How Do We Know the Age of the Earth?

EARL DETRA

John Paul:
And all events to the atoms that make up the earth started during the plasma (ionized) state, which made it hot. The clocks started ticking during the (ionized) plasma stage.

The atoms that formed rocks and minerals were not in a plasma state when the rocks were formed. Nor have they undergone such a state since formation. Now, an atom of U238 is an atom of U238, whether it was once formed in a plasma state or not. That atom is now incorporated into a mineral and begins to decay in the normal fashion. I don't care if it was a blue elephant eating peach ice cream before it became an atom of U238. After it becomes uranium, it behaves as a uranium atom.

Or are there several different kinds of uranium other than the ones presently known?

Besides, these atoms were not incorporated into minerals until they cooled to well below 2000 degrees C. How long do you think that was after the plasma state disappeared.

So what happens to your plasma ions when they condense out of the plasma? Can you tell them from other atoms? According to you, we should be completely unable to measure the half life of any material. And yet there you have it, measureable, dependable half lives. How do you explain this?

Earl Detra:
This is all very interesting, but I would really like to see evidence that the minerals we date actually crystallized from a plasma or somehow endured the plasma state after formation.

John Paul:
Much of the big-bang and the nebula hypothesis are very interesting too. I would really love to see some evidence that would indicate both are indicative of reality.

Does this mean you are not going to show me the conditions you indicate are so important?

Earl Detra:
Do you begin to see where this is all irrelevant to radiometric dating?

John Paul:
I don’t think you understand the Creationist position on this. The clock was started upon the Creation of the (ionized) plasma cloud, accelerated (that’s were the heat came from to make it a hot plasma cloud), and then set to what we now observe (de-ionization & cooling, which was accomplished in part by transforming the heat to energy). All of this happened at the atomic level therefor affecting every mineral anywhere in the universe. (of course some atoms get recycled through the fusion generators that are stars.

But that is emphatically, not how the clock started. If it were, then all clocks would give us about the same date. They don't. The clocks starts when the mineral incorporates a radionuclide and then cools below its trapping temperature. You misunderstand geochronology completely.

Earl Detra:
There are NO conditions on earth that would permit the variation of radiometric decay in any crustal rocks that we can or do date.

John Paul:
OK. What is your evidence that the variation that occurred to all the atoms in this plasma would not be carried over once they were used to form this planet?

First of all, in your case, all samples should give the same date: The time when matter condensed from the plasma... the beginning of the universe. They don't. Second, why would the past history of an atom have anything to do with what it is now. Can you tell if a helium atom was formed by fusing hydrogen? No. Does a water molecule tell you the history of its components? No. I think it is incumbent upon you to show us where there is a difference between two atoms of the same radionuclide.

John Paul:
No Joe. Earth came from a hot plasma body:...

Earl Detra:
Exactly! The rocks came along later. Therefor they were not influenced by the hot plasma conditions.

John Paul:
The atoms of the rocks were influenced. That is the real concern. Also you have to remember we are talking about two very different processes of planet formation.

Okay then tell us how an atom that condensed from a plasma is different from any other. Tell us how any two atoms of U238 are different. Furthermore, if they all had the same origin as you seem to indicate, there is no different process to discern the two atoms. Ergo, you point is invalid.

 

JOE MEERT

JP: Such an event would have no effect on the age of the earth
calculations
or radiometric dating in general. So while you may postulate a hot
plasma
start to the solar system, you've no evidence to back up the
claim--unless
of course, that plasma was a supernovae from a preceding star. In
that
case, you must acknowledge that we are a second generation solar
system
(something we do have good evidence for). This is a case of
finding some interesting research on plasma states of matter and
applying it
incorrectly to their creation model.

* * *

[from a second email]

JM: There are several problems with the article you cited. The first
is
that Coe and Prevot did NOT document a rapid reversal at Steen's
Mountain.
They found what they thought were rapid excursions of the main field.
Interestingly, upon further examination and the collection of more
data
(1998 or 1999), they now view the rapid excursion model as 'less
likely'.
So, despite assertions on the page you provided, the evidence that
reversals
can happen quickly is not there. Finally, neither creationists nor
evolutionists can explain the origin of the magnetic field that
matches the
observations, but geophysicists are getting closer (search Bloxham in
a
georeference for some recent articles).

[ August 29, 2002, 09:34 AM: Message edited by: Administrator ]

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

For Jhappell:

Thank you for your response concerning magnetic fields.

I have a question. If the earth's magnetic field is decaying from an intially created strong, stable state, as postulated by those who claim the current weakening is a sure sign the earth is still young, how can that scenario possibly explain the Oregon Steen Mountain results? Why would a weaker field that is reversing be possible under such a theory? Could it be that the Oregon Steen Mountain results are not a problem for magnetic reversal theory, but instead, are perfect illustrations of what happens when the earth's magnetic field goes through one of it's periodic reversals?

Lets get a little background here on the earth's magnetic field. It is sustained by a chaotic process of moving magma (the same motions that propel continental drift) and the interaction of the magnetic field itself with the electrically conducting hot molten metal of the earth's interior. The equations that describe the way moving conductive materials create and sustain currents also suggest the formation is inherently unstable. The result is the earth's magnetic field does reverse. The same phenomenon occurs on the Sun. The sun's magnetic field also reverses. For some reason, the earth's field reverses over periods of a few hundred thousand years and the sun's field reverses over a period of eleven years - the famous time for the sunspot cycle. The driving mechanism is the same in both cases, but the inherent fluidity of the two bodies is vastly different, of course.

There's no particular problem for normal science with the Oregon Steen's Mountain lava flows. They simply captured magnetic events occuring during one of the transitions as the earth's magnetic field reversed. It is an inherently chaotic process, so the transition times would necessarily leave behind messy, complex records. Here's a link discussing the reversal of earth's fields:

http://www.psc.edu/science/glatzmaier.html


For John Paul:

May the Lord bless you in your quest for truth. You posted these words to me:

Catastrophes can never literally age the earth. They can only scar the earth. Thus, the continental split between Europe and the Americas leaves a vast scar in the middle of the atlantic to this very day. Thus the impact craters of various ages around the world. Radiometric dating sets dates for these events going back millions and millions of years.

Carbon 14 dating, of course, completely avoids your plasma scenario, as does tree ring dating, lake varve dating, Greenland ice core count dating, Antarctica ice ore count dating. And you might consider how fast the continents move apart compared to how far they have moved apart.

The difference between my scenario and yours is that in my Scenario God's faithfulness extends to His being faithful even in the way he sustains His universe; keeping His laws valid at all times. Your scenario, on the other hand, depends on God altering and changing the laws of the universe a few dozens of thousand years ago, all over the whole universe. Why would He do that? Especially since we see the evidence of the faithfulness of the Universe in obeying His laws over extended times, in geological formations and in astronomical observations.

I'm sure you do not feel it is beyond God's capacity to devise a universe that could, in the course of expressing natural law, even allow for such as us to evolve.

I submit that the evidence is clear: that is what He did.

[ August 29, 2002, 09:37 AM: Message edited by: Administrator ]

 

SCICWRU

In response to JP:
The heat generated was then transformed into the
energy required. Heat to energy- dont we do that
now?

Heat is energy. Also, one cannot have heat
without matter, so trying to say it was
heat=>energy=>matter doesn't make sense. If this
isn't what you are saying, then please be more clear.

As in estimating 7 days instead of a few hours:
That is only generous if every day in the Creation
week depicted in the Bible were a true 24-hour day.
And it also omits the fact that only several hours
might have been required.

I was giving you 7 days because it greatly helps your
argument. If I used a few hours, then the result
would be more ridiculous. I showed you that 7 days is
far less than required. If my calculations are not
clear, let me know, and perhaps I can present them
more clearly.

Also if you are going to define a day as a different
length of time than 24 hours, then we might as well
quit right here. If the days mentioned in the Bible
are not 24 hour days (which 1 hour today is the same
length as 1 hour then), then I can just as well argue
that the Earth is 4.5 minutes old providing one minute
is the same as 1 billion years.

Also I have done nothing to falsify a God created
scenario, please stick to the material in my post.


What is so ridiculous about ionization? Whens the
last time you created a living planet without using
that method?

Nothing about ionization is ridiculous. What is
ridiculous is saying that atoms with very high atomic
numbers will remain completely ionized for long
periods of time.

I have showed that given AiG's scenario a 4.5 billion
year old year Earth would be seen as a 4.48 billion
year old Earth. If decay rates were accelerated, then
it would have had to have been for a much longer time
increment. This is not possible in a YEC timeframe.

