Talk:Age of the Earth

The statement that "Charles Lyell supported Hutton's idea in 1830, in Principles of Geology" seems inadequate. Did Lyell set forth a scientific theory about an Old Earth in 1830? I'm skeptical.--Aschlafly 12:38, 18 June 2007 (EDT)

Lyell was a geologist who created several theories related to the geologic age of the earth, including I believe uniformitarianism, and contained in his book Principles of Geology. Karajou 12:50, 18 June 2007 (EDT)

Here's a copy of "Principles of Geology". The table of Contents is in HTML, but the text in PDF. [1] The first few chapters are about the development of ideas of the age of the earth.--Steve 13:45, 18 June 2007 (EDT)

Helium diffusion, polonium halos, C14 dating

All of these methods give ample evidence for a young earth(C14 works best for more recent things). I was wondering if anyone wanted to write about these(If not, I can do some independent research for this article, but I'm in school right now so I can't promise anything).

-- RichardT^Talk 23:26, 4 September 2007 (EDT)

We already briefly discuss these in Young Earth Creationism. Philip J. Rayment 07:53, 5 September 2007 (EDT)

Reversion explanation

The article doesn't say that individual scientists haven't been around for billions of years, it says that the scientific community hasn't been around that long. The people of God have been around for six thousand or so years, so have direct, first-hand records of the earliest days of creation. Jcw 15:41, 7 June 2011 (EDT)

The age of the scientific community and what the term "scientific community" means can be debated, and that's the point - this debate and the current debate over which group has the more accurate age of the Earth shouldn't be in the overview section of the article but instead represented in the sections dealing with the controversy over the age of the Earth. --Mike127 17:41, 8 June 2011 (EDT)

Atheism and Old Earth Theories

The opening section of this article currently states that “atheists ... insist that Earth is somehow 4.5 billion years old” but it implies that all atheists (or only atheists) believe the Earth is billions of years old. This is incorrect and the section should be clarified: it is the majority scientific community that assert the Earth is billions of years old, regardless of religious orientations of individuals in this community. Simply put, not all atheists believe the Earth is billions of years old and not all Christians or others with religion believe the Earth is only thousands of years old. --Mike127 22:40, 10 June 2011 (EDT)

Would you likewise object to a statement that "Republicans oppose Obama's policies"?--Andy Schlafly 23:16, 10 June 2011 (EDT)

Yes, it's to general of a statement – conservatives oppose the liberal policies of the Obama administration, or it can be said that the Republican Party (leadership) opposes the Obama administration. Not all Republicans are conservative on all issues (e.g. the Log Cabin Republicans) and not all of Obama's polices are liberal (e.g. keeping Guantanamo Bay's prison open). The statement would be similar to asserting that Republicans agree on all issues (otherwise why would Republicans bother to have a presidential primary) and that the Obama administration is consistently liberal (they've done plenty of flip flopping to try and gain votes in the upcoming election). So bringing this back to the current article, the overview section (or opening section, whatever one would like to call it) should be more explicit on which groups are putting forward the Young-Earth vs. Old-Earth theories. When it comes to Old-Earth theories - "atheists" is to general of a term and insinuates that those of the scientific community that support Old-Earth theories are without religion. --Mike127 23:55, 10 June 2011 (EDT)

6 thousand years old

I was wondering, is there a reason why this number is written in this way? personally I would either say "6,000 years old" or "six thousand years old", but I wanted to ask for your opinions before changing it. --Leo-from-UK 19:42, 14 June 2011 (EDT)

No particular reason. Either of your suggested edits would be fine.--Andy Schlafly 19:48, 14 June 2011 (EDT)

Thanks, change implemented. Personally I think that little, apparently meaningless details like this improve the perceived quality of an encyclopedia. I chose 6,000 years because it's more "visually immediate" than "six thousand". --Leo-from-UK 19:53, 14 June 2011 (EDT)