Revolt against anticipated, rather than actual, tyranny

This is from a test I did in my senior year of high school. This particular item came from a review question that was at the end of the first quarter.

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Mac

AP US History

Monday, October 4, 1999

Throughout the events preceding and during the Revolutionary War, the cries of "no taxation without representation" stirred up popular sentiment and created a common cause for the divided colonies. Many Patriots aligned themselves with Patrick Henry and his "Give me Liberty or give me Death" speech; it was "Common Sense" to take off the shackles of tyrant King George III. Although the Founding Father’s and fellow Patriots were wanting to throw off the chains of the "absolute tyranny" of England and become free, the Americans were revolting against the tyranny they anticipated, rather than actual tyranny. The Americans had just as much representation as most of England, paid less taxes, had less interference than other British colonies, were the freest people in the world, and yet they still felt they were rebelling against tyranny.

The trouble between the British government and the Americans on the issue of representation was the misunderstanding of what representation meant. Most of the common people in England did not have the right to vote for representatives in the Parliament. They did, however still feel as though they were politically participating and that they were represented. Although not many people could vote for the members, the House of Commons and, to a lesser degree, the House of Lords were believed to represent everyone, even those in America. This became a problem when combined with the American belief about representation. The people in America were traditionally used to direct and equal representation. This contrast caused the Americans to believe that they were not being represented in the British government. They perceived representation to mean they had an equal voice in the legislature, which they did not, and therefore believed that they had no voice. Hence they felt they were being oppressed and under tyrannical authority when, in actuality, they had a greater voice than most of the people in the Mother country. Although there was no tyranny, this situation did have the possibility of opening up the Americas to tyranny from the British government.

The issue of taxation was closely related to the misunderstanding on representation. Because the Americans were used to not having to pay taxes to England (the very few tax laws that existed were usually ignored) when Parliament decided to actively tax their colonies they people revolted. The taxes themselves were not tyrannical. The Sugar Act was seen as worse than the previous Molasses Act (which no one revolted to) because it was in principal a taxing measure, not a way to regulate trade. The dreaded Stamp Act was already in place in England and it was a fair way to distribute the tax burden and could easily be collected. It was also a relatively low tax. The British government felt that because the colonies were British citizens, received British protection, and were British colonies they should share in the burden of paying for the government; the Americans disagreed. To the American the government was trying to take away the hard earned money. America was prosperous, the government wanted its portion (just as it receives its portion from all other industries and colonies), and this was the grounds for a battle. The colonists did not pay many taxes, yet they felt because they could not completely stop one tax, nothing could prevent an unlimited number of taxes from being forced upon them.

These misunderstandings between the Americans and the British caused the initial struggles between them. Not because they were under tyranny but because the Americans saw that they could be put in the chains of tyranny they revolted to the simplest measures of control the British put on them. Then, just as with humans, the Mother country started to react to the Child’s tantrums with more control. More control led to more rebellion, which led to more control. This cycle was broken with the "shots heard ‘round the world;" by then the damage was irrevocable and the Declaration of Independence was signed.

Bibliography

Garraty, Thomas. The American Nation. New York: Harper Collins publishers, 1995.
Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. New York: The Macmillan Company. 1952.
Wood, Gordon S. The Radicalism of the American Revolution. New York: Vintage Books. 1993.
Zinn, Howard. A People’s History of the United States. New York: Harper Perennial. 1995

The Age of the Earth: By Radiometric Dating

This is from a report I did for Biology class in High School. I have not modified the text, except for the name line. That means that there will be grammatical and other language-derived errors. Furthermore, the reasoning may not be as logical as I could make it today. However, I make no appologies for the content...

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Mac

10^th Biology

Delaware Christian School

6 March, 1998

The Age of the Earth: By Radiometric Dating

Most people know that the Evolutionary Model calls for millions and billions of years in its timeline, and that Evolutionists claim that radiometric dating, using the decay of radioactive elements to date objects, proves that the earth is as old as they say. Actually, though, the earth has been shown to have a young age, which agrees with the Creation Model, because of the unreliability of some dating methods, the change in the amounts of Carbon -14, and the existence of Polonium halos in granite.

Radiometric dating, or isochron dating as it is sometimes called, employs the knowledge that elements that are radioactive, those that give off particles or energy (Finkle), decay at a given rate. If the amounts of the parent element (isotope of a given element) and the daughter isotope, along with the decay rate are known, the time that the element has been decaying can be found. The equation for the time in a standard isochron dating is:

(Isochron)

Where D stands for amount of the daughter isotope and P for the amount of the parent isotope.

