Research Finds Carbon Dating Flawed

eldavojohn writes "New research funded by the National Science Foundation at the University of Miami is showing that carbon dating (the 13C/12C ratio used to infer age) in the ocean can only be trusted up to 150 million years ago. From the primary researcher, 'This study is a major step in terms of rethinking how geologists interpret variations in the 13C/12C ratio throughout Earth's history. If the approach does not work over the past 10 million years, then why would it work during older time periods? As a consequence of our findings, changes in 13C/12C records need to be reevaluated, conclusions regarding changes in the reservoirs of carbon will have to be reassessed, and some of the widely-held ideas regarding the elevation of CO2 during specific periods of the Earth's geological history will have to be adjusted.' While this research doesn't necessarily throw carbon dating out the window, it should cause people to rethink so many theories about early life that revolved around ages of sediment in the oceans."

Comments

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[Idiomatick]

Is frustrating, oh no its only accurate for 150million years. JUST WAIT for the ID people to jump all over this and start with the whole dinosaurs didnt exist, invisible man made everything 5000years ago. *sighs* these people live in my neighborhood and are going to harass me with their ignorance again.

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[eebra82]

Is frustrating, oh no its only accurate for 150million years. JUST WAIT for the ID people to jump all over this and start with the whole dinosaurs didnt exist, invisible man made everything 5000years ago. *sighs* these people live in my neighborhood and are going to harass me with their ignorance again.

I realize that you're somewhat frustrated, but this does not prove science wrong. After all, that's what science is all about. You make a discovery and you prove it. Eventually, the discovery is disproved/adjusted/strenghtened due to new findings. And again, and again, and again.

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[Chris Pimlott]

It's not the science he's upset about, it's the reporting.

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[PunkOfLinux]

Now, if only the creationists would adjust their fucking theory...

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[ObitMan]

As soon as it is disproved/adjusted/strenghtened due to new findings.

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[Le Marteau]

I'm not sure you understand what the word "theory" means in science. I'll give you a hand. From (eeek) Wikipedia:

"In scientific usage, a theory does not mean an unsubstantiated guess or hunch, as it can in everyday speech. A theory is a logically self-consistent model or framework for describing the behavior of a related set of natural or social phenomena."

"Theories" are built upon "Facts". "Intelligent Design" does not even reach the level of a "Theory" because it is not based upon facts, but mere conjecture.

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[unlametheweak]

I'm sure the carbon dating will prove that the Earth was created 6000 years ago as scienticians re-evaluate the alchemy involved in the study of Earths history. Me and my buddies at the NRA were waiting for the Truth to come out and hit Humanist reality with a 45 caliber hollow point bullet. Now hopefully we can bring FUD to conspiracy of Ape-man Darwinism and relish in the biblical Truth that the big bang happened before the domestication of dogs. If you believe in Science then you have little faith.

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[Ostracus]

Hmmm. Is slashdot going to have this debate again? If memory serves no one "won" the last time. How about we cut to the chase and simply say "we agree to disagree".

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[magus_melchior]

Serious question to elucidate those who are misinformed (including myself): What effect does the Industrial Revolution and the subsequent history's use of fossil fuels have on carbon dating?

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[catbutt]

Did you maintain a count of how many opinions were changed? How do you know?

No one is going to admit they lost an argument. Some people who argued will later realize their position is weak. Other people were fence straddlers, and simply lurked and read while others debated. And some actually changed their opinion.

There are a lot of creationists who have changed their opinion, it just happens gradually, a concept many have difficulty with. You are about as unlikely to see a creationist suddenly say "wow, you're right!" as you are to see monkey give birth to a human.

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[guyminuslife]

As soon as it is disproved/adjusted/strenghtened due to new findings.

Book of Mormon?

Jesus was actually a Cylon, and God is a supercomputer. That's a new finding that should satisfy any creationist---it strictly adheres to the "pulled it out of my ass" standard of peer-review.

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[funwithBSD]

Poppers rule of Demarcation is a better measure.

IF a theory can be disproved by an observation, then it is a theory.

If there is no disprovable facts in a theory, then it is not a theory. (it must also have significant supporting evidence for it to get to the theory stage, otherwise it is a hypothesis)

ID is not a theory because there is no way to disprove it. No can prove there is no God(s), therefore it is not a matter of science, it is a matter of belief.

Evolution does not state life began on earth by autogenesis. It states that species evolve and specialize, and that more complex lifeforms evolved from lesser life forms.

So there are several possibilities:
a. Autogenesis
b. Exo-genesis (life came from another planet)
c. Intelligent Design (genesis)
d. Exo-genesis by another life form. (Quite a few nutters fall into this category, but it is also possible)

Occums Razor cuts out c, marginalizes d, and splits a/b in half with a being the most simple explanation.
If we find identical lifeforms on Mars or in comet/astroid that matched Earth DNA exactly AND it predated any lifeform possibility on earth then b gets a boost as to how life formed on Earth.

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[glitch23]

Is frustrating, oh no its only accurate for 150million years. JUST WAIT for the ID people to jump all over this and start with the whole dinosaurs didnt exist, invisible man made everything 5000years ago. *sighs* these people live in my neighborhood and are going to harass me with their ignorance again.

I'm sure they get tired of you harassing them with your holier-than-thou attitude. Remember, one man's teaching the "facts" is another man's spreading propaganda. Both sides always feels harassed except that one side is always thinking it's one way because of the holier-than-though attitude.

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[jeevesbond]

Now, if only the creationists would adjust their fucking theory...

As soon as it is disproved/adjusted/strenghtened due to new findings.

Creationism is not a theory. Two properties of a theory are: must be possible to disprove; and must be able to predict results of a test. Creationism is capable of neither of these things.

It is impossible to test or disprove that an invisible man is living in the sky, therefore this is the realm of philosophy and spirituality. These things that have their place, but should not be interfering, aiming to replace, or masquerade as good science.

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[DrCJM]

In spite of such evidence, evolution believing geologists build models based on today's observed rates of change and expect these to produce reliable results reaching back millions or billions of years.

Allow me to interrupt you there...

The geological observations that lead to the model of a multi-billion year old earth were made by creationist geologists. Many before the theory of evolution had been proposed.

This is one of the minor errors in your contribution. The accuracy and 'linearity' of radiometric dating has been demonstrated (both theoretically and experimentally) and confirmed beyond any shadow of reasonable doubt - your beliefs notwithstanding. Please learn something about the history of geology, evolution and the philosophy of science before commenting on them again.

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[Inner_Child]

But dinosaurs were animals, right? If that's true, Noah should have had them on the Ark and they never should have perished in the Flood. If Noah didn't do this, he directly disobeyed the will of God (likely out of a desire not to be eaten, and I can't say that I blame him). And God was okay with this "oversight"? Sounds to me like there's a wee bit of a double standard there...

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[mattOzan]

"Theories" are built upon "Facts". "Intelligent Design" does not even reach the level of a "Theory" because it is not based upon facts, but mere conjecture.

I don't think sets of natural or social phenomena are best referred to as "facts," but rather "observations."

In common parlance, "facts" tend to include suppositions, conscious or not, about the causation, correlation or relation of observations.

"Fact: It is raining." != "Observation: Liquid seems to be falling onto the sidewalk."

The former takes the mere observation, links it with other previous observations, and raises it to a declaration based on categorization. Some night say this is a form of "theorizing" in itself.

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[unlametheweak]

Your quote:

Actually, the people who are critical of being lead like sheep into believing current estimates on the age of the earth (whether intelligent design proponents or simply intelligent critical thinkers) have been citing flaws in carbon dating for years.

Radiocarbon dating isn't used to determine the age of the Earth:

Radiocarbon dating is a radiometric dating method that uses the naturally occurring radioisotope carbon-14 (14C) to determine the age of carbonaceous materials up to about 60,000 years... One of the most frequent uses of radiocarbon dating is to estimate the age of organic remains from archaeological sites.