 

EARL DETRA

Just a note regarding John Paul's most recent post.

John Paul:
"Every atom that went into making the earth would have been “aged”. The clocks would have started ticking at that time (in the plasma) and then would have slowed once the atoms were de-ionized (electrons added) before (or even during) the planetary formation process began. The heat generated was used for the Creation of planets, stars, etc. (heat-to-energy)"

It seems that you think each atom has some kind of clock attached to it, and each atom could tell us the moment of its own formation. This is incorrect. Radiometric half-lives are properties of populations of atoms, not of individual atoms. Indeed, if it were so, then radiometric dating would be impossible because predicting when a single atom will decay is impossible.

The processes that start radiometric clocks are very different from the processes creating atoms. If this were not the case, then all dates would be the same and give us the age of the universe rather than the age of a lava flow or an authigenic mineral.

You also state:

"There is no evidence that the earth formed via any unguided accretion process but that isn’t stopping scientists from pursuing that avenue. The hot plasma scenario is a hypothesis Joe. Creationists that are pursuing the truth (science being the search for the truth via our never-ending quest for knowledge) are allowed to form them. What part of the scenario in the AiG article didn’t you understand?"

I'm not sure what you mean by jumping from accretion process to plasma scenario in this paragraph. It seems that you have the two confused. Furthermore, there actually is some evidence for accretion as we can see some of the effects on the moon and other planets. Why is this hypothesis so far out compared to (whatever) you espouse?

 

HELEN

To Paul of Eugene:

One of the lovely things about being here in Australia with my husband is that I can ask him about the rings. And you are right?.sort of?. The finding of shepherd moons which ?clear? paths delineating the rings more sharply has possibly explained some of the phenomena, but he doesn?t think that enough moons have been found to explain all of them. However he did mention that the expected gap in the Cassini structure did not exist, and that this may be the case with other seeming gaps as well.

Sounds good for the evolutionists except he brought up something else which has bothered him about the rings. Why weren?t they smashed by meteorite and asteroid bombardments? If they are as old as the old-agers say they are, then what about the bombardments which have left such evidence other places? The rings, then, remain as possible evidence for a young solar system, or at least a young ring system?

We know so little, don?t we?

Regarding the magnetic reversals, your presumption is gradualism. That may not be true.

Regarding the quasar at the beginning in the center of the Milky Way ? you presume long ages and so you think it was billions of years ago. I do not agree with long ages but hold to a faster speed of light and faster atomic processes at the beginning and so have no trouble with the idea of a quasar being the original light on planet earth during the first 3 ½ days of creation week.

Regarding Genesis 5:1, ?the generations of Adam? is a phrase, with different names, we see throughout Genesis. Work in the Middle East has shown that the earliest tablets discovered used this type of phrase as the author?s signature at the end of a tablet rather than at the beginning. It is one of the evidences not only that Genesis is a series of eyewitness accounts, but that it is possibly the oldest creation account on record.

As far as the ?firmament? and ?dome? thing, I have presented the material on that so many times I can?t believe you haven?t seen it. I?ll get it here again for you, though, when I get home in a couple of weeks. It is in my Word files there. The concept of the dome being either metallic or solid is total nonsense. The word is used, in the Hebrew, to denote something different about it, as also mentioned in Isaiah, as I recall. I?ll get it for you later. If I forget, nag me, OK?

There is one thing that is easy for me to mention here, though, without the technical references. There are three meanings for the word ?heavens? in Hebrew, just as there are in English. The first is the heavens where the birds fly, or the atmosphere; the second is the heavens where the stars are, or ?outer space,? and the third is referenced in the Old Testament as ?God?s Throne? and in the New as the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven. So waters above the heavens can mean above any given section of the atmosphere. Or above all of it. My guess for a long time has been the thermosphere, which has the wild temperature variations and the thickness (300 miles as I recall?) to include vast amounts of water/ice/vapor without it causing a greenhouse effect on earth. Water droplets are evidently there now, much to the puzzlement of a number of scientists. I can reference that for you, too, when I get home. I do know that there was one good article in New Scientist about that a couple of years ago and several other articles other places as well. But again, I do not have access to them here.

To Earl Detra

My point about the deep sea trenches was that because of the lack of sediments which would be expected in any long age scenario, special application of existing theories had to be made to explain them. The idea of sudden and recent phenomena is rejected out of hand, regardless of possible evidence for it.

Regarding the mountains and erosion, I specificially mentioned mountain VALLEYS, not slopes! Valleys in the European Alps are quite fertile and the soil is good there. Why is there any soil there at all if the mountains are so ancient?

Regarding daughter elements ? a presumption is still a presumption. Unless there is a specific radiogenic isotope as a daughter element (and some are), we have no way of knowing how much was present anywhere in the beginning.

Going on ? radiometric analysis of recent volcanic rocks is an excellent check to see how accurate our dating methods are and what needs to be accounted for.

You told me to account for correlations in old age results of radiometric dating. Sure. Atomically they DO show ancient ages. Atomic processes were faster in the past. The atomic clock started out much faster than now and is not in sync with the orbital clock.

To John Paul
I know that you have differing religious views than I do, but I read in Genesis that the earth started as a watery mass at the least, if not simply water. This indicates a cool beginning, not a hot one. I think, for Christians and Jews who are creationists, this would be the indication of the temperature at the beginning. Things heated up from there.

 

GEORGIA

Suppose we started our research regarding the age of the earth from a
slightly different perspective, which in my opinion brings science and
religion into harmony.

Science says that matter cannot be created or destroyed! Taking this
hypothesis, and saying, "and God took matter unorganized from the
universe and organized it into an earth." God knowing the
purpose for
which he needed the earth, to place his children upon it, knew also
all
that was needed to sustain life! Hence he took from the universe,
perhaps from worlds gone by that have been destroyed....or changed in
molecular form and altered in it's shape and form.....took the debris
of
the universe, if you will, and formed the earth!

 

HELEN

Hi Georgia!

Interesting post. OK, where did the debris come from?

It seems to me that if matter is eternal, then either God eternally co-existed with matter or matter somehow created God! Neither of those options fits the concept that God created all that is (Colossians 1).

The first line in Genesis states "In the beginning." That means, biblically, there WAS a beginning. The first law of thermodynamics, which is what you were referring to, would not have been in existence before that, but only afterwards.

In the beginning, God CREATED

the word used for 'created' there is 'bara.' And although it can mean 'formed,' when it is used in juxtaposition to the other verb meaning 'formed' which is used primarily in Genesis 1 ('bara' is only used three times there and in the Bible it is ALWAYS used in terms of what God did, and never man), 'bara' then reverts to its other meaning of 'created from nothing' or 'ex nihilo'.

And so then we have

In the beginning, God created [ex nihilo] the heavens and the earth.

There are three heavens in the Hebrew language idiom, just as there are in English: the heaven where the birds fly, or the atmosphere of earth; the heaven where the stars are, or outer space; and third heaven (which Paul refers to later) which is called "God's Throne" in the Old Testament and "where I am" by Jesus in John 14 -- or our concept of heaven where we will be when we die.

The earth, in Genesis 1:1 can refer to the earth as apart from the heavens and everything in them, or it can possible refer to 'earth stuff' or mass itself.

But either way, the concept of instant creation by God of all there is, including mass, is very much a part of the Biblical presentation of creation "in the beginning."

 

EARL DETRA

My point about the deep sea trenches was that because of the lack of sediments which would be expected in any long age scenario, special application of existing theories had to be made to explain them. The idea of sudden and recent phenomena is rejected out of hand, regardless of possible evidence for it.

First of all, in some locations there are large accumulations of sediments. In others there is simply no source of large sediment volumes. In some trenches there are sediments, in fact, more than in other parts of the ocean. Plate tectonics explains all this. The problem here is that those other lines of evidence give us direct information as to what happened to those sediments. I'm not sure what you mean by 'special applications' of existing theories. Perhaps you could give us an example. Would you rather that we ignore independent lines of evidence?

Helen: Regarding the mountains and erosion, I specificially mentioned mountain VALLEYS, not slopes! Valleys in the European Alps are quite fertile and the soil is good there. Why is there any soil there at all if the mountains are so ancient?

Well, most people would say that the formation of soil is an ongoing process and, indeed, it takes thousands of years to really develop a decent soil profile. So, even thought mountains are uplilfted it is still, in human terms, a very slow process that allows soil development, especially in low areas.

Regarding daughter elements ? a presumption is still a presumption. Unless there is a specific radiogenic isotope as a daughter element (and some are), we have no way of knowing how much was present anywhere in the beginning.

