What is the age of the earth within. The history of the development of the planet earth

What is the age of planet Earth? .. Who gives the correct answer to this question - creationists, who, on the basis of the Old Testament, grant our planet only six thousand years, or modern geologists, who count it as much as four and a half billion years? .. How accurate is the geochronological scale and absolute dating methods? ..

Analysis of these issues in the light of the accumulated modern science data leads to the idea of ​​the need to move to a fundamentally new concept geological history and revision of absolutely all available results of stratigraphy, paleontology and geochronology. Within the framework of this concept, the history of the Earth is significantly reduced, although it does not descend to the biblical version.

Note:

Name of the book"A sensational story of the Earth "given by Veche Publishing House. In the author's version, the book had a much more modest title "How old is the planet Earth? .."

From the author

If even ten years ago someone had said that I would take up the writing of this book, I would at least shrug my shoulders in surprise, since I have never been seriously interested in either geology, or geophysics, or biology, or paleontology, and indeed, perhaps, none of the sciences that in one way or another relate to the formation and development of the Earth as a planet. If I showed any interest in them, it was rather contemplative and curious and was supported only by the desire to be at least superficially familiar with how modern science imagines the world in which we live.

Therefore, it cannot be said that this book was the fruit of any many years of reflections on the history of the planet Earth, although the individual parts that are included in the material presented below have been written and published as Internet articles since that very ten years ago, or even more. ... The origins go even further into the past - at the very beginning of the 80s of the twentieth century. It was then that I, still a student at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, came across an article in the popular magazine "Knowledge - Power" in which various models of the Earth's development were considered. Including such a theory according to which our planet has seriously changed its size in the course of its history.

Yesterday's schoolboy, brought up in the spirit of the Soviet education system, according to which everything discovered in science is an "irrefutable truth" (alas, this ideology still dominates in our society), in addition, is already quite familiar with the hypothesis of continental drift and the theory of plate tectonics, and also the theory of the origin and development of planets Solar system in the form as it was then presented (and is still presented) in textbooks, such an idea - the idea of ​​a "growing" Earth - naturally, at first seemed complete nonsense.

In addition, the subjective factor clearly affected: after all, we live on a "solid" Earth and do not feel any change in its size. Try a person who is completely unfamiliar with the heliocentric system and who observes the movement of the Sun across the sky every day to convey the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and not the Sun around the Earth. It will not be so easy, as all his daily experiences show the exact opposite.

First, the Znanie - Sila magazine, despite all the popularity of its format, was famous at that time for publishing accessible materials on what is called “on the cutting edge of science”.

Secondly, although presented in short form the theory of the "growing" Earth had its own internal logic and did not contain any obvious contradictions. And this is a fairly clear indicator that the theory may turn out to be correct, no matter how “strange” it may look.

And thirdly, after all, I was no longer a schoolboy, but a student. A student of such an institute, the essence of the training system in which one of our mathematics teachers was well formulated in the following figurative form.

A student comes after school convinced that two times two equals four. The task of our teachers is to make this student doubt this by the end of the first year; by the end of the third - to be sure that this is not so; and by the end of the fifth year - to be able to prove that two times two is equal to anything, but not four.

This is, of course, rather exaggerated. But on the other hand, in a condensed form, it represents the essence of the concept that there is no "once and for all established truth" in the world. There are only versions, hypotheses and theories... And they may be wrong. Moreover: they are exactly wrong and give, at best, some kind of getting closer to the truth... In a certain period of time, this approximation describes reality with a sufficient degree of accuracy. But the moment comes inevitably when this accuracy ceases to suit us. One theory is replaced by another. And there is nothing "terrible" in this. This is a natural process of the development of knowledge.

There is, say, a classic textbook example in physics - the theory of caloric.

For a long time, physicists believed that the processes associated with the transfer of heat from one body to another are due to the presence of such a substance as "caloric". But over time, it became clear that the essence of such processes is completely different - in the thermal motion of molecules. The caloric "died". He was abandoned. But at the same time, all the laws of thermodynamics remained, which were obtained on the basis of the "erroneous" theory ...