This is an accurate way to date an object, when the following conditions are met:

1. None of the daughter isotope could have been in the
   sample when it was formed (Isochron)


2. None of the parent or daughter isotope could have entered
   or left the sample (Isochron),
   which is a closed system (Morris 138)


3. The decay rate has to have been constant (138)

Evolutionists maintain that all three of these conditions are true; if any of them are not true then the date is not a valid date. Creationists say that it is impossible for all of these conditions to be true because:

1. It is improbable that none of the daughter isotope was
   present at the time of formation
2. There is no such thing as a closed system
3. Every rate is changeable with the right conditions. (Morris 139)

This now becomes the crux of the problem. It is a highly debated issue whether or not radiometric dating is true, and if it is true, whether it shows a young earth or an old earth.

Evolutionists claim that the earth is 4.55 billion years old (Faq-Age), and creationists claim that the earth is 6,000 - 10,000 years old (imp-189). Which dates are correct?

Two popular isochron dating methods are the Uranium to Lead decay (both ²³⁸U/²⁰⁶Pb and ²³⁵U/²⁰⁷Pb) and the Potassium to Argon decay (⁴⁰K/⁴⁰Ar). Both of these yield an old age for the earth so therefore they are used by Evolutionists to combat Creation. But both have the
same problem that all radiometric dating has, they are based on uniformitarianism, the belief that every process has remained unchanged (Morris 98). This means that the decay rates have remained constant and that the entry or exit of atoms has not contaminated the amounts of the isotopes.

Lead can capture free neutrons from its environment; this can cause ²⁰⁸Pb, one of lead’s radioactive isotopes, without having to have decayed from ²³⁸U and ²⁰⁷Pb without ²³⁵U (140-141).

Not only can radioactive lead be formed without having to go through the decay process, but also lead can move through rocks, as can uranium, therefore it can cause a rock to appear older
than it is. This movement can also cause different ages for the same rock layer in the same locale (141).

The idea that the rate of decay has been constant is not valid. The decay rate of U can be changed by neutrinos (142), which come from the sun.

Volcanoes have shown that lava can get both U and Pb from the interior of the earth, which make the volcanic rocks to look much older than they really are (143).

⁴⁰K/⁴⁰Ar dates are not good because if the rock is heated to or above 125°C (257°F) it will show what the ratio was at the time of heating (Finkle).

The 1986 dacile flow from Mount St. Helens received, from K-Ar dating, the ridiculous date of 0.35 ± 0.05 million years old. The minerals in the rock received ages of 0.34 ± 0.06 and 2.8 ±
0.6 million years old. As it can be seen, the rocks formed in 1986 are not millions of years old (sa).

Carbon-14 is used to date anything that was once alive (Humphreys). Willard Libby, an American scientist, designed the Carbon-14 method in 1947 (Finkle). The method is based on the fact that when cosmic rays strike ¹⁴N (the stable form of nitrogen) if can form ¹⁴C (a
radioactive isotope of Carbon) (Humphreys).

Like all radiometric-dating methods Carbon-14 also has to follow certain guidelines. The initial ratio of ¹⁴C to ¹²C must be known and the decay rate has to be constant. And for C-14 the problem is with the ratio (Humphreys).

The method is like this: Living plants breathe in the radioactive carbon from carbon dioxide and it is put into molecules that animals eat. The amount of ¹⁴C in a living organism remains the same because the organism takes in as much Carbon-14 as is decayed or passed out of its system. When the organism dies it stops taking in the radioactive carbon and so the ¹⁴C decays until no C-14 is left (Finkle).

Evolutionists admit errors, but they say that because the errors are only 2,000 - 5,000 years that it is not that detrimental. The upper limit that they set for reliability is 50,000 (Finkle) to 80,000 years (Debate-age).

Although dates of 50,000 years are received from Carbon-14 dating, it is easy to show why. Ninety percent of the dates for C-14 dating are young (Humphreys) and the other 10% are high because of the effects of the Flood. The canopy that was above the earth blocked out the radiation that causes C-14 (Remnant) and so the amount of C-14 was very close to zero. The stronger magnetic field that the earth had would also deflect the radiation away from the earth also (Humphreys).

This lower amount of Carbon-14 in the biosphere would make it look like the organic material was decaying for a longer time than it really was. Because the C-14 was 1/16 smaller before the
Flood Carbon-14 dating needs to account for that. When it is, all of the "old" dates then become "young" (Humphreys).