But that is irrelevant. The real question is: were there daughters incorporated into the rocks and minerals at their formation. In some cases we can be reasonably assured by independent measurements that, no, there were no daughters present. And what is wrong with presumptions? I dare say that each of us makes thousands of them every day.

Going on ? radiometric analysis of recent volcanic rocks is an excellent check to see how accurate our dating methods are and what needs to be accounted for.

Not if the method is inapplicable. Would you check the timing of a horse race with a calendar? Basically, this is what some creationists papers on the subject do.

You told me to account for correlations in old age results of radiometric dating. Sure. Atomically they DO show ancient ages. Atomic processes were faster in the past. The atomic clock started out much faster than now and is not in sync with the orbital clock.

You make a rather bold assertion. Are you sure of this? Can you say that you have measured these faster processes? Do you think they really fit in with a 'perfectly designed universe' that was intended for human life? Do you not see this as a 'presumption' on your part? I rather think that the evidence is not on your side on this one. Who agrees with you on this? Do you realize that 'atomic clocks' do not all start at the same time? Do you know that this would result in absolutely chaotic dates and why do we see systematics in radiometric dating?

 

JOHN PAUL

Helen:
I know that you have differing religious views than I do, but I read in Genesis that the earth started as a watery mass at the least, if not simply water. This indicates a cool beginning, not a hot one. I think, for Christians and Jews who are creationists, this would be the indication of the temperature at the beginning. Things heated up from there.

John Paul:
I understand what you are saying. Muslims who are Creationists would most likely come to the same conclusion (God of Abraham is the same God for Christians, Jews and Muslims).

He goes on to say the enormous g force would compress the ?deep? very rapidly and the subsequent result is all molecules and atoms get ripped down to their elementary particles. Then thermonuclear fusion reactions began, forming heavier nuclei from lighter ones and liberating huge amounts of energy.

The Answers in Genesis article (I assume they have read Genesis also) isn?t explicit to exactly what part of Day One the author was talking about but obviously it has to be after the heavier nuclei were formed. As Earl has reminded us an atom can?t decay until after it is created.

SCICWRU, my apologies. I should have said the heat generated provided the energy required to Create the universe. You also have to remember time is relative. IOW 24 hours on the face of the ?deep? mentioned above wouldn?t be 24 hours in the center. Dr. Humphreys discusses relativity?s role during the Creation in his book Starlight and Time: Solving the Puzzle of Distant Starlight in a Young Universe.

For Earl:

You are right there would be no way to tell one atom of U238 to another. So if you have many atoms whose nuclei were subjected to the plasma conditions and some that weren?t (the atoms that weren?t subjected to the plasma are the atoms ?created? from the decay of atoms that were after the plasma subsided) you would get a false reading because you didn?t factor in the unknowable initial conditions. IOW many (most?) of the atoms of U238 were already well on their way to Th234. Do you think an exposed nuclei would aid alpha decay? I do.

Earl:
I'm not sure what you mean by jumping from accretion process to plasma scenario in this paragraph. It seems that you have the two confused. Furthermore, there actually is some evidence for accretion as we can see some of the effects on the moon and other planets. Why is this hypothesis so far out compared to (whatever) you espouse?

John Paul:
The reality is that both scenarios require accretion Earl. I was just pointing out that the hot plasma scenario is part of a hypothesis as is the unguided accretion scenario. Why is the unguided scenario so far out to me? The very fact that much (most/ all?) of what we observe can be described by mathematical equations: Hamilton?s (mechanics); Maxwell?s (electrodynamics); Boltzmann?s (statistical mechanics); Schrodinger?s (quantum mechanics); and Einstein?s (general relativity) added to the mystery of the constants (ie universal & fine structure constants) is a good start to understanding there was very little (if anything) unguided in the process(es) that led to all we observe.

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

In reply to Helen's post to me above. Greetings, Helen, it's always with mixed emotions when I read one of your posts, its good to hear from you, but why do you always have to be on the wrong side of the evolution controversy? <ggggg>

The rings are the end result of a whole series of smashings and pulverizings. We may suppose they started as a comet or a moon that broke up. And why would it break up? Because it is so close to Saturn that the Saturnic tides tore it apart! Well, the pieces from the breakup kept smashing together over and over until all that's left is the little pieces that make up the rings. And a few of the bigger pieces got elected as shepherd moons, of course. As the millions of pieces kept colliding, they began to enforce a general sort of majority rule, each over the other. The more any particle deviated from the perfect plane of the rings, the more likely it was to collide with the rest of them, and this collision would change it's orbit.

Now the actual working out of what all that kind of colliding is not something you and I are capable of performing in detail but we are capable of gazing at the results and marveling. It is also quite clear that the formation of the rings from a broken moon would not happen in a mere 6 to 12 thousand years. That said, it is an open question as to whether the rings of Saturn are primordial from the creation of Saturn itself or perhaps the result of, say, the breakup of a captured comet within a few hundred million years or so ago. Supercomputer calculations will someday let us know more about just how long those rings can endure.

The idea that a meteor struck earth 65 million years ago and wiped out the dinosaurs isn't a very "gradual" kind of idea. The idea that a comet was captured by Saturn and torn apart to form the rings by tidal forces isn't a very "gradual" kind of idea. Even the idea that the earth's magnetic field persists for hundreds of thousands of years - and then suddenly reverses over a very short period - isn't exactly gradualism, now is it? On the other hand, if you mean by "gradualism" that I believe God's laws have been true from the beginning, then I'm guilty.

Observations of quasars indicate that as a group they waxed and waned in an earlier epoch of the history of the universe, before even the earth was formed. They are clearly actively growing black holes that became relatively quiet when all the material near them that would fall in had fallen in, leaving them without the source of energy that caused them to light up the universe 10 billion years ago. Well, material still falls in, of course, just not as fast any more! If the speed of light were tremendously faster at that time, then black holes would be tremendously harder to form, wouldn't they? Quasars wouldn't be so bright then, would they!

Author's signature? Here's the first use of the phrase "generations":
Gen 2:4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens

The heavens and the earth had no part in penning the verses associated with that phrase! They never composed a tablet ! Instead, the Genesis writer used that phrase as a STYLISTIC METHOD to indicate the subject he is about to deal with. Style, you know, is a matter of fashion, and if there were tablets around with similar phrases, that could have certainly been an influence in the style that was used.

Second, check out the use of "generations" in scripture. In Genesis, the subject associated with the phrase "these are the generations of" . . . ALWAYS FOLLOWS. For example:

Gen 6:9 These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. 10 And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.

Just look up the word "generations" in a good concordance and read the passages associated. That truth will be abundantly clear.

I think that would make a really great discussion topic all its own. What do you think?

The space shuttle typically orbits under 300 miles. How often do they have to turn on their windshield wipers? <gggggg>

Cepheid variables wax and wane and in their waxing and waning, all the forces of nature are involved. Nuclear forces cause the outer envelope of the stars to heat and expand, and they literally are blown off the surface . . . but not so fast that they won't be falling back. Electromagnetic forces contribute to the elasticity and pressure forces involved between the atoms. The cooling of the gases that lets us see the variations in the brightness also involves electromagnetic forces. Gravitational forces cause the expanded envelopes to fall back after they have cooled. All these work together in the same synchronized patterns in the galaxies 2 to 5 million light years away as they do within our own galaxy. They match the behavior based on predictions for current behavior of gravity, electromagnetic, nuclear forces. Your theory would predict a different behavior, and therefore fails the test of observation.

It is worth dwelling on this point a little more. There are only four known forces in nature - gravity, electromagnetic, strong nuclear, weak nuclear. Light speed, of course, is related to the strength of the electromagnetic force in relation to the other forces. There is no standard for us mortals by which to measure the strength of any of these forces except in relation to the other forces. To assert that light speed was faster in the past is to assert that the electromagnetic force was stronger in relation to the other three in the past. Hence the discussion about Cepheid variables!

Now about the Clouds of Magellen. My planetarium software shows me they are visible year around from Sydney. But are they as easy to see as, by way of example, the big dipper here in the states? Just hoping.

May the Lord give you every blessing and use you to advance His truth.

 

EARL DETRA

You are right there would be no way to tell one atom of U238 to another. So if you have many atoms whose nuclei were subjected to the plasma conditions and some that weren't ...

You ignore the simple explanation that there is no difference between U that formed in the primordial plasma and any other U atom. If there were a difference we could measure and isolate the different 'subisotopes' of uranium. We can't. So why this story of unidentified elements making up our universe?

...you would get a false reading because you didn?t factor in the unknowable initial conditions. IOW many (most?) of the atoms of U238 were already well on their way to Th234.

