Does the "clear meaning" of the scriptures trump science?

[thoughtful (Valerie (non-scientist))]

@T_aquaticus

Why wouldn’t that be evidence? There is a non-radiometric date for each layer done by simple counting, and then a measurement of the carbon in each layer.

If that were the case, great.

But I checked - it’s not done by simple counting at all. You can go back and look at my entire post if you want.

@thoughtful

Lake Suigetsu contains annually laminated sediments that preserve both paleoclimate proxies and terrestrial plant macrofossils that are suitable for radiocarbon dating. The lake’s potential to provide an important archive of atmospheric radiocarbon (14C) was realized in 1993 ( 1 ). However, the single SG93 sediment core then recovered included missing intervals between successive sections ( 2 ). This, together with the difficulty of visual varve counting, resulted in inconsistency between the SG93 and other 14C calibration records ( 3 ). The SG06 core-set recovered in 2006 consists of four parallel cores that together avoid any such sedimentary gaps ( 4 ). Here, we report 651 14C measurements covering the period between 11.2 and 52.8 thousand years before the present (kyr B.P.) tied to a time scale derived from varve counting and temporal constraints from other records . Using visual markers, we applied a composite depth (CD) scale to all cores, including SG93. We also define an event-free depth (EFD), which is the CD with substantial macroscopic event layers (such as turbidites and tephras) removed.

@T_aquaticus

Why can’t we use radioactive decay rates to do the same thing?

It’s not historical evidence.

For instance, I watched a PBS Spacetime video that described how scientists first came up with an age of the universe that was younger than the age of the earth. They were forced to go back and fix it only because of that contradiction. An earth younger than the universe would actually fit a biblical model. I’m not suggesting they weren’t doing bad science in the first place, but that if you work in cosmology, geology, or anything do with with radiometric dating, the data has to be fit into the model. And it generally works decently because we have no idea yet how the flood really affected the earth. Whatever it did to the climate was unlike anything we can see now and can only guess at.

When radioactive decay rates are used, they make assumptions about the climate. But the last 4000 years of history were actually observed by people. There’s enough historical record to give us independent evidence that we haven’t made huge mistakes.

I can already see that sometime in the next 100 years cosmology isn’t going to fit into the Big Bang model anymore. That’s probably not the only thing that’s going to change in science.