True Age of the Earth
For years, the theory that the Earth formed billions of years ago was the only accepted theory of the creation of the Earth; whether or not you were Christian or not. But in recent years there have been many questions raised to the Old Earth theory. Now there is a brand new line of theories, one that consists of a Young Earth. This new theory uses scientific principles and data that has been collected from the Earth's magnetic poles. We know that the poles surround the entire Earth and the have a distinct power to them. That is why compasses work. Scientists know the exact power of the magnetic poles and they also know that the poles have been on a steady decrease in power. They now say that the poles dissipate by the half every 1400 years. So if the power of the poles was at 200 amps (or whatever they are measured in) at the year 2000, 1400 years before that the power of the poles were at 400. 1400 years before that it was at 800, then 1600, then 3200 and so on and so forth. Someone sat down and did the math with the real numbers for the past 10,000 years and discovered that the power of the magnetic poles were so powerful that molecules and atoms could not combine together. Everything that is on this Earth is made up of combined molecules and atoms. If the poles were at such a great power 10,000 years ago, nothing could have existed. Therefore it is believed that there was no Earth any more than 10,000 years ago.

Ancestors or Not?
For centuries, scientists have theorized that humans evolved from apes. We as Christians believe whole heartily that God created us in His own image. Now, I don't know about you but can you picture an all-powerful ape? Their main reasoning for the evolution theory is that humans and apes share a similar tailbone. Now we all know that if someone discovered tomorrow that a dog and a whale had the same rib cage design then it would be said that they are ancestors. Any way, that is the main reason for the speculation on evolution. But why are apes still around if they evolved? And just because we have similar bone structures doesn't mean anything. Is the chariot the cars physical ancestor. Well, to a scientist they are because they both have spokes on the wheels. Science should be taught in school. The data, how it was achieved, what has been discovered -- these are the backbone of science. But science cannot mean much without interpretations as to meaning. Evolution is the reigning paradigm governing those interpretations at the moment and in that light should certainly be taught. It is not a fact apart from simple speciation, however, and should not be taught as such. I do think that challenges to the evolution interpretation should be discussed and the idea of options to that interpretation be discussed. Since evolution itself is an idea that is quite pervasive, however, it certainly should be part of the curriculum, but it should not be treated as some sort of icon immune from challenge or disagreement. To do so is to disallow students to think their own way through data and possible meanings.

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IS CARBON DATING RELIABLE?
C14 dating is very accurate for wood used up to about 4,000 years ago. This is only because it is well calibrated with objects of known age. Example: wood found in a grave of known age by historically reliable documents is the standard for that time for the C14 content. This standard content of C14 can then be used for wood not associated with a historically documented date. Dates up to this point in history are well documented for C14 calibration.For object over 4,000 years old the method becomes very unreliable for the following reason: Objects older then 4,000 years run into a problem in that there are few if any known artifacts to be used as the standard. Libby the discoverer of the C14 dating method was very disappointed with this problem. He understood that archaeological artifacts were readily available. After all this what the archeologist guessed in their published books. Some believe trees are known to be as old as 9,000 years. They use tree rings as the calibration standard. A lot of people doubt this claim for various good reasons I wont go into here. We believe all the dates over 5,000 years are really compressible into the next 2,000 years back to creation. So when you hear of a date of 30,000 years for a carbon date we believe it to be early after creation and only about 7,000 years old. If something carbon dates at 7,000 years we believe 5,000 is probably closer to reality (just before the flood). Robert Whitelaw has done a very good job illustrating this theory using about 30,000 dates published in Radio Carbon over the last 40 years. One of the impressive points Whitewall makes is the conspicuous absence of dates between 4,500 and 5,000 years ago illustrating a great catastrophe killing off plant and animal life world wide (the flood of Noah)! I hope this helps your understanding of carbon dating. If you have any more questions about it don't hesitate to write.2. I just listened to a series of lectures on archaeology put out by John Hopkins Univ. The lecturer talked at length about how inaccurate C14 Dating is (as 'corrected' by dendrochronology). The methodology is quite accurate, but dendrochronology supposedly shows that the C14 dates go off because of changes in the equilibrium over time, and that the older the dates the larger the error.Despite this she continually uses the c14 dates to create 'absolute' chronologies. She says this is ok so long as you take into account the correction factors from dendrochronology. (They conveniently forget to mention that the tree ring chronology was arranged by C14 dating. The scientists who were trying to build the chronology found the tree rings so ambiguous that they could not decide which rings matched which (using the bristlecone pine). So they tested some of the ring sequences by C14 to put the sequences in the 'right' order. Once they did that they developed the overall sequence. And this big sequence is then used to 'correct' C14 dates. talk of circular reasoning!!!!3. Even if the rate of decay is constant, without a knowledge of the exact ratio of C12 to C14 in the initial sample, the dating technique is still subject to question.4. Traditional 14C testing assumes equilibrium in the rate of formation and the rate of decay. In fact, 14C is forming FASTER than the observed decay rate. This skews the 'real' answer to a much younger age.

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