Introduction
There is nothing more devastating to the doctrine of evolution than thescientific evidence of a young earth age. That evidence is provided by therapid depletion of the energy in the earth's main magnet, itselectromagnetic dipole magnet in the conductive core of the earth. Itselectric current is using up the magnet's energy. The rate of energyconsumption is now known. From that information and a reasonable limit onthe maximum plausible initial energy one can show that the earth's magneticage is limited to thousands of years, not the billions claimed byevolutionary scientists.
A search of the technical literature in 1970 provided two important clues tothis explanation of the earth's dipole magnet:
| 1. In 1883 Sir Horace Lamb solved the complex electromagnetic problem of a free current circulating in a conducting sphere.[1]
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| 2. Evaluations have been made on the strength and direction of this dipole magnet in the core of the earth ever since the first historic evaluation was made by Gauss in the 1835 epoch. [2], [3] The first clue predicted decay, the second clue confirmed it. Rarely in physics has there been a better illustration of a mathematical physics theory and such extensive observational data to confirm it.
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The author's articles and book, that developed and applied this theory of afreely decaying magnet to an earth-age limitation, were ignored by doctrinaire evolutionists for years. They apparently felt that the less saidthe better. In 1981, however, the American Civil Liberties Union decided tomake an all-out attack upon it. The U.S. Geological Survey researchgeologist G. Brent Dalrymple has spearheaded the attack. In addition to hisappearing as their expert witness in the courts, he has written a book andan article in the Journal of Geophysical Education [4] attacking this author'spublications on the theory of the earth's magnetic age limitation. ThisImpact article is a response to his geological education article.
Dalrymple's Dynamo Hypothesis
As is true of most evolutionary geologists, Dalrymple hypothesizes a dynamoin the molten core of the earth. It is supposed to be the mechanism forgenerating the electric current required to power the dipole magnet for morethan three billion years. Dalrymple states: "Barnes criticizes the dynamotheory because of the absence of a definitive solution." He then goes intoa lengthy discourse about dynamos. One may summarize his ultimate conclusionby his own statement: "Even though there is near universal agreement that adynamo exists in the earth's core, the exact mechanism...is not known."Not only are evolutionists in trouble by having nothing but faith to supporttheir dynamo hypothesis, the same can be said for their lack of anapplicable energy source to run the dynamo. One has but to review theliterature to see that no one has come up with an acceptable energy source.Dalrymple uses the "scatter-gun" approach. "At present, scientists do notknow which of the several sources actually drives the dynamo; in fact, itmay be some combination of sources." Prior to that he stated: "At present itseems that gravitation may be the most plausible source of energy...." Thatis nonsense and completely unsupported. There is as yet no concept as to howthat type of energy would be able to run the mechanism, if there were such athing.
Signal vs. Noise
The basic problem with the evolutionary geologists' education on the earth'smagnetism may be expressed in the language of an engineer as his failure todistinguish between the signal and the noise. The two are not functionallyrelated. The earth's dipole field is the signal. It is known to be due toelectric current in the core of the earth, more than a thousand miles awayfrom the earth's surface. The noise is the super-position of all othermagnetic fields from whatever magnetic sources that may exist near enough tomake any contribution to the net magnetic field at any point where themeasurements are being made. There are literally billions of sources ofmagnetic noise and ordinarily their location and energy content are notknown. For example, there are times when there are magnetic storms of suchmagnitude that transatlantic radio communication is totally disrupted. As an illustration of Dalrymple's failure to make this distinction betweensignal and noise one should examine his statement: "Barnes' hypothesis alsodoes not fit the facts. Freely decaying currents cannot explain theexistence, configuration, movement, or changes of the nondipole field...."Dalrymple does not seem to understand that the nondipole field is noise, notthe signal. The magnetic age of the earth is related to the signal, thedipole field, not to the noise. The dipole field is decaying in accordancewith known theoretical physics equations. That is the signal which Gaussseparated from noise when he made his historic evaluation. Dalrymple quotes the following statement from Barnes: "As of now there is nophysical evidence, seismic or otherwise, that there is any motion within thecore." He rejects that and cites a westward motion of the nondipole field asevidence of motion in the core. His