This is immaterial. First, there is no evidence of 'subisotopes' of uranium. Second, at any given time there are a number of U238 atoms that have gone to Th234. Whether it is 'most,' 'a few' or 'all' really has no bearing on the issue of radiometric dating. If a given nucleus were not U any more, or if it were simply an exposed nucleus, it would not fit into a U site.

Do you think an exposed nuclei (sic) would aid alpha decay? I do.

Actually, I have no idea. The point is that the rocks and minerals we date did not form from a plasma, nor have they been subject to the plasma state since their radiometric clocks started ticking. And atom of U238 is an atom of U238. If you have any evidence to the contrary, I would be glad to examine it. If you do not, then the whole scenario is just a made-up story.

...Why is the unguided scenario so far out to me? The very fact that much (most/ all?) of what we observe can be described by mathematical equations: Hamilton?s (mechanics); Maxwell?s (electrodynamics); Boltzmann?s (statistical mechanics); Schrodinger?s (quantum mechanics); and Einstein?s (general relativity) added to the mystery of the constants (ie universal & fine structure constants) is a good start to understanding there was very little (if anything) unguided in the process(es) that led to all we observe.

So, do you think that before those equations were discovered that we should have believed that all order was imposed by a will? By the way, who says that all of the processes were unguided? Seems to me that they would be guided by some of the same concepts that you mention. Do you think that the formation of a snowflake requires a will, or a 'guided' (your definition) process?

 

HELEN AND BARRY

To Earl Detra

The ocean trenches are presumed to be areas where subduction is taking place. This means that one plate should be scraping across the surface of the subducting plate. This should result in a real pile-up of contorted sediments from the scraping for so many thousands or millions of presumed years. Where are these contorted sediments? In the majority of such trenches, the sediments have been found to be horizontally layered. They also appear to be relatively undisturbed. This contrasts with the prediction of the long-age plate subduction model.

Does that explain a little more what I was referring to?

Then you pleaded mountain uplift and soil formation to explain why the mountain valleys still have soil. I would answer in return that mountain uplift in the old-age scenarios is a very slow process, as is soil formation, but that erosion and wash-out is a very rapid process. So I repeat, why is there good soil in the mountain valleys still?

Regarding daughter elements in radioisotope decay: It is important to remember that it is the daughter/parent ratio that is usually used to determine the age of the mineral radiometrically. The possible existence of any amount of ?daughter? element in that mineral at the beginning, which is not identified as such, can certainly throw the age determination off. But my point was not so much this as that we must recognize that a good deal of radiometric dating is right only if the presumptions which go into it are right. To assume that they are and work with that is one thing in the beginning, but when that assumption becomes, somehow ?fact? then perhaps the possibility of a different presumption being true is thrown out on an a priori basis. This might not be the best way to do science.

On the lava dating, I was not disagreeing with you! The way that we found out the K/Ar dating of lava flows was inapplicable was because we tried to date flows whose ages we knew exactly and found the problem. Earl, I?m not fighting with you over everything! I?m just trying to get a few things on the board, and I think we agree on this one!

Then, in response to my assertion that atomic clocks ?ticked? faster in the past as atomic processes were faster in the past, you responded:
You make a rather bold assertion. Are you sure of this? Can you say that you have measured these faster processes? Do you think they really fit in with a 'perfectly designed universe' that was intended for human life? Do you not see this as a 'presumption' on your part? I rather think that the evidence is not on your side on this one. Who agrees with you on this? Do you realize that 'atomic clocks' do not all start at the same time? Do you know that this would result in absolutely chaotic dates and why do we see systematics in radiometric dating?

Yes, I am sure of this, firstly. I did not have to measure it. It had already been done. Tom Van Flandern, when he worked for the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington D.C., measured the comparative rates of ?ticking? of the atomic and orbital clocks. His published conclusions were that the atomic clocks were slowing relative to the dynamic, or orbital clocks (U.S. National Bureau of Standards, special publication #617, 1984).

In what way do you feel this would have made the universe unfit for human life, or not perfectly designed by God? When you say not all atomic clocks started ticking at the same time, are you referring to initial processes or the resetting of some of these atomic clocks at various times in earth history? This does not cause any problem at all regarding the chronologies, since the effect is systematic.

To John Paul

Russ? interpretation of what happened is quite different from the one we are willing to accept. He refers to the entire universe being a sphere of water. We find no support for this either biblically or astronomically. However the Bible does indicate that the surface of the earth was, at one point, entirely covered with water (Genesis 1:2) . This would not be subject to the compression that Dr. Humphreys speaks of in his model. Therefore the heat internally in earth would have had to come from something other than what he suggests.

To Paul of Eugene

An article Barry recalls in Sky and Telescope dealt with this question. Looking on the net we found this mention also referencing that article:
http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf039/sf039p07.htm

There is evidence that Saturn?s rings are, actually, quite young. And this might be considered reasonable evidence against at least some of the old age scenario. Old agers now have to interpret the rings as something other than primordial, and yet Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune ALL have rings?.

Now, about magnetic field reversal. The gradualism I was referring to is that a field maintains for ?hundreds of thousands of years? and then quickly reverses. You have assumed those hundreds of thousands of years, and you agreed to that in your response.

On to quasars: Quasars are the supermassive, hyperactive black holes at the centers of galaxies. With redshifts lower than about 1.7, their activity tapers off dramatically. The activity peaks around a redshift of 2 and plateaus at higher redshifts than that. Now, the higher the redshift, the farther out in the universe you are from earth and the further back in time you are seeing. I think we both agree on that. So it is a matter of seeing that long ago the quasars were active and that with time they have decreased in activity. The one we are closest to in space as well as time is then our own in the center of the Milky Way Galaxy, and it thus shows what the result is with the passage of time. Therefore the argument is NOT that our black hole was not a quasar but when it was hyperactively luminous. Astronomers agree that all quasars were brilliant during the earliest time in the history of the universe. That would include ours.

That means that in a YEC model there would have been a brilliance coming from the center of our galaxy at the beginning and for some amount of time after. The Bible states that at about the half-way point through day four, the sun was ?lit? or perhaps even formed, and that this was then God?s plan for light on the earth on a continuing basis. In the variable speed of light model, the quasar would have aged approximately four billion years atomically during the first three and a half days of creation. This would have caused a dramatic decrease in its activity very rapidly, after which time the sun would have taken over the delineation of the day-night sequence on earth.

A faster speed of light would not preclude the formation of black holes. What the changing speed of light does do is to allow the black hole to increase its radius with time, thus permitting the engulfing of greater amounts of material. This would feed the quasar activity. Therefore quasars would be brighter with a faster speed of light. This is indeed what we see when we look far enough back in time ? by looking far enough out into the universe.

On to Genesis and the writing of it. You are right that the first use of the word generations is in Genesis 2:4a. That closes the first tablet. Adam?s account begins with 2:4b. There was only ONE eyewitness to the creation before Adam. That was God. Genesis 1:1 ? 2:4a is HIS account of what happened. The toledot that you quoted in Genesis 2:4 states that the LORD made the heavens and the earth. This is HIS signature. Did He write this Himself? Why not? He wrote the original version of the Ten Commandments Himself.

Adam?s signature toledot in Genesis 5:1a states that it is a written record. Why this should surprise any Christian I don?t know. God did not create a dummy to start with.

I have read and looked up the use of the words in Genesis, long before you suggested I do. I have become fairly well convinced, as have a number of Old Testament scholars now that the toledot is being used as a colephon, meaning that it ends the tablet. Those who wrote down our version of the Old Testament ended up combining these with the opening of the following tablets, which does cause some confusion, but if you realize what was being written, the confusion disappears. If you would like more information on the Tablet Hypotheses and what some other scholars have written, please feel free to email me at [email protected] and I will pop you off a Word file I have on this material. It?s much too long for here.

The firmament question has been discussed here already and I found the link to it here:
http://www.baptistboard.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=36;t=000103

Regarding the evidence of water in the thermosphere, there have been a number of articles about it in various journals as well as New Scientist and other summary magazines. There are several theories about why the water is there, as well as a lot of arguments. All I could do was sigh when I saw your silly comment about windshield wipers on the space shuttles.
On to the atomic clock ? why do you think a variable speed of light would predict different behavior where the Cepheid variables are concerned? Their variability is localized to a very small section of the upper envelope of the star, and is dependent upon opacity, which is light speed related! As all the factors are examined, it turns out there is no contradiction between observation and the variable light speed theory.

