CSE Seminar Notebook - Free Bible Resources

Afreshly killed seal wascarbon dated as having died1300 years ago!—Antarctic Journal Vol. 6Sept-Oct. 1971 p. 211“Ageologist at the BerkeleyGeochronology Center,[Carl]Swisher uses the mostadvanced techniques to datehuman fossils. Last spring hewas re-evaluating Homoerectus skulls found in Java inthe 1930s by testing thesediment he found with them. Ahominid species assumed to bean ancestor of Homosapiens“Erectus” was thought to havevanished some 250,000 yearsago. But even though he usedtwo different dating methods,Swisher kept making the samestartling find: the bones were53,000 years old at most andpossibly no more than 27,000years, astretch of timecontemporaneous with modernhumans.”—Kaufman, Leslie,“Did aThird Human Species LiveAmong Us?” Newsweek(December 23, 1996), p. 52.Carbon 14 CalibrationCurve: How Carbon Dating IsSupposed to WorkRadiocarbon dating was invented by Willard Libby in theearly 1950s at the University of Chicago. While not totallyuseless, dating methods are overrated. Willard Libby said thatcarbondatingwasonlyaccurateforobjectsafewthousandyearsold.Cosmic radiation strikes our atmosphere, changing theelementNitrogen(N 14)toCarbon14(C 14).ThisC14isradioactive(canbedetectedbyaGeigercounter).Thisradioactivecarbonismixedinwiththenormalcarbonintheatmosphere,generallyintheformofcarbondioxide(CO 2).Plantsintakecarbondioxideandmakeitpartoftheirtissue.Animals eat the plants and the CO2becomes part of their bodytissue.WhentheplantoranimaldiesitstopstakinginnewCO2.Radioactive carbon is very rare in the environment today(only .0000765%) and becomes even more rare as it decays intosimpler components. About half of the C14will break down(decay) into simpler components in about 5,730 years. This iscalled the half-life of C 14.In two “half-lives” (11,460 years),onlyonefourthoftheoriginalC willstillbeinanobject.ByusingthenumberofclicksontheGeigercounterasaguide,scientistsshouldbeabletodeterminetheageofanobject.Becausetheatmospheretoday will produce about 16 clicks perminute for each gram of carbon, the Geigercounter should click 8times per minute if asample is 5,730 years old and 4clicks perminuteifitis11,460yearsold.While Carbon 14 dating sounds goodsofar,severalfaultyassumptions,whicharelisted on the following page, underlie theprocedure. Most of the other radiometricdating methods use the same faultyassumptions. See Frequently AskedQuestion #3 for examples of datesgivenbyradiocarbondating.14Tree RingsBible ParchmentPtolemyRedwoodSesostrisZoserHemaka16141210864245,00040,00035,00030,00025,00020,000YearsBeforePresent15,00010,0005,000045Creation Science Evangelism •29 Cummings Road •Pensacola, Florida 32503