Thank you again SoSick for your opinion.

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Bog bodies do present proof that petrification is possible in short spans of time, relatively speaking. Some may actually only be a couple or a few hundred years old, which may very well be the case of the more intact bodies.
And some of the bodies are dated to times BCE.

Nor does this fact affect the accuracy of the tree ring counts and the minimum age of the earth that they provide evidence for. Nor are tree rings the only source of annual measurements of age that we have evidence of in the world of reality.

Lake Suigetsu Varves

Scientists lead by Dr. H. Kitagawa were able to measure a chronology extending over a period of 29,100 years. They were also able to measure and match the "C-14 age" of samples taken with the core to the ages and Carbon-14 levels documented for the tree ring data for an overlap period starting 8,830 years ago. This is a "floating" chronology, as it does not have accurate data on the present due to the coring technology and the characteristics of the recent formed bottom (silty clay) before it gets compacted by time and later depositions.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/279/5354/1187 (3)

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A 75-m long continuous core (Lab code, SG) and four short piston cores were taken from the center of the lake in 1991 and 1993. The sediments are laminated in nearly the entire core sections and are dominated by darkcolored clay with white layers resulting from spring-season diatom growth. The seasonal changes in the depositions are preserved in the clay as thin laminations or varves. The sedimentation or annual varve thickness is relatively uniform, typically 1.2 mm/year during the Holocene and 0.61 mm/year during the Glacial. The bottom age of the SG core is estimated to be older than 100,000 years, close to the beginning of the last interglacial period.

To reconstruct the calendar time scale, we counted varves, based on gray-scale image analyses of digital pictures, in a 10.43- to 30.45-m-deep section, producing a 29,100-year-long floating chronology. Because we estimated the varve chronology of older than ~20,000 yr B.P. (19-m depth of SG core) by counting in a single core section, the error of the varve counting increases with depth, and the accumulated error at 40,000 cal yr B.P. would be less than ~2000 years, assuming no break in the sediment (12).

The 14C/12C and 13C/12C ratios of more than 250 terrestrial macrofossils (leaves, twigs, and insect wings) in the sediments were measured by accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) at the Groningen AMS facility (13), after proper sample pretreatment (14). The floating varve chronology was connected to the old part of the absolute tree-ring chronology (2, 15) by 14C wiggle matching (16), resulting in an absolute calendar age covering the time span from 8830 to 37,930 cal yr B.P. (17). The age beyond 37,930 cal yr B.P. is obtained by assuming a constant sedimentation in the Glacial.
If the above link is not accessible try http://www.accuracyingenesis.com/varves.html (1)

Note that annual varves run for a period of 29,100 years (from 8,830 back to 37,930 cal yr B.P if correctly aligned with the tree chronology), and that this alone is several times older than any YEC model for the age of the earth. The varve layers continue down below the limits of C-14 dating to ~100,000 years, with some assumptions made below the 37,930 cal yr BP level. As the data below this 37,930 cal yr BP level does not use annual varve layers but an estimated rate of sedimentation, we cannot use it for our minimum annual layer counts other than to say that the earth is older than the annual varves show. Again we can be minimalist: if we take 2,000 years as the error in the data at maximum depth counted, then either of these two scenarios can apply:
  • This chronology is totally independent of the one from the tree-ring data in spite of several thousand years of matching Carbon-14 levels, and the minimum age of the earth is 12,326 + 29,100 +/- 2,000 = 39,436 years old, OR
  • These chronologies overlap as determined by matching the "C-14 age" curves, and the minimum age of the earth is 37,930 +/- 2,000 = 35,930 years BP = 35,987 years old in 2007.
Minimum age of the earth = 35,987 years based on this data.

Note that the climatological information from the varves matches that from dendrochronology for the period of overlap, including the Younger Dryas. Note further that this extends annual chronological dating to the archaeological dates found for the cave paintings at Lasceaux and Chauvet - the archaeological record shows that an early nomadic cave using civilization that involved stone tools, burial ceremonies and undeniably impressive artwork at the Lasceaux Caves in southern France around 15,000 to 13,000 BC, (what is known as the late Aurignacian period) or 17000 years ago, and at a cave near Chauvet (south-central France) around 30,340 and 32,410 years ago. We have verified a chronological age for these artifacts, and we have hardly begun to get into the age of Homo sapiens, the hominid ancestors of man, the age of life on the earth or even the actual ancient age of the earth.

Note further that the layers extend back to 100,000 years ago but that this research only concentrated on the last 45,000 years to calibrate C-14 dating (albeit making some assumptions for before 37,930 years BP).

Carbon-14 Correlations to Lake Varves

We discussed the calibration curves for Carbon-14 above, using them to show the Carbon-14 environment and making a clear distinction between the levels of Carbon-14 being measured and the age determined by calculation from the measured levels of Carbon-14 in the rings. We also noted that these calibration curves have been extended by other later work.

