Potassium-Argon Dating: Flawed Science, Corrupted Result

[Wanda7771]

You make me feel so young

You make me feel so spring has sprung!

You make me want to bounce the moon just like a toy balloon!

[Wanda7771]

Ha ha ha ha!!! Shhhhhhhh! You're not supposed to say this stuff!

[alyosha24601]

@Wanda7771 Sorry, yes. I did it. I bad boy.

You should see the last video I put up. My son (he's 15) and I laughed so hard my daughter thought we were both nuts. I almost choked from laughing. This subject provokes the strangest scientific debate on the planet. You're "not allowed" to think certain ways!

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 So am I. One of the most interesting new chronometers is the 182Hf–182W system, used to understand the formation of the Earth's (and Moon's) core e.g.

Dahl, T.W. & Stevenson, D.J. 2010. Turbulent mixing of metal and silicate during planet accretion — And interpretation of the Hf–W chronometer. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 295(1–2), 177-186.

[yxrcbszg]

If anybody else think this is bullshit, it was already debunked by Skeptoid.com

[alyosha24601]

@yxrcbszg If it has been debunked, then why does every rock in the world yield a different date when tested with all five decay methods? (This is expensive and almost no one does it) If you do however, anyone will find that the "dating" techniques are unreliable. Your confidence in them is essentially religious. The earth is young.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 As I have explained to you, the processed involved in making a rock occurs in several discrete steps, the different techniques date the timing of these different steps.

Making a rock is like making a cake, making a cake takes stages - harvesting from a farm, mixing the ingredients, baking in an oven, allowing to cool and serving the cake.

When you ask "how old the cake is", do give the harvesting age, mixing age, baking age, cooling age or serving age?

[Diamonddavej]

@yxrcbszg The different dating techniques date different events, because the formation of a rock involves several stages and steps.

Whole Rock dating typically dates when Magma separated from the Mantle.

U-Pb dates when Zircon cooled <900 degrees.

Ar-Ar dates when Biotite cooled <350 degrees.

U-Th/He dates when Apatite cooled <50 degrees.

These obviously happen at different times.

[Diamonddavej]

K-Ar dating is an old technique, it's not used any more by geologists. Prof Grenville Turner invented Ar-Ar dating for NASA's Apollo program in the 60s-70s. It's far superior to K-Ar dating, it involves no prior assumptions and it self-checks for error i.e. Isochron diagrams. Prof. Turner's laboratory dated geological samples for me.

See: Ar-Ar Geo-/Thermochronology by Dr. Jörg Pfänder & How Serious are Errors in Ar40-Ar39 Dates and How Good are Their Monitoring Standards? by Dr. Kevin R. Henke

[alyosha24601]

@Diamonddavej Yes, this is good news. The upsetting discovery that I have made is that the four major dating methods never agree within the same rocks. Geologists usually preform only one test, assuming the same result will result, but the numbers are always vastly different. This I find upsetting. Thanks for commentary - very professional and worthy of respect.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 Thanks. Well, the reason is different techniques date different events. Typically, I'll use several dating techniques to know how a rock formed e.g for Gneiss:

* U-Pb dating tells me Zircon crystals formed in Granites 755 to 611 myr old

The granites were eroded & Zircons (& other minerals) formed Sandstone

* Sm-Nd dating tells me the Sandstone was heated to 650°C & formed Gneiss 225 myr ago

* Ar-Ar dating tells me Biotite in the Gneiss cooled <300°C, 180 myr ago.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 Such as study was carried out on rocks from China, these fascinating Ultra High Pressure rocks contain Diamond. They experienced extreme pressures >75 miles underground, and where gradually brought to the surface by erosion and mountain building. The Pdf is available.

Wang et al., 2004. Protolith age and exhumation history of metagranites from the Dabie UHP metamorphic belt in east-central China: A multi-chronological study. Geochemical Journal Japan 38(4), 345–362.

[DoomsdayWars]

@alyosha24601 What is your actual source on the dating methods not agreeing within the same rocks?

[DoomsdayWars]

@alyosha24601 You do realize that Diamonddave was pointing out that radiometric dating works right?

[Diamonddavej]

@DoomsdayWars I just saw a creationist video, pointing out the different techniques give different ages, that they are inconsistent. Ah, so that's where is originates.

But the different techniques date different events.

U-Pb & Pb-Pb isochron dating tells you when a Zircon crystal cools below 900°C, U-Th/He dating tells you when an Apatite crystal (same rock) cools below 80-50°C. A rock might take 100s of million yrs to cool below 80-50°C, because it's deep underground.

[TheDoomsdayWars]

@Diamonddavej Exactly, any anomalies would be *older* than we would think by initial testing.

[Diamonddavej]

@TheDoomsdayWars Just watched another video, an ash layer was dated to 200 myrs & then to 2 myrs old, supposedly an error.

No, not an error. Volcanic rock may form via meting of old rock, Zircons from old rock often don't melt. So you date old Inherited Zircons & new Zircons that grew as the lava cooled. You date the source & the eruption.

