0
The age of dead sea scrolls was found by carbon dating Could this technique have worked if they were carved in stone tablets explain?
Wiki User
∙ 15y ago
No. Carbon dating tells how long ago something died (more specifically, when it stopped absorbing carbon). Things that were never alive or are more than ~70,000 years old have to be dated by analyzing for other isotopes or isoptopic ratios. I started to explain carbon dating in more detail, but I realized I was going to have to write a short novel to explain it in any more detail and do a good job. So, unless something was written on a stone tablet by grinding a dead bird into the tablet, you could not carbon date text carved on stone. Similarly, carbon dating an old, written text tells you when the plant/animal that was used for a writing surface died. It does not tell you when the text was written (but I believe that, generally, the ages are fairly close).
Wiki User
∙ 15y ago
Add your answer:
Earn +20 pts
What is the limitations if carbon dating and what is a example of the materials for which the technique cannot be used?
"Carbon dating" is the technique used to calculate how long ago a living organism died. Here's how it works. Cosmic rays from space hit atoms in the atmosphere, and in some cases will generate thermal neutrons. Nitrogen-14 atoms in the upper atmosphere absorb a few of those neutron, become unstable, and then emit a proton. This changes the Nitrogen-14 (atomic number 7) to carbon-14 (atomic number 6). This process has been going on for a very long time, so there's a relatively constant - but low - percentage of carbon 14 in the atmosphere. Living things breathe in the carbon-14 (along with oxygen and ordinary nitrogen) and the biological processes incorporate this carbon-14. Carbon-14 is slightly radioactive, and decays with a half-life of 5760 years. As long as you are alive, you keep replenishing your supply of carbon-14. But when you (or any other living thing) dies, it's no longer getting fresh carbon-14, and the existing carbon-14 continues to decay. By measuring the amount of carbon-14 remaining in any organic material, we can calculate approximately how long ago the organism died. It's fairly accurate back to about 10,000 years, and sort-of accurate back to about 60,000 years. After that, the proportion of carbon-14 that remains is too tiny for accurate analysis. This only works with living things, and only within the past 60,000 years. This also assumes that there have been no discontinuities in the formation of carbon-14 in the atmosphere. If there had been a supernova explosion within about 50 light years, a spike in cosmic rays might have caused a spike in carbon-14 production, and carbon-dating analysis might indicate that the sample was younger than it really was.
What is radioisotope carbon dating?
Carbon 14 is the isotope that is used for carbon dating.
What does carbon dating have to do with the fossil record?
Nothing. Something must contain carbon to be carbon dated. By definition fossils are mineralized and contain no carbon.
How can carbon dating be used in materials?
Carbon dating is mainly used by archaeologists to date recent finds as the technique is only accurate for 50,000 to 60,000 years in the past. To date fossils, or rather the rocks in or near where the fossils are found, we use radioactive isotopes which have a much greater half life.
Why do pop rocks and soda fizz?
Actually, carbon dioxide is shot into the soda and that what makes it so fizzy. can you explain why that happens?-flub flub
How does modern technology help decode the artifacts found in the dead sea scrolls?
Carbon dating (the measure of the isotope carbon 14) was used to estimate how old the scrolls were.
What was used to write on the dead sea scrolls?
Carbon Based Ink
Is carbon - 14 is an example of correlative dating?
No. Carbon 14 is an absolute dating technique
What substance is released when effervescent tablets are dropped in water?
carbon dioxide
Explain the hybridization of the bonding orbitals of carbon in carbon formaldehyde?
Hyberdization of each carbon in formaldehyde
Why is carbon dioxide formed when using indigestion tablets?
because when the acid in your stomach reacts with the indigestion tablet, it gives of carbon dioxide :)
What properties of carbon explain carbon?
proteins carbohydrates lipids and nucleic acids
What gas do Alka Seltzer tablets give off?
They give off carbon dioxide.
What they didn't know about Mummy No1770?
The Manchester Museum, for example, has supplied samples from its mysterious mummy No. 1770 for carbon testing using the Garza-Mattingly cleansing technique. British experts cannot fully explain why carbon dating of No. 1770's wrappings indicate they are 1,000 years younger than the bones.
What type of fossil dating uses half life to determine age?
Radiocarbon dating is a technique that uses the decay of carbon-14.
Could carbon dating be used on stone tablets?
Carbon Dating can only be used on something that contains carbon. Therefore the stone tablet would have to have Carbon it it's structure (Carbonate) , or it would need to be covered in soot or ash.
How did researchers discover how old the Dead Sea Scrolls were?
As the Dead Sea Scrolls were abandoned at Qumran about 70 CE, this is the latest possible date for any of the scrolls, although few would be likely to have been written in the years of turmoil just before this date. Radio-carbon dating has shown that some of the scrolls date from the second century BCE. These are the oldest copies we have in the Hebrew language, of any books of the Hebrew Bible.