In the case of the Lake Suigetsu Lake Varves they present a calibration curve as well, and we can use this to represent the Carbon-14 environment in the same way we did for the tree-rings - as an indicator of what the levels of Carbon-14 were when the organic samples were alive and growing.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/279/5354/1187 (3)

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. . . . <img src="http://herballure.com/ForumExtras/Images/lrlpqrwcqx.jpg">
Fig. 1. (A) Radiocarbon calibration up to 45,000 yr B.P. reconstructed from annually laminated sediments of Lake Suigetsu, Japan. The small circles with 1s error represent the 14C ages against varve ages. For the oldest eight points (>38,000 years, filled circles), we assumed a constant sedimentation during the Glacial period. The green symbols correspond to the tree-ring calibration (2, 15), and the large red symbols represent calibration by combined 14C and U-Th dating of corals from Papua New Guinea (squares) (8), Mururoa (circles), and Barbados (triangles) (7). The line indicates that radiocarbon age equals calibrated age.
We are only concerned here with the open blue circles and their match to the green tree-ring data. Additionally we need to look at the number of cores involved with the data for a measure of their replication of data.
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Because we estimated the varve chronology of older than ~20,000 yr B.P. (19-m depth of SG core) by counting in a single core section, the error of the varve counting increases with depth, and the accumulated error at 40,000 cal yr B.P. would be less than ~2000 years, assuming no break in the sediment (12).

The 14C/12C and 13C/12C ratios of more than 250 terrestrial macrofossils (leaves, twigs, and insect wings) in the sediments were measured by accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) at the Groningen AMS facility (13), after proper sample pretreatment (14). The floating varve chronology was connected to the old part of the absolute tree-ring chronology (2, 15) by 14C wiggle matching (16), resulting in an absolute calendar age covering the time span from 8830 to 37,930 cal yr B.P. (17).
If the above link is not accessible try http://www.accuracyingenesis.com/varves.html (1)

We are only concerned here with the open blue circles and their match to the green tree-ring data. Additionally we need to look at the number of cores involved with the data for a measure of their replication of data. This graph shows the previous dendrochronology calibration curve, the Lake Suigetsu data and some other data from marine corals. On this graph we have the Carbon-14 levels (represented as "Radiocarbon Age") shown for multiple cores from 8830 to ~20,000 years on the horizontal time scale, and data (I count ~50 samples) from ~20,000 to 37,930 years from one core correlated with counted varve layers, and then eight more organic samples where the horizontal age datum is assumed from sediment thickness (and which are not included in discussion here). This means that most of the 250 samples occurred in the area of most reliability - where there were multiple cores.

Again we can look at the "C-14 age" as a measurement of the amount of Carbon-14 actually remaining in the samples from what was absorbed from the atmosphere at the time that the leaves, twigs and wings were formed.

What are those amounts? The age calculation is based on the exponential decay curve for a radioactive element with a half-life of 5730 years:

http://science.howstuffworks.com/carbon-14.htm/printable (2)

t = {ln (Nf/No)/ln (1/2)} x t1/2

where t is the "C-14 age", ln is the natural logarithm, Nf/No is the percent of carbon-14 in the sample compared to the amount in living tissue, and t1/2 is the half-life of carbon-14.

t = {ln (Nf/No)/-0.69315} x 5730 = -8267 x ln (Nf/No)

Where No is the original level of the C-14 isotope in the sample (when it was alive and growing and absorbing atmospheric C-14), and Nf is the amount remaining. The value for No today is ~0.00000000010% of total organic carbon and Nf is smaller depending on how much time has passed.

Exponential curves look like this:
. . . . <img src="http://razd.evcforum.net/Pictures/carbon14decaycurve.jpg">

We can calculate (Nf/No) ratios for a number of decay ages and use those with the horizontal time frames to show what the approximate ratios would have been (we could refine those by multiplying by the ratio between the data point elevations and the 1:1 correlation line if we want to get more accurate numbers):

(Nf/No) = e^(t/-8267)

