How We Learn About Ancient History Using Carbon | Carbon Dating Compilation

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Turns out, we can learn a lot about history and the age of things with a thing called Carbon Dating. Carbon dating has allowed scientists to learn numerous things about the world and how it developed! You can learn all about it too in this new episode of SciShow! Let's go!
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Sources:
How to Date a Dead Thing
• How to Date a Dead Thing
Why Carbon Dating Might Be In Danger
• Why Carbon Dating Migh...
What Science Has Taught Us About Stonehenge
• The Strange Mystery of...
How Climate Scientists Predict the Future
• How Climate Scientists...

[@SciShow]

Visit brilliant.org/scishow/ to get started learning STEM for free, and the first 200 people will get 20% off their annual premium subscription.

[@EyeoIsis]

I hope you'll do an episode featuring the experimental use of neutrinos in paleontology.

[@rowinfun]

That was a great line "Dating is hard, especially if the thing you are dating is dead. " I have never been on a date that was dead as a dinosaur!

[@byyanga6315]

The little "carbon dating isn't a precursor to carbon marriage" joke in the beginning was kinder funny. Loved it 🇿🇦

[@yosefleibjacobson3698]

🇿🇦🇿🇦🇿🇦🇿🇦

[@MKRex]

"Carbon dating is not the quickest way to carbon marriage" took me out. 🤣🤣🤣

[@klugscheier5160]

Carbon dating is hard especially your dating is dead

[@descarteslancaster9843]

It's precursor

[@Paladin88]

Carbon Courting?

[@chadmann69420]

“Precursor” does not mean “quickest way” 💀

[@Svensk7119]

​@@klugscheier5160 Yes. That was hilarious.

[@simateix6262]

It is impressive how many different clever methods humanity has come up with to help us understand the universe and the world around us

[@kellydalstok8900]

And it’s equally impressive how a significant number of people, in the US at least, do their utmost to misunderstand those methods.

[@41052]

@@kellydalstok8900 don’t need to call us out there 😭

[@semaj_5022]

@@kellydalstok8900 Ahh don't worry, it's not just us Americans. We're both amazing and horrible as a species everywhere we live. Both qualities just manifest differently in different cultures.

[@noneyayeast]

Yet at the end of the day a goddamn worm knows as much as us on the big questions.

[@jessestreet2549]

maybe to you but i'm an older person and getting darn tired of unlearning all i once thought i "knew".' joking. i wish i had more time to see the wonders on the way. my mamaw remembered horses and buggies and lived to see the moon landing.

[@nucleogenexaffiliate]

"dating is hard, especially if what you're dating is dead" 😂😂😂

[@jeaniebird999]

I use Michael's hair to date your videos. I call it SciShow-Michael-Coif Dating.

[@monk607]

Yes! I thought I was the only one

[@glenngriffon8032]

And here i thought the Suess Effect was what made my ham and eggs green. But that's the Seuss Effect.

[@lindareed8265]

I'll never look at Stonehenge the same way ever again. "A very, very, very heavy piece of Ikea furniture."

[@Alpha_fitz]

I'm mostly neutral on carbon dating, but no copulation until marriage.

[@TheHomelessDreamer]

And I'm Solo on being frozen in Carbonite.

[@A.Filthy.Casual]

No carbonation til marriage

[@CobaltContrast]

Kinda like the difference between relative dating in science and Alabama.

[@jessical4866]

Until decay do us part!

[@kelseywoodie3012]

😂

[@killxxhollywoodxx]

Carbon dating sounds like a great dating app for scientific people

[@Chris_W]

Maybe a dumb question but, in layman's terms, how did we determine the half lives of atoms that take such long timespans to decay? Surely we couldn't reliably detect any amount of atoms that decay within a reasonably observable timespan.

[@evelynlamoy8483]

The halflife is the time it takes half a sample to decay. We have it set to "half" because it's the easiest way to quantize it, but the numbers you are working with get much more manageable when you realize we can detect decay at far smaller percentages, and that amount can be inflated, simply by looking at a larger sample. Soo the answer is, conversion and maths. Now, an obvious next question for an inquisitive mind might think "Well, how do we know for sure that once those numbers are converted, and a scale is established, that it actually works that way, reliably ?" and the answer is, they had to take a bunch of other estimates of age for known objects, and to compare compare the estimates and see if it manages to corroborate the numbers we expected. They could also probably figure it out with knowledge about subatomic force calculations but that is way beyond my wheelhouse.

