Genesis and Science Radiocarbon Dating (Part 2)

NOTE: This is the second of three articles by R. H. Brown, reproduced from the book Genesis and Science, by Harold H. Coffin.

Carbon-14 and Post flood History

Aside from the information supplied in  the book of Genesis and the Ellen G. White comments thereon, there is at present no firm basis for inferring historical age for any sample with a radiocarbon age greater than 3,500 to 4,000. Commenting on radiocarbon data for eastern middle European paleolithic material, Dr. Laszio Vertes, of the Hungarian National Mu­seum, says, "From the present until about 25-28,000 radiocarbon years ago, the data are congruent; earlier data than these are inconsistent, and chaotic—a fact that is all the more striking as the contradictions ap­pear just in that period from which the bulk of analyses are available: the time be­tween 30,000 and 45,000 C" years" (Vertes, 1966). Studies conducted in the C-14 lab­oratory at the University of Uppsala indi­cate that "infinite" age material may give a radiocarbon age between 32.000 and "infinite" (greater than 40,000), depend­ing on the method of sample preparation (Olsson, 1966). While Dr. Olsson's studies were conducted with Tertiary Age oyster shells (geological age at least one millionyears), her findings together with the observations of Dr. Vertes indicate that any radiocarbon age greater than 28,000 should be regarded with liberal skepticism. Added to the difficulties of counting low-level radioactivity (one gram of 28,500-year-old carbon would average only one carbon-14 disintegration every two and one-half min­utes), very old samples present problems due to critical but uncertain contamina­tion with modern carbon which is easily acquired during collection, handling, and laboratory preparation.

Those who accept the Genesis account as inspired and historically valid interpret the radiocarbon age for ancient material such as the Tertiary oyster shells referred to above, anthracite coal, mineral oil, natural gas, et cetera, to indicate that earth's at­mosphere before the Genesis Flood had a relative carbon-14 activity no greater than 1/100, and possibly less than 1/1000 of the level that became established by 1500 B.C. (A relative carbon-14 activity of 1/128 the contemporary level corresponds to decay over seven half-lives, or a radiocarbon age of 39,976. 2=128; 7 x 5,568=39,976.)

Although up to the present no basis has been found for precise and reliable con­version between historical age and radio­carbon ages greater than 3,500, radiocar­bon age determinations in the 4,000 to 30,000 range do, nevertheless, give impor­tant support to the book of Genesis. With a particularly appropriate figure of speech, a leading archeologist states, "W. H. Libby, in developing radiocarbon dating . dropped the equivalent of an atomic bomb on archaeology" (Johnson, 1966). Radio­carbon dating of spruce trees buried by glacial advance in Wisconsin has forced geologists to reduce the presumed time which has elapsed since major glacial ad­vance from 25,000 solar years to 11,400 radiocarbon years. Assuming a one-to-one correspondence between radiocarbon years and solar years results in a drastic compres­sion of the time which previously had been considered available for the development of Western civilization (Putnam, 1964).

The remarkable scarcity of objects that are clearly associated with human activity and that have radiocar,bon ages in excess of 12,000 suggests that the human popula­tion has grown from a small beginning in a short period of time. It is highly significant that the greatest radiocarbon ages firmly related to human activity are provided by material from the Middle East and the Mediterranean basin (Haynes, 1966; Smith, 1966). Radiocarbon ages for the oldest evidences of man indicate that earth was populated as the result of migration which spread out in all directions from the Middle East area, reaching the Western Hemisphere by way of Alaska. Radiocarbon dating has established that the recent gla­cial periods in Northern Europe and Northern North America were coincident, that the earliest appearance of man in North America coincided closely with the latest advance of glacial ice across Wiscon­sin, and that both North America and Northern Europe were settled rapidly after the first appearance of man in these regions (Libby, 1956).

