Talk:Age of Earth

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Revised date - Earth about 70 million years younger

If anyone could find more scientific reference (e.g. a journal article, New Scientist etc.) for this I'd be grateful, but it looks like the article needs to be revised: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/science_and_environment/10577055.stm 62.56.67.85 (talk) 09:39, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The headline doesn't really do justice to the content, as is all to often the case in the media, I don't have access to Nature so I'll have to go on the BBC report. These researchers have used a different technique to give an age but note that it's not necessarily inconsistent with other estimates, it just requires a longer period for the formation of the earth. Anyway, this sort of finding needs to wait until other groups have had a chance to have their say. Once the findings have been repeated, or obviously widely accepted, that would be the time to change the article. Mikenorton (talk) 09:54, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Data from a newly studied meteorite recovered from the Saharan Desert show that the solar system formed 4,568.2 million years ago, 0.3 million to 1.9 million years earlier than other estimates. The results were published online August 22, 2010 in Nature Geoscience. http://news.discovery.com/space/solar-system-age.html 98.192.80.133 (talk) 18:02, 3 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Do we have better source than this, and has this been confirmed elsewhere? DVdm (talk) 18:22, 3 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fact?

How can we possibly state, as an absolute fact, that the world is such and such an age? We can't, it's a theory, and estimate. And it will, without a doubt change in the future. We will become more accurate with our science, and know more. To say "is" as one use wrote it, is not true. Even the +/- thing. There's no way. Scientists in 100 years will laugh at us.

In other words, I'm arguing for my restored intro. 216.66.59.102 (talk) 01:46, 5 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To say is only asserts it as a good approximation, and the best we have. It has held up well for decades. Your edit only said what was already clear in the sentence: it is an estimate. Saros136 (talk) 08:11, 5 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with the new wording, and I'm surprised it was reverted. It is clearer and obfuscates nothing. Dawnseeker2000 02:06, 5 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Absolute fast" ... no, "theory" ... no. We report the current age based on valid scientific evidence. Will future scientific evidence change? Quite possibly - and most likely to reduce the +/- "thing". We follow the current scientific findings and report the uncertainty of their numbers with that +/- bit. It is scientific fact based on solid evidence. Vsmith (talk) 02:55, 5 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Methinks someone doesn't understand science. Science is characterized by its falsifiability, not verifiability. In fact (get it?), nothing in science is ever proven, only given evidence to support. Therefore, all theories in science have the built in qualification, "until proven wrong or further refined." 68.107.22.105 (talk) 17:16, 22 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I thik that is why scientific fact was cursified in Vsmith's remark: scientific fact indeed simply implies "until proven wrong or further refined", as is somewhat verbosely explained in Science#Certainty and science, Fact#Fact and the scientific method, and Scientific method#Elements of scientific method. DVdm (talk) 18:31, 22 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Exactly. This is why we don't need to remind people that the Germ Theory of Disease is not fact and may someday yet be disproved. 76.212.163.234 (talk) 22:31, 22 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Almost. I.m.o. it is why we don't need to remind people that this theory is fact but may someday yet be disproved. But that is off-topic here. DVdm (talk) 05:21, 23 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]