[@matthewcox7985]

@@evelynlamoy8483 Short version: Math. LOTS of math. 😁

[@brianedwards7142]

It's like a bucket with a small hole. By working out how fast the water flows you can work out how long before it reaches half way.

[@leogama3422]

1 gram of any radioactive isotope has a number of atoms in the order of 10^20. Even if you have a very small amount of a slow decaying isotope, it's more than enough for a Geiger counter, for example, to detect a bunch of decays. I'm not sure, but I believe that in such situation the hard part becomes to quantify the isotopes, not the decays.

[@shanek6582]

@@brianedwards7142 Brian, this is the only comment that actually answered the original question lol.

[@punkypink83]

I used to go to UCL's Institute of Archaeology and yea Gordon Square is right outside our faculty building where we'd often conduct experimental archaeology. It's so funny to hear about it in a scischow video

[@rubixloverful]

i had no idea Hank and Merlin had beef until now 😳

[@byyanga6315]

What's going on?

[@dwaynewilliams3077]

@@byyanga6315 hank doesn't believe in magic.

[@MarkBarrett]

Stonehenge was most likely built to track star movements.

[@jayteet.8204]

Ok, so for this video, I learned that dating is not a guarantee and not the only way. You have to combine it with other techniques or use a different technique completely. Got it. Subscribed! Didn't know that this is a dating advise channel.

[@polydynamix7521]

I saw a documentary that demonstrated that when lifting the stones on top they likely used a dirt mound. They built one using 6 guys to demonstrate.

[@njlkerins]

Excellent episode! Keep up the good work.

[@pelewads]

Thank you so much, for not referring to Jeffrey of Monmouth as a historian. I hate when educators do that. At best he's a historical novelist. But I like your description better. "A fanciful writer of English History."

[@ashconner2293]

This clarifies so many questions that I had. Thank you so much for doing this video

[@almosteducational3729]

17:31 People also forget that everyone was rather strong then, so it’s very possible they just put logs under and would role them like that

[@connorchallis7333]

Always the highlight of my day !!

[@retard_activated]

Eye see what you did there, lol 🤣

[@itskitty808]

I actually visited Stongehange 11 years ago. It gave off an eerie feeling.

[@rowmane2048]

That feeling is the radioactive decay of the elements around you. IDFK

[@suelane3628]

@@rowmane2048 It is a pity that Paul Deveraux' Dragon Project didn't measure the radio-activity on the site.

[@poorplayer9249]

This gets me thinking it's about time to binge a couple of season's worth of TimeTeam, Yay!

[@annikathewitch3950]

I had a chem professor once try to argue he could use carbon dating to determine how old he was. I wanted to correct him so badly.

[@ivytarablair]

1) love compilations! 2) man, the text colors and size changes were SO HELPFUL FOR DYSLEXICS, you guys! Can we have them back please? pretty please?

[@reaper4812]

"Just because you understand something, that doesn't make it any less fascinating!" Hank have you ever seen a magic trick?

[@Merennulli]

That's your personality at play. Odds are pretty good Hank doesn't find magic less fascinating when he understands it. For many of us, magic tricks only become interesting when we either know how it's done or have at least something to start from in working it out. Take, for example, a math problem where ? is an operator you don't know: 1 ? 1 = 27 Unless I miss my guess, you don't really care what the question mark is doing because I presented it as if it were math. The question mark could stand for " + 25 + " or it could be something more convoluted, but you really don't care. It's just a dumb example problem. And that's how magic tricks look to many of us. If you're math minded, though, you can already think of things that might be interesting if you were presented with them. For example, ? could be "round( (10^a) * (e^b))" where a is the antecedent and b is the postcedent of the operator. A math-minded individual could then have fun imagining the applications of that now that they know how it works. And that's how magic tricks entertain me. I figure them out, or I go find out how they were done. Sleight of hand is also more a demonstration of athletics. You can usually tell when that's what's being done even if you can't see how it was done.

[@reaper4812]

@@Merennulli Interest and fascination are two wildly different things though. I like finding out about how magic tricks are performed, I like being impressed by the technical skill and creativity that goes into each trick, but that doesn't change the fact that the FASCINATION aspect is all but gone once the mystery is revealed. Sure, you can have a moment of "Oooooohhh" where you maybe feel a sense of excitement, but finding out that someone has a tube running along their arm and down their finger will never compare to the childlike wonder of watching someone fill up an empty glass with beer out of thin air right in front of your eyes.

