Evolution

[Abishalom]

What information have you given me (rhetorical question because I read your post)? You would not accept an article from a creationist website yet you expect me to accept a poorly constructed "rebuttal" from an evolution website.

Who the FUCK are you to tell me what I would and would not accept?

Here's a free fucking clue for you: If a source has adequate citations which are peer reviewed, I don't give a flying fuck what the source is.

The first page I quoted was a summary of some of the evidence (with citations). The second was an article (with citations). Poorly researched, my ass.

I'm sure they spend plenty of their life dedicated to undermining creationist claim, but I actually never questioned how much research they did. I said it was poorly constructed (ie full of circular reasoning and selective information). Obviously Talks Origin has a purpose (to "refute" every claim a creationist makes) regardless if there arguments are sound or not.

I only post information from independent sites and not someone else's argument (that's not evidence) form an extremist website (one who takes a side in this discussion), so I expect the same form any atheists.

Are you even aware of the man-years of research that went into the talk.origins FAQ?

What does man hours have to do with a poorly constructed argument?

Let's examine the actual evidence...

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"Radiometric dating is a technique used to date materials such as rocks, usually based on a comparison between the observed abundance of a naturally occurring radioactive isotope and its decay products, using known decay rates." Wikipedia

This method is chosen because the nuclear properties are essentially are unaffected by outside influence (ie temperature, pressure etc). In other words the decay process is not affected by the environment.

But there are preconditions to obtaining accurate measurement...
"The basic equation of radiometric dating requires that neither the parent nuclide nor the daughter product can enter or leave the material after its formation." Wikipedia

In other words we must know the amount of parent/daughter isotopes present at the time of formation of the rock (which is billions of years ago according to them). Of course scientist claim they can rectify possible contamination (gain/loss of parent/daughter isotopes) in several ways.

One way is to check for sign of alterations (metasomatism) which would seemingly render the sample useless. Another way is to take samples from different locations of the same rock body. But it's the same rock, so even if x amount of sample were useless, then how could we even be sure that the "good" samples are any better? If the rock contains different minerals and we assume that they were formed at the same time then we can measure the isochron. In the case of uranium-lead dating we can use a concordia diagram to decrease the problem of nuclide loss. BUT we have to first assume that the rock was in a closed system. Lastly we can use different methods to see if they agree, which would only increase precision not accuracy.

Actually all of these methods could only enhance precision at best, and we must make assumption at every level of the "filtration" process in an attempt to "limit" contamination. Precision would be like going to a gun range and shooting all your shots in the same vicinity but outside the target. Accuracy is when all your shots are hitting the target. We seem to be hitting our shots in the same vicinity, but are we hitting our target? Even if all the dating methods give you precise answers, that does not equate to the true value or age. Especially when you consider that most (if not all) of the parent/daughter isotopes are readily movable by heat and water. Well the earth's core is immensely hot spewing off magma through cracks and about 70% of the earth's surface is water including an underground water table that saturates the rock below it. Oh and not to mention the isotopes are also present in the atmosphere which could easily interact with the rocks or the natural processes (ie floods, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, hurricanes etc) that could easily contaminate rocks over "billions" of years. Well so much for assuming that the rock was in a closed system. Precision is probably the best we could ever do when it comes to the age of the earth (and I have uncertainties about that).

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Yes, lets. While you're at it, you might investigate isochron dating (which does not depend on known parent/daughter isotopes). You might also provide some insight on means by which solid rocks can be contaminated in such a way that is a) not known and accounted for by science, and b) applicable to the dating method being used. The second article I linked has adequate citations to investigate your assertions. Can you find a problem with the particular evidence that the conclusion came from, or are you just going to throw around generalized assertions?

Well for one thing I never said isochron dating relied on knowing the parent/daughter isotopes. I said that you have to assume that since a rock had different minerals these minerals were all formed from the same event (pretty lofty assumption).

To your contamination remark...a) scientist know but either overlook it or ignore it (you decide) b) we're talking about the age of the earth so it's applicable to all methods used for this process.

I have no problem with actual evidence, but evidence are they using to "refute" said claims. Here's an example of a "rebuttal" from talks origin...

"2. Claims that the assumptions of a method may be violated
Certain requirements are involved with all radiometric dating methods. These generally include constancy of decay rate and lack of contamination (gain or loss of parent or daughter isotope). Creationists often attack these requirements as "unjustified assumptions," though they are really neither "unjustified" nor "assumptions" in most cases."

If that's their idea of a rebuttal, then that's laughable at best.