How Old is the Earth?

[26 X World Champs]

carbon dating? There was a man who brought a leaf to a scientist to be dated, he told the scientist that he thought the leaf might be really old, and that he had never seen a leaf like this before... The scientist performed a carbon-dating test on the leaf and came back to the man and told him it was 140,000 years old... It turned out that the man had lied to the scientist and that the leaf had fallen off the tree the previous fall...

PLEASE! Prove this BS incident with facts, not religiously inspired legend.

If you're going to make one sweeping post to discredit all of science then you have to do so with facts, not some little made up story that you typed into a post without one shred of evidence.

Ridiculous!

 

[Tashah]

The light between the star and the Earth is created 'in being'.

Really.

I have a B.A. degree in Astrophysics and a M.S. degree in Cosmology with a minor in Optical Physics. Nevertheless, I thank kindly you for the physics lesson.

 

[Tashah]

The light between the star and the Earth is created 'in being'.

Really.

I have a B.A. degree in Astrophysics (minor in Optical Physics) and a M.S. degree in Cosmology. Nevertheless, I thank you kindly for the physics lesson.

 

[Montalban]

Really.

I have a B.A. degree in Astrophysics (minor in Optical Physics) and a M.S. degree in Cosmology. Nevertheless, I thank you kindly for the physics lesson.

Appeals to incredulity aside, you are now suggesting that you can prove that God didn't make the light that exists between the stars and the earth, at the same time that he created the stars?

I would dearly love to see this experiment. Which scientific method do you use?

 

[Montalban]

PLEASE! Prove this BS incident with facts, not religiously inspired legend.

If you're going to make one sweeping post to discredit all of science then you have to do so with facts, not some little made up story that you typed into a post without one shred of evidence.

Ridiculous!

How about just one shred then....?
http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v19/i2/dating.asp

 

[Tashah]

Appeals to incredulity aside, you are now suggesting that you can prove that God didn't make the light that exists between the stars and the earth, at the same time that he created the stars?

Electromagnetic waves can be described by their frequency (number of waves per second) as well as by their wavelengths. Wavelengths of visible light are in the range of 400 to 700 nanometers. Light photons are a massless wave/particle quanta that move at the speed of light (c=30,000,000,000 cps). They are an energetic entity and are in constant motion. Photons do not exist in-situ as you suggest above for if this were true... the photoelectric effect would be a constant in nature rather than a cause and effect phenomena.

If you find it necessary to invoke the God card to explain your unique notions of physics, then your notions have digressed beyond all credulity and reality.

 

[Montalban]

Electromagnetic waves can be described by their frequency (number of waves per second) as well as by their wavelengths. Wavelengths of visible light are in the range of 400 to 700 nanometers. Light photons are a massless wave/particle quanta that move at the speed of light (c=30,000,000,000 cps). They are an energetic entity and are in constant motion. Photons do not exist in-situ as you suggest above for if this were true... the photoelectric effect would be a constant in nature rather than a cause and effect phenomena.

I think the problem here is you miss what I am saying.

I am not denying that light moves and that it moves from a star outwards to an observer.

You contend that a star is billions of years because we can observe the light that has reached us, and that it would have taken billlions of years to reach us.

However I am saying that the light that exists between the star and the earth, that is still moving towards us, could have been (as has been suggested) created already

As an analogy imagine you tie a knot in a ball of string and throw that ball out to me, I catch it and start tugging on it, and then calculate how long it takes for the knot to reach me.
That is the situation you are suggesting, point of origin, time to reach me, etc.

But suppose in the act of creation the string is made between us already, I still tug on the string, until the knot reaches me, but the string existed in the gap between you and I already.

I hope that analogy makes sense.

If you find it necessary to invoke the God card to explain your unique notions of physics, then your notions have digressed beyond all credulity and reality.

And yes, it would be logical to evoke God if I believe in God. And yes I do believe that God exists above our reality.

 

[Tashah]

Montalban... your ball of string analogy does make sense but it is not applicable when speaking of electromagnetic waves. Light photons are created when an electron is excited above its resident energy level. It is a cause and effect phenomena rather than an inherent and intrinsic state.