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dating

For dating the age of the Earth or anything in the billions of years one is not going to use carbon-14, but rather something like uranium because "Uranium and thorium have long half-lives, and so persist in Earth's crust..." (Ref. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_the_Earth#Modern_radiometric_dating).

Your quote:

Presently there are too many circular arguments in so-called scientific theories on the age of the earth which cannot be independently or repeatably tested for me to throw any weight behind the random numbers I saw in my text books.

I've personally never seen any "circular arguments" or any "random numbers" in the text books that I was assigned to read.

You said:

...you don't want to be confronted with others' beliefs.

I don't think anybody likes confrontation. The debate is really about religious beliefs being passed off as science, and more importantly (to the gp at least) the potential FUD that almost always seems to arrive from ideologues when scientists improve their theories or observations.

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[dafrazzman]

Occums Razor cuts out c, marginalizes d, and splits a/b in half with a being the most simple explanation.

I am sick of people abusing Occam's Razor. It is by no means a scientific law, but rather a method of choosing which guess is the best guess. Even used as such, it's much more philosophical than scientific.

Read Wikipedia if you like.

Occam's razor is not an embargo against the positing of any kind of entity, or a recommendation of the simplest theory come what may[11] (Note that simplest theory is something like "only I exist" or "nothing exists"). Simpler theories are preferable other things being equal.

"Other things being equal." This is often applicable, but is a big stretch in this particular situation. Since we are making our guess about the existence or non-existence of God independent of any significant evidence (one side can say "autogenesis, things evolved, no God", the other can say "God made everything, everything is the way it is because God made it that way", both sides' explanations can fit the evidence equally well (regardless of whether or not one is actually a theory)), we must resort to philosophical arguments. This is where Occam's Razor is often abused as some sort of scientific law. It's not, it is purely philosophical and statistical. As said in wikipedia, it is only truly applicable "other things being equal." However, to say that all things are equal on both sides is ludicrous. There are massive philosophical ramifications for either guess, and any attempt to effectively weigh them all in a manner agreeable even with most people is surely doomed to failure.

My point here is that the existence or non-existence of creation is not a matter that can be settled scientifically, as much as we would all like. Attempts to use Occam's Razor in this way are the products of somebody who wants to fool themselves or others into thinking that creation is naturally excluded by some law.

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[Stephan Schulz]

The difference between advanced space aliens and a deity is the the supposed omnipotency of a deity. It can do anything without leaving any traces, hence it's existence can never be refuted. "Last Tuesday the invisible Pink Unicorn created the universe with the apparent age of 13.6 billion years".

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[Stephan Schulz]

...For example, the process of radioactivity is used to date living and non living objects. Carbon dating is only one of these dating methods based on radioactivity. Science has known about radioactivity for only about 100 years. Over that short time span we observed radioactive decays to be occurring at a quite regular, apparently highly predictable rate. We assume (believe) therefore that this is a linear process, even over immense amounts of time, millions and even billions of years.

We can actually observe many radioactive decay processes long in the past, by looking at events far away. Supernova SN 1987A, for example, allowed a very good observation of uranium decay 168000 years ago.

We can also C14-date objects over a wide range of known history, and synchronize the dates with e.g. dendrochronology and simple recorded history. This is not enough to deal with geological time ranges, but it is plenty long enough to rule out any kind of Bishop Uther young earth chronology.

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[Hal_Porter]

No, no. Evolution is the ABSOLUTE TRUTH and creationists are HERETICS.

Seriously people get over yourselves. People who claim to believe in evolution on the internet have quite clearly never read any science and are behaving like some caricature of ignorant fundamentalists.

It's one thing to read some Dawkins when you're a teenager and decide he's probably right and it's cool to watch him argue with idiots. It's quite another to try to be Dawkins yourself in your thirties when you have one millionth of the knowledge he does.

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[IWannaBeAnAC]

Let's say for the sake of argument that some advanced alien space travelling race created life on earth and guided its advancement over time through genetic engineering. There's no reason in principle why this fact, if it was a fact, could not be subjected to scientific investigation. If we substitute divine being for alien being, nothing changes in principle.

Err, if you substitute divine being for alien being, then everything changes. It isn't creationism anymore, since that explicitly attributes everything to an omnipotent god, there is no room to substitute an alien being. If you made this suggestion to a creationist they would either laugh at you or smack you.

Besides, I would agree with you that the hypothesis "an alien race created life on earth" is something that could, in principle, be tested scientifically (eg, by searching for the aliens and trying to communicate with them, or trying to find some alien artifacts they left behind, or testing the rate of genetic change to see if it matches what biology/chemistry/physics would predict), but the same cannot be said for creationism. I've never heard of anyone (except perhaps for some fringe nutjob cults) trying to use the SETI project to communicate with god. Indeed, I think pretty much all creationists would be very clear that creationism isn't a science in this sense. To them, god exists, and simply isn't subject to what we call the laws of physics. Whereas of course an alien race WOULD be subject to the laws of physics!

What some creationists do claim is that there is scientific evidence that demonstrates that the biblical creation myth is correct, especially in details such as the great flood etc. The biblical creation myth is indeed testable by science, but the result isn't what the creationists like! So they ignore it and just pretend.

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[Mattsson]

They don't have a theory.
They don't have a hypothesis.
They don't even have a conjecture, since that is something that is unproven but deemed likely to be true

All the creationists have is a set of guesses.
Hmm... In the eyes of a creationists, their guesses probably are likely to be true, so they can say that creationism is a conjecture.

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[Alsee]

What effect does the Industrial Revolution and the subsequent history's use of fossil fuels have on carbon dating?

Interesting question.

It would have no effect on anything already old and dead. It wouldn't really have any effect on normal uses of carbon dating. What the Industrial Revolution and burning fossil fuels has done is taken large amounts of "old" C14-depleted carbon out of the ground and dumped it into the atmosphere as CO2. Radiation hitting the upper atmosphere slowly turns some of that carbon into "fresh" radioactive C14. However I believe it takes several thousands of years for that conversion to C14 to really rise to its full level. So this means that for a few thousand years the carbon in the air is going to be somewhat C14 depleted - it reads as "old" in carbon dating. Plants will consume that "old" carbon CO2 from the air and photosynthesize it into the sugars and starches and proteins and everything else that makes up the plant. This should have the effect of dead modern plants testing as probably a few hundred years older than they actually are. It will have the same effect on animals - the plants eat "old" carbon from the air and then the animals eat the "old" carbon from the plants. The animals build their bodies out of that "old" carbon in their food.

So the effect will likely be maybe a few hundred year shift in the apparent readings for materials from this general era, but carbon dating readings will be calibrated against the expected results to take that effect into account. Future archaeologists may have trouble telling the difference between 1700's materials and 2000's materials. They may read about the same.

My estimates may be off on the size of the effect, but that is how carbon dating works and that is approximately the sort of impact it should have.

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[penguin king]

What gives anyone the right to try set out and change what someone believes? If you want to have a belief system with an omnipotent deity, and the structure of your life rests on that, then I think it's incredibly immature for someone to try argue against it. We just all need to learn to keep our own beliefs to ourselves, and those that _want_ to hear them. There shouldn't be any stupidity about trying to change peoples minds.

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[Sique]

If we substitute divine being for alien being, nothing changes in principle.

Everything changes. The alien hypothesis would lead immediately to further questions:
- Was it a single visit, or several visits of the aliens?
- If several, does a pattern emerge?
- If several, were they the same aliens? Or did different types of alien visit us?
- If several of the same type, can we detect a development in technology and goals of the aliens?
- If a single visit, did they come and leave again, or are they still present?
- If a single visit, can we determine when and where they landed?
- ...

All those questions can be handled scientificially. With an omnipotent being, none of those questions makes any sense.

