Difference between revisions of "Age of the Earth"

Revision as of 03:06, December 31, 2011

... is 4.5 billion years old.

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-''See also [[Counterexamples to an Old Earth]].''
+... is 4.5 billion years old.
-The '''Age of the Earth''' has been a matter of interest to humans for millennia. The subject is still debated today, particularly between [[young Earth Creationism|young-Earth scientists]], who believe that the Earth is only approximately 10-6,000 years old, and [[Old Earth Creationism|Old Earth creationists]] and scientists who argue that Earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old.<ref>http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/22/opinion/polls/main965223.shtml</ref> The scientific evidence [[young earth creationism|points to a young age of the earth and the universe]]. The biblical creation organization [[Creation Ministries International]] published an article entitled ''[http://creation.com/age-of-the-earth 101 evidences for a young age of the earth and the universe]'', that provides much of the scientific evidence in support of a young Earth.
-The fatal flaw in Old Earth arguments is their overreliance on the assumption that the [[Radiometric dating|rate of radioactive decay]] somehow remains constant over thousands of years.
-== Historical views ==
-[[Image:Landscape.jpg|right|300px]]
-For most of recorded history, humans of many backgrounds viewed the age of the Earth to be around 6,000 years,<ref>Burnet, p. 258.</ref> such as St. Barnabas and St. Irenæus.<ref>Burnet, p. 259.</ref>
-In 1830, Dr. Hales published a list of 120 historical authorities from various cultures who had decided on an officiall [[date of creation]].  These ranged from 6984 B.C. to 3616 B.C.<ref>Batten 2002 quotes from "Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Holy Bible", 1879 8th Edition, 1939, which relates this, and reproduces the selection of the dates from Young.</ref>
-Included in Hales' list is [[James Ussher]], who calculated the famous date of 4004 B.C. for creation.  Young-Earth creationists still consider this date to be close to the actual date.
-In 1778 George-Louis Lecrerc, Count of Buffon, proposed that the Earth was about 74,832 years old.<ref name="ingv">INGV</ref>
-[[James Hutton]], whilst not proposing a date, dismissed the Biblical account and claimed in 1785 that there was not evidence of a beginning at all.<ref name="ingv" />
-[[Charles Lyell]] supported Hutton's idea in 1830, in ''Principles of Geology''.<ref name="ingv" />
-In 1854 [[Hermann von Helmholtz]] estimated an age of between 20 and 40 million years.<ref name="ingv" />
-Around the same time [[Lord Kelvin]] put his mind to deriving an age, and came up with a range between 20 million years and 400 million years.  He later refined that down to between 20 million and 40 million years.<ref name="ingv" />  More recent discoveries of radioactivity and mantle convection explain why the assumptions Helmholtz and Kelvin made resulted in dates that are much lower than current uniformitarian estimates.
-The 1911 edition of the [[Encyclopedia Britannica]] discussed dates up to 500 million years.<ref>Encyclopædia Britannica, pp 650-651.</ref>
-By about 1930, J. H. Jeans was arguing for an age of the Earth of around two billion years.<ref>Universal History of the World, p.76.</ref>
-Using circular logic -- assuming that decay rates somehow remained constant despite necessarily changing physical characteristics as time approached the origin -- [[atheists]] insist that the Earth is 4.5 billion years based on an implausible assumption of constancy in [[Potassium-argon dating|Potassium-argon (K:Ar) decay rates]] and other radiometric methods.<ref>Peck, 2000, p.376.</ref>
-== Geology ==
-[[Image:516XZRGNCKL AA240 .jpg|right|300px]]
-[[William R. Corliss]] is a cataloger of scientific [[Anomaly|anomalies]] (observations and facts that challenge prevailing scientific [[paradigm]]s) and has published many works on the subject.<ref name="sf">[http://www.science-frontiers.com/ Science Frontiers] (Corliss' web-site)</ref>
-He also wrote 13 books for the [[National Aeronautics and Space Administration]] (NASA), a dozen educational booklets for the [[Atomic Energy Commission]] (AEC), and a dozen articles for the [[National Science Foundation]] (NSF).<ref>Corliss, 2002</ref> The science magazine ''[[New Scientist]]'' had an article which focused on the career of William Corliss.<ref>Adrian Hope, ''Finding a Home for Stray Fact'', New Scientist, July 14, 1977, p. 83</ref>
-''New Scientist'' wrote regarding Corliss's work: "All I can say to Corliss is carry on cataloging". <ref>Quoted on the [http://www.science-frontiers.com/sourcebk.htm Science Frontiers web-site]</ref>  [[Arthur C. Clarke]] described Corliss as "[[Charles Fort|Fort]]'s latter-day - and much more scientific - successor."<ref>Clarke, Arthur C. (1990) ''Astounding Days: A Science Fictional Autobiography''. Gollancz. Page 110</ref>
-Corliss's work on geological anomalies catalogs scores of anomalies which challenge the [[old-earth]] [[paradigm]].<ref>[http://www.science-frontiers.com/sourcebk.htm#Geology Geological Catalogs] (Science Frontiers)</ref>
-== Bibliography ==
-* Burnet, Thomas, [http://www.sacred-texts.com/earth/ste/ste36.htm The Sacred Theory of the Earth, chapter V], 1691.
-* Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th edition (1911).  [http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/User:Tim_Starling On-line page facsimiles].
-* Hammerton, J.A. (Ed.), "Universal History of the World" (8 volumes) The Educational Book Co., London, c1930.
-* Batten, Don, [http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/417 Old-earth or young-earth belief: Which belief is the recent aberration?], ''Creation'' 24(1):24–27, December 2001.
-* [http://www.ingv.it/~roma/SITOINGLESE/activities/geomagnetismo/analysistheory/historicalresearch/age.html The age of the Earth] (Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV)).
-*Peck WH, Valley JW, Wilde SA, and Graham CM (2000) Ion microprobe Evidence for Pre-4.4 Ga Continental Crust and Low Temperature Water/Rock Interaction. ''Geol. Soc. Am. Abstr'', vol 32, no. 7.
-== External Links ==
-*[http://creation.com/age-of-the-earth Age of the earth] by [[Creation Ministries International]]
-*[http://creation.com/refuting-evolution-chapter-8-how-old-is-the-earth How old is the earth?] - ''Refuting evolution'' - Chapter 8 by Dr. [[Jonathan Sarfati]] at [[Creation Ministries International]]
-*[http://creation.com/young-age-of-the-earth-universe-qa Age of the Earth and Universe] by [[Creation Ministries International]]
-== Notes ==
-<references />
-[[Category:Geology]]

Difference between revisions of "Age of the Earth"

Revision as of 03:06, December 31, 2011

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