The Age of the Earth - Can it be trusted?

a reply to: SkepticOverlord

The failing of humans is that it is often hard to imagine things on a much larger scale than is actually thought possible. Even now, knowing the vastness of the universe, I struggle to imagine it. I can look at the numbers and understand that the universe is a very, very huge and very, very old. However; I have trouble imagining those numbers as actual space and time. It's literally unfathomable.

originally posted by: SkepticOverlord
a reply to: stosh64

As compared to science, yes, mythology paints the earth as much younger.

Egyptian mythology places the earth near 60,000 years old. That's 0.02% of science's current best calculation.

Good, that's not the mythology I hold to.

originally posted by: Hellhound604
a reply to: IndependentAgent
well, according to some in 2014, the earth is only 6000 years old....

Pffft .... serious opinions only... thnx

You aren't supposed to ask a lady her age..

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

we have steel, iron and aluminum tools are are embeded in limestone found all around the world.
And using *carbon dating* puts a lot of these objects into the hundreds of thousands - 1 million years.

We've all seen those threads and researched these topics right?

Also, the EVRs in our DNA that is millions of years old. Older than the grand canyon.

Humans have been around for quite some time.




Even when we use genetics to guess time, We still get into an unfathomable timeline.

If science is to be correct, they assume humans are a couple hundred thousand years old. So what were we doing all that time? We went from stone cities 6000-8000 years ago to computers and satellites, motors engins.

For a couple hundred K years what were we doing? Fighting sasquatch? lol.

The thing about using viruses to establish a time line is that viruses can be contracted via infection. Which does not require the host to procreate in order to spread to other species. It is very likely that we share a lot of genetics with animals and insects because of these reasons.

Some of the EVRs are required to make a human. Some are not. Some were just inherited overtime by our parents when their ancestors contracted it.

Yeah i know im going off about genetics now. But both are used to estimate time. We don't fully understand genetics yet but we may actually beable to put a time on some of those things because of mitchondrial dna traces back through the bloodline to the original ancestor that procreated.

a reply to: stosh64

Egyptian mythology tends to paint the oldest non-scientific picture of the age of the earth. What mythology are you referring to?

originally posted by: ScientificRailgun
a reply to: SkepticOverlord

The failing of humans is that it is often hard to imagine things on a much larger scale than is actually thought possible. Even now, knowing the vastness of the universe, I struggle to imagine it. I can look at the numbers and understand that the universe is a very, very huge and very, very old. However; I have trouble imagining those numbers as actual space and time. It's literally unfathomable.

Me too. I can accept the numbers but I'll be damned if I can really wrap my mind around it.

Its why I like laying out and staring at the stars, it blows my mind.

a reply to: stosh64

I really miss the stars sometimes.

Damn urban light pollution.

originally posted by: SkepticOverlord
a reply to: stosh64

Egyptian mythology tends to paint the oldest non-scientific picture of the age of the earth. What mythology are you referring to?

I choose not to discuss it here, it usually brings out the worst in a lot of people.

The ancient text I believe in really doesn't have a start date, although a lot of people try to give it one. I believe it coincides with science as far as time periods.

I believe in a antediluvian and a pre Adamic history. Be gentle

originally posted by: puzzlesphere
a reply to: IndependentAgent

So what's your position?

How old do you think the earth is?

My opinion on how old the earth is, is not really important to the discussion.

More pressing question:

Why does the age of the Earth matter?

We've never agreed on it and I can STILL get funny cat pictures sent straight to my inbox.

a reply to: AgentShillington

I understand you're parodying the typical consumer ideology.

But this made me genuinely lol.

a reply to: stosh64

I don't discount antediluvian cultures. I just tend to think that, if unknown pre-history civilizations existed, that it was tens of thousands of years (even hundreds of thousands) before the supposed flood/cataclysm.

However… there's precious little fossil record or archeological record to support such theories.

originally posted by: IndependentAgent

originally posted by: eriktheawful

The age of the Earth is 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years

Age of the Earth - Wikipedia

Take a look at that number. Specifically take a look where it says "± 0.05 billion years"

That's Plus or Minus 50,000,000 years. Plus or Minus 50 million years.

Not exactly a pinpoint figure.

As time goes buy, science learns things. One of the things it learns to do is: ask more questions. And when they find the answers to some of those questions, it can cause even more questions, and cause certain theories or knowledge before it to change.

A long time ago they thought everything surrounded the Earth and orbited it.

Quite a bit later, we figured out that no, everything orbit's the sun.