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[knutkracker]

Radioactive dating is not the only branch of science that assumes constancy over a long time.

Well, yes. But if you want to take that stance and question the well -evidenced assumptions in the 'God-wants-to-test-our faith' game, why not be properly scientific (as you seem to want to be) and test all your assumptions and not just some. For example, the assumption that the Bible is actually the word of God. I hear creationists go on and on about the minutiae of evolutionary science, but deafening silence about how to choose between the numerous holy books that claim to be the one and only.

Given the number of religions in the world (~2000) I can only come to the conclusion that not only did God plant fossils and such like to test us, but that he also planted the false holy books for the same reasons. How can you be so certain that you're following the right one?

Personally, I'd say that the Bible doesn't look so hot. Its got references to genocide, sexual deviancy and oppression of women (all sanctioned by God) and the 10 commandments are a very poor attempt at a universal moral code. Things like 'Thou shalt not keep slaves' or 'Thou shalt not abuse children' spring to mind as obvious oversights.

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[jacquesm]

that's easy, the alien artifact is us.

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[ObitMan]

i'll agree with what you say.

No believer in creation should be afraid of what science concludes. but many are. It's silly.
The fact that scientific discovery is ongoing is not proof that it's flawed, it's just proof that we continue to learn about the things around us.
That is important. In fact I think God would be pleased that his creation was using thier thinking abilities to the full. Because if a person believes in creation and an omnipotent being that started it. How better to learn about that creator than by examining the creation.

Where the ID and creationist loudmouths fall short is that they don't leave any room in thier interpretations for any new information that arises.
These people forget that the bible is not a text book on science but a message concerning God and his Soveriegnty.

"In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth" does not specify any time periods of methods. I won't get into the whole "days" issue and the parallel creation accounts in genesis, but there's a lot of room to examine scientific discovery and correlate it with what the Bible has to say and there not be any conflict on most matters.

Faith doesn't need proof, but when facts jive with faith it's faith strengthening.
And when scientific theory does not fall in line with my Faith I don't worry. This is because whats postulated in any theory is usually based on the best knowledge of the time. When that knowledge changes the theory will change or eventually it may be confirmed. And if some scientific matter is confirmed and it seems to disagree with the bible, the faithful person should re-examine thier understanding of the issue involved.

I'll point to the calculation of Pi in the bible. At face value it's wrong according to current understanding. To dogmatically insist that it is exactly 3 would make for all sorts of errors if needing the value for anything.
It doesn't mean that the bible is wrong, it just means that the understanding of the dimensions presented in 1 Kings 7:23 may be off. One would have to know that he measurements are given in round numbers (as the Hebrews tended to round off measurements to whole numbers), that cubits were not exact units, or that the basin may not have been exactly circular, or that the brim was wider than the bowl itself.

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[Alsee]

It's one thing to read some Dawkins

I've never read any Dawkins, but from the few clips I've seen of him on TV he seems like a bit of an ass.

People who claim to believe in evolution on the internet have quite clearly never read any science

Hmmm. Willful trolling, or incredibly misinformed?

Every national or international science organization with an an official position on evolution state that evolution in overwhelmingly confirmed by all evidence. Just a sampling of such scientific bodies that have made such statements on the subject:
Academy Of Science Of The Royal Society Of Canada
Alabama Academy Of Science
American Anthropological Association
American Association For The Advancement Of Science
American Association Of Physical Anthropologists
American Astronomical Society
American Geophysical Union
American Institute Of Biological Sciences
American Astronomical Society
American Society Of Biological Chemists
American Chemical Society
American Geological Institute
American Psychological Association
American Physical Society
American Society Of Parasitologists
Association for Women Geoscientists
Australian Academy of Science
Botanical Society of America
California Academy Of Sciences
Ecological Society of America
Genetics Society of America
Geological Society Of America
Geological Society of Australia
Georgia Academy Of Science
History of Science Society
Iowa Academy Of Science
Kentucky Academy Of Science
Kentucky Paleontological Society
Louisiana Academy Of Sciences
National Academy Of Sciences
North American Benthological Society
North Carolina Academy Of Science
New York Academy Of Sciences
Ohio Academy Of Science
Ohio Academy Of Science
Ohio Math and Science Coalition
Oklahoma Academy Of Sciences
The Paleontological Society
Society For Amateur Scientists
Society For Integrative and Comparative Biology
Society Of Systematic Biologists
Society Of Vertebrate Paleontology
Southern Anthropological Society
Virginia Academy Of Science
West Virginia Academy Of Science

You can read the statements from each of them collected here.

Actually the "National Academy of Science" for almost every major nation on earth has made such a statement, but I don't have a handy link for all of them.

There are minor activist groups dedicated to both sides of the issue, but as far as National or International organizations dedicated to science or particular fields of science, non-biased organizations that incidentally issues position statements on the issue as an incidental action aside from their actual mission of preforming and promoting other science, every single one has come down on the side of confirming the scientific legitimacy of evolution and categorizing the anti-evolution side as invalid or pseudo science.

In fact I personally have dabbled in some evolution experiments and I have personally witnessed the fact that it's right and works.

On your side you have the crackpot answersingenesis website, and you have the Discovery Institute activists and a couple of other minor activist groups, and not one single legitimate scientific body, not one recognized International or National body dedicated to general science.

If you think the science is against evolution, you have been wildly misinformed. Except for a tiny fraction of a single percent, actual professional degreed scientists across all of the earth and life sciences come down on the side of evolution being valid and established by the evidence.

You can cite Michael Behe and a small handful of other actual degreed professional biologists who dispute evolution, but as I said they represent a minuscule faction of a percent. And not a single major body dedicated to general science acknowledges any credible scientific results from any of their attempts to refu

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[unlametheweak]

There are a lot of creationists who have changed their opinion, it just happens gradually...

You mean through the process of evolution?

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[Alsee]

There could have been evolutionists who have changed their opinions as well

Possible, though I have never seen it. I guess it's fair to say many people on the evolution side haven't really looked at the evidence might be persuadable. In my experience the anti-evolution arguments are only good for preaching to the highly motivated choir, or to present the uninvolved uninformed general public with a general impression that a scientific controversy exists. The claims never hold up under informed critical review.

The debate has been more heat than light

Yes, sadly. However there is still some light amidst all the heat. I personally have completely won over a few converts to the evolution side. There are many many people convinced evolution==atheism or somesuch, people who rant against evolution with no interest in mutually discussing and honestly considering each other's evidence on the subject, and of course conversations with them go nowhere. However I have also had people come in asserting some doubts, challenges, questions against evolution and honestly examining the response. And such people are inevitably amazed by the examples of science and evidence that exist backing up evolution. People saying wow, I didn't know all that was out there. People suddenly coming to a very strong decision about which side is grossly guilty of pushing false claims.

Just to cite a single example and to squeezed it down to a single sentence, there is a chunk of the fossil record that is completely continuous and gap-free showing the intermediate forms spanning thousands of species - a chunk of evidence which is pretty well sufficient all by itself to establish the validity of evolution beyond any reasonable doubt. If you want me to back that up I can copy-past a several paragraphs from one of my old posts explaining it in detail.

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[Hatta]

Two properties of a theory are: must be possible to disprove; and must be able to predict results of a test.

Aren't those the same thing? If a theory predicts the results of a test, and you get different results, you have disproved that theory. Likewise, if a theory makes no predictions, how is it possible to disprove it?

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[budword]

"Last Tuesday the invisible Pink Unicorn created the universe with the apparent age of 13.6 billion years".

Change that to the Giant Spaghetti Monster, and you've got me.

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[budword]

Flying Spaghetti Monster.... sorry, I've been touched by his noodley appendage this morning, and it's left me dazed, and with less money than I had before. (Does that mean it's officially a religion now ?)

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[spidercoz]

Please, don't give credence to ID by calling it a "theory".