I believe in God also, but see no need to invoke the metaphysical to explain natural occuring processess that are already well understood by science and validated by decades of observation and measurement.

It seems that we agree in substance but disagree on mechanics. That's ok by me because it makes it all the more interesting and unpredictable

 

[Montalban]

Montalban... your ball of string analogy does make sense but it is not applicable when speaking of electromagnetic waves.

It is only an analogy to illustrate the movement of light from a statr to the earth, and also to the suggestion that the light in progress from the star might also have been created too.

Light photons are created when an electron is excited above its resident energy level. It is a cause and effect phenomena rather than an inherent and intrinsic state.

Indeed. I will give this another go.
just say that the light travels from that star to the earth through several reference points in space called 'a' 'b' 'c' and 'd' (Co-ordinates)

light must travel through space so that at one point the light beginning from the star is at the star

After a million years it reaches 'a', a point in space on the journey towards earth, after another million years it reaches 'b' another point on the journey, but closer to earh. And so, it continues to move until it passes through points 'c' and then 'd'.
That is the conventional idea.

But say God creates the star, and the light already travelling to earth from that star, and that which is travelling through point 'a', 'b', 'c', and 'd'. We would observe the light still travelling towards the earth in one continuous stream, only the stream was all in fact created together.
and the light that left the sun at the time of the creation has as yet to even get to point 'a'. The light that travelled through point 'd' is also yet to arrive, the light, at all points between those points is still travelling towards earth, but has yet to get here.

I believe in God also, but see no need to invoke the metaphysical to explain natural occuring processess that are already well understood by science and validated by decades of observation and measurement.

We have not observed the light travelling for millions of years. Further, it seems to me odd that you believe in God, yet don't believe in God doing anything extra-ordinary

It seems that we agree in substance but disagree on mechanics. That's ok by me because it makes it all the more interesting and unpredictable

I don't disagree on the mechanics. God creating the light moving already in its progress to the earth would not negate the mechanics of it moving to the earth.

 

[Tashah]

But say God creates the star,

My dear Montalban... you are making this more complex than it actually is. Gravity and matter accretion combine to create not only stars but all celestial objects. These dynamics have been in effect for billions of years... at least since the epoch of *recombination*. This scenario was predicted and is verified by the various Cosmic Microwave Background radiation (CMB) survey's.

and the light already travelling to earth from that star, and that which is travelling through point 'a', 'b', 'c', and 'd'. We would observe the light still travelling towards the earth in one continuous stream, only the stream was all in fact created together.

I can't make this any planer... photons are created individually and travel in constituent waves at a particular frequency or hertz. Light photons travel in discrete packets of energy known as quanta. In our continuum of space-time (3:1), photons are subject to and obey the laws of physics. To embrace your thesis would render many of the results of relativity (Lorentz transformations et. al.) null and void.

We have not observed the light travelling for millions of years. Further, it seems to me odd that you believe in God, yet don't believe in God doing anything extra-ordinary.

I hate to burst your insular bubble, but I have personally observed radiated light waves from Type 1a supernovae that have traveled approx. 10 billion light years. Type 1a supernova are excellent *standard candles* for determining distance because they all possess the same absolute magnitude (the true intrinsic magnitude of an object). If one already knows the absolute magnitude of an object and then measures the apparant magnitude (the magnitude of the light that reaches Earth), one can then mathematically calculate the distance of that object from the Earth.

And speaking of God, it seems just as odd to me that you consider it incumbant to invoke extra-ordinary explanations for typical cosmic mechanics that do not require any deistic assistence. I have been involved in the space-sciences for many years and I can honestly say that neither I nor any colleagues have ever witnessed God meddling in the dynamics of the laws of physics. I can only conclude, as the Bible stipulates, the He was pleased with what He had done.

 

[Montalban]

My dear Montalban... you are making this more complex than it actually is. Gravity and matter accretion combine to create not only stars but all celestial objects. These dynamics have been in effect for billions of years... at least since the epoch of *recombination*. This scenario was predicted and is verified by the various Cosmic Microwave Background radiation (CMB) survey's.