[@Merennulli]

@@reaper4812 First off, straight from the dictionary, "to command the interest of". I do get that they have contextual differences despite literally referencing one another in their definitions, but "fascination" still describes how people view a magic trick after they know how it works. Nothing in the usage or definition of the word requires ignorance. Only that the predicate has the attention, interest, and excited engagement of the subject. You may have that childlike wonder when you see a glass fill up by "magic", but most of us don't. (This is intentionally the only time I've used "most" so far.) We know that it's done by a tube, a trick glass, or some other mechanism, and sight-unseen we have no appreciation for how it might work. People DO experience that same childlike wonder watching physics demonstrations where they are explained how it works before seeing it. The coin vortex many science centers have in the lobby is a perfect example of that. How many times have you been to one and seen grown adults putting coin after coin into it, knowing full well how it works, but wanting to experience the wonder of it over and over? Or the VAST number of physics toys that are sold to adults? Newtwon's cradles, tensegrity sculptures, Tesla coils, gyroscopes, Stirling engines, multi-arm path tracing pendulums, etc. There are many different ways people experience fascination with magic acts. If yours happens to require ignorance of the mechanism, so be it. Embrace the wonder of what fascinates you. But don't project that onto everyone else and deny the wonder of what fascinates us.

[@saywhat9158]

Why can’t they just re-carbon date something that was previously carbon dated and using the current levels of CO2 compared to previous levels determine a new calculation for the ratio where both determinations are consistent?

[@Merennulli]

Because the added C12 can make 2 ages look identical in amount of C14. Let's say you put a box with 100 pennies in it on a shelf each year, and each year I take a penny out of each box. After 10 years the first box will have 90 cents, the second 91 cents and so on up to the last box you put up with 100 cents. Next year you decide to put up a box with 95 cents in it. How do you tell it apart from the box that is 5 years old?

[@rowmane2048]

@@Merennulli You label your boxes... jkjk

[@mikeheatherly7518]

Apocalypse has his space ship parked under it,lol!

[@uChakide]

Did I miss something here? How can you use carbon dating to date Stonehenge, when it is made of stone and not organic material?

[@davebennett5069]

they use the organic material that was above / below / surrounding the stones, to figure out a date range. like gobleki tepe in turkey - it was a massive stone megalith that was buried in a hill. the organic material that was used to bury the stones was dated, and it was known that the stones had to be placed there BEFORE that, since they stones were UNDERNEATH the dirt.

[@uChakide]

@@davebennett5069 okay, not the stones then, but elements in the environment they are surrounded by.

[@sandybarnes887]

He explains at the 13:00 mark

[@tuijakarttunen9164]

I`ve always wondered, why is it so hard to believe that people were able to built Stonehenge, when people were already building step pyramids in Egypt around 2660 bc?

[@yellowflowerorangeflower5706]

Awesome

[@twocvbloke]

Even carbon dating wouldn't land me a girlfriend... :P

[@DavidLindes]

3:32 - something interesting I discovered about this, that you sort of hint at but don't quite mention, is that some folks have taken to thinking of January 1st 1950 as a sort of arbitrary threshold for about when all this was going on, and referring to times before that date as "Before Present" or "Before Physics". Of course, I see no reason not to extend this out the other direction ("after physics"/"after present"), too, and so I'm writing this comment in the year I think of as AP73 (that most folks know as 2023). Because I figure there should be a year zero (1950), because number lines, and that, yeah, we should base our numbering on something that actually matters scientifically somehow. Happy new year!

[@jimcurtis569]

Hello to 406 from 906. Another informative video, thanks.

[@That_Emily]

whenever you say "the models" its pretty entertaining to imagine a group of super models doing science

[@erikarussell1142]

I like your response error shirt.

[@tcf70tyrannosapiensbonsai]

Come on! You can never rule out a real magician. A capacity like Merlin can make his work look in every desired fashion.

[@Gomer._.]

But perhaps Merlin is the obscured form, magic, if we live in such a world then we just need to yell, really loud

[@Cosmiccoffeecup]

Dating is hard.

[@zandelion87]

This is the best comment.

[@dieselexhausted]

Especially when the thing you're dating is... dead.

[@CleverMonster101]

Original!