Another proof of the lower C-14 is that all of the C-14 currently in the biosphere could have been built up in 8,000 years, one of the higher ends of the creation model dates (agee). And even Evolutionists admit that the amount of Carbon-14 can change, like it has since 1950 (Finkle)

Just these three dating methods alone show that all radiometric dating can be called into question. But Evolutionists claim that just because "one wristwatch has failed to keep time properly cannot be used as a justification for discarding all watches" (Faq-Age). They claim that the "assumptions" that the decay is not steady do not have enough evidence (Faq-Age). How much evidence is enough?

One of the largest attacks on Evolutionary time scale is the appearance of radioactive polonium halos in the lowest layer of rock, primordial granite, found by Dr. Robert V. Gentry, the recognized leader in the field of radioactive halos (Gentry 32). Po halos are the rings left from the alpha particles escaping from the center, the Po nuclei.

Polonium halos have "nothing at all to do with ‘dating’" (debate-age) is the cry made by some Evolutionists. In a way they are right, but look at the evidence:

Evolutionists believe that the earth formed slowly, cooling down after several years and became hard rock many years later (po-halos). Polonium-218, a radioactive element in the Uranium decay series, has a half-life of 3 minutes. For granite to contain halos made by ²¹⁸Po the granite had to have cooled very quickly. The long period of time given for the earth to cool is incorrect (Gentry 32). This calls into question the time frame that Evolutionists have given.

Evolutionists have been quick to try to find another way for the Po halos to form and still be in the granite. From saying that the granites cooled slowly and the Po came from U towards the end of the cooling (csun), that the Po halos came from ²⁰⁶Pb that went to ²¹⁴Po to ²¹⁰Po and then back to ²⁰⁶Pb (po-halos), and that he was mistaken on what he was looking at (po-halos).

Gentry has defended himself on all of the counts, yet he still was and is discriminated against. He was denied funds from the National Science Foundation, even though some of his colleagues who were studying the same thing received funds (Gentry 76).

As some of the Evolutionists say, the Po halos do not have anything to do with the dating of the earth, but they do call for a redefining of the earth’s history of formation. The Evolutionary model for the origin of the earth is definitely refuted and so far no one has come up with a counter to Gentry’s finds. So although not pinpointing an exact date for the age of the earth the Po halos do show that it is a young earth, not an old one.

As it was shown earlier, radiometric dating is not very reliable when viewed from a uniformitarianism point of view. The decay rates of some of the isotopes have been changed, deeply questioning the Uranium-Lead results; the amounts of C-14 have changed showing that the earth is young; the Po halos in the granite show that the earth did not take a long time to cool, but was made almost instantaneously.

The entire Evolutionary time scale is based on the belief that every process has been going on since the beginning of time. And when the Flood is ignored, and for that matter the Bible, Evolution seems to make sense. But the evidence when viewed from a Biblical perspective clearly points to creation.

So why the controversy? The Bible has the answer:

First of all, you must understand that in the last days
scoffers will come…They will say…Ever since our
fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the
beginning of creation. But they deliberately forget that
long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the
earth was formed out of water and by water. By these
waters also the world of that time was deluged and
destroyed (2 Peter 3:3-7).

Even the Bible say that people will come and try to push
uniformitarianism and that in their calculations they will
purposely leave out the Flood. This accounts for the discrepancy
of the dates that occur in radiometric dating. So the earth is
young by radiocarbon dating, when viewed from God’s point of
view.

Works Cited

Finkl, Charles W. Jr.: "Dating Methods" Microsoft Encarta. 1994.

Gentry, Robert V. Creation’s Tiny Mystery. Knoxville, Tennessee: Earth Science Associates, 1988

Holy Bible. NIV

http://pathlights.com/ce_encyclopedia/05agee2.htm

http://www2.biglobe.ne.jp/~remnant/creation.html

http://www.csun.edu/~vcgeo005/gentry/canada.htm

http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-189.htm

http://www.icr.org/research/sa/sa-r01.htm

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/debate-age-of-earth.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-age-of-earth.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/isochron-dating.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/po-halos.html

Morris, Henry Madison (ed.). Scientific Creationism. El Cajon, California: Master Books, 1985.

"Radiocarbon, Creation and the Genesis Flood."" Russell Humphreys, Ph.D. Creation Videos a
ministry of Creation Science Foundation, 1992.

Old Web Site

Several years ago (before the age of blogs), I had a website that I had started to maintain, but never really finished it. I decided that I should post some of the information that I used to have up.

