Re: paleonet Young Earth Research

["Michael Kishel" <mike@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think I am starting to understand you Campbell.  Creationists, all bad.
ID people, many bad and many misrepresented by a biased media looking to
keep the unattractive propaganda going.  By the way I did read up on the
distinctions in the ID groups.  As far as the C14 claims they were instantly
and obviously misleading.  I just wasn't as familiar with the polonium halo
facts and fables.  Thanks all.

-Michael Kishel

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Dr. David Campbell" <amblema@bama.ua.edu>
To: <paleonet@nhm.ac.uk>
Sent: Monday, November 28, 2005 4:06 PM
Subject: Re: paleonet Young Earth Research


> > "Peer review" among the IDiots likely consists of checking how well
> > the given paper conforms to Holy Scripture.
>
> Peer review among creation scientists probably selects the "peers"
> from among other creation scientists, equally committed to the
> misrepresentation of science in order to promote a misrepresentation
> of Genesis or other scriptures.  Young earth "science" does not
> conform well to most scriptures because most scriptures disapprove of
> lying.  Young earthers often label particular claims as "Biblical",
> actually meaning "in agreement with the traditions of creation
> science, which is sort of inspired by bits of the Bible and other
> sources without regard to serious consideration of their orignial
> meaning."
>
> Intelligent Design peer reviewed papers, on the other hand, often
> appear in more or less authentically peer-reviewed settings, but
> either the journal/volume/etc. is not actually adept at dealing with
> the actual topic of the paper, so that the reviewer doesn't recognize
> what's going on, or else the paper does not actually do anything
> significant to support ID versus evolutionary interpretations
> (e.g., "X evolutionary mechanism doesn't work so well under these
> circumstances", which does not address other mechanisms nor how
> frequent those circumstances really are).
>
> Although the average person doesn't realize a difference between the
> creation scientists and the Intelligent Design advocates, standard ID
> doesn't care about the age of the earth and thus offends the hard core
> creation scientists (but probably doesn't stop the young earthers from
> stealing ID arguments).  The media often isn't interested in details,
> either-I know someone who teaches at a Christian college who got
> contacted by a national news network.  The network hung up as soon as
> it was clear that he was not saying what they wanted about Robertson's
> foolish statement about Dover.
>
> Some of the RATE-type attacks on radiometric decay involve deliberate
> misuse of radiometric dating to generate screwy-sounding results in
> order to discredit the dating.  E.g., 14C dating of ancient carbon
> (diamond, coal, etc.) is an indication of the amount of modern
> contamination, e.g., through chemical exchange with the atmosphere on
> exposed surfaces, adhering bacteria, or fingerprints.
>
> The polonium halo argument is particularly remarkable in that it
> requires the legitimacy of radiometric dating.  Polonium halos can be
> identified only if the laws of radiometric decay have not changed
> since they formed (plus the need to prove that a thin section cut
> through the center of an unsquashed spherical void, a detail neglected
> by young earthers).  Polonium halos can be claimed to have anything to
> do with the formation of the rock only if it is possible to identify
> and compensate for possible post-formational alteration or
> contamination (also neglected by young-earthers).  If the laws of
> radiometric decay are unchanged, and if alterations and contaminations
> can be identified, then radiometric dates are valid.  (There are
> additional problems with the Po halo argument-I'm sure Talk.Origins
> has more detail, and there's an old J Geol Ed article as well.)
>
> -- 
> Dr. David Campbell
> 425 Scientific Collections Building
> Department of Biological Sciences
> Biodiversity and Systematics
> University of Alabama, Box 870345
> Tuscaloosa AL 35487-0345  USA
>
>