And God could have made the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation

I can't make this any planer... photons are created individually and travel in constituent waves at a particular frequency or hertz. Light photons travel in discrete packets of energy known as quanta. In our continuum of space-time (3:1), photons are subject to and obey the laws of physics. To embrace your thesis would render many of the results of relativity (Lorentz transformations et. al.) null and void.

If there is a God, as you seem to recognise you seem also to place limitations on what God can and can't do

I hate to burst your insular bubble, but I have personally observed radiated light waves from Type 1a supernovae that have traveled approx. 10 billion light years. Type 1a supernova are excellent *standard candles* for determining distance because they all possess the same absolute magnitude (the true intrinsic magnitude of an object). If one already knows the absolute magnitude of an object and then measures the apparant magnitude (the magnitude of the light that reaches Earth), one can then mathematically calculate the distance of that object from the Earth.

And speaking of God, it seems just as odd to me that you consider it incumbant to invoke extra-ordinary explanations for typical cosmic mechanics that do not require any deistic assistence. I have been involved in the space-sciences for many years and I can honestly say that neither I nor any colleagues have ever witnessed God meddling in the dynamics of the laws of physics. I can only conclude, as the Bible stipulates, the He was pleased with what He had done.

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You still don't understand my point. I am not saying God is continually creating the light, which means you would indeed not observe Him doing so. I said that in the act of creation He made all the light in being.

This is my last attempt. You go to a river. The water is flowing from a source to you. You stand in the river. The water is immediately touching you, but the water has travelled a long way, so that there is water touching you now, water that is a short way off from touching you, and water that is still at the source (a lake). For you, you observe the water now as an event of past present and future. Water that you can see in the distance that has passed you, water that is touching you, and water in the distance heading towards you. For you, you must assume that at one stage there was no water in the river bed, and it might have taken aeons to reach you where you now stand. You can measure the rate of the water flow and conclude the time it took for the first drops of water to make the distance from the source to where you are now.

However, what if God made the whole river in being as it is now, that is with water at the source, water where you are, water that has 'passed' where you are. Your measurements of the rate of the water flow would then not give you any indication of how long the river has run its course. And this is not to say that God is continually making the water run. It runs now, and shall continue to do so.

That is my last attempt at analogy of this. I can do no more. This will go on forever, I'm afraid as I've not got through to you; judging by your responses.

Further you seem to believe in a God of the gaps, or a God incapable of actually creating 'everything' within the universe, perhaps for you He just got the ball rolling, so to speak.

There is nothing in my notion of God to say that He could not have created everything working together.

 

[Tashah]

That is my last attempt at analogy of this. I can do no more. This will go on forever, I'm afraid as I've not got through to you; judging by your responses.

And that was my last attempt to educate you... any additional physics lectures would compel me to charge you tuition as fair and just compensation for your lack of absorbtion.

Further you seem to believe in a God of the gaps, or a God incapable of actually creating 'everything' within the universe, perhaps for you He just got the ball rolling, so to speak.

Although in your case He certainly should, God does not have to slap you into conciousness every morning does He? I never said nor intimated (scroll up) that deistic design is either an impossibility or an untruth. To the contrary, I stipulated quite clearly that I embrace theology. What I did say in my preceeding post is that God does not interfere in the clock-work mechanics of the cosmos. If it ain't broke don't fix it. Please take however much time you require and ponder the wisdom of that witticism.

There is nothing in my notion of God to say that He could not have created everything working together.

Nor in mine. In my universe everything works quite well and in perfect harmony. To quote a beautiful lyric...

Harmony and me, we're pretty good company - Elton John​

 

[laska]

I couldn't make it through the whole thread so i hope I am not mentioning something already stated. I am not a science type person and my head starts spinning on this topic but I will throw a few things out from a LDS(Mormon) perspective. A earlier poster mentioned an important point for those who want to dismiss the Bible because of certain groups interpretation of it. The hebrew word for the english translation for "day" can mean period of time, and the creation account was given to Moses, a shepherd, not a scientist, so God would explain things differently according to audience. Also the creation account is a rich piece of literature with a lot of symbolism that teaches spirtual truths and parts are probably not to be taken literally. The LDS believe the elements are eternal, they had no beginning and no end, and this is why matter cannot be destroyed. As a circle symbolizes eternity, if something has a beginning then it must have an end. A more perfect statement would be that God "organized" the earth from eternal matter. In fact the english translation "create" in the bibical record comes from a hebrew word that means to organize from matter and not to create out of nothing. Anyway, much of this argument is based on the strawman that the bible states the earth is six thousand years old, it does not, only that Adam and Eve, the parents of modern human family, lived about six thousand years ago.

