural logarithm, Nf/No is the percent of carbon-14 in the sample compared to the amount in living tissue, and t1/2 is the half-life of carbon-14 (5,700 years).

So, if you had a fossil that had 10 percent carbon-14 compared to a living sample, then that fossil would be:


t = [ ln (0.10) / (-0.693) ] x 5,700 years
t = [ (-2.303) / (-0.693) ] x 5,700 years

t = [ 3.323 ] x 5,700 years

t = 18,940 years old

Because the half-life of carbon-14 is 5,700 years, it is only reliable for dating objects up to about 60,000 years old. However, the principle of carbon-14 dating applies to other isotopes as well. Potassium-40 is another radioactive element naturally found in your body and has a half-life of 1.3 billion years. Other useful radioisotopes for radioactive dating include Uranium -235 (half-life = 704 million years), Uranium -238 (half-life = 4.5 billion years), Thorium-232 (half-life = 14 billion years) and Rubidium-87 (half-life = 49 billion years).


Thus you have taken the limitations of carbon 14 dating as to how old the earth is. That is wrong.

Answer 3

Carbon relationship has in no way been utilized in demonstrating the age of the earth, because's barely useful on samples as much as ~50,000 years old. different radiometric strategies, including potassium-argon and rubidium-strontium, provides dates with blunders costs interior 1000's and 1000's of years. each and each piece of geologic information in existence shows that Earth is older than 6,000 years. additionally, why are you asking this question of atheists, as a replace of asking geologists? Atheists only don't think in gods. It does not mean they're all professionals interior the earth sciences.

Answer 4

If what you say is true, then it seems we could determine the exact age of the earth by simply comparing levels as they currently are, the same way we do with organic samples.

Interesting.

On the other hand, if you commit the same error as the global warming crowd, then you could actually start a new religion, like they did. (Measuring temps from cities over decades not realizing your measure will increase as cities grow, not because the earth is warming. Silly mistake to make--actually a silly assumption to make.)

The way you would verify your findings would be to read the same ratios everywhere on the planet. If you get varied readings, you'll have to put the soap box down and figure out why, or if your hunch even holds water.

Answer 5

Ack! Get a life, and do a little research. Idiot! This question does not even deserve an intelligent answer. The "sound" science that is dating the Earth at 35,000 thousand years old is rather off the mark, and quite un-scientific - I'd love to know where you got your 'facts'. How truly amusing.

Answer 6

Good thing carbon-14 isn't the only atomic isotope that can be accurately dated using half lives, huh?

Organisms consist of organic molecules made up mostly of carbon, which makes dating dead ones after 60,000 yrs next to impossible using carbon-14.

But the earth is not made up entirely of carbon. The earth consists of almost every element we know of.

Rubidium-87/strontium-87, for example, has a half life of about 50 billion yrs. I'd rethink your misguided position. Straw-man arguments will get you nowhere against the truth.

Answer 7

1) Carbon-14 is not formed from carbon-12; it is formed from nitrogen-14.
2) Solar activity is not a constant, so the conversion rate is not a constant.
3) Since the rate is not constant, there is no equilibruim.

Creationism relies on false statements to come to false conclusions.

Answer 8

The problem with carbon dating and evolution is that they depend on everything in the world changing at a constant rate. If anything, I mean ANYTHING caused a faster or slower speed of change then the C14 testing would be grossly inaccurate.

And since no one recorded world wide events from more than 5,000 years ago, the whole theory is just one big assumption.

Answer 9

Pilgrim clearly understands nothing about carbon dating or radioactive decay rates.
Sorry tool, back to school, don't be a fool!

On a more personal note, postings like this are convincing me that you are a mental defective with a drug problem. Do some FN research before posting stupidities.

Answer 10

idiot that's been debunked countless times, are you aware that the earths magnetic field influences how much carbon 14 is created? and that the earth magnetic field has been fluctuating (weakening) over the last 50 years or so before we undergo a pole reversal?

and why don't you present any data that uses radio-isotopes with longer half lives?? you're being disingenuous