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[Wildclaw]

n the exact same respect, Evolution cannot be a theory with that logic

Testing a theory works like this:

1. Prediction: Think of a way that the world can be obeserved that could contradict the theory in question.
2. Preparation: If the observation can not be found or is more difficult to do in nature, create it artifically, otherwise find it in nature.
3. Observation: Make the observation and see if the observation matches or contradicts the theory.

A common misconception seems to be about points number two. Creationists seems to have the misconceptions that tests has to be done in labs and be infinitly repeatable in the exact same way. This is simply not true. As long as similar tests can be done on the same prediction, that is more than enough.

There exists more than enough fossiles to implement the scientific method. While there aren't an infinite number of fossiles, there are enough to provide for an acceptable amount of repeatable observations. Of course, we could one day run out of new fossiles to study and that would mean we could no longer make tests based on finding new fossiles. Still, even then it would be possible to study existing fossiles.

and when it is decided that it is several thousand years old, life just evolved a bit faster. "Theory" status only fits on limited perspectives, such as gravity on earth and the laws of thermodynamics.

Oh, that reminds me. The grandparent is slightly incorrect. Creationism actually had a theory which was disproven. The 6000 year old prediction simply didn't work out. Too many scientists has found how it contradicts various observations.

He may be talking about intelligent design which distanced itself from anything that could be disproven.

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[mdwh2]

Okay then - what predictions does the "theory" of Intelligent Design make? And what would falsify it?

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[guyminuslife]

You're accusing me of trolling, which is fine. However, I'm more concerned with the fact that this information you present means that I'm hopelessly unoriginal, which does concern me. I will have to be snarky in more creative ways, it seems.

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[Shimmer]

God is the Universe, sentient or not, it contains you, me and everything else. We are all part of the whole.

The English word "God" refers to a supreme being. You can look it up yourself. If you are not referring to a supreme being, why not just stick with the word "Universe" instead. That's what scientists do.

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[IWannaBeAnAC]

Astronomers know this and mention it often, but they tend to say things like 'The Universe is getting bigger' or 'Galaxies are moving away from each other as the space between them grows'...ie. mass is getting smaller.

Sorry, that doesn't follow. Yes everything is moving apart, which means that the average density of the observable universe is decreasing, but that has nothing to do with the total mass. For example, I could give you a solid block of lead weighing say 1000lbs, that would be a small-ish object, maybe about 1 cubic foot (I'm just giving some example numbers). Then I could melt it and re-form it into a honeycomb structure that contained lots of gaps and was, say, 10 foot across. It has gotten bigger, but the mass hasn't increased!

But I have a suspicion that there is a variable factor involved in the decay rate that physics has overlooked.

While it is possible that some physical 'constants' are actually changing value in time, there are lots of experiments in this area and there are quite rigorous bounds that show that, if there is any variation, it is on time-scales of ~ billions of years, and of no consequence to carbon dating methods. For example, if there was some changing physical constant that caused nuclear decay rates to change over time, then this would change in the rate of nuclear fusion in the sun (which depends on the same physics as nuclear decay), and this would be observable in astronomical observations of distant stars. In fact, that no such effect is seen is one of the experiments that puts a bound on how fast the physical constants can be changing over time.

There may also be some biological reasons why the C12/C13 ratios in particular, could change in time. But this would be due to changes in biology as species have evolved, not changes in the underlying physical laws. The ratios of C12 and C13 retained by plants is determined by things like climate and moisture. Both of these isotopes are stable, it is just the slightly different sizes and masses cause them to act slightly differently in chemical reactions. This has nothing to do with radioactive decay (which is C14 radiocarbon dating, which is based on the notion that unstable radioactive C14 is made in the upper atmosphere by cosmic ray collisions, so while a plant is living it absorbs some fraction of C14 from the atmosphere, and this stops when the plant dies. So by seeing how much of the C14 has decayed into a stable atom [into nitrogen-14 in fact] and how much of it remains, you can determine how long ago the plant died.)

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[morcego]

You can still look at which side has the most evidence and make a logical conclusion.

I was once talking to a Jesuit Priest who was a physics teacher, and asked him about the whole "science vs. religion" thing (way before the whole ID bullshit). His answer was pretty simple:

Some ignorant people are too concerned on the "how" god made things. There is nothing in science that goes against religion. DNA, Dinosaurs. Why can't people that believe in god simply understand that the bible was written to be read by people who didn't understand science, and to people who didn't understand science. As far as I believe, this is just the way god decided to do things. One can easily believe in god and still believe in evolution

Despite personal believes, it is still good to see there is sane people even inside the roman catholic church, who can separate science and religion. Actually, that same priest (which was my teacher at one point) was a vigorous defender of evolution. I haven't talked to him for about 15 years, but I'm pretty sure he is just as sick of the ID people as we all are. And he is a priest. Which just shows how stupid the ID people are.
 

Re:Title

[ausmusj]

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

Why is the "supposed omnipotency of a deity" not attributable to a sufficiently advanced alien race? Are we, as human-kind, so egotistical to think that we have unlocked enough of the mysteries of science to believe that we know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that certain things are impossible? I, for one, think that we can not *ever* rule out the possibility of life forms so far advanced beyond us that they are indistinguishable from a deity.

What would we seem like to an amoeba? Can't we essentially "create" the amoeba's universe, even with characteristics that would make an amoeba think that it was an naturally evolved universe over a period of millions of years? Who's to say that we're not amoebas in someone else's petri dish?

Re:Title

[Shimmer]

Science is one shifty bitch. Human spirituality needs something more stable.

What a crock. It's reality that's shifty - science is just trying to plumb it. My spirituality recognizes this, but yours apparently puts the need for "stability" above the need for truth. This is the precisely attitude that leads to theocracy.

Re:Title

[w0mprat]

If it's not Theory, Hypothesis not even Conjecture... then your left with Fiction

Oh no!

[Anonymous Coward]

carbon dating can only be trusted up to 150 million years ago

Does that mean we'll never know for sure how old John McCain is?

Re:Oh no!

[Anonymous Coward]

> Does that mean we'll never know for sure how old John McCain is?

Nah, we just have to ask some dirt how old it is.

Re:Oh no!

[oldhack]

Does that mean we'll never know for sure how old John McCain is?

Big Bang is only a theory. Only McCain knows how the shit went down.

Re:Oh no!

[evilviper]

Does that mean we'll never know for sure how old John McCain is?

Not at all!

We just have to wait until he dies (which will no doubt be on November 5, because God hates us) to cut him open and count his rings.

Spore?

[wcspxyx]

Will there be a patch?

Re:Spore?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Spore already supports Intelligent Design.

Not news

[orkybash]

Anyone who uses any form of radiometric dating knows that there are limits to the accuracy. The fact that a new limit was discovered doesn't make the technique "flawed", though I will grant that it may call for re-evaluation of some results. Anyone who thinks that the fact that these limits exist is news, though, is terribly misguided.

Re:Not news

[DrCJM]

Not wanting to be a pedant, but 13C/12C dating isn't radiometric. Neither isotope of carbon is radioactive.

OK, may I do want to be a pedant. :)

Re:Not news

[Anonymous Coward]

The title "Carbon Dating Flawed" was a poor choice as there are at least 2 different carbon dating methods, and the most common and well-known, radiocarbon-14 dating, isn't affected by the finding.

Re:Not news

[bigstrat2003]

The fact that a new limit was discovered doesn't make the technique "flawed"

Well, to be proper, it does make it flawed, it just doesn't mean that the technique is worthless.

Re:Not news

[zippthorne]

Based on the article, it appears that it isn't "dating" either: it is used to infer biological activity. Presumably, the sample would be dated using other isotopes.

Re:Not news

[Monsieur_F]

We geeks are always confused when dating is involved.

Re:Jesus is the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

JESUS cares about those dirty rocks, you insensitive clod!