 

[Tashah]

Thank you for your thoughts and thread contribution laska. Hebrew is my native tongue and I have read the Torah portions of Genesis in the archaic Hebrew religious script that dates to the Babylonian diaspora. Since Hebrew (like all Semitic languages) derives from root and stem words, deciphering the holy texts does not yield one singular truth... but rather many valid interpretations.

As an example, the word echad equates with the numeral one. When God stipulated in Genesis that He is Echad, this can be literally interpretated as *The One*. However, there is also a deeper meaning of echad in this usage than that. It also implies that God is everything that ever was, is now, and ever will be. Every attribute of God is immersed in a single entity. Light and darkness, good and evil, merciful and vengeful etc.

If you consider the interpretation of echad in this particular light then, what God is also saying is that He is everything in simultaneity and exists in a perfect symmetry. In science, a perfect symmetry is only to be found in a singularity such as the posited Big Bang. In effect, both the Torah and modern science agree in essence that an initial perfect symmetrical singularity is the wellspring of everything.

Something certainly for both creationists and evolutionists to consider.

 

[Binary_Digit]

carbon dating? There was a man who brought a leaf to a scientist to be dated, he told the scientist that he thought the leaf might be really old, and that he had never seen a leaf like this before... The scientist performed a carbon-dating test on the leaf and came back to the man and told him it was 140,000 years old... It turned out that the man had lied to the scientist and that the leaf had fallen off the tree the previous fall...

Some scientist. I guess he didn't know that carbon dating isn't accurate beyond 50,000 years. And the leaf would have to be dead for at least 50 years before enough carbon would have decayed to get an accurate reading. Living snails have been carbon dated to 43,000 years old. That doesn't mean carbon dating doesn't work. That's like saying your car doesn't work because it won't start without the key in the ignition. If you use it the wrong way, then you'll get the wrong results.

Potassium argon dating can record up to 2 billion years ago, but it only works on rock that used to be lava (basalt). It's also more accurate, because they don't have to assume a starting amount of carbon.

 

[Dogger807]

This whole discussion is a perfect example of why Christian Science is such an oxymoron. One should form a theory, establishing an experiment, observing data, and making logical deductions from the data. Instead they start with the “truth “ let others collect data and then try to cram that data into their rigid world view.

Keeping in mind that the authenticity of religious text is in itself debatable and not proof, can anyone really deduct from scratch that the world’s age is measured in a mere handful of millennia from the data provided?

We all know how long and tedious it is for anyone to make organized religion give any ground (just look at how the earth is the center of the universe.)

So my question is this, what proof is there that the earth is so young? I’d like to see you present some data to that effect that is more than nay saying evidence collected in a scientific manor.

In short, I’m looking for something, anything, nonreligious based to support your theory.

 

[Montalban]

This whole discussion is a perfect example of why Christian Science is such an oxymoron. One should form a theory, establishing an experiment, observing data, and making logical deductions from the data. Instead they start with the “truth “ let others collect data and then try to cram that data into their rigid world view.

Keeping in mind that the authenticity of religious text is in itself debatable and not proof, can anyone really deduct from scratch that the world’s age is measured in a mere handful of millennia from the data provided?

We all know how long and tedious it is for anyone to make organized religion give any ground (just look at how the earth is the center of the universe.)

So my question is this, what proof is there that the earth is so young? I’d like to see you present some data to that effect that is more than nay saying evidence collected in a scientific manor.

In short, I’m looking for something, anything, nonreligious based to support your theory.

Is exobiology science?

 

[Montalban]

And that was my last attempt to educate you... any additional physics lectures would compel me to charge you tuition as fair and just compensation for your lack of absorbtion.

Great

Although in your case He certainly should, God does not have to slap you into conciousness every morning does He?

