Changes

== The game changer: Radioactivity mythmaking==

== The game changer: Radioactivity mythmaking==

By the end of the nineteenth century, Lord Kelvin had completely demolished all opposition.<ref name="West"/> He made uniformitarian geological community to accept that the age of the earth must be finite and that estimating the age by quantitative reasoning instead of supporting steady-state theory with [[Horror of a Divine Foot|philosophical bias]] should be crucial part of the geological endeavor. Even ‘Darwin’s bulldog’ and [[T. H. Huxley|musketeer of Darwinism Huxley]], who previously attacked Kelvin by making indirect allusions about ''“the first passer-by who fancies that our house is not so well built as it might be”'', ventured to suggest in front of the Geological society of London that ''“limitation of the period during which living beings have inhabited this planet to one, two, or three hundred million years, may be admitted, without a complete revolution in geological speculation.”''<ref name="KelvinOnDynamics"/> But T.C. Chamberlin, head of the Department of Geology at the [[University of Chicago]], was not prepared to concede defeat. While defending his faith in long-ages, he speculated without any observational basis whatever that there might yet be discovered new sources of energy that would allow more time than Kelvin had calculated.<ref>{{cite book |title=Earth |author= Frank Press, Raymond Siever |publisher=W. H. Freeman |edition=4 |year=1986 |pages=40 |isbn=978-0716717430 |url=http://www.amazon.co.uk/Earth-Frank-Press/dp/0716717433}}</ref> Thus, the quest for the age of the earth as a subjective, arbitrary and erratic pursuit, was set for an fascinating turn.<ref name="West"/> This came in 1896, when Radioactivity was discovered by Henri Becquerel and when in 1903 Pierre Curie and Albert Laborde demonstrated that radioactive decay releases heat. Before long, several people argued that this source of heat was great enough to overturn Kelvin’s conclusion about the boundary for the age of the earth. Among them was Ernest Rutherford, who in 1904 suggested, in the Royal Institution, that ''“Lord Kelvin had limited the Age of the Earth, ‘provided no new source of heat was discovered.’ That prophetic utterance refers to what we are considering tonight, radium!”'' Later, Rutherford often repeated his tale of thinking on his feet in front of the “old bird” Kelvin who “beamed” at him. This episode and pleasing form of the anecdote, boosted by the eminence of its author, who was considered the father of nuclear theory, provided a ready vehicle for mythmaking and uncritical acceptance of proposition that because the discovery of radioactive heat undermined an assumption behind Kelvin’s calculation, it also undermined his conclusion.<ref name="PerryKelvinCritique"/> As the half-life of radium's dominant isotope is 1600 yr, heat given out by radium obviously could not be the wanted missing energy. Nevertheless, later assumptions of equilibrium in decay series of uranium and thorium allowed to consider heat sources with half-lives in gigayears (Ga; 1 Ga = 10⁹ years).

By the end of the nineteenth century, Lord Kelvin had completely demolished all opposition.<ref name="West"/> He made uniformitarian geological community to accept that the age of the earth must be finite and that estimating the age by quantitative reasoning instead of supporting steady-state theory with [[Horror of a Divine Foot|philosophical bias]] should be crucial part of the geological endeavor. Even ‘''Darwin’s bulldog''’ and [[T. H. Huxley|musketeer of Darwinism Huxley]], who previously attacked Kelvin by making indirect allusions about ''“the first passer-by who fancies that our house is not so well built as it might be”'', ventured to suggest, in front of the Geological society of London, that ''“limitation of the period during which living beings have inhabited this planet to one, two, or three hundred million years, may be admitted, without a complete revolution in geological speculation.”''<ref name="KelvinOnDynamics"/> Materialistic philosophers, such as the British analytical [[Bertrand Russell]], realized that the Hutton's materialstic concept ''”no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end”'' is further unmaintainable, and de facto denounced it while starting to proclaim Biblically compatible apocalyptic views: ''“all the labors of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of Solar System”''. These things should be regarded, ''“if not quite beyond dispute,”'' ''“yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand.”''<ref name="Signature">{{Cite book

 