Re:Jesus is the answer

[ichbineinneuben]

I'm having a hard time believing that "no one cares about some dirty rocks under the ocean" makes up a full half of the only knowledge that truly matters.

Re:This has been known for some time

[DrCJM]

You're confusing 14C radiometric dating with 13C/12C isotopic ratio dating. There is no decay rate issue for 13C/12C dating - well, except maybe for theoretical proton decay!

Well duh!

[EmbeddedJanitor]

I've been trying to date carbon based life forms for a while now and it is damn tricky.

I was going to switch to one of those plastic blow up dolls until I found out that they're loaded with carbon too!

Re:Well duh!

[Migity]

Doesn't posting on /. make it harder to date carbon based life forms??? You may want to look into that.

Re:Damn...

[jadedoto]

The same ones that say "God put the fossils on Earth to test your faith" ?

Re:Damn...

[Narpak]

For crying out loud its a belief. Beliefs are by nature irrational. If you believe that the earth was created by aliens, God, etc it can't be proven either way.

Unless god(s) or the aliens actually shows up and confirms it of course. Even then I reckon there will be wide-ranging debate on the issue.

29 dimensions of carbon compatibility

[charlesbakerharris]

For next-generationcarbon dating, try eCarbony.com

Not at all the news you're thinking of

[momerath2003]

The radiocarbon dating you're talking about, and most of the posters are thinking of, is with the radioactive isotope Carbon-14 against the stable Carbon-12. This is what's used to date more recent carbon-based life.

This is not what this article is talking about. The method in question is using two stable isotopes and apparently wrongly assuming a correlation between the 13/12 ratio in the plants and the atmosphere.

Re:Damn...

[Tr3vin]

Unfortunately, he is not trolling. I've heard the very same thing before. I definitely have seen that opinion expressed by creationists, although it is hardly the majority. I've also heard that fossils are a device of the devil. Fortunately, these ideas were only from a select few.

So much hate...

[megamerican]

Why are there so many people in this thread worried about what other people are going to think about this? So many reactions were so similar it seems to be a Pavlovian response.

It is really sad that people who consider themselves to be smarter than others would immediately resort to the grade-school tactic of making fun of others because they are different than you in an attempt to make yourself feel accepted by the group.

I must be new here.

P.S. I'm no creationist or ID advocate.

Re:So much hate...

[jfengel]

Because the creationists have been pushing an untenable decision for quite some time, using extremely dubious tactics. They've achieved a disturbing amount of political success by exploiting people's ignorance of science.

Imagine how much they can accomplish when they can point to scientists actually being wrong about something. Never mind that it does nothing to bolster their position. All they need is to sow doubt about science.

Scientifically, this is merely interesting. Politically, it's an immense hassle on a battle which wastes a huge amount of time with zero scientific merit.

So yeah, you're gonna get some bitching when this sort of thing happens.

Re:So much hate...

[unlametheweak]

Why are there so many people in this thread worried about what other people are going to think about this?

It matters because any FUD (apparent or real) about science will be exploited by those whose political ideologies diverge with scientific findings. For political ideologues, any apparent negative-sounding news means exploitable FUD. This can effect how education is funded and mandated, among other things. Science unfortunately is not an Ivory Tower sheltered from politicians.

Re:So much hate...

[mike2R]

From a correspondence between Ensign Guy H. Raner and Albert Einstein in 1945 and 1949. Einstein responds to the accusation that he was converted by a Jesuit priest: "I have never talked to a Jesuit prest in my life. I am astonished by the audacity to tell such lies about me. From the viewpoint of a Jesuit priest I am, of course, and have always been an atheist." "I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one.You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from religious indoctrination received in youth." Freethought Today, November 2004

"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it." From a letter Einstein wrote in English, dated 24 March 1954. It is included in Albert Einstein: The

From a letter Einstein wrote in English, dated 24 March 1954. It is included in Albert Einstein: The Human Side, edited by Helen Dukas and Banesh Hoffman, published by Princeton University Press. Albert Einstein, Out of My Later Years (New York: Philosophical Library, 1950), p. 27.

"During the youthful period of mankind's spiritual evolution, human fantasy created gods in man's own image who, by the operations of their will were supposed to determine, or at any rate influence, the phenomenal world... The idea of God in the religions taught at present is a sublimation of that old conception of the gods. Its anthropomorphic character is shown, for instance, by the fact that men appeal to the Divine Being in prayers and plead for the fulfillment of their wishes... In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vase power in the hands of priests." Albert Einstein, reported in Science, Philosophy and Religion: A Symposium, edited by L. Bryson and

"Thus I came...to a deep religiosity, which, however, reached an abrupt end at the age of 12. Through the reading of popular scientific books I soon reached a conviction that much in the stories of the Bible could not be true....Suspicion against every kind of authority grew out of this experience...an attitude which has never left me." The Quotable Einstein

"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

I hate science journalism

[IICV]

A classic example of science journalists who don't have any idea what they're writing about! Ratios of 13C/12C in ocean sediments are used as a proxy of paleoproductivity and a weak proxy of past temperatures. Generally 18O/16O is a better temperature proxy, and is just as easy to obtain. No one really relies on carbon isotopes for anything, except sometimes methane hydrate release. Carbon dating, like figuring out how old something is, is done with 14C/12C, and it is a well known fact that carbon dating is only useful back to 50,000 years ago. Bad science journalism makes me sad inside.

Re:I hate science journalism

[Kesch]

The article at least seemed to have a fairly good grasp of the subject. I guess they may have overstated the implications a bit to make the article seem less boring.

Although, no one even seems to read far enough into the article to come away with that naive misunderstanding. Instead people seem to think this related to carbon-14 dating and going into off-topic discussions about creationism when the off-topic discussion for this article should in-fact be global warming.

Re:I hate science journalism

[rve]

I agree. Long ago I noticed that journalists are often spectacularly wrong about stuff I happen to know a lot about.

How can I trust them to be right about things I don't know much about?

Re:I hate science journalism

[smoker2]

Exactly.
I watched a BBC program about global warming last week, where the well meaning and apparently ill-qualified scientist presenting made several glaring scientific errors. The most laughable was when he described the Keeling curve. All very interesting, up until he summed up the segment by saying that now that Keeling had taken measurements of the growth of CO2 in the atmosphere over a long period, we now had irrefutable proof that humans caused global warming.
Absolute bollocks. All Keeling had done was show that CO2 over time had increased in the atmosphere. The cause of that increase had not been established, so using a set of measurements to attribute a cause is unforgivable.
It makes me sick.
Of course the rest of the program was spent building on that fallacious argument to prove the agenda. How is the general public supposed to understand science when even the most vocal proponents twist the evidence to fit their opinion ? Note that I am not siding with AGW or the sceptics here, I am just pointing out the misinformation and bad scientific methods used to illustrate the issues to the public.

Re:Damn...

[debatem1]

I hear that all the time. And that the scientists who dig up dinosaur bones are agents of the Adversary, and that they know better but refuse to acknowledge God out of pride. This is out there. A quick anecdote:

When I was 7 or 8, there was a kid up the road who was about my same age from a Pentecostal family. Being a kid and fascinated by anything that seemed bitey, I loved dinosaurs, and at some point during a neighborhood get-together I told him so. He promptly told me that I was going to hell for believing Satan over God. I, growing up in a family that could be charitably described as occasionally Catholic, asked him (in slightly different terms) what the fuck he was talking about, and how he could refuse to believe that dinosaurs walked the earth when there were so many fossils and such a well-constructed fossil record. The conversation ended when he, within hearing range of both his parents and mine, shouted "Shut up, Satan! I'm going home to get my Bible!", and left.

Now, don't get me wrong, kids can make up some damned creative things- but I would wager my bottom dollar that there isn't a kid alive that would come up with the idea that dinosaur bones were planted by the Devil all on his own. My guess is that we don't have to look too far from the ol' homestead to figure out where he found that particular line.

