Re: [asa] Denver RATE Conference (Thousands...Not Billions)_Part 2

Okay, I'm really rather embarrassed that I'm not more
familiar with this topic, but just to clarify my
understanding...

C-14 should be practically non-existent in any rock
older than about 100,000 years old...however, because
uranium and other radioactive materials give off
neutrons, and because C-14 is formed by nitrogren
capturing a neutron, C-14 can be formed at low levels
in rocks secondarily, thus creating a (relatively
constant?) "background" concentration?? (I read this
explanation at a debate forum discussing
creationism...)

In Christ,
Christine

--- Steven M Smith <smsmith@usgs.gov> wrote:

> Denver RATE Conference (Thousands...Not
> Billions)_Part 2
> Continued from Part 1
> (http://www.calvin.edu/archive/asa/200709/0498.html)
>
> "Thousands ... not Billions"
> Radioisotopes and the Age of The Earth (RATE)
> Conference
> Colorado Community Church, Denver, Colorado
> September 15, 2007 (8:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.)
>
> ------
>
> **Dr. John Baumgardner ? Coal & Diamonds Contain
> Evidence for Recent
> Formation**
>
> At 9:30 a.m., Dr. Gary Parker (the previous
> speaker-see part 1) introduced
> us directly to the next speaker; Dr. John
> Baumgardner. We were told that
> Baumgardner had a PhD. in Geophysics & Space Physics
> from UCLA, had worked
> at Los Alamos National Laboratory until he retired,
> was world famous for
> his supercomputer modeling work on Plate Tectonics
> (even featured in a US
> World & News article), now works full time with the
> Institute for Creation
> Research (ICR) where he has set up a supercomputer
> for use in Creationist
> research, and would be speaking to us about his own
> Carbon-14 (C14) dating
> research for the ICR Radioisotopes and the Age of
> The Earth (RATE)
> project.
>
> The initial PowerPoint slide for his talk had the
> title, "Evidence for a
> Young Earth: C-14 in Coal & Diamonds". In our
> conference
> schedule/brochure we were given his "Main Points"
> and some "Technical
> Definitions" that are reproduced here ...
>
> _Main Points_
> * Large amounts of Carbon-14 found in coal and
> diamonds support a young
> earth and the Biblical account of Noah's Flood
>
> _Technical Definitions_
> * CARBON-14: a short-lived isotope used for dating
> organic materials like
> fossils (Carbon-14 has a half-live of 5,730 years)
> * HALF-LIFE: the amount of time it takes for half
> of the mass of an
> isotope to decay radioactively
> * UNIFORMITARIANISM: the belief that geological
> processes have always
> been of the same kind and intensity; implies vast
> amounts of geologic time
>
> Dr. John Baumgardner began with his testimony: At
> the age of 26 he was
> converted during a Bible study of the first gospel
> of John. He had grown
> up in a non-Christian home - his father was an
> agnostic college professor.
> Before his conversion, Baumgardner was an
> evolutionist but by 6 months
> afterwards he had decided that evolution was false.
> During a weekend
> Creationist conference by Henry Morris & Duane Gish
> in Albuquerque, New
> Mexico, Baumgardner was exposed to scientific
> evidence for the Genesis
> Flood and became a Young Earth Creationist (YEC).
> Soon after that he
> became a Campus Crusades lecturer for YEC.
>
> Baumgardner was a pleasant and engaging speaker;
> especially as he shared
> his testimony. However as his talk became more
> technical, his speech was
> more dry and less dynamic (approaching monotonic)
> and filled with
> hesitations and 'uhs'. Of the four RATE research
> speakers that day,
> Baumgardner was the least dynamic and hardest to
> follow. Despite this,
> his talk was very effective - in part, I believe, by
> the scheduling of his
> lecture. As the first technical lecture of the day,
> people were eager to
> hear the science and paid close attention. Had he
> been later in the day,
> such as the first speaker after lunch, I believe his
> message would have
> been less effective. As it was, during some of the
> more technical parts
> of his talk you could see puzzled looks and furrowed
> brows on faces in the
> audience. Then he would recast his point in
> simplified English and you
> would see the faces change with relief and perceived
> understanding.
>
> When Baumgardner became a YEC, he realized that the
> Genesis Flood had to
> be a tectonic catastrophe and not just a lot of
> water. This led him to
> pursue his PhD. at UCLA to study the relationship
> between Plate Tectonics
> & the Flood. He was able to continue this research
> during the time that
> he worked at Los Alamos. His recent research is on
> radiocarbon dating but
> this study was added late to the RATE project and
> thus wasn't included to
> any great detail in the first RATE technical volume
> (RATE I book).
> However, enough work has now been done on C14 dating
> that he could share
> the major conclusions with us: "The mere presence
> of C14 in fossils show
> that they must only be a few thousands years old!
> We need more laborers
> to communicate the success of the RATE C14 studies."
>
> At this point, the talk became more technical.
> First he set the stage by
> explaining some of the basics of Carbon-14 dating
> (NOTE - I am reproducing
> here the numbers and explanations that Baumgardner
> gave. I did not
> attempt to check, corroborate, or correct these
> statements except as noted
> in [brackets]): 90% of the world's carbon is the
> stable isotope Carbon-12
> (C12) which has 6 neutrons. [He did not mention
> that C12 also has 6
> protons and that 6 protons + 6 neutrons = C12.]
> There is another stable
> carbon isotope, C13, that has 7 neutrons. C14 has 8
> neutrons (instead of
> 6), is unstable or radioactive with a half-life of
> 5,730 years., and
> decays back to Nitrogen-14 (N14) by emitting a beta
> particle. The current
> ratio of C14 to C12 in the atmosphere is 1:1.2
> trillion (1 atom of C14 for
> every 1.2 trillion atoms of C12). C14 is constantly
> being produced in the
> atmosphere as high energy protons in cosmic rays hit
> an air molecule
> (either nitrogen or oxygen) to produce neutrons.
> These neutrons interact
> with N14 to produce C14 and a proton. This
> atmospherically-produced C14
> is taken up by all living organisms (as carbon
> dioxide and in the food
> they consume). At death, the organism stops
> ingesting C14, the C14/C12
> ratio is set, and contained C14 begins to decay back
> to N14. Therefore if
> we know the initial C14/C12 ratio, the half-life of
> C14, and measure the
> remaining amount of C14, we can calculate the time
> that has passed since
> the death of the organism.
>
> Baumgardner said that there are 3 assumptions made
> for C14 dating.
> (1) The original C14 content in the atmosphere is
> known;
> (2) No exchange of carbon with surrounding
> material (he noted that this
> was difficult to guarantee); and
> (3) The C14 decay rate hasn't changed.
>
> Next we received an explanation (with PowerPoint
> diagrams) of the
> different types of instrumentation that are used to
> detect C14 in a
> sample. I will not include those details here.
> Suffice it to say that
> there is an older methodology that can measure C14
> up to about 9 or 10
> half-lives (~55,000 - 60,000 years or 55-60 ka) and
> a newer methodology
> called Accelerated Mass Spectrometry (AMS) that is
> more sensitive and can
> go to about 17 half-lives or 100 ka.
>
> Baumgardner then emphasized some points so that we
> could appreciate the
> impact of the RATE conclusions. I will quote
> statements here from my
> notes.
>
> "C14 has a half life of 5,730 years. One million
> years
=== message truncated ===

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Received on Tue Sep 25 15:17:44 2007