By the time corresponding to a radio­carbon age of 7,200, farming had been established throughout a strip approxi­mately ten degrees latitude in width ex­tending from Greece across southern Asia Minor to Iran. During the succeeding pe­riod of time, represented by a span of 1,200 "years" on the radiocarbon time scale, farming extended over the Nile Delta, Northern Egypt, Babylonia, and Central Europe. By the time corresponding to a radiocarbon age of 5,000, farming had be­come established in Northwestern Europe, Northwestern Africa, and the Ukraine (Clark, 1966). Data are lacking concern­ing the spread of agriculture eastward from Babylonia, but there are in India remains from the highly developed Harappa cul­ture which have radiocarbon ages as great as approximately 4,300 (Agrawal, 1966). This culture developed elaborate irrigation facilities and had a written language which appears to be unrelated to the writing of subsequent Asian cultures and which mod­ern man has been unable to decipher.

The limited time suggested by radiocar­bon dating for the spread of human popu­lation and for the development of ancient civilization has led many individuals whose world view is not based on that informa­tion given in the Bible to seek support for the postulate that in the ancient past earth's atmosphere contained a greater relative amount of carbon-14 than it has over the 3,000-year period up to A.D. 1850. (Every doubling of the initial relative amount of carbon-14 in a specimen over the relative amount which characterizes material living

March, 1968 in A.D. 1850 would add 5,730 solar years to the difference between the historical age and the radiocarbon age of the specimen, if the historical age is greater than a radio­carbon age based on assumed initial condi­tions equivalent to those which existed in A.D. 1850.) Search for firm evidence to support a higher carbon-14 level in the ancient atmosphere has not been fruitful.

Since primary cosmic ray particles are deflected away from earth by its magnetic field the role of this field in the carbon-14 production rate has been investigated (El­sasser, et. al., 1956; Kigoshi, 1966). De­tailed calculation indicates that a com­plete disappearance of earth's magnetic field would no more than double the pres­ent carbon-14 production rate, with con­sequent extension of the time indicated by the oldest radio-carbon dates by no more than 6,000 years.

A higher level of carbon-14 activity would be brought about by an increase in the primary cosmic ray activity. Since stud­ies of the cosmic ray effects in meteorites indicate that the cosmic ray flux in the solar system has remained close to its present level over a period of time many orders of magnitude greater than that with which radiocarbon dating is concerned (Libby, 1966-11), the only possibility for a large increase in the relative amount of carbon-14 appears to be through a reduction in the amount of nonradioactive carbon in the atmosphere. An addition of 17,190 solar years to the historical age of ancient ma­terial in this manner would require a re­duction of the atmospheric carbon dioxide to one eighth its present concentration (17,190=3 x 5,730; 1/₂ x 1/₂ x 1/2= 1/8

Since only 0.053 per cent by weight of earth's atmosphere is carbon dioxide at present and the fossil record indicates much more extensive and more luxurious vegetation than now covers earth, a signifi­cant reduction of atmospheric carbon di­oxide below the present level does not ap­pear to be a reasonable postulate.

It seems much more suitable to think of earth's ancient atmosphere as character­ized by a higher, rather than a below-mod­ern, carbon dioxide composition. Coal, oil, and gas reserves, limestone beds, shales, and vast amounts of organic ma­terials scattered in gravel beds through­out the planet indicate that before the Flood the biosphere was many times richer in carbon that it is today. A plant or an animal that might have lived at a time when the biosphere contained the same amount of carbon-14 but eight times the amount of nonradioactive carbon as are characteristic of contemporary condi­tions would at its death have a radiocar­bon age of 17,190 "years" in comparison with contemporary materials. Earlier in this chapter evidence was presented which suggests that prior to the Flood the relative amount of radioactive carbon in earth's biosphere was at most 1/100 and possibly less than 1/1000 of its present value. The reader must be cautioned that harmony between the historical requirements of the book of Genesis and radiocarbon ages can­not be obtained by postulating a hundred­fold greater concentration of carbon di­oxide in the pre-Flood atmosphere, since carbon dioxide becomes highly toxic when it reaches unit per cent levels. It is the amount of carbon in the entire carbon di­oxide exchange system, not relatively the small amount contained in the atmos­phere, that determines the carbon-14/car­bon-12 ratio with which we are concerned.

(To be continued)