Barry looked at your comments about light speed and the electromagnetic force and all he could say was that you do not understand about this. I really do suggest that you read his 1987 paper ?Atomic Constants, Light, and Time? which is webbed at his site: www.setterfield.org -- go into the science essays part and you will see it. So much has been explained already concerning this in not only that paper but in the material Lambert Dolphin has also put together in the section entitled ?Consequences of cDK? or something like that. Look for the word ?Consequences??

ITM, Barry says to tell you that the Clouds of Magellan are basically circumpolar here in the southern hemisphere and thus can be seen clearly on most nights. They are best seen in the early evening in summer, though.

Wow, how long have you waited for that answer? I remember you asking it a long time ago and I kept forgetting to ask him. You are a patient man!

[ September 09, 2002, 08:38 AM: Message edited by: Administrator ]

 

EARL DETRA

Helen and Barry: The ocean trenches are presumed to be areas where subduction is taking place. This means that one plate should be scraping across the surface of the subducting plate. This should result in a real pile-up of contorted sediments from the scraping for so many thousands or millions of presumed years. Where are these contorted sediments? In the majority of such trenches, the sediments have been found to be horizontally layered. They also appear to be relatively undisturbed. This contrasts with the prediction of the long-age plate subduction model.

Actually, these deposits are quite common. If you look at the Fransiscan Formation in California, you are looking at an accretionary wedge. This is one of the ways that continents actually grow in size. The sediment in trenches is is horizontally layered because it is laid down after the subducting oceanic crust has flexed. These deposits are usually terrestrial in origin and are deposited by density currents (turbidity currents). They will eventually be disturbed and some future geologists will map them as a 'melange' or an accreted terrane. And no, they are not 'presumed' areas where subduction occurs.

Does that explain a little more what I was referring to?

Yes, but as I explained, there is a lot more to the story.

Then you pleaded mountain uplift and soil formation to explain why the mountain valleys still have soil. I would answer in return that mountain uplift in the old-age scenarios is a very slow process, as is soil formation, but that erosion and wash-out is a very rapid process. So I repeat, why is there good soil in the mountain valleys still?

Well, look at it this way, if erosion is so rapid, then why do we have mountains at all? Rates of erosion and uplift are highly variable. Sometimes the mountains win and sometimes erosion wins. In the Himalayas, the mountains are still rising. In the Appalachians the mountains are losing ground.

Regarding daughter elements in radioisotope decay: It is important to remember that it is the daughter/parent ratio that is usually used to determine the age of the mineral radiometrically. The possible existence of any amount of ?daughter? element in that mineral at the beginning, which is not identified as such, can certainly throw the age determination off.

However, it has been shown empirically that there is virtually no daughter in some minerals.

But my point was not so much this as that we must recognize that a good deal of radiometric dating is right only if the presumptions which go into it are right.

Yes, just as telling time by your watch requires the correct assumptions. It is clear that many people who spend their lives studying the radiometrics believe the assumptions to be valid.

To assume that they are and work with that is one thing in the beginning, but when that assumption becomes, somehow ?fact? then perhaps the possibility of a different presumption being true is thrown out on an a priori basis. This might not be the best way to do science.

I maintain that it is the only way to do science. What if the Wright brothers weren't so certain that they were not just lucky? No, sometimes repeated investigation without contradiction, allows us to use a hypothesis as a premise to move ahead.

On the lava dating, I was not disagreeing with you! The way that we found out the K/Ar dating of lava flows was inapplicable was because we tried to date flows whose ages we knew exactly and found the problem. Earl, I?m not fighting with you over everything! I?m just trying to get a few things on the board, and I think we agree on this one!

To a degree. I would also maintain that most people today know that K-Ar dating is a misapplication to modern lavas. This was known generations ago.

Then, in response to my assertion that atomic clocks ?ticked? faster in the past as atomic processes were faster in the past, you responded:

"You make a rather bold assertion. Are you sure of this? Can you say that you have measured these faster processes? Do you think they really fit in with a 'perfectly designed universe' that was intended for human life? Do you not see this as a 'presumption' on your part? I rather think that the evidence is not on your side on this one. Who agrees with you on this? Do you realize that 'atomic clocks' do not all start at the same time? Do you know that this would result in absolutely chaotic dates and why do we see systematics in radiometric dating?"

Yes, I am sure of this, firstly. I did not have to measure it. It had already been done. Tom Van Flandern, when he worked for the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington D.C., measured the comparative rates of ?ticking? of the atomic and orbital clocks. His published conclusions were that the atomic clocks were slowing relative to the dynamic, or orbital clocks (U.S. National Bureau of Standards, special publication #617, 1984).

But doesn't modern creationist theory say that c-decay has stopped? Well, no matter. Give us more details on this slowing phenomenon.

In what way do you feel this would have made the universe unfit for human life, or not perfectly designed by God?

If all processes were so much faster in the past, how did we survive? It would seem to me that there would be massive modifications in the human structure if we were to have lived through such events.

When you say not all atomic clocks started ticking at the same time, are you referring to initial processes or the resetting of some of these atomic clocks at various times in earth history? This does not cause any problem at all regarding the chronologies, since the effect is systematic.

Not sure what you mean here. Are we talking about John Paul's plasma effects?

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

Thanks for your reply, Helen. May God bless us both as we seek to uncover more of His truth.

Now about the rings of Saturn. Saturn's rings are certainly spectacular, but not particularly a challenge to old universe ideas even if they aren't primordial. If they turn out to be dynamically impossible to maintain for a billion years then we simply look for a way to create them following the creation of the planet, and the capture of a comet within Roche's limit would do the job nicely. Roche's limit is the area within which tidal forces tear up a body that otherwise would hold itself together. Saturn's rings, you might recall, are well within Roche's limit for the planet. So when you write this:

you should realize that the ubiquity of rings is probably telling us something about comets and how often they get captured by gas giants as they come in from the oort cloud.

Now you refer to evidence against "some of the old age scenario". That's a funny kind of thing to say! Of COURSE we are always finding evidence against one scenario and developing another scenario in its place in various areas. It's too easy to see how they could have been created more recently. A comet colliding with a moon and forcing it into a lower orbit within Roche's limit would do it. Only part of the resulting debris needs to survive as rings, you know.

Well, there are certain definitions of "gradualism" I'll tolerate as applying to my acceptance of the reality, just so long as you realize I'm not opposed to disaster on general principles . . . .

Everyone needs to be reminded of exactly what the z scale is concerning red shifts. One z is, to light, just what one octave is to sound. Indeed, you could call a one z an octive. When a shift reaches one z, then the light coming from that galaxy has shifted to exactly half the frequency, just as a note on the piano that plays one octave below another sends out sound vibrations exactly one half the frequency of the other. Now IF the universe is a giant hypersphere that is expanding THEN the redshift of exactly one z tells us something very profound about the SIZE of the WHOLE UNIVERSE at the time the galaxy emitted that light. That is, the whole universe was at that time exactly one half the size it is today. A z scale of 2 would correspond to light emitted by a galaxy at a time when the universe was one fourth the size it is today. And so forth. The cosmic background radiation is generally assummed to have been generated at a fantastically high temperature and undergone a z scale shift of over 1000. That means the universe at the time of the creation of the cosmic background radiation was less than 1/(2^1000) th as big as it is now.

Somebody please tell me just how big that was at that time. I want to know!.

Now since the universe is about 12 to 14 billion years old, if we assume the speed of expansion has been linear since creation, and it came from a singularity, then the z scale of 1 would correspond to distances of 6 to 7 billion light years ago. This is based strictly on geometric considerations. Of course, we do not expect the universe to expand uniformly. On the other hand, we're not sure just what the expansion curve is like, so we use the idea of uniform expansion as a first approximation. How does this estimate of the distance of galaxies with a z scale of 1 compare with other means of estimating the distance to galaxies of z scale 1? Does the fact that as the different sciences converge on comparable age estimates for their parts of the earth, universe, etc act to increase our confidence in the age estimates? It does for me.

I'm sorry, but you will have to drop the early quasar idea for your creation scenario. Literally, quasars would not have been created before day four, any more than any other stars. To the ancient world, anything in the firmament was either the sun, the moon, or a star. They did not confine the word "star" to a certain class of objects. The planets, most un-star like to our modern minds, were wandering stars. Meteorites, to us rocks, not stars, were falling stars, and it is not a scientific mistake for them to use the term star there, it is merely that our modernity has restricted the word star more than was done so in ancient times. Therefore to the Hebrews your quasar would have been a star. Therefore it would have been created only on day four, because that was when God made the sun, moon, and stars. To make quasars earlier than day four is to go against the literal interpretation of the Genesis narrative! This was not a problem for the ancient Hebrews, the idea that light could shine without anything to generate it made perfect sense, because God was making the light directly. If you make a big deal about keeping to the literal narrative, you should follow your own rules! Or to put it as I did before, even you don't interpret Genesis literally.