[@Charles_S09]

@@dieselexhausted lmao

[@ktak2811]

@@zandelion87 yes, especially since it's straight from the video.

[@ivanborsuk1110]

1500 years of construction by POSSIBLY different groups of people i wonder what is the possibility that there were a team of builders every one of which lived more than 1500 years?

[@johnlarson111]

I took a course in meteorology LTCC and my teacher worked at DRI. He said that they 100 models for the basin. if they could get five to agree that was the forecast for the lake tahoe basin

[@MoGas71]

I love science humor more than science😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@julescaru8591]

Late to the party as usual but I enjoyed this presentation 🤷‍♂️

[@Svensk7119]

Hate to say, but when Hank(?) adds that extra letter to BC, it's like he's spoiling for a fight.

[@MrLarryLicious]

Now I want to make a cilinder earth society.

[@kellydalstok8900]

I’m sure that already exists.

[@MrLarryLicious]

@@kellydalstok8900 Oh god damn it.

[@chancebrock289]

I loved this video very informative but damn the asian tourist at stone hedge killed me

[@sidneyvand8722]

How do scientists know if something is that old versus made out of something old?

[@rowmane2048]

@6:22 are those steam stacks?

[@nope_]

ooooooo sci show compilation. I feel like the aliens from sesame street- car-bon day-ting. yup. yup. yupyupyupyupyup mhm yup yup yup yupyupyupyup

[@barrydysert2974]

When are you going to tell us about the Beaufort Gyre?

[@maliciousfry]

wow

[@craigb8228]

Since we've been throwing lead into the atmosphere for 2000 years can we have lead dating? Our planes are still throwing lead out everyday.

[@rifz42]

so when will be able to tell how old the sphinx is?

[@will.mcguire]

Oof.... Mixing science with closeups of Michael is my new favourite way to learn.

[@themanimal7602]

It only took me 2 minutes to realize how my brain only possesses less than 1% of the knowledge that is on earth,but that realization itself is knowledge.

[@thewatcher5271]

Good Video But It Seems Like You Should've Mentioned Arthur Holmes.

[@newyorkcityabductschild]

Dating items that are dead is really difficult, people frown at me when i take her to the restaurant…..

[@brianedwards7142]

I'm an Aussie so I don't have direct knowledge of the area but isn't Salisbury Plane chalk geology? A glacier would carve chalk up like butter.

[@harleebruce4673]

How is the ozone🤔

[@ValeriePallaoro]

@@harleebruce4673 It hurts (with love from Melbourne)

[@litechil4129]

Would it be possible to genetically engineer a tree or plant or algae to take up more CO2, and maybe make it use the CO2 and sugars and stuff more efficiently. Could we engineer better carbon storage?

[@sanjayrajsoni]

IMHO : 8 followed by 26 zeros is 800 Trillion Trillion ! Or 800 Septillion. A Septillion has 24 zeros (aka Trillion Trillion)

[@freshorangina]

Ice paths

[@xJessiGirlProx]

What I don’t get about this is if there are clearly variables, why do some people scoff when people challenge some of the dating that has been done? I get that it’s at least mostly right. But lots of science has the possibility of being wrong, or at least off base.

[@gijs8043]

So... There is a different C13/C12 ratio in fossil fuels? Otherwise you don't get a different ratio from the emissions, right? How does that happen?

[@nano-liam]

Woah whats going with the audio at 3:59 - 4:16 ? It sounds very "fuzzy"

[@CommandLineVulpine]

Just sounds like not a perfect noisegate. Noisegates just cut the mic audio completely if its not past a certain threshold (speaking) Or they don't have noise suppression on that time when they usually do

[@gerrywalsh6853]

Now how and if do you take into account the amount of microbial life that exists everywhere will they not throw off your colon 14 calculations being that they are alive and will stay that way regardless of the death around them and the amount of microbial life will change on temperature oxygen and light so how are we taking all of the variables into account if someone can answer that for me that will help my thirst for knowledge thanks

[@taylortimbrook2030]

Theoretically could other element based lifeforms have their own form of carbon dating, if they exsisted?

[@Uulfinn]

Everyone's dating carbon. Why won't carbon date me?

[@Giselle33888]

I never forget to be awesome, thanks, Carbon 21

[@user-qq7jw6oq8x]

Used ice

[@robertgoldman8064]

Back in the '70s they didn't say the co2 was going to cause global warming, they said we would be in global winter. They even had a movie theaters .

