Here are more comments that we have received from readers of
this website blog:
Comment #1: “When I read
your series about the tree ring data, I was greatly impressed, and it brought
back to mind something I heard during a rather heated college class debate a
few years ago, but had since forgotten about it. I think it was called something
like cross-disturbances or matching or something like that, which would show
longer dates than actual without multiple annual tree ring production. Do you
know anything about that?” Vince N.
Response: Thank you for your comment. As for your question, I
imagine you are referring to the existence of Migrating Ring-Disturbing Events,
what is sometimes called Natural Disturbance Frequency, or the natural causes
of tree ring production disturbance. This can result from such things as insect
attack, earthquakes, releases of gas, etc. If such disturbances occur at
sufficient frequency, and reappear in sequence in other trees at later times, the
actually-contemporaneous trees would cross-match in an age-staggered manner,
thus creating an artificially longer chronology.
To illustrate this, let’s take a simplified situation in just
three trees: tree A, tree B, and tree C. Let’s say they started growing at
exactly the same time, and each lived exactly 500 years. If nothing happened in
those five centuries, the tree-ring series would normally cross-match perfectly
(with each other) according to climatic signal, with the crosmatch point
starting with the first ring of each tree. That is, all the constituents of the three-tree chronology would overlap
completely, creating a chronology that spans exactly 500 years.
On the
other hand, let’s say that an external disturbance causes rings 2, 6, 9, 14,
etc., in Tree A to grow much bigger or smaller than they otherwise would. At
about this time, rings 1, 7, 10, 13, etc. are perturbed in Tree B. 300 years
after the disturbance of the growth of the rings in Tree A, the sequence of
disturbances repeats in Tree B, affecting rings 302, 306, 309, 314, etc. Now
this repetition does not have to be exact, since such discrepancies can be
covered by inferred missing rings, which are common in the Bristlecone Pine
chronology. So, 400 years after the disturbances in the early rings of Tree B,
similar disturbances occur in Tree C, affecting rings 401, 407, 410, 413, etc.
(Of course, identical reasoning can be applied to many more trees over a much
longer period of time.)
The net result is the fact that Trees A, B, and C (and
whatever others we include) will no longer cross-match across their 500-year
common growth history. They will now only cross-match at their ring-perturbed
ends. The result is an illusory chronology that is 1200 years long, not the accurate
500 years.
Such cross-matching experiments have been conducted by
scientists that show it is only necessary to disturb two or three rings per
decade, sustained across at least a few decades, in order to override the
climatic signal, and to cause the tree-ring series to artificially cross-match
at the ring-perturbed ends.
This information is often presented by John Woodmorappe (a
pseudonym), who has written at least 7 books and more than 18 articles showing
fallacies in many current scientific dogmas, and is an outspoken critic of
radiometric dating methods (The Mythology
of Modern Dating Methods), to which he has drawn much ire from mainstream
scientists. His “Young Earth Creationist” views often elicit heated debates
with “Old Earth Advocates.”
Comment #2: “You mention Alma 46:41 about plants and herbs
the Lord prepared for the Nephites and cover quinine of the Chinchona tree, but
having recently returned from several years in the area, there are many other
plants and herbs known throughout Peru and the Andes that are unique in the
healing powers, including the plant Ayahuasca” Janie Irena K.
Response: Indeed there are. We have referred to a few over
the numerous articles on the subject, and Ayahuasca, which refers to a
medicinal drink incorporating two or more distinctive plant species, produce
profound mental and physical (and some say spiritual) effects when brewed
together.
Ayahuasca (left), the giant woody liana vine (Banisteriopsis
caapi) mixed with the leaves of chacruna (Psychotria viridis) and oco yagé;
also known as chalipanga, chagraponga, and huambisa (Diplopterys cabrerana),
are known thoughout the Andean area, including Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia
and western Brazil. In fact, at least 42 indigenous names are used for this
preparation, and at least 72 different indigenous tribes of Amazonia, despite
being widely separated by distance, language, and cultural differences, all
manifested a detailed common knowledge of ayahuasca and its use. Still, it is
only one of many medicinal and useful plants known in the Andes.