At least someone got it right

[IvyKing]

I had assumed from the article title that it was about C-14 dating, but TFS wasn't misleading for a change. One of the problems in using C13/C12 ratios is that there are many processes that will enrich or deplete the amount of C13.

Pop sci

[EmbeddedJanitor]

Write anything that attracts eyeballs and sells magazines or gets hits.

Don't let science or facts stand in the way of business.

Unfortunately this serves as "science" for the unwashed masses where public opinion and being fashionable count more than the quest for "truth".

Re:So much fear...

[UncleTogie]

I find it much more insightful "who" is feeling threatened than anything else. I'll refrain from naming the parties but a moment's inspection will clear that up.

Easy answer: extremists on all sides of the debate. The rest of us are more willing to expand what we know....

Best cure for fundamentalists: scripture.

[copponex]

You need to learn the bible for insight into much of western thought, but you should also learn it for the fun that can be had with it's biblically ignorant followers.

First, ask them what the ten commandments are. This will trip 95% of them up and they'll walk away without bothering you. If they say that the commandments are not important, tell them you think the same about the rest of the Bible.

Claim you don't believe in Yahweh because you don't believe in infanticide. They'll give you a strange look, and then ask them to read Psalm 137:9, which is in context, Jews daydreaming about smashing their enemies' infants to pieces.

Ask them if they eat lobster, or if there's a girl in the group, if they wear pants. If they say yes, ask them why they support the homosexual agenda, since all three are abominations according to the bible.

They will go to great lengths to explain away why what they do or don't is covered by some painful translation-based loopholes, and what everyone else does is what's really wrong. This is the basic definition of a hypocrite, which concerns my favorite scripture:

'As he taught, Jesus said, "Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted in the marketplaces, and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows' houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. Such men will be punished most severely.'

Don't get me wrong, the world would be a great place of everyone followed the advice of Jesus, but most of them have never read more than ten pages of their Holy Book.

Re:Best cure for fundamentalists: scripture.

[commodoresloat]

Don't get me wrong, the world would be a great place of everyone followed the advice of Jesus

That's for sure! If everyone learned to turn the other cheek it would be so much easier to overpower and enslave them all and run the place! MUWAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Re:Best cure for fundamentalists: scripture.

[TheManifold]

Except that Jesus said that he did not come to abolish the Laws (first 5 books of the Bible as you know it) or the Prophets;

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."

Matthew 5:17-20

Following Jesus' advice would not necessarily make the world a better place, then.

Please realise I am Christian, with no background in academic theological studies, though I am actively curious about the very types of questions you are raising.

I will go under flak for this, but you must read the Bible in context. Concerning infanticide; I confess, I did not know of Psalm 137:9, and I also cannot solidly explain this instance, as I find infanticide abhorrent as well. This does not mean that there does not exist an explanation that does not break the foundations of Christianity; it's only that I don't know. My pastor (who has a Theological degree) will know.

I will try and give you other instances for reading the Bible in context. You've quoted the food laws, specifically, the one about seafood (from Leviticus, I forget which chapter though I read it a few days ago). *Modern day* Christians generally believe the reason for the food laws if for hygiene purposes. Eating shell fish is still a common cause for food-poisoning and enteritis even in this day and age..

If a scientist-like mind existed back then, he would have preferred an attempted explanation of pathogens, but God's message was meant to be understood universally, and if not understood (for I'm sure my parents still don't know much at all about infectious disease) then at least followed for their safety and health - see Leviticus' advice on the treatment of infectious diseases, for example, which involved isolation to prevent contamination etc.

The crux of the difference between a myself (a Christian) and yourself (?) is that I believe in the infallibility of the Bible, which is something that can't be proved 100% but only, ultimately, believed in.

(A lot of my information has come from 'The Lion Handbook to the Bible' - I bought it from Amazon; it's very good for answering questions like the one's you've raised.)

it's not carbon dating

[93 Escort Wagon]

Carbon dating is based on the decay rate of Carbon 14, and has a pretty short limit geologically speaking - 70,000 years with enrichment methods, but closer to 50,000 years using traditional counting. It's possible accelerator 14C dating has pushed this slightly - I haven't worked in this field for about a decade.

The tie-in to "dating" in this context is that sediments are deposited over time, and if they're undisturbed you can drill a core that'll give you (theoretically) a record of the 13C/12C ratio over time - but that ratio is not being used for dating AT ALL. The only way you could use the ratio for ersatz dating is if the sediment shows an annual 13C/12C cycle due to annual temperature variations - then you can count the cycles the same way you can count tree rings (BTW 13C/12C in tree rings varies in this same sort of summer/winter - or spring/fall - pattern). In any case, the actual dating of the sediments is usually done using a different, longer-lived, radiometric isotope ration such as you find with rubidium-strontium (That particular isotope pair may not be the best fit for sea sediments; like I said, I've been out of this for a while. We mainly did 13C/12C in trees and 18O/16O in ice cores).

That's the thing with Scientists

[Chuck Chunder]

They are still human.
Newton believed in alchemical transmutation.
Boyle wrote a paper claiming to have generated heat using gold and a special form of mercury.

Scientists get it wrong all the time. The process of science helps us get a better understanding than we had with time and effort, it doesn't make scientists perfect.

Re:Seems like a very long time to me

[jfengel]

That's for Carbon 14 dating. 14C has a half-life of 5,730 years, so after 80,000 years, it's essentially all gone.

This article isn't about dating at all, in that sense. Carbon 13 and Carbon 12 are stable. But plants preferentially incorporate Carbon 12, unless they're growing so fast that they take whatever carbon they get.

So when you see more 13C in some sediment you know that plants are growing faster. When you date the sediment (using other techniques, like uranium dating or argon/argon dating) you know a little bit about the plants growing at the time, and the atmosphere they were growing in.

The title of the Slashdot article is extremely misleading. The article it links to is rather clearer.

Re:Damn...

[funwithBSD]

You forgot Darwin:

Before the attraction of gravity was discovered . . . astronomers might have said God ordered each planet to move in its particular destiny. In the same manner God orders each animal created with certain forms in certain countries. But how much more simple and sublime to let attraction act according to certain law. -Darwin, 1837 notebook.

ID believers go nuts (not)

[Coolhand2120]

I've read at least four posts that "ID supporters are going to go crazy about this". And I've read zero posts from ID supporters going crazy. The fact is that ID could mean anything from you believe in Vishnu to you believe in the Intergalactic space council that seeds terraformed planets and has planted here, long ago, alien DNA by visiting spacecraft now trapped in a small storage locker somewhere in the Alpha Centauri system. ID is SO vague it can't possibly be argued against, or taught outside of saying "Someone or something may have made all this".

It's sort of like saying my Science is better than your imaginary friend. If some lunatic fringe of the radical evangelical right wing Christians want to disbelieve obvious science fact does not mean that everyone who believes in ID is so naive. Even Christians believe in science, and a lot of them believe that god made physics! But it's not something you can, or should argue about, you end up looking like a bigger fool than the guy who believes in a geocentric universe or some such nonsense.

You shouldn't pigeonhole anyone who believes in something you can't possibly prove or disprove as someone who is inherently stupid and who rejects science. There are far too many scientists who believe in ID for that argument to be valid.

Re:ID believers go nuts (not)

[Nimey]

You're assuming that lots of IDers hang out on Slashdot. Not so. Many of them hang out on local newspaper forums, or on websites catering to their kind, or on political-argument sites, or for the retirees with too much time on their hands, they write letters-to-the-editor.

Full paper

[rrohbeck]

Swart, P.K. Global Synchronous Changes in the Carbon Isotopic Composition of Carbonate Sediments Unrelated to Changes in the Global Carbon Cycle, Proc Nat. Acad. Sci. 37, 13741-13745.