Open Letter to Saddam RE: Between the Anvil and the Hammer

Saddam,

If the U.S. could not listen to it's first leader, George Washington, in avoiding foreign entanglements how do you expect Syria to listen to you? However, you may be more true than you realize. Who, besides yourself, has experienced the face-off with the rest of the world and been stuck with no less than two major wars? Surely you don't like Iran -- you fought them, too. Is that why you don't want Syria to join them?

Or is it that you "are [so] convinced that the Iranian and US agendas have met in Iraq and elsewhere in the Arab world" that you fear for the rest of the Arabs you have influence over?

One thing is true... they really "are now placed between the US-Isreali hammer and the Iranian anvil."

I don't think this is Armageddon, yet. Too many people still need to hear about the love and grace of God, before His judgement and wrath comes. However, the lines for THIS battle is being drawn -- WW III. Every major war from A.D. 70 onward has been thought of as the prelude to Armageddon. But not until Christ is on one side fighting His enemies is it time for Armageddon -- many more people still have to suffer.

Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.

And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:

and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in diverse places.

All these are the beginning of sorrows.

Matthew 24

The beginning... not the end.

But take heart, for the winner has already been decided... and, although you are on a hunger strike and possibly near death, you can still join that team!

Another near-war in the Middle East

Airports being bombed, political party headquarters being attacked, cities having missiles launched indiscriminately into them. Those are all the makings of a war.

I really don't want to see another, but I know that they will come. No peace is possible until the Prince of Peace comes. Sometimes wars break out because people don't listen to the full story -- only the part that appeals to them. We in the US are in danger of just that -- not getting the complete story. I guess I serve as part of the problem and solution. I focus on issues that interest me and leave the rest alone. But at the same time, I like to think I bring up alternate sides of the story. Yet when soldiers are being killed or kidnapped then sometimes the information doesn't matter as much as the emotions stemming from the situation.

Suposedly if we were to get attacked here in the states, FEMA has a new system to let us know. I'm very curious as to how it will work. How will they contact all of the internet computers? What port/service will they be using. And how/why isn't it being used to spam everyone right now? Only time will tell.

The Dodgers lost in the bottom of the 14th. At least my (softball) team won today. I went 3 for 3 and additionally reached on an error. So not only did we win, but I ended my hitless streak.

Until next time...

Nope. We Lost.

Cool Fireworks from Pittsburgh. But the National League lost... again. Next year. Oh well. The game counts, but only to see who gets home field advantage for the World Series. I still think the Dodgers can win without it. Did you see how well we've been doing?

All Star Game

Since I'm a Dodgers fan, and I don't like the DH, I'm cheering for the National League. For most of the game we've been leading. Then in the top of the 9th the American League took it. 2 outs left. We'll See.

Zidane's career tarnished.

Today's World Cup Final was being watched by millions of people. Many who, like myself, did not particularly support either team (Italy or France) but wanted to see the stars shine for the last time in 2006 Cup play. Furthermore, this was the last game for the exceptional French player, Zinedine Zidane. In fact, that is how I decided on which team I was going to cheer for. I was going to cheer for Zidane to get a wonderful finale to his great career.

Watching his tarnished, early exit from the game was frustrating. I was then happy to see Italy win -- for Zidane should not have had the right to be excited about his performance. For someone of his stature in the sport to have acted so childishly was horrible. I was also embarassed because I had just finished explaining to one of my friends, who wasn't a soccer fan, how professional most soccer players are -- especially those at this level of play.

Thank you Zidane for proving me wrong. I wonder what your team thinks of you -- how would have this game turned out if you played the last 10 minutes -- if you could have participated in the shoot-out. Well, you won't ever know. Nor will you say that you can prove yourself again in 2010. I wanted to see a great exit, not a greatly regretable exit.

USA def. Ghana in 2010.

Tear is both from the eyes and the hands.

I'm torn. I like the idea of a phonetic spelling -- but at the same time, the etymology of a word is then lost. Similar spellings to root words give clues to derivation, use, and history. All of which are important when understanding the full meaning of a word -- something that a simple definition of a word cannot do.

However, the spellings of words can be quite frustrating, necessitating the use of a dictionary or spell check. Yet, we shouldn't maintain the spelling of a word simply because that's the way it has always been spelled. The reason "because we've always done so" or "tradition" is not a good reason to continue doing so.

So I'm torn. (How does THAT spelling reflect that it came from "to tear" ? And no, not the thing that comes from the eye glands.)