Age of the Earth

[dp07]

I am posting on several religious threads and have a question on Radiometric dating. I do not know much about it, but from what I have heard it is based on how many radioactive particles are left in a molecule or something like that. What I am wondering is there anyway that those radioactive particles are leaving those molecules for different reasons then age such as exposure to sunlight or water or tempatures or even pressure being applied to that particular molecule. This may sound stupid and I may be completely wrong about how it works, but I just was wondering.

 

If you choose to post anything I would like you to be a credible source and just not a kid in the tenth grade that thinks he knows something.

 

Thank you for taking the time to read my post and hopefully not laughing at it.

[insane_alien]

well, its the amount of radioactive particles in the material, not necessarily the molecules that make up the material. it depends on the type of radiometric dating used. Uranium/thorium dating(used for timescales such as the age of the earth) aren't likely to lose concentration of the the radioactive particles unless the rocks drop into a volcano making them useless anyway. carbon dating can lose carbon-14 due to the formation of volatile carbon compounds as well but its not significant.

 

go look at the wikipedia page, well more specifically, the sources on the wikipedia page. they are quite credible even if you think wikipedia is wrong all the time.