A sudden change downward in the speed of light would cause a sudden expansion of the size of the black hole, and a sudden QUENCHING of the light being generated by the ring of matter being drawn into it. The black hole would DIM until it could rebuild the ring from the matter around it and then flare up again.

It doesn't say God, it says heaven and earth. Again we see a departure from the literal text.

I don't think anybody doubts that our present version of Genesis comes from collating records preserved from earlier periods, except a few who suppose Moses wrote them directly from direct inspiration. (And why couldn't Moses have been inspired in picking and choosing what to preserve for future generations?) I just think its an audacious leap to go from subject headings to SIGNATURES!

I'll look that over and see if it looks like we need to say any more than has been already said.

Oh, well perhaps you meant there is an occasional WATER MOLECULE, not a whole DROP? In that case, we agree. Maybe not all our readers know, so I'll just mention here that in the vacuum that exists above 50 miles or so water cannot exist in liquid form. It either boils away to vapor or freezes as solid. In a vacuum in the vicinity of earth, sunlight on solid ice makes it sublimate to vapor anyway.

Barry's theory is not complete until he is least able to specify what the acceleration of gravity was for Adam. Until he is able to do that, there is no need to seriously consider his theory in detail. However, in general, if the electromagnetic field strength were enormously greater in relation to gravity and nuclear forces, then nuclear binding forces would be unable to hold atoms together against the repelling forces of the protons within the nucleous and there would be no fusion reactions taking place in any stars anywhere, let alone in the outer layers of cepheid variables. If the nuclear forces were strengthened along with the electromagnetic, leaving only the gravitational to be weaker, then the forces involved in Cepheid Variable waxing would blow the star's outer envelope completely off the star, never to return, due to the relatively weaker gravitational field. If the gravitational field is also strengthened to prevent this, then the relative strength of all the forces involved remains the same and we mortals could not tell the difference between that state and our present state, i.e. light speed is not changed.

Thanks. We HOPE to make it to Australia in a year or so, just to see those clouds, among other things . . . ummm just to be sure, is that Australian summer or USA summer?

 

HELEN

OK, let’s see what I can do with these now that a few of my brain cells are rested!

Earl,
You are presuming an awful lot that has not been seen to happen where ocean trenches are concerned. I know you don’t accept that there might be another explanation, but there is. As far as mountain erosion and mountain valley soil is concerned, the rate of uplift and soil formation of mountains right now is exponentially lower than the rate of erosion of mountain valley soils down rivers during summer storms and flood melts. If this has been going on at this rate for any length of time, there should not be any mountain valley soils of any thickness suitable for planting at all. But that is not what we see. So either evolutionists must postulate some very different mechanisms than we know now, which puts the explanation into the ‘what-if’ or ‘just-so’ category, or the mountains and their associated valleys are not old at all.

On the radioisotope decay section, you sidestepped the point entirely. It does not matter whether or not some minerals today have ‘virtually no daughter’ elements in them. What matters is that we don’t have any way of knowing that a good many more originated in that state, which is what accurate radiometric dating presumes. Nor does it matter “that many people who spend their lives studying radiometrics believe the assumptions to be valid.” That has nothing to do with the truth of their assumptions as all. That is what they were trained to believe. That is what they are being paid to believe. If they abandon that belief they will lose lab and publishing rights. No pressure there!

However the truth has never been something decided upon by a majority. It stands as what it is, majority or no.

And if you think throwing out a possible conclusion on an ‘a priori’ basis is somehow good science, I guess you are in the majority! From what I have been reading lately, this seems to be what is accepted behavior. Data must conform to the existing paradigm to be accepted. So I guess our definitions of good science are pretty different.

You said K/Ar dating was known not to be accurate/applicable to modern lavas. A couple of questions:

1. When you say that this was known “generations” ago, I am curious as to what your definition of a generation is? When do you think this became known? When do you think this became accepted?

2. How do you know a lava is old, then, if the method is not acceptable for modern lavas?

Regarding the variable c model – no, the slowing of c has not stopped. However it shows to have followed a Lorentzian curve and so is at the bottom of the curve now, which means the rate of slowing is in itself very slow now. Perhaps it would behoove you to look at some of the material on it, on either side of the fence, before you jump to conclusions like that, though.

The ‘more details’ you asked for are quite available on Barry’s website:
www.setterfield.org
The last time I tried to summarize anything here, Joe Meert took it and mocked it on his webpage. That is a mistake I will not make again. Go to the source, please. And feel free to email Barry with questions. I know he answers them, as I help him keep track of emails.

And no, a faster speed of light does not entail “massive modifications in the human structure”. I think you are listening to a lot of people ignorant of what is going on in this research whether it is being done by Setterfield, Troitskii, Barrow, Albrecht, Magueijo, Davies, or whomever. Suggest, again, you go to the sources and study what is actually being said instead of simply accepting what the mockers are mouthing.

And, finally, no, I am definitely NOT talking about John Paul’s plasma stuff. I disagree with it, too.

OK, to Paul of Eugene:

I appreciate your ideas about Saturn’s rings. I would just like to mention that the old-agers have one set of ideas and the young-agers have another. We have no real evidence that either one is correct in and of itself here. And when I mentioned that it could be evidence against ‘some of the old age scenario,’ that’s just me refusing to do the popularizer thing of “now we have shown you!” The evidence has to be looked at on each side bit by bit. Saturn’s rings are possible evidence for a young creation. That does not invalidate other arguments on either side; it only talks’ about Saturn’s rings. That is all I was trying to say, OK?

And no, I do not think you are against catastrophes, per se. That would be rather silly of me to think of you or you to believe in this day and age, eh? But you do seem to hold with the idea of very gradual processes where evolutionists tell you you should – and that is what seems to me to be a mark of your acceptance of gradualism.

On the redshift, age of the universe, etc.: several new issues I am aware of in the news lately. One of which indicates that the ‘cosmic wave background’ may not be there at all but may be an artifice of various telescopes and instruments being used! It appears to be different depending on the instrument used to measure it…

Secondly, your presumption of a 12-14 billion year old universe is just that – a presumption, and it is that which I am disputing! So when you say, “since the universe is 12-14 billion years old” I have to pretty much discount what you say after that since I disagree with your presumption!

And, if different areas of science really did converge on the age of the universe, then that age would not be shifting so dramatically in whatever the current estimation of it is, would it? Nor would there be so many astronomical ‘anomalies’, would there?

You stated quasars would not have been created before day 4. Why not? Job speaks of the ‘morning stars’ and astronomers know there are two populations of stars, indicating two basic times of creation or formation. I don’t understand your blanket statement that quasars would not have been possible before day 4!

If you read Genesis 1, you will see that it is not stated that all the stars were created on day 4; only that “He made the stars also.” The timing is not given there. I think that the reference in Job makes it quite clear that God also is aware there are two populations of stars and that there were the early, or population II stars from the first moments of creation. It is they which were lit when “Let there be light!” resounded through the early universe. It is not a matter of a literal Genesis; it is a matter of letting Bible explain Bible rather than people changing Bible to fit their own ideas and preconceptions.

As far as the formation and sustenance of black holes with a faster speed of light, the math does not support your hypothesis. For technical arguments regarding this, please feel free to contact Barry at [email protected]
Especially now as he is still recovering from surgery, he is trying to spend some quiet time resting and catching up with reading and emails, so you stand a pretty good chance of getting a relatively rapid reply from him!

Regarding your argument about the toledot being used as a colephon in Genesis, I think that I prefer the information the actual biblical scholars are coming up with rather than your doubts about their work. The Bible says God Himself wrote out the original Ten Commandments. Why should He not have written down the original creation account?

And no, I’m not talking about the occasional water molecule in the thermosphere. I’m talking about droplets big enough to show up on screens. Say what you like about them, they appear to be there.

Regarding gravity: that was the same for Adam as for us. You have your idea of subatomic mass totally mixed up with gravitational mass. Gravity has not changed; subatomic mass, however, reacts to changes in the vacuum of space. Totally different concepts. God gave us gravitational, or orbital time, by which we were told to measure signs and seasons and years in Genesis 1:14; atomic time is not steady and runs by a different clock. Gravitational time has held steady through the history of the universe, however.

Barry has looked at your arguments and all he can say, and that over and over again, is that you are completely misunderstanding what is going on with his work. So, again, I urge you to contact him directly, but that after you have become more familiar with his work yourself.

