The Earth is older than the Bible perceives.

I will begin by first responding to Pro's round 2 arguments. I will then move on to responding to his round 3 claims and defending my case. Rebuttal of Pro's Round 2 Arguments My opponent has used what is commonly known in debates as the "shotgun method" which can be seen in the Bill Nye - Ken Ham debate, where Bill Nye quickly lists many "evidences" without providing substantial support (. http://creation.com...). This method, when used in time-limited debates, often leaves the opponent unable to adequately address each presented evidence. Since Pro has used this method for his case, I will respond by using this method for my rebuttal of his claims by simply proving a quick word and a link for support. Utah Aspen/Jurupa Oak/Old Tjikko While Pro provides no compelling reason why these trees "ages" should be accepted, I will address his claim concerning carbon dating and DNA matching. I begin by quoting Dr. Donald Batton concerning dendrochronology, "The biggest problem with the process is that ring patterns are not unique. There are many points in a given sequence where a sequence from a new piece of wood matches well (note that even two trees growing next to each other will not have identical growth ring patterns). Yamaguchi recognized that ring pattern matches are not unique. The best match (using statistical tests) is often rejected in favour of a less exact match because the best match is deemed to be ‘incorrect’ (particularly if it is too far away from the carbon-14 ‘age’). So the carbon ‘date’ is used to constrain just which match is acceptable. Consequently, the calibration is a circular process and the tree ring chronology extension is also a circular process that is dependent on assumptions about the carbon dating system (. http://creation.com...). " The assumptions involved in carbon dating, and in any radioisotope dating method for that matter, concern the starting ratio of parent and daughter isotopes, the lack of contamination, and the constancy of the rate of radiogenic decay. While the first two assumptions are certainly dubious, as claimed starting ratios are model-dependent, and contamination would have been nearly impossible to avoid during a worldwide flood where the best medium for isotopic exchange, namely water, covered the Earth, the third assumption is demonstrably false. Based on the evidence I presented, which I will develop more in the defense of my case, decay rates must have been much greater during the flood for there to still be detectable amounts of helium and argon in Precambrian zircons and feldspar respectively. Similarly, using radiometric dating, diamonds have been dated to be more than a billion years old yet detectable amounts of radiocarbon, or C-14, has been found in them greater than ten magnitudes of order than what would be expected if they were truly that old. This demonstrates that the rate radiogenic decay must have been sped up greatly at least once in order for the recorded isotope ratios to be thus (. http://creation.com...). Concerning tree rings I quote Dr. John Morris, "It has been found that all trees, even slow-growing ones, respond dynamically to tiny environmental changes, even hourly changes in growing conditions. Scientists have observed that numerous 'normal' conditions can produce an extra ring or no ring at all. Weather was fingered as the most 'guilty' culprit. Unusual storms with abundant rainfall interspersed with dry periods can produce multiple rings, essentially one per major storm. Thus, the basic assumption of tree ring dating is demonstrably in error. Can we trust the overlapping calibration curves? As it pertains to Flood model considerations, remember that the centuries immediately following the Flood witnessed the coming of the Ice Age. All trees growing on the continents were recently sprouted, actively growing trees. The still-warm oceans rapidly evaporated seawater, thus providing the raw material for major monsoonal-type storms. Earth was ravaged by frequent and wide-ranging atmospheric disturbances, dumping excessive snowfall in northern regions and rainfall to the south. If ever there was a time when multiple rings could develop in trees, this was it. Those centuries probably produced tree ring growth that was anything but annual (. http://www.icr.org...). " There are clearly some unknowable assumptions involved in dating a tree by its growth rings. When attempting to formulate a date, growth rings are simply calibrated using radiocarbon dates, and are thus used ad hoc as a supposed separate line of evidence. Moving on to DNA matching of root systems, this method is also simply calibrated against radiocarbon dating. So in essence, radiocarbon dating is the only way one can get an older age for trees than what the Bible's history allows. Using such a method which is based on unknowable assumptions is faulty and is a poor evidence for an old Earth. Mount Everest/Continental Drift I agree that Mount Everest was formed by plate tectonics. What I don't agree with is the uniformitarian assumption that slow moving continental subduction and uplift formed this mountain over many millions of years. Indeed catastrophic plate tectonics (CPT) is supported by the physical data. I quote Dr John Baumgardner, "Experimental studies of the deformational behaviour of silicate minerals over the last several decades have revealed the strength of such materials also depends strongly on the state of stress. At shear stresses of the order of 10-3 times the low-temperature elastic shear modulus and temperatures of the order of 80% of the melting temperature, silicate minerals deform by a mechanism known as dislocation creep in which slip occurs along preferred planes in the crystalline lattice. In this type of solid deformation, the deformation rate depends on the shear stress in a strongly nonlinear manner, proportional to the shear stress to approximately the third power. At somewhat higher levels of shear stress, these materials display plastic yield behaviour, where their strength decreases in an even more nonlinear way, in this case inversely with the deformation rate. When these stress-weakening mechanisms are combined with the temperature weakening discussed above, the potential for slab runaway from gravitational body forces is enhanced dramatically. A point many people fail to grasp is that these weakening mechanisms can reduce the silicate strength by ten or more orders of magnitude without the material ever reaching its melting temperature (. http://creation.com...). " Dr. Baumgardner has developed a computer model for CPT which not only makes sense of the physical data but requires much fewer assumptions than does the standard uniformitarian model. Mount Everest would have been formed during catastrophic geophysical events after the Flood within a few years time rather than millions. The CPT model also addresses your claims about continental drift. A Pangea-like supercontinent indeed likely existed before the Flood, but this is not the reason for similar animals and fossils existing on separate continents. Rather, animals migrated from Noah's ark onto the various continents using land bridges which no longer exist due to glacial melting after the Ice Age event. The similarities found in animals and fossils are arbitrary as homology is very selectively used. Regardless, CPT better explains the separation of the continents in that the model correlates perfectly with geophysics when tested via Dr. Baumgardner's computer simulation. CPT provides a viable mechanism for the separation of the continents while secular hypotheses do not (. http://www.icr.org...). Ice Layering As with the tree growth ring method of dating, measuring ice care rings is subject to faulty dating as the method is based on uniformitarian assumptions. Indeed, the ice layers fit well with the biblical model of the Flood and Ice Age. The problem is that your starting assumptions determine how you view the ice layers. This is why such evidences, which rely so heavily on ultimately unknowable assumptions are so weak (. http://creation.com...). Rebuttal of Pro's Round 3 Response Pro begins this round by stating that I must argue that the Earth is no older than precisely 6,000 years. I have already explained that the Bible does not explicitly state that the Earth is 6,000 years old, and that no dating method can prove an exact age. I will leave it up to the reader to determine whether I should truly be arguing for an age equal to or less than 6,000 years. Also, how have I shown that the Earth is younger. The error margin does not necessitate that the Earth is younger, rather it simply allows for a deviation of a certain amount of years. We both do not believe the Earth is younger than about 6,000 years, so I would not be arguing for a younger Earth than that. It simply means that the Earth can be between about six and eight thousand years, definitely less than 10,000. This demonstrates that the biblical model is consistent with physical data rather than proving an absolute age. Pro simply seems to cite radioisotope dating as counter evidence to my evidence. The fault in such a counter is that my evidence requires no assumptions whilst radiometric dating requires three critical assumptions, one of which is proven faulty by the very evidence I have given. Therefore, my evidence is to be accepted over yours based on the Occam's Razor principle (. http://creation.com...). Unfortunately I have ran out of space so I will defend my case and rebut Pro's arguments concerning erosion, petrified wood and coral reefs in the next round.