L is the natural log of 2 divided by the half life of the radioactive element. The half life is determined by observation of the decay of the element and documenting when half of the element has decayed into another element. For extremely long lived elements the half life calculation is performed using an extrapolation from a timed observation of decay.
Which part of this process do you consider arbitrary?
As I said before, the decay rates have not been observed and are therefore assumed. You referred to this problem in your post using the word "extrapolation".
We can call it what we want, but the bottom line here is that the extrapolation is an assumption, not an observation.
I think this is something you need to provide more depth on. I have explained above how the half life is determined. You need to show how that process involves "faith".
What I mean when I say a process involves faith is that one does not know the process. Nevertheless, when people choose to accept that which we don't really know as fact, they are actually accepting it by faith.
Some scientists assume that all radioactive decay rates operate according to the formula that you provided. Since many of these curves have not been observed, this is an assumption.
Our records of observations of decay rates only go back perhaps 70-80 years, and even then, records were not kept until well after that. So, as you said, there is an extrapolation that takes place.
The problem is that this extrapolation is based on the assumption that all decay rates follow the same curve defined by the formula.
We don't know if this is true or not because many of them have not been observed, especially those often quoted in relation to evolution.
It is, therefore, an assumption. If this assumption is accepted, it is accepted by faith.
Name a condition that could change the radioactive decay rate of an element.
A more pertinent question would be to ask you if you can state with confidence that there are no factors that affect radioactive decay rates.
That gets to the root of the matter much more directly.
I don't believe you are making a correct statement. Perhaps you remember it wrong. I was in high school in the 1970's and I remember the 4.5 billion from my Geology class.
I'm quite sure I remember it correctly. I did a lot of thinking at that time about how long a million years is because of those textbook claims.
Additionally, I'm not the only one. I have heard from others over the years who have also seen the textbooks changing the age of the Earth over the past few decades.
Duh. How about providing the original reference...or is that not important to the imparting of truth that you so revere?
I apologize if the quote is incorrect. If you find it is, please correct me.
I don't wish to misquote anyone.
Pierre-Paul de Grasse was not a creationist. He was a follower of Lamark's theory for the diversity of life on the Earth. The theory is similar to evolution in that all life came from one ancestor but the mechanism is different than Darwin's theory.
I guess you subscribe to the idea that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend"....regardless of what they really believe.
No.
Actually I don't judge truth by my personal feelings about the messenger or their reasoning.
Truth is truth no matter how I feel about it. I discovered this important principle in elementary school.
It's not about friendship, likes, dislikes, or feelings. It just about truth.
Since there is no such thing as "self-replicating" in the manner which Russ appeared to mean, I saw no reason to answer his question. Besides, he did not state which "rules of chemistry" were violated by assembly of "complex self-replicating machines", despite being asked several times. It was his claim of such that started the exchange, he should support it, I think. However....
You're asking me to prove a negative.
My position is that chemical binding rules do not facilitate the self-assembly of highly-complex, symmetrical, sexual (different organisms having perfectly compatible reproductive systems), self-reproducing machines.
Darwin tried to break the claim into little pieces, but he did not know or understand even the slightest about the depth of complexity that exists inside a cell. He did not consider symmetry. He did not properly consider sexuality.
His obsolete claims are those of a simple man obsessed with promoting a claim, whatever his ambitions.
"It may metaphorically be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinising, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting those that are bad, preserving and adding up all that are good;..."(Charles Robert Darwin, The Origin of Species (1870), 80.)
Linear has stated that complex reactions to occur within the cell. Indeed they do, but their require the assistance of a vast toolshed of complex machinery to do it.
Shall we then claim that the toolshed of complex machinery built itself?
No.
An external intelligence built the machines that facilitate complex processes.
There is no other logical explanation.