Note that the paper is only about carbon dating of shelf sediments, *not* fossils.

Nuclear Decay Rates are Not Random, People

[pln2bz]

Slashdot should have ran the more interesting story pertaining to nuclear decay rates that came up this week, which my nuclear physicist associate (Oliver Manuel) forwarded to me ...

Evidence for Correlations Between Nuclear Decay Rates and Earth-Sun Distance

Seach the Firehose for "decay rate" and you'll find my submission, which was rejected (not complaining actually, just a bit confused).

And it's not even that this result is the first time it's been noticed. Russian researcher Simon Schnoll has performed *thousands* of simple geiger counter isotope decay rate experiments and noticed the same exact thing -- that there is an astrophysical influence to decay rates ...

Russian Discovery Challenges Existence of 'Absolute Time'

The idea that nuclear decay rates might not be random is pretty paradigm-changing. We can doubt the results, but shouldn't we at least be talking about it? It seems to me like a very important finding.

Isn't this even more pertinent to the concept of anthropogenic warming than the absolute dating article Slashdot went with???

Re:Nuclear Decay Rates are Not Random, People

[Sheafification]

Isn't this even more pertinent to the concept of anthropogenic warming than the absolute dating article Slashdot went with???

Maybe it is. After all, it was posted on Slashdot a few weeks before this article.

LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[mcrbids]

Have you ever watched The Bible is Repulsive? It's a great 15 minutes. Spare it. You won't regret it.

I used this video one time while talking to a fundamentalist. We were downtown, there was a gay rights parade (I'm a left-coaster) and the usual fundamentalist Christians on the other side of the street. Several blocks away, I struck up a conversation with a guy who was hanging around.

I guess it was because I'm obviously hetero, and fairly well-dressed, short hair, etc. because he assumed that I was on the Christian Fundamentalist side. I joshed with him for a while, talked about the wife, the kids, working, paying bills, blah blah blah. I mentioned something about strictly following the good book, and tisked about the guys down the street. He was very adamant that we should "follow the good book".

Having planted that seed, I got the kids into the conversation again a little while later. I started in with how I have lots of kids (I do) and how they sometimes misbehave. He agreed, and then I talked about what do you do about it? How do you keep your kids in line!?!? You have important values you want to teach! and he was with me all the way.

And then I said:

"It's a good thing that the good book thought of this, two. When my oldest son snuck out and smoked a joint with his buddies, I grabbed some bricks and killed him, right there on the spot". I played it perfectly, too! He was speechless. "Yeah, I believe that the good book should be taken literally, and it's pretty clear, right there in the Deuteronomy, when your children misbehave, you stone them to death".

As he cursed and walked away, I hollered out: "And the cops haven't even investigated! It's been 2 years now!"

I don't think I've ever laughed so hard in all my life...

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[Bryan Ischo]

Your explanation for why the old testament laws are so jacked up is not very convincing. It sounds an awful lot like a rationalization. Why exactly are some parts of the bible meant to be interpreted more literally and some parts meant only to be interpreted as posing a "sharp contrast"? Can you give a reason that is more convincing than the obvious explanation that Christians simply spin the bible however best fits their preconceived notions of what it should say?

I have nothing against Christians or their beliefs, except when those impinge upon my personal freedom not to be a part of Christianity. Unfortunately, religions have a way of trying to force themselves upon everyone else even when they claim that they are benign, and the modern political climate of the USA is downright frightening in how strongly it is influenced by religion.

I always find it really ridiculous when Christians try to invoke logic in any form when discussing their belief system. The arguments are so poor and contrived, that it's really hard to even try to argue anything about religion with a Christian (or any religion, for that matter), because the fundamental basis for logical argument isn't anywhere to be found. Simply put - if you have a religion that you insist has any objective truth to it that can be logically argued, then you are already so far beyond understanding the basic concepts of rational logic that you shouldn't even try. Just say, "I don't have to justify my religious beliefs with logical arguments, they simply are true without any rational explanation needed." I can respect that approach much more than an approach that attempts to dress up exceedingly faulty and ridiculous logic as a justification for religion.

All that being said, the "bible is repulsive" YouTube video that the O.P. gushed over was really poorly done. Anyone can find countless examples of indefensible ridiculousness in the bible, all you have to do is open the book up, it's all plainly self-evident. So finding a bunch of passages that show that the bible is complete bunk, and totally at odds with modern Christian theology, is about the most simple exercise one could engage in. Presenting this like it's some kind of major insight is intellectually disingenuous. And doing it in such a repetitive and annoying fashion, results in a video that isn't worth anyone's time.

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not a Christian. I'll happily educate you.

The New Testament and "Jesus Christ" is the part you're looking for, the part where it specifically says the ways of the Old Testament are no longer applicable.

Everything read is "interpreted" by definition. There are no written "truths", biblical or otherwise. I don't know why you think that "interpreting" something must necessarily debase it's value. Even the best Science ever done is at best an interpretation of physical truth; despite this it's still extremely useful and valuable.

There is an explanation for the 'bad stuff' from the Old Testament, it's very clearly stated: Original Sin, also known as Man's Fall from Grace, or Satan's Seduction of Man.

It did go: God says stone people, people get stoned, God says stop stoning people, here's new laws, according to the faily commonly shared foundational tenets of Christianity.

All those people who were stoned to death, and a good deal of the people who weren't all were subjected to eternal damnation, the really bad stuff, well worse than a rock to the head.

We're "supposed" to recognize our lack of qualifications to 'judge' God. We're supposed to trust him and know that everything that happens is 'right'.

If you don't believe in the whole Christian God thing, feel free to do and think what you want, I know I do. But honestly, I don't think many people really care about people getting stoned to death. Far worse happens on huge scales everyday. Unless it's in my neighborhood (Darfur and 2,000BC both surely aren't), I don't really feel obliged to do anything about it.

Yeah, you're also supposed to feel the laws weren't arbitrary. See, according to the doctrine, Jesus came here and redeemed us. That's why the eternal damnation and stoning all stopped. Jesus then went and got all the stoned people and the damned people out of Hell and sent them to Heaven to make up for their torment and trouble.

God made the old law because Man 'deserved' it, being Satan-fodder. Man was unique, having free-will. Man was also special, being made in God's image. Man did bad things which God had granted license for Man to do under penalty. God enforced these penalties to improve Man. I imagine it's somewhat like the theory behind the Department of Corrections in the US.

You're asking for a rational response and hoping you don't get one? Jeez. Christianity doesn't need to be rationalized or accepted as truth. But before you start using your mouth to pass shit all over something, you might want to double check what windmills you're tilting at first, Mr Quixote.

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[TheRaven64]

The New Testament and "Jesus Christ" is the part you're looking for, the part where it specifically says the ways of the Old Testament are no longer applicable.

Care to point out the passage? It's been a few years since I read the bible, but the only thing I remember Jesus saying that came close to this was a specific case about the 'unclean' laws from Leviticus. The rest was not touched. Did he invalidate the ten commandments? I remember him adding two (love the Lord your god with all you heard, mind, and soul, and love your neighbour as yourself - the ordering of which pretty much put the Christian Church on the path of bloodshed for the next two thousand years) but I don't remember him invalidating the old ones, or the laws about stoning other than to say 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone,' which didn't invalidate the laws, just the punishments.

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[Bryan Ischo]

Thanks for the information, it is interesting. However, I don't really appreciate the ad hominems. If you tone the attacks down in the future, you will save yourself from having an otherwise informative post leaving a sour tasts in readers mouths.

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[EllisDees]

>You wouldn't understand it now, but the old testament laws are meant to be a sharp contrast to new testament grace.

Seems to me that the man is very selective in the old testament laws he chooses to want enforced.

Re:LULZ with Fundamentalists!

[mcrbids]

Ok, let's see.

God is consistent. Except he isn't.

