Evolutionary Science-v- Creationism

[Clodfobble]

OC, what about carbon-dating? The decay rate of carbon is scientifically known and observable, and all tests ever performed on things with known ages have matched up exactly. So if carbon-dating says something is millions of years old, why is that not scientific fact?

[Kitsune]

Secondly, why do "scientists" continually advance a theory they SEE has holes in it? I thought that if a hypothesis has big glaring mistakes that scientists were supposed to trash it and start over?

Because thats how it works. Theories aren't intended to be perfect, nor will they ever be.

There are LOTS of holes in their theory but they continue to advance it LIKE ITS A FACT.

Stop that! Researchers do not advance them like facts. Every theory is open to peer review and challenges.

When ANY science programme starts talking about millions of years I cringe. They don't KNOW that. They just assume it is so, and present it like it's so, and people are buying into it like it is truth.

Ahhh... the marketing of "science" on your friendly Discovery channel. Warning: what you see and hear on television is not a true representation of the work being done by the research communities. I see the problem you are experiencing, now. To correct this, please return to school. Please read books. Do not pass "go", do not collect $200.

[OnyxCougar]

Originally Posted by Kitsune

Ahhh... the marketing of "science" on your friendly Discovery channel. Warning: what you see and hear on television is not a true representation of the work being done by the research communities. I see the problem you are experiencing, now. To correct this, please return to school. Please read books. Do not pass "go", do not collect $200.

I don't particularly care for your tone, so I'll let it ride for now.

I happen to read alot of books, and go to school. Unfortunetly, I cannot send my children to private school, so am forced to send them to public school, where they are being taught the theory of evolution is a FACT.

If you haven't seen a public school textbook, go look. It is presented as fact. It's not just the way the discovery channel presents it, it's how every single person who believes it presents it. LOOK AROUND YOU. LISTEN to how information is presented. You'll hear "millions of years ago" and "descended from" thrown around AS FACT.

[OnyxCougar]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

OC, what about carbon-dating? The decay rate of carbon is scientifically known and observable, and all tests ever performed on things with known ages have matched up exactly. So if carbon-dating says something is millions of years old, why is that not scientific fact?

The main page regarding Radiometric Dating is http://answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/dating.asp

and here is a series of quotes:

People who ask about carbon-14 (14C) dating usually want to know about the radiometric1 dating methods that are claimed to give millions and billions of years—carbon dating can only give thousands of years.

[snip of religious stuff to get to the science stuff]

Carbon has unique properties that are essential for life on earth. Familiar to us as the black substance in charred wood, as diamonds, and the graphite in ‘lead’ pencils, carbon comes in several forms, or isotopes. One rare form has atoms that are 14 times as heavy as hydrogen atoms: carbon-14, or 14C, or radiocarbon.

Carbon-14 is made when cosmic rays knock neutrons out of atomic nuclei in the upper atmosphere. These displaced neutrons, now moving fast, hit ordinary nitrogen (14N) at lower altitudes, converting it into 14C. Unlike common carbon (12C), 14C is unstable and slowly decays, changing it back to nitrogen and releasing energy. This instability makes it radioactive.

Ordinary carbon (12C) is found in the carbon dioxide (CO2) in the air, which is taken up by plants, which in turn are eaten by animals. So a bone, or a leaf or a tree, or even a piece of wooden furniture, contains carbon. When the 14C has been formed, like ordinary carbon (12C), it combines with oxygen to give carbon dioxide (14CO2), and so it also gets cycled through the cells of plants and animals.

We can take a sample of air, count how many 12C atoms there are for every 14C atom, and calculate the 14C/12C ratio. Because 14C is so well mixed up with 12C, we expect to find that this ratio is the same if we sample a leaf from a tree, or a part of your body.

In living things, although 14C atoms are constantly changing back to 14N, they are still exchanging carbon with their surroundings, so the mixture remains about the same as in the atmosphere. However, as soon as a plant or animal dies, the 14C atoms which decay are no longer replaced, so the amount of 14C in that once-living thing decreases as time goes on. In other words, the 14C/12C ratio gets smaller. So, we have a ‘clock’ which starts ticking the moment something dies.

Obviously, this works only for things which were once living. It cannot be used to date volcanic rocks, for example.

The rate of decay of 14C is such that half of an amount will convert back to 14N in 5,730 years (plus or minus 40 years). This is the ‘half-life.’ So, in two half-lives, or 11,460 years, only one-quarter will be left. Thus, if the amount of 14C relative to 12C in a sample is one-quarter of that in living organisms at present, then it has a theoretical age of 11,460 years. Anything over about 50,000 years old, should theoretically have no detectable 14C left. That is why radiocarbon dating cannot give millions of years. In fact, if a sample contains 14C, it is good evidence that it is not millions of years old.

However, things are not quite so simple. First, plants discriminate against carbon dioxide containing 14C. That is, they take up less than would be expected and so they test older than they really are. Furthermore, different types of plants discriminate differently. This also has to be corrected for.2

Second, the ratio of 14C/12C in the atmosphere has not been constant—for example, it was higher before the industrial era when the massive burning of fossil fuels released a lot of carbon dioxide that was depleted in 14C. This would make things which died at that time appear older in terms of carbon dating. Then there was a rise in 14CO2 with the advent of atmospheric testing of atomic bombs in the 1950s.3 This would make things carbon-dated from that time appear younger than their true age.

Measurement of 14C in historically dated objects (e.g., seeds in the graves of historically dated tombs) enables the level of 14C in the atmosphere at that time to be estimated, and so partial calibration of the ‘clock’ is possible. Accordingly, carbon dating carefully applied to items from historical times can be useful. However, even with such historical calibration, archaeologists do not regard 14C dates as absolute because of frequent anomalies. They rely more on dating methods that link into historical records.

Outside the range of recorded history, calibration of the 14C clock is not possible.4

Go to the link, there is TONS of stuff there.

[Kitsune]

Fair enough, OC -- I'll agree with most of what you say. I still take issue with this:

scientists believe evolution is a fact, based on this theory

I think they only give the impression of that when you hear them speak or when they use it to generate other theories. The evolutionary theory is still a theory, it is still challenged to this day, it is still revised and updated to this day, and [hopefully] that is something all scientists understand. What a theory is, how they are generated, how they are published, how they are changed, and how they are reviewed is taught in the most basic of classes. Evolutionary theory still isn't fact, just as the theory of gravity isn't a fact just at relativity isn't a fact.

Remember the post someone made about the different portions of the brain named after different animal types? People all over the world are being told that evolution happened. Period.

This is just terminology that people are misreading. If people are accidentally getting that much out of these basic terms for functional parts of the brain, thats their problem. Just as there is no funny "bone", simple reading about it would clear up the issue very quickly.

[OnyxCougar]

I'll round up some quotes for you, Kitsune. This is way more pervasive than I think you (and alot of other people) realize.