How Reliable are Scientific Dates? Part I

Unfortunately, most people take for granted such things as Carbon-14 dating which is used throughout the world by many scientific disciplines and then published as facts on dating places, people and artifacts of antiquity—and we just go along with such dates. However, the question always is with science, how reliable are such dates?

In discussing this it becomes evident that there are two sacrosanct factors that cannot be challenged, and that is 1) the age of the earth (4.55 billion years old), and 2) the geologic time scale, which includes the fossil record and the evolutionary history of life. These cannot be debated, questioned, or criticized in our world today. Those who accept the time scale and evolution are so adamant in their stand, that much of science is held hostage to that viewpoint.

The evolutionary wheel, or time scale, shown as the claimed evolutionary events unfolded over time. Man, as can be seen, came along some 4.6 billion years after the earth came into being

These sacrosanct points are taught in school at every grade level, in every college, and covered in every scientific journal and publication. It is as though there is absolutely no question about this one fact—evolution in all its aspects is a proven, scientific certainty, and as unchallengeable a scientific principle as gravity or the speed of light. To even suggest another possible viewpoint is to overstep the bounds of acceptable scholarship, and any idea to the contrary is laughed right out of existence.

Biologist and geneticist John Klotz,h as said, "It might also be pointed out that scientists are not quite as objective as they say they are. It is simply not possible for the scientist to detach himself completely from the theories and hypotheses, which he espouses. This is particularly true when they are different or new. He finds considerable pride of authorship and an intense personal loyalty to ideas which he has developed. For this reason there is a great deal of subjectivity in science."

Also as has been stated elsewhere, “Scientists see the evidence for creation, and they see it clearly, but peer pressure, financial considerations, political correctness, and a religious commitment to naturalism force them to look the other way and insist they see nothing. And so, the illogical origins myth of modern society perpetuates itself."

Radiocarbon dating tests are performed in the laboratory where accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) analysis is performed on a wide variety of geologic materials on this carbon extraction line. Here sample CO₂ gas is reduced to pure carbon as graphite precipitated on iron powder for dating

The point is, if this radiocarbon dating is inaccurate, then every other aspect of evolution, time scale, and geologic history becomes questionable. Therefore, to protect their stand, evolutionists and their fellow travelers in the scientific community, simply ignore or discredit out of hand, any opposite view expressed, even by very qualified scientists with armloads of data and proof at their disposal.

Take, for instance, the scientifically claimed last major glacial advance in America, which is said to have occurred about 25,000 years ago, but C-14 dates forced a revision down to 11,400 years. On the other hand, the United State Geological Survey carried out studies that gave a C-14 date as recent as 3300 years ago. One would think that this would be considerably important news, since the glacial advance is used to determine ages and times of numerous historical events. Yet, no textbook treats such a puzzling find that falls well within historic times.

Another important event, the Siberian or Beringia Land Bridge, which is used, without challenge, as determining the time frame when humans first appeared in the New World (America) at 12,000 years ago. As one scientific article proclaimed, “We've long known that a land bridge joined present-day Alaska and Russia, when the bridge "rose" from the ocean as vast amounts of ocean water became tied up in the enormous glaciers of the last ice age. That exposed the broad continental shelves now covered by the Bering Strait and created the land bridge. The bridge last arose around 70,000 years ago. For years, scientists thought it disappeared beneath the waves about 14,500 years ago, toward the end of the last ice age. Unfortunately, that was about 2,500 years before the first accepted date for human settlement in the new world.

To correct this problem, researchers recently analyzed samples of sediment taken from beneath the Bering Strait with an advanced version of the radiocarbon dating method that had produced the 14,500 year date. Their "more accurate" analysis showed that terrestrial plants and animals were living on the land bridge 11,000 years ago, meaning that the land bridge existed until after the oldest believed human settlements in the New World were started.

Scientists also claim that the Americas, 15,000 years ago had a menagerie that looked much like that of East Africa, with North American lions, cheetahs, saber-toothed cats, mammoths, and relatives of camels. But within a millennium or so, they were all gone. Why? No one knows.

Scientists claim a land bridge 1000 miles long joined Siberia and Alaska, over which the first migration into the Americas took place 12,000 years ago, then spread rapidly throughout North America

Now, is any of this known, or can it be proven? No. It is simply a scenario that science claims existed, yet, read it anywhere, and you will find it presented as though it is unquestionable fact! However, an interesting point has emerged from a book published by the Stanford University Press in which core samples that were taken of the land bridge to determine when the bridge formed. Interestingly, the dates provided showed a range from 4,390 years to 15,500 years ago. Consequently, the results were “adjusted,” because the answers were disarranged from bottom to top of the core that no two samples were in the correct order. This led to discarding the oldest date because it was “inconsistent” with other tests elsewhere. In addition, the remaining dates were assumed to be contaminated by a fixed amount, after which the authors concluded that the data under study had been formed 12,000 years ago. Such is how truth is manipulated and managed by evolutionists imprisoned by their theoretical beliefs and imbedded considerations (David Moody Hopkins (ed), The Bering Land Bridge, Stanford University Press, Palo Alto, 1967, pp110-111).

This all leads, of course, to an interpretation of carbon-14 dates, and their effect on the discoveries found in the Americas and who created them and when.

(See the next post, “How Reliable are Scientific Dates? Part II,” for more information regarding the errors in the evolutionary theory, time dating, and ethnohistory, and how it has affected the viewing of startling new finds)