KBS Tuff shows the flaws of radiometric dating (Talk.Origins)

Claim CD031:


 * The KBS Tuff is an ash layer in the Koobi Fora Formation east of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya. It is significant because hominid fossils and artifacts were found in and under it, so its age gives a minimum age of the fossils. Various attempts to date it have yielded a wide range of different results, from 0.52 to 220 million years. The dating of the KBS Tuff exposes the fallacies of radiometric dating. "Good" dates are chosen to accord with accepted dates of fossils, while anomalous dates may not be reported at all. And in practice, it is impossible to be sure one has selected uncontaminated samples.

Source: Lubenow, Marvin L. 1995. The pigs took it all. Creation 17(3) (June): 36-38.

CreationWiki response:

This is nothing less than a complete vindication of what creationists have been saying about radiometric dating. It is also an excellent example of just how good evolutionists are at rationalizing away problems. The funny thing is that Talk Origins is clearly totally blind to how well this illustrates the truth of what creationists say about the process of radiometric dating.

Here they have dates all over the place, not only by different methods, but by the same methods. Given this, it was the fossils that led the way. In the end they came up with three dates that agreed with each other and the fossils, all of which had also given erroneous results. Simply put, what happened here is that evolutionists kept making measurements until they found results that they liked.

It is those caveats that make radiometric dating totally dependent on uniformitarian geology and the geologic column. They also show how problematic dates can be rationalized away.

But it still provides an excellent example of the process. The fact that these hominid fossils were so important and the KBS Tuff is particularly difficult, simply made the process more visible.

And those dating techniques that disagree with the fossils of a given location are considered inappropriate for the circumstances.

Discrepant dates are not dismissed out of hand without first looking for the sources of error, but failing this there is evidence that even the best of dates will be dismissed out of hand if they disagree with the fossils. The above statement also implies that if the dates are not discrepant, no one bothers to look for possible sources of error.
 * Reference: New Age Data of Buried Peat Deposits From the Site "Fili Park".

This just serves as another example of how things like contamination and analytical errors can be used to rationalize away any date that disagrees with theory. With the exception of the first one, no objective reason is given for accepting the sources of contamination other than the fact that these dates are older than the fossils say they should be.

But since Gleadow got an age that evolutionists like, it is unlikely that his work will ever be similarly checked for possible sources of error.

The only sets of objective evidence shown by Talk Origins are the types of fossil found in the tuff and the fact that the 2.6 Myr date was close to the accepted date for a nearby formation. It is probably these that influenced all concerned to accept the 1.88 Myr age.

These dates are at best only valid under uniformitarian geology theory. They are not valid under Flood geology. So this is just another example of "Your theory does not work under my theory, so your theory must be wrong."