By the time I read the article about the "growing" Earth, I had already passed the second stage - I was sure that twice two is not equal to four. That is, there are no “absolutely true theories”. But he still did not know how to prove that two times two is equal to anything but four. Therefore, the theory of the Earth changing its size, rather simply amused me. Although she left some kind of small wormhole in the depths of the subconscious ...

It so happened in my life that somewhere in the mid-90s I plunged into the topic of ancient legends and traditions, as well as into the problem of silence by modern historical science of facts that contradict the currently accepted picture of the past of mankind, which is drawn and promoted by this science in books and textbooks. With considerable surprise for myself, I discovered that a fairly large layer of information contained in ancient legends and considered by historians to be simple inventions of our distant ancestors, is confirmed in real facts collected by modern science in various branches of knowledge. And an attempt to combine scientific data and "mythological" information as a result gives a very detailed and self-consistent picture of the distant past - only a picture very far from what historians paint for us.

In particular, the well-known plot of ancient legends about the Flood not only finds full confirmation, but also makes it possible to clarify the data that have been accumulated by archeology, geology, climatology and other sciences. The result, which turned out as a result of "combining the incompatible", that is, the mutual intersection of the "indications of mythology" and objective scientific data, was published in the form of an online article "The Myth of the Flood: Calculations and Reality", which later became an appendix to my book "Ancient Mexico without crooked mirrors", published by the Veche publishing house.

In principle, the reality of a cataclysm of a planetary scale under the conditional name "World Flood" interferes primarily with historians. And for geologists, who now recognize the possibility of catastrophes on the planet in the past, there is nothing "seditious" in this. The situation was worse with another circumstance, which I encountered at the same time.

The fact is that in some ancient legends and traditions (see below) descriptions of such processes were found that could be directly related to ... the hypothesis of the "growing" Earth!

And it was here that from the depths of my memory a recollection of an article in the magazine "Knowledge is Power" came to my mind. Only now it was not just a memory of a curious and amusing theory. The mutual intersection and addition of the data of mythology and modern science in the topic of the Flood naturally raised the question - what if there is something here too ?!

In order to find the answer to this question, I had to plunge into the issues of geology, geophysics, geochemistry, paleoclimatology and paleomagnetism. The result was, without exaggeration, stunning - the data of mythology really allow not only to clarify the theory of the expanding Earth, but also to significantly advance it! ..

The result was an online article "Is the fate of Phaeton awaiting the Earth? ..", which was later included as an appendix to the book "Inhabited Earth Island" recently published by the same Veche publishing house.

And here the problem arose. The conclusions of the article were in a cardinal contradiction with the dominant theory of plate tectonics now in geology. Since my interests lay in a completely different area, and it was not part of the plans to enter into conflict with geology, the article for a long time remained rather only as a kind of curious development of a no less curious theory than as an application for something more ...

(For those who are interested in the abovementioned initial articles, I can recommend to look at the website of the Laboratory for Alternative History, where they are posted on the page of my works. For those who are more interested in the substantive essence of the results obtained, I would advise not to waste time on this, because further these results will be presented in the book - and even in a more extended version) ...

The strongest stimulus for further progress on the topic of this book was a meeting in the early 2000s with the candidate of historical sciences Andrei Zhukov, with whom we became co-authors of a large project related to a series of survey and research expeditions to places of ancient cultures and the release of a series of documentary films "Forbidden Themes of History". Despite the "classical" historical education and even obtaining a scientific degree within the framework of the official system, Andrey (like me) was not satisfied with the presence of facts that contradicted the picture of the past of mankind, which is now accepted in historical science. And even more did not suit the position of the most historical science in relation to such facts, which were either openly hushed up, or declared to be forgery and falsification without any objective grounds.

Since our positions and approaches here completely coincided, we decided to move further together, using his humanitarian education and my technical education as complementary factors. And this mutual addition, as the further course of events showed, turned out to be very fruitful ...