Then you really have ignored me when I said that He doesn't have to keep doing the moving of the light. Your replies are not to what I have written, but to straw-man fuelled by incredulity

 

[Dogger807]

Is exobiology science?

This is relevant how?

Again I ask.. what proof can you submit that supports your view on the earth's age?

Disproving another's theory (or the attempt to do so.) in no way proves your own.

 

[Pacridge]

This is relevant how?

Again I ask.. what proof can you submit that supports your view on the earth's age?

Disproving another's theory (or the attempt to do so.) in no way proves your own.

Welcome to Debate Politics

 

[Montalban]

This is relevant how?

Again I ask.. what proof can you submit that supports your view on the earth's age?

Disproving another's theory (or the attempt to do so.) in no way proves your own.

I am not attempting to disprove exobiology at all. I want to know if you consider it a science or not.

When you answer "yes" or "no" I will then answer your question (It is generally considered impolite to answer a question with a question)

 

[Dogger807]

I am not attempting to disprove exobiology at all. I want to know if you consider it a science or not.

When you answer "yes" or "no" I will then answer your question (It is generally considered impolite to answer a question with a question)

Fair enough.

I must admit I haven't given this one much thought and my knowledge of exobiology is sketchy at best. Having not read any of their papers my opion in the mater is at best laden with ignorance. But from the little I have observed it seems to be a valid science. That beening said it seems very much theory based and young but still valid.

 

[Montalban]

Fair enough.

I must admit I haven't given this one much thought and my knowledge of exobiology is sketchy at best. Having not read any of their papers my opion in the mater is at best laden with ignorance. But from the little I have observed it seems to be a valid science. That beening said it seems very much theory based and young but still valid.

Cool, I also believe it is science. However in Post #118, you describe science as where

One should form a theory, establishing an experiment, observing data, and making logical deductions from the data.

This is the classic 'scientific method'. However science can, as shown by some branches of maths, and of exobiology not involve any test/experiment. Logical decutions, yes. Tests no.

SETI (or CETI) studies try to suggest what type of alien civilisations might be capable of interstelar travel, communication etc. These as yet unobserved societies are even categorised into types; Type-I, Type-II, and Type-III (maybe more that I'm not aware of). I believe you have a false idea of what science is. I just wanted to point that out, and realise that debunking your idea of science does not prove/disprove the general topic

"At this point, I think it is necessary for us to introduce or to clarify a distinction between primary-evolved civilizations and diffused civilizations....in the future evolution of our contacts, we should think about the sociology of CETI and by this I mean the social structure of the communication between technical civilizations. We have emphasized the energy aspects of Type II and Type III civilizations..."

Sagan, C, (Ed.) "Communication with Extraterrestrial Intelligence: CETI", 1973, MIT Press pp170-171


"Interstellar transmissions via energy-markers (photons) or matter-markers (probes) appear to be energetically indistinguishable alternatives for advanced technical societies. Since only Type II and Type III civilizations realistically can afford beacons or starprobe technology, alternative distinguishability criteria suggest the possible superiority of intelligent artifacts for contact and communication missions among extraterrestrial cultures. A balanced, more cost-effective Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) strategy is proposed."
http://www.rfreitas.com/Astro/InterstellarProbesJBIS1980.htm

Published in "Journal of the British Interplanetary Society", Vol. 33, pp. 95-100, 1980

 

[Dogger807]

Cool, I also believe it is science. However in Post #118, you describe science as where


This is the classic 'scientific method'. However science can, as shown by some branches of maths, and of exobiology not involve any test/experiment. Logical decutions, yes. Tests no.

tests and experimentation still occur here. However , lacking the means to implement said tests they are limited to models, mathmatics, and rational silmalies. They still fall in the clasic scientific method.

However the point I was trying to make earlier was that all arguments on a younger earth have no evidence to support this theory and the only way to argue the case is to rationalize the existing data to fit your theory instead of extrapolating a theory from said data.

 

[Tashah]

Is exobiology science?

Just for the record, the sobriquet *exobiology* was coined by Russian scientists who were the initial pioneers in this field. By common agreement in the space-sciences community, the term *astrobiology* officially replaced exobiology about a decade ago.

Astrobiology and Comparative Planetology are both considered valid disciplines and reside in the realm of the space-sciences.