Lastly, when Barry refers to summer in Australia, he is referring to Dec. 1-March 1.

 

EARL DETRA

Helen: You are presuming an awful lot that has not been seen to happen where ocean trenches are concerned.

Actually, we have observed what happens at deep sea trenches. It is possible to calculate the motion of faults and the style of deformation along subduction zones using the motion of earthquakes. Are you sure you want to debate this subject? No insult intended, but it seems that this is really out of your depth, so to speak. Perhaps I could refer you to my thesis?

I know you don’t accept that there might be another explanation, but there is. As far as mountain erosion and mountain valley soil is concerned, the rate of uplift and soil formation of mountains right now is exponentially lower than the rate of erosion of mountain valley soils down rivers during summer storms and flood melts.

Exponentially, eh? That means you must have some numbers. I don't suppose you would accept the possibility that erosion is greater in some areas than others, would you? And if uplift is exponentially less, then why are the Himalayas still rising? This is known from mapping of stream offsets and fault plane solutions, as well as direct measurements.

If this has been going on at this rate for any length of time, there should not be any mountain valley soils of any thickness suitable for planting at all.

Not at all. On the other hand if you were correct, we shouldn't have any mountains at all. Look at it this way: When was the last time a summer storm washed away the soil in your yard? Actually, I'm not sure I understand your point here. Perhaps you could reiterate it.

But that is not what we see.

Did you read my last post on this? Do you deny that in some places uplift is greater, and in others erosion is the greater? Also, why do you assume that erosion and uplift have been constant for so long and yet the speed of light is highly variable? This really makes no sense at all to me.

So either evolutionists must postulate some very different mechanisms than we know now, which puts the explanation into the ‘what-if’ or ‘just-so’ category, or the mountains and their associated valleys are not old at all.

Not at all, just plain old erosion and uplift. What are the mechanisms that you know? Can you give us an example of a 'just so' story in this area?

On the radioisotope decay section, you sidestepped the point entirely. It does not matter whether or not some minerals today have ‘virtually no daughter’ elements in them. What matters is that we don’t have any way of knowing that a good many more originated in that state, which is what accurate radiometric dating presumes.

Sorry, Helen, but until you can tell us that there are different forms of biotite relating to different ages, you are way out in left field on this one. Biotite does not admit argon into its lattice and diffusion of radiogenic argon out of the lattice goes to virtually zero below the trapping temperature. This is like John Paul telling us there are different types of U238 nuclei.

Nor does it matter “that many people who spend their lives studying radiometrics believe the assumptions to be valid.” That has nothing to do with the truth of their assumptions as all.

So you'd rather trust the judgement of someone who has no experience in radiometric dating to give you an idea of its validity. Do you hire plumbers to work on your car, too?

That is what they were trained to believe. That is what they are being paid to believe. If they abandon that belief they will lose lab and publishing rights. No pressure there!

Actually, they were trained to think. As far as being afraid to go against the trend, do you really know that many geologists? Sorry, but there was never a more determined bunch of iconoclasts, despite what you say. I've argued many the hour away with some of them over the wackiest ideas; but you know, to a virtual totality, they do not believe in creationism. If there was evidence for creationism, the pressure to publish and obtain credit would be vicious.

However the truth has never been something decided upon by a majority. It stands as what it is, majority or no.

Agreed, but as I asked earlier, would you have an attorney conduct brain surgery? Wallet surgery perhaps, but brain surgery? No way. And yet, that is what you would have us do.

And if you think throwing out a possible conclusion on an ‘a priori’ basis is somehow good science, I guess you are in the majority!

The problem here is that nothing has been thrown out a priori. Creationist ideas were in the majority two centuries ago and were thrown out after considerable debate and thought. Your new ideas have been rejected because they simply do not fit the facts. Nothing a priori about it.

From what I have been reading lately, this seems to be what is accepted behavior. Data must conform to the existing paradigm to be accepted. So I guess our definitions of good science are pretty different.

Not at all. I look for divergent data all the time. I often find it and revise my hypothesis as to some geological phenomenon. Sometimes much to my chagrin. No problem.

You said K/Ar dating was known not to be accurate/applicable to modern lavas.

Correct.

A couple of questions:

1. When you say that this was known “generations” ago, I am curious as to what your definition of a generation is? When do you think this became known? When do you think this became accepted?

Well, I was in school 20 years ago, and by then it was known. I presume it was known well before that. We discussed the pitfalls of all radiometric methods (there were less of them then). One of those pitfalls is that the precision of measuring small differences in argon isotope contents makes young rocks virtually undateabel by this method.

2. How do you know a lava is old, then, if the method is not acceptable for modern lavas?

Well from some of the samples I have heard about from creationist sources, one could look for fossils or artifacts. However, there are other methods such as devitrification rims that can be used to fairly accurately date recent lavas. The point is that if you come up with something around, or older than the maximum workable age for a given method, that is a red flag. Don't just publish a critique of the method, try something else first. It's like the old story of the inept carpenter blaming his tools.

And no, a faster speed of light does not entail “massive modifications in the human structure”. I think you are listening to a lot of people ignorant of what is going on in this research whether it is being done by Setterfield, Troitskii, Barrow, Albrecht, Magueijo, Davies, or whomever. Suggest, again, you go to the sources and study what is actually being said instead of simply accepting what the mockers are mouthing.

So then it's just a coincidence that a body plan that originated during this high c period of history is just perfect for modern conditions. That's interesting. Now all you need is evidence.

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

Greetings to all who read these words. May the peace that passes understanding sustain us as we continue to trust in Him to direct our paths.

In reply to the comments from Helen, above:

There is a perfectly good way to determine how much of an element in a rock came from radioactive decay and how much of that element was there originally. All originally pure elements have a certain specified ratio of isotopes. Radioactive decay series result in elements with a different ratio of isotopes. Comparing the isotope ratios, then, reveals how much was priomordial and how much came along from radioactive decay! And these things are not just assumptions, they have been checked over and over.

There has been no "showing" that the rate of c slowing will ever vary. Instead, there has been an assumption that it varies, and those doing the assuming have fiddled with the rates of change to find the answer they like best, that is, the one that supports the modern failure to find any change in c at all and the need to have a very great change in the past on other than scientific grounds. A "showing" would imply a mathematically compelling REASON for the decay curve exists. Setterfield theory merely describes the way things behave in altered light speed state, there is nothing in it to "show" why the altered light speed state should actually occur.

If you are talking about the background cosmic radiation, it would be difficult for a mere instrumental artifact to capture the doppler shifting of our galaxy's motion towards the great attractor! So without more information, I must remain skeptical.

What, you are suprised that there are still mysteries in the universe? Science always finds two more questions for every answer! That's the way science has always been! But there are some answers we can count on. Unfortunately, there are many who are still trying to disprove what science has established for over a century now.

OK its time to let the scriptures speak for themselves here:

Gen 1:14-18
And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

Job 38:4-7
Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? Or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? Or who laid the corner stone thereof; when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

I call on all who read these to note just how much the interpretation suggested by Helen here is a streatch, to say the least. According to the literal interpretation, it is quite plain that the stars were created on day four, and there is absolutely no conclusion to be drawn from the snippet of reference to the "morning stars" from Job. It is not even clear that true stars are meant, this might be a reference to a class of angels.

There's a lot of experts on my side, and it is a thing that is easy to see; just look up the word "generations" in a good concordance (use King James to get the right verses for this) and let the readers check out for themselves whether "these are the generations" is a concluding signature or a preliminary subject heading.

Source? Exact wording?

OK now this is important. Are you saying, as you appear to be saying, that as Adam walked around on earth, Barry Setterfield's theory calls for the acceleration of gravity to be the same on earth then as it is now, about 32 feet per second per second, even as light was traveling well in excess of 186,284,000,000 miles per second at the time? This would mean, of course, that pendulems would swing in the same time as now and rocks would drop 16 feet in one second, as they do now.

( )yes ( ) let me check on that ( )other value

Ah, what can I say, like Galleleo, Einstein, Newton, and others of that sort, I have this notion that all masses accelerate (fall) equally in a given gravitational field; that the reason this is so is because in Newtonian terms, mass is pulled on by a gravitational field in direct proportion to how much mass there is; and Einstein's theory is correct in asserting the complete equivalence between a body accelerated by a gravitational field and a body that appears to be responding to a gravitational field because of the acceleration of the inertial frame of reference, whether it is characterized as subatomic or not. And in this, all experimental physics is completely in agreement. Mere neutrons, if fired upwards with gentle enough force, will form the same graceful parabola as a stream of water spurting from a fountain. These things have been measured! What's more, when a body gives up energy, it really weighs less. The sun loses tons and tons of weight every second just by virtue of the light it shines. I can look up the value more exactly if you're interested . . . its all there in e=mc^2, you know.