[@lenabreijer1311]

No that wasn't it. If there had been no humans generating co2 then we would have been moving into an ice age. Nobody thought co2 would cool the planet. However enough nuclear bombs would do it.

[@robertgoldman8064]

@@lenabreijer1311 I disagree, I seen the movie in a theater. All those that believe in the so called global warming , sure blow their cult belief on the internet and none have gone to zero carbon footprint. FYI when you exhale your breathe is mostly CO2. If there was zero CO2 starting tomorrow how would the plant life last or human kind . No plants no O2, THE END.

[@lenabreijer1311]

@@robertgoldman8064 like Hollywood always gets their science right? It must have been some obscure scifi B movie because I don't remember it at all. Nobody said there was zero co2 before humans started raising the levels. If that is your kind of knowledge then I suggest you crawl back under your rock and stop embarrassing yourself.

[@Rabcup]

HANK?! Did you put Stefan up to this? Carbon marriage…smh

[@jfh667]

But why go 200 km away to get giant rocks, and then bring them back? Surely there was something else closer?

[@sneeringimperialist6667]

My theory on moving the large stones at Easter Island and in Europe is that they placed posts deep in the ground and tied ropes between them and the rocks. Twisting a log in the ropes would tighten them and pull the rocks between the posts , forwards. This could also lift the rocks off the ground to place them , or just clear obstacles on the route.

[@sneeringimperialist6667]

If multiple round objects were placed in the ropes , several logs could be put in them and pulled on by many people at once. Even holding the rope tight while a different set of posts were put in to turn. Like working a pair of wrenches on a bolt in a tight space.

[@HumanAndroid18]

Woah, who are these people?

[@JP-JustSayin]

"Cylinder earthers" ... LOL ... don't give them any ideas.

[@odjflone8330]

I wonder do we have to know how much carbon 14 is in something at the time it died. If so, how do we know

[@daemenoth]

dating dead things is super hard... just ask jack skellington.

[@markadams7046]

What does the [406] on his T-shirt supposed to represent?

[@dMb1869]

Probably Montana. Im pretty sure that where their studio is. Edit: definitely Montana. 406 is the area code for the whole state, and I know it’s where Hank lives so I imagine the rest do too. Also Google imaged “406 Montana shirt” and it seems to fit.

[@leogama3422]

HTTP Error 406 - Not Acceptable?

[@ValeriePallaoro]

@@leogama3422 Yes; I'd definitely go with this one. It's now a rather archaic, and inside, joke amongst coders. I'm pretty sure he had a 404 t-shirt in the earlier days, that made me laugh

[@BundasaurusPecs]

Always funny how Americans pronounce British place names, like Salisbury and Wiltshire

[@georgewashington63]

There are some who say carbon dating isn't reliable because if you want to date an old stone structure you have to date the organic matter around it

[@darrenjurme7231]

The time stamps don’t correspond to the start of each segment.

[@IsmailAbdulMusic]

I wonder if there is any carbon dating performed on the giant extinct moa bird? I wonder the age of giant extinct moa bird yo

[@ValeriePallaoro]

Moa wikipedia "Polynesians arrived sometime before 1300, and all moa genera were soon driven to extinction by hunting and, to a lesser extent, by habitat reduction due to forest clearance. By 1445, all moa had become extinct, along with Haast's eagle, which had relied on them for food. Recent research _using carbon-14 dating_ of middens strongly suggests that the events leading to extinction took less than a hundred years ..."

[@IsmailAbdulMusic]

@@ValeriePallaoro That is very interesting and fascinating, thank you Valerie!

[@BullCheatFR]

7:20 what if we start pumping a little bit of carbon-14 in the atmosphere to compensate?

[@lordgarion514]

Just like carbon-12, carbon-14 ALSO increases global warming. So adding extra just to make dating easier, seems like a bad idea.

[@BullCheatFR]

@@lordgarion514 C-14 abundance is around 1 parts per trillion. Increasing that amount slightly would have less impact on climate change than the CO2 footprint of a single human being.

[@lordgarion514]

@@BullCheatFR Unfortunately, that's completely irrelevant. We're *already* pumping out more than enough to wreck pretty much everything. Adding a single extra molecule, won't do us any good.

[@BullCheatFR]

@@lordgarion514 this mentality is very counterproductive imo. When everything is important, nothing is.

