Chemistry Technical Paper
Sam Seemiller
Mrs. Tawney
Chemistry ? 11
03 March 2023
Outline:
Thesis statement: Is Radiometric Dating truly factual or merely a fallacy?
The age of the universe is a well questioned topic. Some believe that the universe is billions of
years old, whilst others object, and state that the universe is less than a decade old. But, how can
the difference in beliefs be so drastic? This paper will include topics such as, the method of
Radiometric Dating, the Christian belief, problems between both beliefs, how Radiometric
Dating has been dubbed ineffective, and in the end will raise
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Which means that all organisms, plants and animals,
have a certain amount of radioactive carbon-14 held within their system. When alive, the levels
stay the same and is stable. But when the organism becomes deceased, the levels of carbon-14
halts, and as time passes by, the levels decrease and decay in the organism, which gives us
Radioactive Decay (Connor). ?The technique of carbon dating was suggested initially by Willard
Libby and his colleagues in 1949? (Connor).
Another method is Potassium-Argon Dating. This method uses potassium-40, an
exceedingly rare isotope, and isotope argon-40, a reaction from the decay of potassium-40.
Potassium has a half-life of 1.25 million years, so it is much better for dating things (Khan).
Also, some calcium-40 but it's not focused on. Potassium-Argon Dating is a method used to date
old rocks and fossils (Khan). For example, a volcano erupts and potassium-40 and argon-40 are
present in the lava. The argon-40 is a noble gas so it would seep out of the liquid lava because
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Carbon-14 has been detected in many natural organisms and it dates then back
millions to billions of years old. But carbon-14 shouldn't be detected in any organic matter that?s
older than 100,000 years (Herbert). Once an organism becomes deceased, it stops taking in
carbon-14 and the isotope begins to decay (Herbert). Fortunately, a recent analysis of one of the
assumptions of these systems being used, had to be re-evaluated. Gregory Brenneka of ASU and
others, measured the relative amounts of Uranium 235 and Uranium 238 in an Allende meteorite
(Thomas). They found slight differences in the isotope ratios from samples of the same
meteorite. This discovery was unexpected and it made people question what the age of things
truly are. ?A critical assumption used in carbon-14 dating has to do with this ratio. It is assumed
that the ratio of 14C to 12C in the atmosphere has always been the same as it is today (1 to 1
trillion). If this assumption is true, then the AMS 14C dating method is valid up to about 80,000
years. This is a critical assumption in the dating process. If this assumption is not true, then