But T.C. Chamberlin, head of the Department of Geology at the [[University of Chicago]], was not prepared to concede defeat. While defending his faith in long-ages, he speculated, without any observational basis whatever, that there might yet be discovered new sources of energy that would allow more time than Kelvin had calculated.<ref>{{cite book |title=Earth |author= Frank Press, Raymond Siever |publisher=W. H. Freeman |edition=4 |year=1986 |pages=40 |isbn=978-0716717430 |url=http://www.amazon.co.uk/Earth-Frank-Press/dp/0716717433}}</ref> Thus, the quest for the age of the earth as a subjective, arbitrary and erratic pursuit, was set for an fascinating turn.<ref name="West"/> This came in 1896, when [[radioactivity]] was discovered by Henri Becquerel and when in 1903 [[Marie and Pierre Curie|Pierre Curie]] and Albert Laborde demonstrated that [[radioactive decay]] releases heat. Before long, several people argued that this source of heat was great enough to overturn Kelvin’s conclusion about the boundary for the age of the earth. Among them was [[Ernest Rutherford]], who in 1904 suggested, in the Royal Institution, that ''“Lord Kelvin had limited the Age of the Earth, ‘provided no new source of heat was discovered.’ That prophetic utterance refers to what we are considering tonight, [[radium]]!”'' Later, Rutherford often repeated his tale of thinking on his feet in front of the “old bird” Kelvin who “beamed” at him. This episode and pleasing form of the anecdote, boosted by the eminence of its author, who was considered the father of nuclear theory, provided a ready vehicle for mythmaking and uncritical acceptance of proposition that because the discovery of radioactive heat undermined an assumption behind Kelvin’s calculation, it also undermined his conclusion.<ref name="PerryKelvinCritique"/> As the half-life of radium's dominant isotope is 1600 yr, heat given out by radium obviously could not be the wanted missing energy. Nevertheless, later assumptions of equilibrium in decay series of [[uranium]] and [[thorium]] allowed to consider heat sources with half-lives in gigayears (Ga; 1 Ga = 10⁹ years).

The 1911 edition of the [[Encyclopedia Britannica]] discussed dates up to 500 million years.<ref>Encyclopædia Britannica, pp 650-651.</ref>

The 1911 edition of the [[Encyclopedia Britannica]] discussed dates up to 500 million years.<ref>Encyclopædia Britannica, pp 650-651.</ref>

<div style="padding-left:40px;">&mdash; Richard K. Mauger<ref>{{cite journal |title= K-Ar ages of biotites from tuffs in Eocene rocks of the Green River, Washakie, and Uinta basins, Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado |author= Richard L. Mauger |journal= |publisher=University of Wyoming |year=1977 |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=17-42 (37)|url= https://geobookstore.uwyo.edu/sites/default/files/download/ConttoGeo_TOC.pdf |accessdate=13 June 2015 }}</ref> </div>

<div style="padding-left:40px;">&mdash; Richard K. Mauger<ref>{{cite journal |title= K-Ar ages of biotites from tuffs in Eocene rocks of the Green River, Washakie, and Uinta basins, Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado |author= Richard L. Mauger |journal= |publisher=University of Wyoming |year=1977 |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=17-42 (37)|url= https://geobookstore.uwyo.edu/sites/default/files/download/ConttoGeo_TOC.pdf |accessdate=13 June 2015 }}</ref> </div>

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In 1943 R.A. Daly of Harvard University published his authoritative paper ''“Meteorites and an Earth model,”'' where he studied the analogies between terrestrial rocks and [[meteor]]ites, coupled with deductions on the probable nature of the Earth’s interior. He hypothesized that the latter ones originated by disruption of a planet once situated between Mars and Jupiter, in the region now occupied by [[asteroid]]s. At first textbooks have quoted his theory approvingly, but later it has been disfavored due to mineralogical discontinuities between different groups of meteorites which were interpreted as evidence against a single parent body hypothesis. Nevertheless, the meteorites, “enigmatic bodies,” have managed to attract the great resurgence of interest in scientific research.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Meteorites |author=Brian Mason|journal=American Scientist |volume=55| issue=4 |year=1967|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/27837038?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents}}</ref>  