Looking forward to your reply!

 

PAUL OF EUGENE

Just as a matter of general interest I went to the trouble of locating more exact information about the loss of weight by the sun. The sun loses about 4.5 million tons of weight every second due to energy loss by radiation. This amount of weight is utterly insignifigant to the total mass of the sun.

 

HELEN

Earl

First of all, observation and calculations are two different things. The latter may be based on the former, but that presumes both uniformitarianism and gradualism where the trenches are concerned. In addition, there are some real problems with the current explanations, as I presume you know. We are not seeing what we should see in terms of types of depositional layering under the current evolutionary model. If you need examples, I’ll ask Barry to come in on this a bit, as this is his field.

If you have trouble with the idea of the Himalayas still rising slightly as opposed to the enormous amount of runoff which washes away topsoil from mountain valleys yearly, I don’t know what to tell you. They both happen. Erosion is far more prevalent and faster than either mountain rise or soil formation. And that is the point I was making.

You asked when the last time a storm washed away soil in my yard. Since there is only a ten foot drop, ‘catty-corner’ in my one acre, and that all but the old paddock area is planted or compost heaps or house and patio, I would have to say it hasn’t happened to any appreciable degree. I’m not sure what this has to do with spring runoffs and glacial melt runoff through mountain valleys, however, which have steep drops and much more water going through them! We get about 17 inches a year…

You then asked why I would assume erosion and uplift have been constant for so long and yet the speed of light is variable. I think you are totally confused regarding things I have been trying to present. First, I don’t assume erosion and uplift have been constant ‘for so long.’ I think the data and evidence point to massive catastrophes which would have had a lot to do with both. I also think the data and evidence point to a changed speed of light since the beginning. In both cases I am depending, however, on data and evidence, and not on presuppositions.

And in the presence of data and evidence, hypotheses can be formed. Just-so stories are not needed.

And regardless of your red herring about argon and biotite, my point still stands that we do not know the original ratios of various elements in rocks. We presume when we see a daughter element that only exists as an isotope of radio-decay, that there was none to begin with. And that is certainly a fair and data-backed assumption. But there are a number of other daughter elements which are indistinguishable from naturally occurring isotopes. And that means very simply we must make presuppositions based on current models regarding the original state. Those presuppositions and current models may not be correct.

I was taught, and I taught also, that challenging currently accepted theories was part of good science. That solid theories should be able to stand up to examination. Evolution has been accepted, examined, and found wanting. What has happened, however, is that because it was accepted, the idea that it could be found wanting seems to be anathema.

Nor is it people ‘out of the field’ who are finding the radiometric assumptions currently prevailing to be wanting. There are experts in the field who have questions as well, and are examining the data with a mind to accepting what it might indicate rather than what presuppositions demand it indicates. That, by the way, in my personal estimation, takes a lot of nerve and a very determined person who is probably independently funded in some way to do that. It’s really hard to buck the system, even when you are sure you are right.

I had to laugh when you said, ”If there was evidence for creationism, the pressure to publish and obtain credit would be vicious.” What do you think has been happening in the past thirty years or so? GRI publishes its own material. Who else will? And they are quite respected professionally – strange thing! The two creation technical journals (CRSQ and TJ) both have come up with some interesting challenges, although I will admit with the rest of you that I think GRI holds itself to a higher standard for publication. Nevertheless, these journals and publications came into being for the express purpose of getting material refused by the evolutionist journals out on the table for discussion and consideration.

Nor does this have ANYTHING to do with your question “would you have an attorney conduct brain surgery?” The scientists challenging evolution are scientists working in their own fields who have been brave enough to finally say, “Wait a minute – this is not working!” At which point they tend to get laughed out of peer respect, denied peer review, and often lose jobs, tenure, advancement, and/or funding. Scientists who have been so long respected as long as they fit with the current paradigm really should be given a little consideration and attention when they are willing to risk so much by saying that what they are finding does not fit with what is being published and taught as the truth.

Now, you said some interesting things in response to my questions regarding K/Ar dating in modern lavas. Here is the quote from above:

I find it fascinating, first of all, that you mention there were fewer pitfalls known in radiometric dating twenty years ago than now. Or were you talking about types of radiometric dating? I couldn’t tell. Nevertheless, when you said that the argon differences makes young rocks un-datable, I would wonder how many ‘old’ lavas are not really old, but presumed that way because those dates are showing up with false ages…?

Fossils or artifacts in lava? Ummm, OK. Can you tell me where anyone, creationist or otherwise has suggested that flowing lava would preserve and not burn them to a crisp? There must be something I am missing here.

And the point of my questions was not whether or not something appears older than the ‘maximum workable age,’ but if something is actually much younger but dating older. This would be younger than the minimum workable age for evolutionists, but it just might be true anyway.

And, finally, what ON EARTH does body plan have to do with a faster light speed???

I really think you have not read the work on this at all. Why don’t you?

To Paul:
As I mentioned to Earl, when a daughter element has a signature isotope, that is fine. But many don’t.

And when you stated that “there has been no ‘showing’ that the rate of c slowing will ever vary,” I am assuming you are not keeping up with the current literature on the subject, even from non-creationist sources… there is plenty of evidence which has been published in secular peer-reviewed journals starting with the Albrecht-Magueijo and Barrow articles in Physics Review D in January of 1999. The Davies ‘short communication’ in the recent Nature said almost nothing new, however. All of what he mentioned has been known for some time now.

And yes, Barry has shown mathematically and theoretically why the change in light speed occurred. Please read his material. Again, his website is
www.setterfield.org

And no, I am most certainly not surprised there are mysteries in the universe. You have this great ability to mis-state what I am trying to say, I think. Am I so unclear? What I am saying is that the anomalies cannot be ignored but must be considered. It is by the study of them that we can learn more, not by studying everything that agrees with the current ideas to the exclusion of the anomalies.

As far as the two populations of stars being referenced in the Bible, I think you will find that the grammatical construction in Job indicates two different things: the morning stars sang AND the angels shouted. Two different nouns, two different verbs. In Hebrew poetry the use of ‘and’ generally means two different things. Parallel construction generally avoids the ‘and’ and simply states the two different statements as explanation of one another, such as we find in so many of the Psalms:

I literally just opened up my Bible into Psalms and it opened to Psalm 92 and 93. The examples are right there:

Psalm 92 starts
It is good to praise the Lord
and make music to your name, O Most High,
to proclaim your love in the morning
and your faithfulness at night,
to the music of the ten-stringed lyre
and the melody of the harp.[/I

These are not true parallels: praising is not necessarily the same as making music, proclaiming love is not the same as proclaiming faithfulness, morning is different from evening, and the lyre and harp are also different. Here we have lines expanding and adding, not simply repeating.

Compare with the opening of Psalm 93
The Lord reigns, he is robed in majesty;
The Lord is robed in majesty and is armed with strength.
The world is firmly established;
It cannot be moved.
Your throne was established long ago;
You are from eternity.

Here we have some true parallels. “Firmly established” is the same as “cannot be moved.” “Established long ago” is at least similar to “from eternity” in the minds of humans, although the throne and the person of God are, of course, different.

Now look at Job:
when the morning stars sang together,
and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

Two different things. The stars are not a ‘class of angels.’

Regarding the toledot being used as a colephon, if you wish to email me, I would be happy to send you a Word file of some of the material which is referenced and includes two sections by professionals in the field.
[email protected]

Source for water droplets in the thermosphere: many, including
New Scientist, 12 July, 1997, where Frank’s argument and the arguments against it are presented. There has been a reasonable amount of material arguing about this both before and after, I believe. Plug this into your Google search engine and have a good time: "water droplets" thermosphere Frank

About the variable c material – the gravitational constant has nothing to do with it. That is why God gave us the gravitational, or orbital, or dynamic (all the same thing) clock for us to use in Genesis 1:14. It is constant, whereas atomic processes are not. Barry’s work nowhere calls for a change in gravity. I am quite sure you have only read critiques of his work based on others’ ignorance rather than reading it yourself if you are thinking this.

By the way, Barry is researching the measurements of mass right now and there is a difference between subatomic and larger mass. There are some problems with their measurements in the literature. I can’t go past that as he is the one doing the research, but when he has finished, I’m sure an article will be forthcoming. He is finding some strange discrepancies in the literature.