For thousands of
years people of the Andes and the Amazon have relied on herbal medicines to
treat common ailments like headaches, infections and inflammations. Today,
along with modern medicine, people continue utilizing the same plants with
these positive health benefits! Many of these medicinal plants are native to
the Amazon and the Andes of Peru, such as Uña
de gato (Cat’s Claw), contain high levels of alkaloids that activate the
immune system, reduce inflammation, protect against tumor growth and
carcinogens; Achiote, good for
digestion asthma and antimalarial medicine; Sacha
Inchi, a nut known for its extra virgin oil, and has incredibly high levels
of Omega 3, 6 and 9 fatty acids, even more than fish oil; Muña, like an herbal tea that has high levels of calcium and
phosphorous and is good for bones and teeth and prevents osteoporosis; and the
list goes on and on, with Maca, Coca, Sangre de Grado, etc.
Comment #3: ”You were right in
the last of your articles on “How Far Back Can We Measure Dates? Part XII,”
when you wrote “For those who feel we belabored this point far beyond the need
over the last several posts, we apologize.” I really got tired of reading the
dating stuff over and over again. It was like reading the first half of your
first book about winds and currents. Seems you could have condensed all of this
considerably” Albert J.
Response: Thank you for your suggestion.
It is always a difficult decision as to how much to write about on a given
subject. The problem stems from knowing how much of the opposite view is within
the public conscience, i.e., how deeply the error has been engrained in
people’s thinking. As an example, it takes the public a long time to accept
something—Darwin’s On the Origin of
Species (1859) and his somewhat revolutionary idea of evolution (Jean de
Monet Lamarack, Charles Lyell, Robert Chambers, Alfred R. Wallace, etc.) was
not completely accepted in all of its tenets until the 1930s and 1940s, and his
centerpiece of evolutionary biology and sexual selection received little
attention before 1970! It took more than 100 years to overcome what was in the
public conscience regarding the “Great Chain of Being,” i.e., 6000 year old
Earth and "God created man" beliefs.
This is probably because once
people buy into an idea, they often cannot be moved from it without a great
deal of effort. In this sense, when M. Wells Jakeman earned his doctorate in
archaeology and history at UC Berkeley in 1938, and placed the Land of Promise
in Mesoamerica, it began a series of events at BYU starting in 1946 with the
creation of the first archaeology department that led to hundreds of students
being taught that the Book of Mormon lands were located in Mesoamerica.
In fact, the first expedition
from BYU archaeology (above) was to Aguacatal, Campeche, Mexico, considered then
to be the probable Book of Mormon city of Bountiful, (2nd thru 6th
expeditions 1948-1961 were also to this location), and culminating in 1984 with
John L. Sorenson’s seminal work, “An Ancient American Setting for the Book of
Mormon.”
The point is, since then, anyone
(member or critic) talking about the Book of Mormon Land of Promise, home of
the Jaredites, Mulekites and Nephites, think Mesoamerica.
The winds and currents were
written about in my first book and numerous subsequent posts in this blog, to
try and overcome the fact that in 600 B.C., in a ship “driven forth before the
wind,” the only location that could have been reached would be along the
Chilean or Peruvian coast of South America. However, that does not change the
fact that thousands of people still think Mesoamerica, no matter how illogical
that location has become based on modern knowledge, discovery and technology.
It takes time to overcome
people’s erroneous thinking. It takes a bombardment of truthful facts over
extended time of repetition to get new ideas to sink down into the public
conscience. For those who readily accept truth, it need not be that way—but
most people “fight against the pricks,” when dealing with the truth and repetition
is constantly required. I apologize for the difficulty this presents to some of you.
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