In 1943 R.A. Daly of Harvard University published his authoritative paper ''“Meteorites and an Earth model,”'' where he studied the analogies between [[Rock (material)|terrestrial rocks]] and [[meteor]]ites, coupled with deductions on the probable nature of the Earth’s interior. He hypothesized that the latter ones originated by disruption of a planet once situated between Mars and Jupiter, in the region now occupied by [[asteroid]]s. At first textbooks have quoted his theory approvingly, but later it has been disfavored due to mineralogical discontinuities between different groups of meteorites which were interpreted as evidence against a single parent body hypothesis. Nevertheless, the meteorites, “enigmatic bodies,” have managed to attract the great resurgence of interest in scientific research.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Meteorites |author=Brian Mason|journal=American Scientist |volume=55| issue=4 |year=1967|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/27837038?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents}}</ref>  

In his 1956 paper named ''Age of Meteorites and the Earth'', Claire Patterson, using ''“certain assumptions which are apparently justified,”'' introduced for meteor age a figure of '''4.55 ± 0.07 × 10⁹yr.''' and commented that since earth lead meets the requirement for definition of ''“the isotopic evolution of lead for any meteoritic body,”'' it is therefore ''“believed that the age for the earth is the same as for meteorites”'' and that ''"this is the time since the earth attained its present mass"''.<ref>{{cite web |title= Age of meteorites and the earth |author= Claire Patterson |url=http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Patterson1956.pdf |accessdate= }}</ref> In spite of cautions and skepticism advised by the authors, this figure gradually became a scientific dogma that rarely anyone has dared to question.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Ralph W. Matthews |title=Radiometric dating and the age of the Earth |date=December 1982 |publisher=Creation |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=41–44 |quote=In spite of cautions and skepticism advised by the authors this number has been widely and enthusiastically accepted and is usually quoted as if the evidence was decisive and conclusive. It has assumed something of the status of a universal constant to which all other data must be fitted, thus it has become common practice to assume that data which does not fit this result is either wrong or unintelligible. |accessdate=December 30, 2014}}</ref>  Henry Morris explains that the unprovable assumptions are not the only problem with radiometric dating. One huge concern is that the results published are only a selected sample, chosen especially to agree with preconceived ideas about the earth, life, and [[evolution]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Once upon a time … A Review of The Mythology of Modern Dating Methods by John Woodmorappe |author=Michael J. Oard |url=http://creation.com/once-upon-a-time |accessdate=November 9, 2014}}</ref>

In his 1956 paper named ''Age of Meteorites and the Earth'', Claire Patterson, using ''“certain assumptions which are apparently justified,”'' introduced for meteor age a figure of '''4.55 ± 0.07 × 10⁹yr.''' and commented that since earth lead meets the requirement for definition of ''“the isotopic evolution of lead for any meteoritic body,”'' it is therefore ''“believed that the age for the earth is the same as for meteorites”'' and that ''"this is the time since the earth attained its present mass"''.<ref>{{cite web |title= Age of meteorites and the earth |author= Claire Patterson |url=http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Patterson1956.pdf |accessdate= }}</ref> In spite of cautions and skepticism advised by the authors, this figure gradually became a scientific dogma that rarely anyone has dared to question.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Ralph W. Matthews |title=Radiometric dating and the age of the Earth |date=December 1982 |publisher=Creation |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=41–44 |quote=In spite of cautions and skepticism advised by the authors this number has been widely and enthusiastically accepted and is usually quoted as if the evidence was decisive and conclusive. It has assumed something of the status of a universal constant to which all other data must be fitted, thus it has become common practice to assume that data which does not fit this result is either wrong or unintelligible. |accessdate=December 30, 2014}}</ref>  Henry Morris explains that the unprovable assumptions are not the only problem with radiometric dating. One huge concern is that the results published are only a selected sample, chosen especially to agree with preconceived ideas about the earth, life, and [[evolution]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Once upon a time … A Review of The Mythology of Modern Dating Methods by John Woodmorappe |author=Michael J. Oard |url=http://creation.com/once-upon-a-time |accessdate=November 9, 2014}}</ref>