Wood
found in the ground is usually considered a certain age based on what strata it
is found in, however, sometimes (more often than believed), specimens are found
far below the strata where they are first supposed to have evolved into
existence. Experts answer this in three ways: 1) the fossils "downwashed" through solid rock to lower levels, 2)
say they "reworked"
themselves to lower strata; that is, they slipped, slid, or fell through the
solid rock, 3) or just ignore the fact. The point is, specimens are often found
buried in areas where they cannot be dated by surrounding strata
However, two things need to be considered: 1) When
digging up a tree branch, taking a specimen from an ancient ruin, or uncovering
some object, how does one determine how old it is before measuring to determine whether it is older than the
Industrial Revolution? 2) Since carbon was not measured in the atmosphere
during the Industrial Revolution as it has been since, and that it was not
constant any more than measured changes of nuclear testing, which peaked in
1965, meaning it was less before and after, how do we know how much
compensation in the measurement that needs to be given from Industrial Revolution
carbon change? With nuclear testing, we know that the 1990 atmosphere carbon
was only 20% higher than the theoretical 1950 level (dropping some 80% over
that time), yet the Industrial Revolution lasted not only some 100 years, we do
not know how much additional atmospheric carbon existed at any point during
that time, and at what point it reached its peak, or to what degree it
decomposed over time. It is fine and dandy to say Libby made the adjustment,
but what figures did he use and how accurate could they possibly have been when the basis could not have been known—it
was simply another guess.
However, consider this all important key question,
“Has the ratio of C-14 to C-12 ever
changed from what it is today, and if so, when and by how much?" If a
change or changes took place a carbon year may not necessarily equal a calendar
year. The bigger the change, the greater the age difference in the measurement.
Yet, despite this very obvious problem, Libby simply decided to claim that C-14
in the atmosphere had not changed over the centuries before the Industrial
Revolution.
Regarding
this, Libby stated on pages 4-9 in his `Radiocarbon Dating', (1952): “If
the cosmic radiation has remained at its present intensity for 20,000 or 30,000
years, and if the carbon reservoir has not changed appreciably in this time,
then there exists at the present time a complete balance between the rate of
disintegration of radiocarbon atoms and the rate of assimilation of new
radiocarbon atoms for all material in the life-cycle.” Now consider that Libby
claimed there had been no change in the “present intensity for 20,000 or 30,000
years.” How could he know this? He
could not—he simply decided that was the case.
But that is not the biggest problem. After
compensating for the Industrial Revolution change of atmospheric carbon, Libby
then assumed that the amount of
carbon in the atmosphere was relatively constant for a very long time before the Industrial Revolution. How can we assume this to be correct? In
the atmosphere the amount of Carbon-14 decaying over time increases with the
greater concentration of Carbon-14 in the atmosphere. Eventually the reaction
would reach some equilibrium and the amount of Carbon-14 in the atmosphere
would remain constant.
However,
since a Carbon-14 year must equate to a calendar year which depends on the
uniformity of C-14 in the atmosphere for many thousands of years into the past,
measurements conducted on organic sedimentary layers worldwide have shown that
radiocarbon ages do not increase at a steady rate as one goes down layer by
layer. Instead, they increase at an accelerated rate, which means that the
concentration of C-14 decreased rapidly with depth, proving that the
atmospheric concentration of Carbon-14 was
not stable in the past and such dating methods based on that fact are in
error.
In
addition, while Libby found a 12% variance in the carbon in the atmosphere,
more recently others have tried to duplicate his measurements with more modern
equipment and much greater accuracy. They concluded that the out-of-balance
condition (not in equilibrium) is not only very real, buy even worse than Libby
believed. They have found that radiocarbon is forming 28% - 37% faster than it
is decaying—showing conclusively that atmospheric carbon has not reached
equilibrium! That is, the Earth is not yet 30,000 years old!
The obvious problem lies in the fact that neither
Libby, his colleagues, nor anyone else knows what effects various events during
prehistory took place that would have changed atmospheric carbon like the two
already mentioned. Again, that is not known, and not possible to know; however,
Libby made the decision that before the Industrial Revolution, carbon was stable in the atmosphere, and
adjusted his measurements accordingly.
Obvious, to Libby, this meant that Noah’s Flood did
not happen, the earth did not divide in Peleg’s time, and the area of the Land
of Promise was not impacted with enormous change, including three days of
volcanic action.
Eruption of Chaitén volcano in Chile in 2008. What
impact did the Laki fissure system, Krakatoa, Mt. Vesuvius, and millions of
other volanco eruptions over the centuries have in the atmospohere? More than a
hundred million tons of carbon dioxide (volcanic outgassing) is poured into the
atmosphere each year which effects amounts of atmospheric Carbon-14 and
Carbon-12
Yet,
despite these and numerous other problems with carbon dating, it has become the
measurement device to determine the age for almost everything old that people
want to date. It is taken as fact and used as evidence to gather information on
the world and past civilizations. However, Carbon dating is at best a good
theory, and that is all it is—a theory.
Too many people forget the definition of a theory. Theory is not fact; it is a
hypothesis that is supported by some experimental evidence. There have been
many theories in the past that have been later disproved.
This series
of posts has not been intended to say that Carbon dating is a bad idea. Dr.
Willard F. Libby was a very brilliant scientist and had some remarkable ideas. In
fact, had he kept to his own experimental findings and not rejected them, his time
clock not only showed the Earth to be somewhere around 12,000 years old, but
would have been consistent with the only validator of Earth’s history, the
scriptural record.
However,
in Libby’s defense, it would have been extremely difficult for a scientist of his
caliber, and that of his colleagues in Chicago at the time, to come out and say
the Earth was less than 30,000 years old. He would have been ridiculed by the
scientific community and drummed out of his life’s work—after all, he had
worked on the Manhattan Project, was a professor of chemistry, and at age 36,
the youngest full professor at Chicago. Had he told the truth of his
experiments and gone with that knowledge, it would have likely ended his career.
On the
other hand, a young boy was once faced with the same challenge—tell people what
he actually learned and be labeled a fraud, a charlatan, a swindler, etc., or
keep it to himself. Joseph Smith said what he knew to be true, and his name
became known for good and evil throughout most of the world. Evidently, Libby
preferred the adoration of his kind as opposed to the truth—his deception won
him a Nobel Prize and a prominent place in the scientific history, but at what
a cost. Today, his time clock is used to show the world is millions (billions)
of years old, not under 30,000 as his experiments actually showed by his own
admission—and has given fodder to all the anti-God scientists who want to
eliminate the Creator of all things from the public conscience.
(See the next post, “One Last
Time—Radiocarbon Dating is Inaccurate – Part IV,” for more on the subject of
problems with radiocarbon dating)
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