Lunar dust

An embarassingly common creationist argument is that there's not enough dust on the moon for an old universe. It also has a place among proponents of the Moon landing hoax.
==Creationist disowning==
First, this argument is so bad that creationists themselves have argued against it. CreationWiki, not known for abandoning arguments, wrote in 2013:http://creationwiki.org/index.php?title=Moon_dust&oldid=295659
AIG, back in 2004, wrote:http://web.archive.org/web/20040906192024/http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v15/i4/moondust.asp
And an extremely long 1993 article by Dr. Andrew Snelling and David Rush, published by AIG and republished by CMIhttp://creation.com/moon-dust-and-the-age-of-the-solar-system and ICR,http://www.icr.org/article/moon-dust-solar-system/ wrote:
Thus, even years ago, this argument was proven to be false by creationists themselves. Yet creationists still make it today!
Note also the usage of "evolutionists" to refer to selenologists. Astronomy and geology have nothing to see with evolution in the biological sense.
==Debunking==
Numerous creationists assert that there's too much dust on the moon.Is the Earth Young? by Tim Thompson, taken from a list on CARM.orghttp://www.tim-thompson.com/resp5.htmlhttp://www.creationism.org/ackerman/AckermanYoungWorldChap01.htmhttp://web.archive.org/web/20081211081444/http://www.truthandscience.net/theageoftheearth.htmWhere is the Moon Dust?, 2009 video from Creation Moments
Henry Morris (father of modern creationism) wrote in 1974:Morris, Henry M., 1974. Scientific Creationism, Master Books, Arkansas, p. 152.http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CE/CE101.htmlhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/moon-dust.htmlhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-age-of-earth.html#dust
Kent Hovind said in 1994:
Pathlights, in 2016, maintains:http://www.pathlights.com/ce_encyclopedia/Encyclopedia/~05agee02.htmhttp://www.tim-thompson.com/young-earth2.html#number18
These claims are wrong.
===Dust accumulation===
The number for dust accumulation (either called 15, 14.3, or 14 million tons per year on Earth) is the maximum estimate by Hans Pettersson; his more realistic estimate was 5 million tons, and he warned readers that the real rate may be far lower. The improper citation suggests a lack of honesty from creationists. Most importantly, Pettersson's research was done in 1960 ( years ago yet cited today), with very basic techniques (standing on two mountaintops and collecting dust with a device intended for measuring smog levels), and has been superceded by more recent research.Pettersson, H., 1960. Cosmic spherules and meteoric dust. Scientific American, 202(2):123-132.
More recent studies put the figure at between a minimum of 1.6 x 10^9 grams/year (1763 short tons/yearhttps://www.google.com/search?num=50&espv=2&q=1.6+*+10%5E9+grams+to+tons) and a maximum of 1.7 x 10^11 grams/year (187,392 short tons/yearhttps://www.google.com/search?num=50&espv=2&q=1.7+*+10%5E11+grams+to+tons), both of which are orders of magnitude less than creationists' figures from Pettersson. Even at this maximum value, and even assuming that Earth is perfectly flat, and even assuming that the dust would not compress at all, only 66.18 cm (0.6618 m, 2.171 ft) of dust would have accumulated after 4.5 billion years. This is vastly outpaced by erosion and other factors, which would easily swallow this minute change.
There is no reason why the influx density should be any greater on the moon (and, indeed, one would expect it to be less (about 75% so), as the Moon has less gravity to attract dust).
===Ignored factors===
The surface of the moon is also often hit by larger meteorites and asteroids which turns over the regolith layer (a loose layer of heterogeneous rocks and grains which is several meters thick and covers the surface of the moon) and mixes the dust into it.
This claim also fails to take into account the phenomenon of , in which small objects in a hard vacuum (such as dust on the surface of the Moon) naturally solidify. This effect was reported to be a problem with the first American and Soviet satellites, as small moving parts would seize together.The Implications of the Ranger Moon Pictures (Page 4 references lunar dust vacuum welding)Lunar Rated Fasteners (Page 3 specifies how to build components resistant to vacuum welding)
===Moon landing story===
The story that scientists worried about astronauts sinking in moon dust is a total fabrication. As Don Lindsay reports:http://www.don-lindsay-archive.org/creation/moondust.html
Indeed, McCracken and Dublin wrote:http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind/howgood-yea.html#proof2Shore, Steven N. 1984. "Footprints in the Dust: The Lunar Surface and Creationism" Creation/Evolution, Issue XIV (Fall), pp.32-35 National Center for Science Education, P.O. Box 9477, Berkeley, CA 94709-0477
==See also==
*Rotation of the Earth (the Earth's spin is running down too fast)
*Lunar recession (the moon is going away from the Earth too fast)
*Lunar formation (the moon couldn't have formed)
*Lunar radioactivity (the moon is too hot)
*Lunar atmosphere (there's too much moon gas)
*Lunar bukkake hypothesis (the moon got shot with water during the Flood)
==External links==
*
*Moon-dust argument no longer useful (2013 video from CMI, debunks moon dust argument)
*A dusty old YEC argument backfires (part 1)
*An excellent and thorough analysis of the creationist literature on the issue from Morris to Hovind
*Not Enough Dust on the Earth or Moon Prove the Earth is Young, OEC
==Calculations==
==References==
Category:Creationist claims
Category:Moon