point is to justify the evolutionaryclaims of fluid motion in the core as the dynamo mechanism. That isirrelevant because as previously noted, there is no known dynamo mechanism.Nevertheless, it shows his failure to distinguish between signal and noise.The nondipole field is noise and no one knows the location of its source.Without knowing the location of the sources of the noise one cannot computeits total energy. There has been a measured westward drift of the earth's magnetic dipole, aprecession but not a nutation. Stanley Stanulonis has derived a theoreticalphysics explanation of this westward precession. [5] It is due to the solarwind drag on the magnetic dipole field as the earth rotates eastward. Thenet result is a shifting of the electrical currents in the core of theearth, not a motion of the molten mass in the core of the earth. Stanulonis'solution contains both the precession and decaying properties of the earth'smagnetic dipole field. Those are properties of the signal, not the noise. Dalrymple holds to the evolutionary arguments that paleomagnetic evidencesshow that the earth's magnetic field is more than three billion years oldand has gone through many reversals, changing its polarity from north tosouth and back many times, at irregular intervals. Those and the otherarguments of Dalrymple are answered in detail in the new revised andexpanded edition of Barnes' Origin and Destiny of the Earth's MagneticField, Technical Monograph No. 4, published by the Institute for CreationResearch (132 pp.). One cannot make a credible evaluation of the earth's magnetic dipole momentfrom such paleomagnetic data. They are useful for geophysical exploration,where anomalies indicate deviations from the dipole field, but not forevaluating the dipole field. That is illustrated by the graph shown. Itcompares the paleomagnetic data with the unquestioned real-time magneticdipole moment data. The top curve is from the earth's magnetic moment data.It shows the known decay. The bottom jagged curve is derived from a Russianscientist's paper (S.P. Buriatskaya, 1967), which used all of thepaleomagnetic data. Note that there is not the slightest trace of the knowndecay in the curve of these paleomagnetic data. One can classify thepaleomagnetic data as noise and the real-time data as the signal.
YEAR OF MEASUREMENT  |
Conclusion
The Barnes' theory of a young magnetic age for the earth, only a fewthousand years, is the only theory of the source of the earth's dipolemagnet that is supported by the following important facts:
| 1. A rigorous mathematical physics solution.
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| 2. A history of real-time evaluations of the state of the magnet (its magnetic moment).
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| 3. A clearly identified source of energy (its own magnetic field energy).
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| 4. A definitive predictive value.
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| 5. A means of computing its source energy and subjecting that value to an independent check that would have falsified the theory had there not been a check.
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On the other hand, the presumed dynamo theory has no substantive theoreticalbasis and no definitive predictive value. Its presumed reversal mechanismhas admittedly remained inscrutable. The presumed supporting paleomagneticdata contributes to the noise, not the signal. It does not even check withthe decay of the earth's dipole field during the time in which that isaccurately known, ever since Gauss' evaluations. The game is up for the evolutionist if he acknowledges that the earth isonly a few thousand years old. To avoid being completely wiped out he knowsthat he must fight with all his might, fair or foul, against this scientifictheory and supporting evidence of a young magnetic earth-age. It is nowonder that Dalrymple, his ACLU sponsor, and the nine additional notedevolutionists whom he acknowledges gave him review support on his article,have made such a desperate effort to conceal this Achilles heel ofevolution, the scientific evidence of a very young earth.
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References
1. Sir Horace Lamb, Philosophical Transactions, (London) 174, pp. 519-549. Return to Text
2. Sidney Chapman, The Earth's Magnetism. Methuen and Co., Ltd., London; John Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York, p. 23. Return to Text
3. Keith L. McDonald and Robert H. Gunst. "An analysis of the earth's magnetic field from 1835 to 1965," ESSA Technical Report. IER 46-IES 1. U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., p. 15. Return to Text
4. Brent G. Dalrymple, "Can the earth be dated from decay of its magnetic field?", Journal of Geological Education, Vol. 31, No. 2, March 1983, pp. 124-132. Return to Text
5. Stanley Stanulonis, "The Mechanism Responsible for the Precession of the Geomagnetic Dipole with Evaluation of the Earth's Core's Charge Density and Its Implication," Master of Science Thesis, University of Texas at El Paso, Physics Department, May 1974. Return to Text
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