The Western Hemisphere. General term for the Americas following their discovery by Europeans, thus setting them in contradistinction to the Old World of Africa, Europe, and Asia.
LEE HOCHBERG, NewsHour correspondent: What archaeologist Dennis Jenkins found in the Paisley Caves in south central Oregon may turn on its head the theory of how and when the first people came to North America.
Many scientists believe humans first came to this continent 13,000 years ago across a land bridge from Asia and they started the so-called Clovis culture. But Jenkins says they may have been living in these caves 1,000 years earlier, toward the end of the last ice age.
DENNIS JENKINS, archeologist: We certainly knew that people had lived in the caves, but we did not have adequate dating to prove that they were here at the end of the ice age.
LEE HOCHBERG: In 2002, he and his students at the University of Oregon began excavating the caves looking for proof. They discovered 14,000-year-old camel bones and signs they'd been butchered by humans. And then, they found artifacts of the humans themselves.
Butchering marks on the bones sounds pretty human to me. Assuming that the fangs of a smilodon would make different marks.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
Some are saying thousands of years of urination and crapping would alter the readings of the lower status found-----but it would only make them more recent---would it not?
People say lots of things about C14 dating. I think the major valid complaint is that the assumption that C14 in the atmosphere is "constant" is shaky.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
Jenkins' turds seem pretty legit to me at least so far as I have read. The article, however, kind of sucks. There really aren't that many archaeologists who think that humans came across 13,000 years ago, and few are still Clovis-firsters.
Last edited by Knuckle sandwhich on Wed Jul 09, 2008 8:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Minimalist wrote:People say lots of things about C14 dating. I think the major valid complaint is that the assumption that C14 in the atmosphere is "constant" is shaky.
That is why there have been calibration curves for a long time now.
Yes, K/S, but that of course is based on educated guesswork, too. No one was around taking measurements.
Do I think C14 dating is reliable? Yes. And they have done much to improve it in recent years but it is based on certain assumptions that may or may not be totally correct themselves.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
Jenkins' turds seem pretty legit to me at least so far as I have read. The article, however, kind of sucks. There really aren't that many archaeologists who think that humans came across 13,000 years ago, and few are still Clovis-firsters.
Nicely put. Clovis-first advocates appear to be going extinct since too many sites are popping up throughout the Americas that precede Clovis technology to keep that hypothesis alive and well.
Eventually, eyeballs must roll to the ceiling and the chorus be heard, "Enough! Let's move on, already." That should be Stuart Fiedel's cue to go get a life somewhere, but he keeps banging into the wall over and over like the Energizer Bunny.
Minimalist wrote:...it is based on certain assumptions that may or may not be totally correct themselves.
I'm not sure what assumptions you mean, here. The half-life is a matter of physics. As for the rest, calibration is done with tree rings and other sources in order to provide an independent reference point. BUT. I think C14 today is kind of used for ball-park estimates and order of magnitude. Later, other methods which are less prone to environmental contamination are used if accuracy is called for.
Minimalist wrote:...it is based on certain assumptions that may or may not be totally correct themselves.
I'm not sure what assumptions you mean, here. The half-life is a matter of physics. As for the rest, calibration is done with tree rings and other sources in order to provide an independent reference point. BUT. I think C14 today is kind of used for ball-park estimates and order of magnitude. Later, other methods which are less prone to environmental contamination are used if accuracy is called for.
I meant the calculations that are used to "calibrate" the results.
One man's "calibration" is another man's "tampering" if you know what I mean.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
dannan14 wrote:
Monk, do you mean accuracy or precision?
I meant accuracy. I think the precision is given by the rate of radioactive decay and how accurately we can measure the amount of material.
Maybe i'm misunderstanding some definitions, but to me it seems like precision would mean that tests of multiple samples from the same layer would produce very similar results. If calibration happened to be incorrect the result would be inaccurate ages.
If i am getting this all straight then environmental contamination would cause results to be less precise, unless all samples were contaminated.
Not that any of this really matters, but my mind was wandering and i decided to follow it.
