backwoodsman wrote:dwight92070 wrote:If you will look at the letter from Answers in Genesis (previous post), you will see there that they claim that the method that Dr. Austin used to date the Mt. St. Helen's rock was the PROPER method. So it's your word against theirs. I am not a scientist, so whose word should I believe?
Did you not read the article I linked earlier in this thread? It explains in detail exactly why AIG and Austin are wrong about the potassium-40 dating method Austin specified for the test sample. Again, it's been well known and understood for several decades; yet AIG and Austin simply ignore it. Since you're in touch with them, maybe you should ask them why, and then do your own research to see who's telling the truth about it.
Dwight: Since you have obviously researched all of this, then I guess I can assume that you have contacted AIG yourself, to at least give them the chance to explain and defend themselves. Or haven't you?
Dwight: I looked at that article back then and again now. No, I did not read it all, because what I did read, I don't understand. It reads like a physics textbook. If it explains in detail why AIG and Dr. Austin are wrong, you could have fooled me, because I did not see that. As I have said, I am not a scientist. I did see the part where they specifically mentioned the rock at Mt.St. Helens and said something to the effect that if you're looking for an errant reading, you can probably find it, clearly suggesting that Dr. Austin deliberately wanted to find an error.
In a nutshell, the half-life of potassium-40 is about 1.26 billion years. Anyone who knows anything about radiometric dating (even a non-scientist like me) knows that, to get an accurate result, the sample's age should be within about a factor of 10 of the half-life of the method used.
Dwight: I know nothing about radiometric dating and did not understand the article explaining it.
So every scientist knows that the youngest rock for which potassium-40 is appropriate and accurate would be around 126 million years old.
Dwight: So I guess you have to ASSUME that there IS a rock that is that old to begin with. Then you would have to know beforehand that the specific rock that you seek a date on, is at least that old before you can use the potassium-40 method to find out the actual age of the rock. Sounds like circular "reasoning" to me, not a scientific method.
As I explained before, it's dishonest of Austin to send the lab a 10-year-old rock, specify that test method, then present the result as proof radiometric dating is unreliable, and AIG is being either dishonest or incompetent and irresponsible in propagating it.
Dwight: "For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions." Matthew 6:14-15
Now please go back and read the article, and don't ask me any more questions that it has already clearly answered for you.
Dwight: Sorry for being such a bother to you. I did not find the article clear at all.