Creation's Tiny Mystery

Turning to Dutch's review, part (1) reveals how easy it is to arrive at erroneous conclusions when reading someone else's reports. It is true that U and Th halo radiocenters are generally known U- and Th-bearing minerals, but Dutch displays a lack of knowledge of radiohalos by erroneously assuming these minerals also form the centers of polonium halos. The data I have published, especially in my 1974 Science and Nature reports, show that polonium halo radiocenters in granites are quite distinct from the usual U- and Th-bearing minerals found at the centers of U and Th halos. Other unpublished results of mine are in agreement with these findings. Thus, when Dutch argues against polonium being in U- and Th-bearing minerals, he is arguing against a straw man of his own invention.

Part (2) in essence disputes the conclusion that polonium halos in granites are primordial on the basis that halos from other polonium isotopes should also be present if this were the case. Dutch has produced no scientific evidence to contradict the existence of primordial polonium halos in granite. Instead he has introduced a hypothetical phenomena into the discussion—namely, of what he thinks primordial polonium should consist—and then claims that my model must be wrong because it doesn't include his hypothetical component. This is, of course, exactly the same argument that Brown used in paragraph 4 of his review. As I showed in my lengthy response to Brown's paragraph 4, the fallacy in this whole idea is the assumption that the Big Bang version of primordial polonium is correct. Indeed, as I indicated in the conclusion of my response to Brown's paragraph 4, the isotopic composition of lead in polonium halos in granites provides unmistakable evidence that the Big Bang version of primordial polonium is fictitious.

As mentioned previously, I have provided abundant scientific evidence that some polonium halos in nature are secondary—referring to the polonium-210 halos found in uranium rich coalified wood specimens from the Colorado Plateau—and have shown in detail how these halos differ from the primordial polonium halos in granites. For some reason Dutch omits any mention of these differences from his review.

In part (3) Dutch attacks my creation model because it includes elements of uniformity and nonuniformity. It should be noted that his attack is based on philosophical rather than [p. 320] scientific grounds. I make no apologies for proposing a model that includes both uniformity and nonuniformity because this is what the scientific evidence dictates. What Dutch avoids saying is that my model can account for both primordial polonium halos in granites as well as secondary polonium halos in coalified wood, which is something the standard evolutionary model can never do. What is most interesting in this paragraph is the way Dutch first raises questions about the identification of polonium halos using the uniformitarian aspect of my model, but then admits my identification of polonium halos is correct after all! The last point in this paragraph concerns whether decay rates may have speeded up or slowed down. My response is that the evidence from the U/Pb ratios in coalified wood, as well as the results from both the Pb and helium retention in zircons taken from deep cores, provides strong evidence that the earth's age is very young. This implies an enhancement in the decay rate in the past.

The last paragraph of Dutch's review starts out as a philosophical defense of the uniformitarian principle, with the implication that evolutionists have the truth. With this mind-set Dutch then proceeds to relegate all my discoveries for creation to the category of "unresolved problems in science." He claims that scientists will only revise their beliefs after they are confronted with incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. But somehow he fails to see that evolutionists have been confronted with just that kind of evidence for a long time—the falsification test was proposed almost eight years ago. Clearly, when the issue between creation and evolution was reduced to the outcome of an experimental test, evolutionists signally failed—and are continuing to fail—to meet the challenge of creation.

Dutch's comments about variable decay rates reveal again, unfortunately, that he continues to utilize the straw man approach—this time erecting two of them—as a means of attacking my work. As just noted (two paragraphs ago), the evidence cited for a change in the decay rate is based on the U/Pb ratios in coalified wood and the results of Pb and He retention in zircons taken from deep granite cores. I also cite the existence of primordial polonium halos in Precambrian granites of presumably varying geological ages as prime evidence that the different radiometric ages of those granites are fictitious. But I oppose the idea that it is possible to produce significant decay rate changes at present. Dutch must surely realize that this is my position because the creation model I have proposed—and about which he comments—pictures significant decay rate changes only in the context of supernatural intervention into the affairs of this planet during such periods as creation week and the time of the flood. From this it can be seen that the whole Idea of inducing significant decay rate changes at present is diametrically opposed to the basic tenets of my creation model.

Near the end of his review Dutch begins to critique other creationists' views of radiometric dating, including a reference to changes in electron-capture decay rates. I do not understand why these remarks are included in his review because all the views that Dutch comments on here are quite different from mine, and in fact are completely disassociated from my results.

Finally, I again express my personal esteem for Dutch. And in response to his last sentence, I would hope that he—and for that matter all who hold a purely uniformitarian view of earth history—would carefully consider that God left scientific evidence of creation to help those who doubt Genesis come to a full knowledge of the truth of His Word.

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