BeardOfZeus
New Member
What's the deal with radioactive decay? I keep hearing young-earth creationists saying that it's "been proven false."
Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Pulsar said:
PuppetXeno said:I'm quite glad radioactive decay is pretty damn sound, else I could throw my education overboard and give up my job in the process. I hate stupid idiots who piss on other people's life's work or even people's dayjobs (as in my case) simply because they're allergic to reality. Arrogant dickheads. Radioactive isotopes save lives, producing them is a matter of very accurate irradiation processes and chemical extraction and well calculated amounts of application... If radioactive decay would be anywhere near unpredictable or if there was any guesswork involved or if any random anomalies ever emerged in any of the processes, you could expect, in the best case, null-yielding batches - or in the worst case: death of all operator personnel by over-exposure. Since this hasn't ever happened, in practice it turns out the theories are astonishingly correct, and many patients in hospitals around the world are served with the fine products from our little reactor at the seaside of our little country.
What a morons.
Just a small point carbon dating is only accurate up to 50,000-60,000 years ago. It's not really used to date the age of the Earth.
Hmm, someone may need to make a thread explaining the different radiometric dating methods...JacobEvans said:I'm pretty sure we use radioactive dating in hundreds of different isotopes to find the ages of things, including Earth.
Hmm, someone may need to make a thread explaining the different radiometric dating methods...
That sounds like some new hip thing in town... "Speed dating? Pfff, that's sooo last year, I've been 'tope dating yesterday. Man, she was radiant!"Aught3 said:hmmm is 'tope dating better?
TheJilvin said:The top misconceptions about dating (valid ones if asked honestly) are this:
1. The curious belief that Carbon dating is used to measure the age of rocks. As discussed earlier, C14 decay is only measurable from 50,000-60,000 years. New calibration techniques may push this up to 100,000. Still not even close to old enough to date rocks.