Age (yrs BP) Ratio (Nf/No)
[color:"white"].[/color]5,730 . . . . . . 0.5000 (= 1 half life)
[color:"white"].[/color]8,000 . . . . . . 0.3799
[color:"white"].[/color]8,500 . . . . . . 0.3576
[color:"white"].[/color][color:"red"]8,830 . . . . . . 0.3436[/color]
[color:"white"].[/color]9,000 . . . . . . 0.3366
[color:"white"].[/color]9,500 . . . . . . 0.3169
10,000 . . . . . . 0.2983
10,500 . . . . . . 0.2808
11,000 . . . . . . 0.2643
11,460 . . . . . . 0.2500 (= 2 half lives)
11,500 . . . . . . 0.2488
12,000 . . . . . . 0.2342
[color:"red"]12,326 . . . . . . 0.2251[/color]
12,500 . . . . . . 0.2204
13,000 . . . . . . 0.2075
13,500 . . . . . . 0.1953
14,000 . . . . . . 0.1839
14,500 . . . . . . 0.1731
15,000 . . . . . . 0.1629
15,500 . . . . . . 0.1534
16,000 . . . . . . 0.1444
16,500 . . . . . . 0.1359
17,000 . . . . . . 0.1279
17,190 . . . . . . 0.1250 (= 3 half lives)

(A quick look at data point elevation to 1:1 correlation line ratios for this period on the tree-ring calibration curve above shows this ratio to be fairly constant at ~90%, with variations that are ~+/-2% - not enough to make a significant impact on the actual amount of C-14 that we can infer was actually measured.)

These ratios apply to both the tree-ring data and the Lake Suigetsu varve data. This means that to match the levels of C-14 between the two in order to see how they correlate with each other we are matching curves for slopes and general curvature, with the tree-ring data from 0 yr BP to 12,326 yr BP and the varve data from 8,830 yr BP to 17,190 yr BP and beyond. The ends of this overlap period (8,830 yr BP to 12,326 yr BP) are shown in red in the table above, where the measurable C-14 should be 34% to 22% of the original amounts, well within robust detection levels.

Possible sources of error involve C-14 from other than atmospheric sources (use of already aged carbon would mean that there was less C-14 in the original sample, and C-14 made by radioactive interaction in the ground would mean there was more C-14 in the measured sample). There were no radioactive elements in the sediments to artificially raise the measured sample amounts, and in both the tree-ring data and the varve fossil data the organic samples involve atmospheric C-14.

Loss of carbon from the samples by leaching in the lake or other similar processes would not preferentially leach one isotope in favor of the other as they are a purely chemical reaction. This would reduce the amount of both C-14 and C-12 in the samples in proportion to the numbers of atoms of each in the sample, and thus not affect the ratio of C-14 to C-12.

Conclusions

With the continual loss of C-14 with time due to radioactive decay, there is only one period where both the tree-rings and the lake varve fossils will have similar levels of remaining C-14 if they were living, growing and absorbing C-14 from the atmosphere at the same time.

Both sets of data use samples from trees, and thus should be obtaining their original levels of C-14 from the atmosphere.

Samples that get carbon-14 only from the same source while living (and that have not been contaminated by other carbon-14 since then) cannot be the same age and NOT have the same carbon-14 content.

Any mechanism that would not have C-14 decay in the distant past would not match the decay curve shape and this would show up on the calibration curve as a sharply rising line.

Any mechanism that would produce lower C-14 levels in the distant past would not match the decay curve at the point of overlap - it would be too low.

Anyone wanting to invalidate this link between tree-ring age and lake varve age will need to provide a mechanism to produce higher C-14 levels at some point in the distant past for the varves, which then decay down to the tree-ring levels over longer periods of time -- and this would mean that the lake varves are even older than listed.

Because actual amount of C-14 in the lake varves and the tree-ring samples comes from the same source - the atmosphere at the time that each sample was living, growing and absorbing C-14 from the atmosphere - matching the actual C-14 levels between them will provide an accurate estimate of age for the start of the varve floating chronology - objects that are the same age cannot have different C-14 levels because they grew in the same "C-14 environment".

Anyone wanting to invalidate this link will need to provide a mechanism to produce false amounts of C-14 in one system that doesn't happen in the other. This has not been observed.

Anyone wanting to invalidate the lake varves as being annual varves will need to provide a mechanism that produces a continual change in the decay of C-14 so that the curve can be compressed in the horizontal scale and match the curvature of the 5730 half-life curve. This has not been observed.

The logical conclusion is that this Carbon-14 data (the actual amount of C-14, not the calculated age) confirms the lake varve chronological age.

Minimum age of the earth > 35,930 years based on this data.

Enjoy.

References:
(1) Anonymous "Lake Varves" Genesis Research. updated 28 Oct 1998. accessed 10 Jan 2007 from http://www.accuracyingenesis.com/varves.html
(2) Brain, Marshall, "How Carbon-14 Dating Works" HowStuffWorks.com. Undated. accessed 10 Jan 2007 from http://science.howstuffworks.com/carbon-14.htm/printable
(3) Kitagawa, H., et al., "Atmospheric Radiocarbon Calibration to 45,000 yr B.P.: Late Glacial Fluctuations and Cosmogenic Isotope Production" Science 279, 1187 (1998); DOI: 10.1126/science.279.5354.1187
accessed 10 Jan 2007 from http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/279/5354/1187
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