In beta decay, a neutron turns into a proton by emitting a beta particle, which is an electron click for credit. As someone who has studied radioactivity in detail, I have always been a bit amused by the assertion that radioactive dating is a precise way to determine the age of an object.
The standard scientific estimate is that the universe is about 15 billion years old, the earth about 4. It is important to recognize from the start that there are independent procedures for obtaining each of these estimates, and that the procedures yield ranges of values that overlap.
See also Counterexamples to an Old Earth. Radiometric dating is a method of determining the approximate age of an artifact by measuring the amount of radioactive decay that has occurred.
There is no RationalWiki without you. We are a small non-profit with no staff — we are hundreds of volunteers who document pseudoscience and crankery around the world every day.
Carbon 14 is used for this example: The above is offered as a simple fact of research.
Radiometric dating of rocks and minerals using naturally occurring, long-lived radioactive isotopes is troublesome for young-earth creationists because the techniques have provided overwhelming evidence of the antiquity of the earth and life. Some so-called creation scientists have attempted to show that radiometric dating does not work on theoretical grounds for example, Arndts and Overn ; Gill but such attempts invariably have fatal flaws see Dalrymple ; York and Dalrymple