Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski
Well, you could take organic samples from ancient items where the age can be determined via other means (wood from a ship or building from a particular period, old paper with dates, human remains from a dated burial mound, etc.) and run a carbon dating analysis to verify the accuracy. That is what I mean by calibration. From what I understand, it shows some scatter but it is reasonably accurate. Certainly gives you a good ballpark estimate of the age.
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Yes but if the accuracy is only "reasonable" for time periods for which you can actually find dated materials, how can you assume that it's accurate for items even older. You personally are free to trust carbon dating, for myself I remain very skeptical. Anything beyond a couple of hundred years old and I think you're pretty much just making educated guesses.