He's loving, unless he wants to kill you for whatever minor crime.

He holds you personally accountable for your sins, unless he wants to eliminate your race.

You can talk with him, unless he's not in the mood.

He can heal you, unless you've been amputated. He never heals an amputee, or any kind of serious scar.

He worries about a bunch of guys building a tower to the heavens so much that he creates all the races of mankind, but when we build a spaceship and actually GET to the heavens, nothing much happens.

It's no wonder that Christians fail basic tests of logic...

The truth is that if you canonize a work and believe it to be true, you should canonize your work and believe it to be true. The bible is truly a repulsive, insane, conflicted, and uncivilized work. People who worry about a few swear words or the latest movie should actually pay attention to 'the good book' that they pay homage to every Sunday. In fact, God's behavior in the bible I would expect from a 3 year old child with power. Yuck.

And my mark certainly wasn't praying, unless by "prayer" you mean words generally written as "fsck" or "f--k" in order to avoid bad word filters.

The article is not about "carbon dating!"

[j_w_d]

The OP never bothered to read the article, or has some strange ideas about carbon dating. The article title is just wrong. The 13C/12C ratio doesn't offer a date of any kind. What it has been used for, as the article says, is to infer when life begins to be an important player in the planetary environment. The article explains that a researcher has identified flaws in how the ratio is estimated. Nothing what-so-ever to do with "carbon dating." Instead it has to do with estimated dates of the ratio changes. The dates are probably Uranium based dates (you can't date anything more than about 50,000 years old using radiocarbon). The C13/C12 ratio estimated from proxies FOR that date are apparently in error.

Re:Now get this, creationists

[Gandalf_the_Beardy]

This is NOT carbon dating. The title is exceedingly confusing. C-14 is radiocarbon dating - good for 50,000 years back - 100,000 years with very good equipment. To date this sort of age you would need something like uranium lead, lead-lead techniques. These are accurate to a percent or so out to billions of years. The C12/C13 ratio is purely used as an indicator of how fast plants are growing and how abundant CO2 is at that time. It is NOT used for dating.

RTFA finds slashdot article seriously flawed

[mbone]

This is not about Carbon dating at all (that's about looking at the decay of Carbon 14, produced by cosmic ray radiation high in the atmosphere), this is about the Carbon 12/13 isotope ratio used as an indicator of biological activity in the distant past. Basically, what they say they found was that this is only trustworthy in deep ocean sediments, not on land or in island sediments, and you can only find deep ocean sediments for the last 150 million years or so, due to plate tectonics recycling the sea floor.

This will not affect geological dating at all. It may affect the interpretation of some work regarding, e.g., extinction events. It's hard to say without looking in detail at the other work (they may have several lines of evidence, etc.).

Re:RTFA finds slashdot article seriously flawed

[ggpauly]

The OP is hilarious. It has _Nothing_ to do with the PNAS article http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2008/09/03/0802841105). In fact the PNAS article is only useful or interesting to a handful of people who model the global carbon cycle over the history of the earth, most of whom are members of the NAS.

Half the blame lies with the ScienceDaily piece that misconstrued the PNAS article, possible for the purpose of a titillating headline.

Coincidentally, I used to work in the lab of the sponsoring editor of the PNAS article. Hi John.

Re:Damn...

[Kneo24]

Well, it seems you hold the idea of a general Christian and a Creationist in the same boat.

So let's spell out the differences here, as you clearly don't understand them.

General Christian:
Believes in "God". Follows the bible. However they aren't so deeply rooted in their faith that they're not able to make a nice compromise between reality and fantasy. They will follow science until it starts to make some serious infringements on their belief system (i.e. if science could prove "God" didn't exist, they wouldn't believe that). They will also follow the bible until it makes some serious infringements on the real world. However, it's generally noted that their faith isn't that strong. Science usually wins over faith.

Creationist:
"God" did it. The bible is law. Anything to contradict either of those two statements is clearly false. If you believe otherwise, you will burn in hell.

As you can see, a general Christian isn't going to get hung up about dinosaurs or whatever. They don't believe in the 6,000 year old earth crap. They realize there is a fine line between the real world and their faith. Although they may not put it in those terms, this is what it boils down to. The Creationists on the other hand, one can only wonder how they manage to function in our societies while being so willfully ignorant. Science is marginalized in their minds.

Re:Damn...

[Nursie]

"I don't believe we, as a species, decended from monkeys or apes but I suspect (strongly) that we've adapted over time to the current form we have today."

I suspect you mean you don't believe we had a common ancestor.

if that's the case, may I ask why?

There's a whole heap of evidence.

Re:Global Warming is not a scientific theory.

[indifferent children]

Is it your contention that they only measure CO2 levels at that one location, and that all Climate Change work is based on measurements from that one location? If so, then you are mentally ill. Such a belief can't be based on stupidity; you would have to be too stupid to read or write (or breathe). Please seek professional help.

Re:This has been known for some time

[CheshireCatCO]

No, GP means "proton decay". Neutrons *do* decay, it's been observed. They don't do it in nuclei, though. Protons are *hypothesized* to decay, but no one has ever seen it. (And the timescale estimates keep getting revised upwards in response to the non-detections. Makes ya wonder, doesn't it?)

As a creationist, this I don't get.

[Vexar]

C-14 is radio-carbon dating. C-12 and C-13 are not half-life techniques. For a creationist, though, answer me this: how do we know the half-life of anything going back more than 100 years? Mdme. Curie's work really got going around 1910, so people could have started making test samples for measurement at that point.

Is it me, or is there an awful lot of extrapolation going on here? Also, how do people get the half-life of stabilized nickel to be some odd Billion years? I read once in an article that they used the geologic record of the earth to determine it, but I figured that can't be right, because you use that to determine the age of a mineral sample, and that makes it circular reasoning.

Re:As a creationist, this I don't get.

[Gandalf_the_Beardy]

You know the half life by taking a sample of known mass which has a known number of atmons in it and counting decays. For some items with extremely long half lifes, like samarium it can take months to get a good figure for decay half lifes - there was a lot of work done in the 1950's determining these values. Because the decay rates are closely linked with various constants that can be observed in stellar phenomena we can look at distant galaxies, doing so is to look back in time to conditions millions and billions of years ago. The decay rate of nickel for example can be observed in stellar supernova remnants in Andromeda some 2 million years ago and we find it is the same - we can go back much further to several billion years ago and we find the constants are the same.

Re:Damn...

[CautionaryX]

Ok, start listing the evidence for macro-evolution then. I am a creationist but I also believe in micro-evolution which accounts for differentiation amongst members of the same species. However, I don't believe in macro-evolution which states that one specie can change into another specie.

Headline is misleading, at best

[AMESN]

"Miscalculation" is the wrong word. Geologists are nuanced (unlike this headline) in how they interpret C-13 vs. C-12, especially for early Earth history. The PNAS paper is not about the ratio being flawed, it's about another way to interpret the activity of the shallow ocean versus the deep, open ocean. The paper is simply another line of scientific discussion, itself part of the scientific method.

Get a lawyer!

[vecctor]

See my sig - we can make it class action!

Re:Global Warming is not a scientific theory.

[indifferent children]

Read the OP again. Look at:

For example, did you know that they've only been measuring atmospheric carbon dioxide levels since 1959? Less than 50 years. And did you know that they measure the carbon dioxide levels on an active volcano? ... Obviously people aren't going to believe that they are measuring CO2 from an active volcano, because it's just too stupid to be true.

If the OP was not trying to at least insinuate that the CO2 readings used to support Climate Change are being taken from that active volcano, then s/he has no point, whatsoever. Is it "too stupid to be true" to measure the CO2 output of a volcano? No. Is it "too stupid to be true" that scientists would use only those measurements and discover Climate Change? Yes, that would be too stupid to be true, and that was obviously the OP's intent.