"Inherited and magmatic zircon from Neogene Hoyazo cordierite dacite, SE Spain—anatectic source rock provenance and magmatic evolution"

[alyosha24601]

@Diamonddavej Why do the four or five dating methods never agree between themselves on the same rocks? Even the error bars are far apart. It's a mystery which casts doubt on dating methods yes, but I can't explain what's happening either.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 I'm sorry if I wasn't clear.

The different techniques, date different minerals & events, rocks are made of mixtures of minerals akin to a cake with different ingredients.

In our imaginary example, a method will date when the eggs, butter & flour were added, a different technique will tell us how long the cake was baked and then lastly different technique will tell us when the cake was taken from the oven.

Some techniques do date the same thing e.g. Pb-Pb and U-Pb.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 We commonly carry out several analyses a rock using several different techniques, when we want to understand the rock's complete history, date it's inception, date it's cooling, possible re-heating time and finally, date when was eroded at surface. The different techniques reveal when these events occurred.

Also, zircon will grow episodically, in steps. New techniques can now date sections of crystals, like tree rings, we can chart a crystals growth though time.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 Thus, for reasons I explained, different techniques will obtain different dates (it would be an error if they were the same). And much like a cake, we can work out the events involved in a rocks formation and the times when these events occurred.

Part of my PhD involved Apatite Fission Track analysis; the date when rock cooled below <120°C. Clearly, this AFT age will be younger then a U-Pb date obtained from Zircon, that tells us when the rock first cooled <900°C.

[alyosha24601]

@Diamonddavej I'm not familiar with these tracks. I just know about the radioactive decay products. The five series never agree and their error bars don't even overlap. How do you explain it?

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 The formation of a rock doesn't happen in a single event e.g. granite is made of 3 main minerals - Feldspar (D), Mica & Quartz & 2 rarer minerals, Zircon(D) & Apatite(D). Of these, 3 minerals (D) are amenable to dating.

Zircon crystallizes >1000°C, it's the first mineral to form. Whereas U-Th/He dating of Apatite tells us when the rock cooled below 80-50°C. These two events happen at different times, often millions of years apart. That's why we get different ages.

[alyosha24601]

@Diamonddavej This is interesting to me, as geology is my weakest area and I've never heard this before. Nevertheless I can't believe a rock can take "millions" of years to cool. I suspect this is an assumption based on the dating values!?

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 Underground is hot, we know this via direct temperature measurements in deep boreholes and mines, it is not an assumption.

e.g. the TauTona Gold Mine of South Africa, is 3.9 km deep & the rock temperature is 60°C. They use the worlds biggest ice making plant to pipe 150,000 tons of slush into the mine per day, cooling the tunnels to 28°C (incidentally, the gold rich sediments contain Uranium Oxide, which imply the early Earth's atmosphere had no oxygen).

cont...

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 The slow rate of cooling, reflects the long period rock spent deep underground - deep hot rock cools below 80-50°C Apatite Partial Annealing Zone if there is substantial uplift and erosion, that brings these hot rocks to the cooler surface.

Here in Ireland, rock temperature increases ~20°C per km. Rocks, now at surface in Ireland, cooled below 60°C some 55 million years ago. Therefore, the Irish landscape experienced ~3 km of uplift and erosion in 55 million years.

[Diamonddavej]

@alyosha24601 I watched Dr. Snelling's lecture on YT, I understand your confusion.

Rb-Sr, Sm-Nd & Pb-Pb are Whole Rock dating methods. Dates derived by these methods maybe Model Ages. Model Age is NOT a rock's age (that's Crystallisation Age).

A Model Age is the time when Magma that e.g. erupts as Lava at a volcano, began its journey from the Earth's Mantle to surface.

Only if the dates agree (are concordant) with Ar-Ar / U-Pb dating, then the dates are a Crystallisation Age.

[alyosha24601]

@ABriefHistoryOfTime So, how come every time we use this method on a rock where we know the date, it is way way off! I'll tell you why, because it's the only method that delivers an ancient age - because it's flawed.

[AffairWithGravity]

@alyosha24601 If you'd actually read the articles posted you might have some minor semblance of an understanding as to why there are anomalous dates and also why this is irrelevant, such as the use of Ar-Ar dating instead.

Also, about a dozen radiometric dating methods give ancient ages. Bear in mind, you're the one that thought a trait had to be present in both partners to be passed on to the offspring. Are you really going to insist that your ignorance (and censorship) is an argument?

[alyosha24601]

@AffairWithGravity Look, I just don't want to spend my time here. Please just stop harassing me. Just go watch explosions or ballerinas or car crashes. Please just leave me alone!

[CreationismMirrored]

@alyosha24601 Then stop posting ignorance.

[alyosha24601]

In theory Potassium-Argon Dating seems useful. But in practice there are just too many assumptions and contaminates. It is flawed science and almost always yields a corrupted result. It never agrees with other methods, and in cases where we know the actual history, bogus dates are generated. So why is it used? Because it's one of the few methods that yield "billions of years"! This method is quake science!