Still much later we discovered galaxies and found that our sun is in orbit around the center of our galaxy and that our galaxy is just one galaxy among a extremely large number of galaxies through out our universe.

So by your logic: we shouldn't believe science on that either, because they keep changing their minds.

Prior to the 1960s, they thought Venus might be a hot tropical type of world, and they just knew Mercury did not rotate anymore on it's axis.

Turns out Venus is a barren wasteland of temps close to 900 deg F and Mercury does indeed rotate on it's axis.

Prior to the 1970's, we were not 100% sure of the mass of Neptune. Voyager flies by it and allows us to refine what it's mass is with precision.

As we learn more things, we are able to revise things that we know. Science is great that way.

So scientists should learn not to place that much trust in their own work, and should be open to acknowledge the possibility of being wrong?

Ah, a twisting of the words.

Not once in anywhere did I write such a thing. I wrote that scientist are always asking questions, and sometimes the answer to those questions may lead to changes in our understanding of things.

Any scientist that follows the scientific method will be more than ready to admit they are wrong about something. IF you can show them that they are, and IF they can repeat your process and get the same results over and over.

originally posted by: AnuTyr
a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

we have steel, iron and aluminum tools are are embeded in limestone found all around the world.
And using *carbon dating* puts a lot of these objects into the hundreds of thousands - 1 million years.

you are going to need to give me some specifics about those tools that have been found. I've heard some anectdotal stories, but without any solid evidence, then that's all they are -- anecdotes. As far as I know, none of those accounts of "tools in very old rock" have been confirmed.

There was this alleged "400 million year old machine" that made the rounds a couple of years ago:


But, alas, it is not a machine after all. It's just the fossils of Crinoids (sea creatures).

a reply to: IndependentAgent

I think it's important you understand the scientific method so that you can understand how conclusions are drawn to things, such as, the age of the Earth.

As someone earlier mentioned, our science is only as accurate as our tools. As we develop better telescopes we see older and older light increasing the known age of the universe. Science isn't necessarily based on 'right or wrong' but more on 'what we know now.'

a reply to: SkepticOverlord

There is lots of Evidence tho, Take this 1.2 million year old stone chopping block in the British museum.

1.2 million year old stone chopping tool

It comes from an early human campsite in the bottom layer of deposits in Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. Potassium-argon dating indicates that this bed is between 1.6 and 2.2 million years old from top to bottom. This and other tools are scientifically dated to about 1.8 million years.

Using another hard stone as a hammer, the maker has knocked flakes off both sides of a basalt (volcanic lava) pebble so that they intersect to form a sharp edge. This could be used to chop branches from trees, cut meat from large animals or smash bones for marrow fat - an essential part of the early human diet. The flakes could also have been used as small knives for light duty tasks. To some people this artefact might appear crude; how can we even be certain that it is humanly made and not just bashed in rock falls or by trampling animals? A close look reveals that the edge is formed by a deliberate sequence of skilfully placed blows of more or less uniform force. Many objects of the same type, made in the same way, occur in groups called assemblages which are occasionally associated with early human remains. By contrast, natural forces strike randomly and with variable force; no pattern, purpose or uniformity can be seen in the modifications they cause. Chopping tools and flakes from the earliest African sites were referred to as Oldowan by the archaeologist Louis Leakey. He found this example on his first expedition to Olduvai in 1931, when he was sponsored by the British Museum.

and then there's these other objects that dont fit in our timeline.

Peices out of time

originally posted by: Soylent Green Is People
There was this alleged "400 million year old machine" that made the rounds a couple of years ago:

But, alas, it is not a machine after all. It's just the fossils of Crinoids (sea creatures).

Yes.

For those not willing to take your word for it, because this image got quite popular online: FossileLaudonomphalus regularisP1

a reply to: IndependentAgent

Is it off topic though? You have made a specific claim that would need to be backed up with a source as well as how it fits in with the context of all the other corroborating evidence. Seems like you're anomaly hunting to push an agenda.

a reply to: AnuTyr

I don't have an answer to all of those anecdotal accounts, but the ones about the screw-shaped object could have been a sea creature with a spiral shell. The vase base that was mentioned wasn't necessarily inside the rock that was dynamited -- they found it after the blew up to rock, but it wasn't necessarily inside it.

As for the 1.2 million year stone tool? Sure -- our early ancestors may have exhibited some cleverness. However, a relatively crude stone tool, no matter how clever it is for a non-human to fabricate, is not really evidence of a human civilization 1.2 million years ago.