[@lordgarion514]

@@BullCheatFR Your opinion is irrelevant TBH, because not everything is important. Just the things that can get us killed.

[@brianedwards7142]

Hypothetically speaking: if I ate nothing but Egyptian mummies 🤮would that change my "age" by carbon dating because the C14 in the mummies has decayed?

[@leogama3422]

In theory, yes. But you would need to eat _a lot_ of mummies...

[@Al13n1nV8D3R]

I am all for Diamond Dating.

[@youtube7076]

did he just say its the Dr.Suess effect? lol

[@GIBunz]

nitrogen fixation at the bottom of the ocean

[@dominic2446]

0:45 80 trillion trillion has 25 zeroes, not 26.

[@DrewOfAnders]

how do we know that the issue with carbon dating hasn't always affected the earth. we've been burning coal for hundreds of years. Can we assume that the carbon levels were the same 500 years ago much less 10,000 years ago. If we base the age of a creature or plant on a ratio that has been changing for a long time, how can we know that it's accurate without more controls?

[@natsarimwatcher8366]

maybe, maybe, maybe how exacting maybe

[@jluke168]

If you've seen the range of uncertainty in the most recent IPCC report, I would say accurate is not strictly a scientific way to assess that range of uncertainty.

[@ValeriePallaoro]

To get an exact date is expensive and time consuming (see the bit about using an AMS to calculate actual atom numbers) so ball park figures and an average is more often used. When a scientist (or otherwise intelligent person) reads these figures, they know what's going on. And it's future modelling, which always has the element of surprise in it = Ah!

[@marklondon9004]

Don't rule out Merlin! Whilst a fictional character clearly didn't build Stone Henge, it's possible that the source of the myth is a druidic leader who had a part in acquiring the stones from a rival tribe. If so, Merlin did build it.

[@neurostreams]

I don't understand the multiple comment references to this video's use of the word "marriage". Is that related to carbon-dating lingo?

[@neurostreams]

Oh, it is because "dating" is a homophone (and also spelled the same) : "dating" like assigning a date/time stamp to something; and "dating" like romantic courting, which usually transpires prior to marriage.

[@Jay_Rule]

I believe in the Bible stating the earth and the universe is only about 6000 years old, which is enough time for fossils to develop. I don’t believe in the accuracy of radiocarbon dating because carbon decays relatively fast (C has a half life of 5730 years), and after that only half of the original amount remains. If say, after 10 half lives or 57,300 years, the amount of C remaining is only

[@hawks9142]

I've never seen a young earth creationist try to use science to back up their claims. Typically it's just their faith. How do you do that? The science isn't on your side so is it just pick and choose or do you just not know some other it?

[@daviddonoso6577]

13:10 Wait you said cremated human remains for the date.. Wouldn't that make things worse for using carbon dating? Here's a quote from Science Direct: "As seen from the resulting data, fire-induced carboxylation, i.e. “carbonization”, of the textile cellulose, leads to a significant error in the radiocarbon dating results.". Granted, the paper is referring to a different material but it seems that if they used that method data would get skewed

[@lordgarion514]

Not exactly. If you raise a cow, kill it and make leather that gets burned in a fire the same week, you'll get an accurate age. If you put that piece of leather in storage for 2,000 years, and then it gets burned, your date will be skewed.

[@youtuberesearch7017]

@@lordgarion514 This is so irrational what you writed.

[@lordgarion514]

@@youtuberesearch7017 No, you just didn't understand it. Is English your native language?

[@youtuberesearch7017]

@@lordgarion514 Then why u deleted comment.

[@lordgarion514]

@@youtuberesearch7017 It's a YT thing lately. And it's happening to lots of people. I can repost.

[@donniecarlson9677]

lol stone henge was prolly made like 100 years ago they just moved Old rocks lol

[@Amocles]

Yes, dating dead things is hard...

[@EMBer3000]

Ah... 6 degrees. The difference between "Man, it's hot out today!" and "Holy f*ck, my shoes just melted into the asphalt!".

[@BabaBabelOm]

80 trillion trillion is 8x10^25 isn’t it?

[@mcburcke]

Carbon dating has now been shown to be very approximate, at best. The original assumptions of C14 abundance, uptake and decay rates are not supportable by reference to other empirical measurements. It can get you in the rough vicinity, but nothing more than that. Worsens as the calculated age increases, too.