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Fossil Dating Methods: Pick Your Date, Pick Your Method

We went to the Smithsonian's Human Origins web site to get evidence proving evolution is true. What did we find?

Smithsonian Web Page

The Smithsonian web site gives several evidences they say are proof evolution. One of them is the dating of fossils. In a series of 30 SECOND videos and web pages we are looking at the various datign methods used to determine the age of human fossils.

THERMOLUMINESCENT DATING

In the previous video we looked at carbon dating of the Mungo Woman fossil. This human fossil was found near a dry lake, Mungo Lake, and originally carbon darted as 19,000 years old. By dating different parts of the fossil that C14 date increased to 25,000 years, and then C14 dating of the sediment raised the age to 26,500 years. In 1998 thermoluminescense was used to directly date the sediment the Mungo Woman was found in. The new date became 42,000 years. If these dating methods were reliable, they should all be giving close to the same date. But they don't. That's a sure sign there is something wrong with one of, or most likely both dating methods.

How does thermolumaniscent dating work? Quartz crystals store light energy when exposed to the sun. When quartz crystals are heated they emit light, and the amount of light is related to the amount of radiation stored in the crystal structure of the quartz. The amount of emitted light is measured and that gives the "stored" radiation level in the crystal.

Here are a couple of assumptions made when using thermoluminescent dating:

• The initial level of radiation in the quartz is assumed to be zero (no one was there thousands of years ago to measure it)
• The assumption is that the radiation absorption rate was constant over thousands of years.
• It is assumed the available environmental energy level was constant

What we are seeing in the dating of the Mungo Woman fossil is that, depending on what is dated, a different age results. We also see that secular scientists accept that dating methods are not reliable. They readily switch to an older date (the greater hte age, the more prestige amd money there is for the discoverer), and discard earlier, younger dates.

Additional, More Detailed Information

Examining Thermoluminescence Dating (ICR Article)

On the (Evolutionary) Road to Morocco? (AIG Article)

If you'd like to jump ahead and get all the details, the following article provides that information: The Dating Game (Details About Mungo Woman) (CIM Article)

Image of Mungo Lake in video is by: dfinnecy - Wikkicommons images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mungo_lake_1.jpg
Image of the Skull in video is by: Didier Descouens - Wikkicommons images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mungo_lake_1.jpg