Even at our very first meeting, when we shared with each other our views on the problems of our future joint activities, Andrey raised the question of the reliability and correctness of both dating of specific artifacts and the dating methods themselves, which I somehow even did not think. As a humanist, it was difficult for him to determine this problem, since the bulk of the methods of the so-called absolute dating (that is, determining not the relative, but the absolute age of an object) is based not on humanitarian, but on technical knowledge. And here efforts were required on my part.

I will not say that it turned out to be quite simple, but rather quickly we managed to sort out the problems of dating objects that are relatively small in age, but constitute the bulk of the source material for restoring the history of ancient civilizations. The result was an Internet article with a long title "What do you want? .. Menu of radiocarbon dating and dendrochronology", which was included as an appendix to the book "Civilization of the Gods Ancient egypt", Also published by the Veche publishing house.

Being used for dating objects with an age of a maximum of several tens of thousands of years, these methods, if they influenced anything, then only the dating of events of the very recent past (when compared with the time scales of the life of the planet as a whole). And although some of these datings are associated with the events of the Flood, which had a significant impact on the modern appearance of the planet's surface, errors and shortcomings of these methods do not particularly affect the history of the Earth as a whole.

However, among the historical artifacts there are those that make one think about more significant periods of time and which pose "inconvenient" questions not only to historians, but also to the currently accepted picture of the evolution of the living world as a whole. For example, in the collection of clay figurines from the Mexican city of Acambaro, there are images of people interacting ... with dinosaurs. And the plots of human interaction with dinosaurs are even more numerous in the Peruvian collection of Ica stones.

Rice. 1. Man riding a dinosaur (Acambaro collection)
Rice. 2. Hunting people for dinosaurs (Iki collection)

According to modern views on evolution, the most ancient hominids (that is, the ancient ancestors of man) appeared only a few million years before the current point in time, and dinosaurs became extinct as much as 65 million years ago. The gap between the two events is colossal - the "numbers" differ by an order of magnitude. Then where did the stories about human-dinosaur interaction come from in the collections of Acambaro figurines and Ica stones? ..

The size of both collections (tens of thousands of items), as well as the history of their formation, sweep aside all suspicions of falsification. In addition, we were able to make sure that the collections are genuine, and personally during the expeditions. But then where is the “mistake”? .. And what is the “truth”? .. People lived already during the period of the dinosaurs, that is, tens of millions of years ago? ..

Of course, even now we can find images of dinosaurs and people - in films, books, children's toys, etc. However, we do not really live among dinosaurs. Their images reflect only our knowledge of the existence of these ancient animals. Likewise, the collection of clay figurines of Acambaro and Ica stones may well reflect not real events at all, but only knowledge of ancient people about dinosaurs(I take this point of view). The only question that remains is where our distant ancestors got such knowledge. But this question already transfers the problem from the plane of the evolution of the living world as a whole to the plane of only the relatively recent history of mankind.

Everything would be fine, but in addition to the plots in the two collections, there are reports (albeit very scanty) about the discovery of dinosaur bones along with human remains. For example, in South America where the remains of people were found even deeper than the bones of dinosaurs. What about this? ..

Moreover. There is also a whole layer of strange finds - artifacts (that is, artificially created objects) found in coal deposits and other rocks, the age of which is sometimes calculated not even tens, but hundreds of millions of years! ...

Rice. 3. A hammer in a rock dating back over 100 million years

Such findings raise the question not only of the correctness of determining their age, but also of the reliability of the methods of geological dating, and, consequently, of the reliability of the currently accepted geochronological scale. And this is a huge layer of knowledge accumulated by a variety of sciences. And finding a gap in this knowledge is not so easy. Here the problem cannot be solved with a swoop. It was necessary to catch on to something.

Archimedes needed a fulcrum in order to turn the Earth over. And here it was required to turn not the planet itself, but "just" its history. But for this, too, some kind of fulcrum was needed. And the corresponding lever ...

Rice. 4. Monograph "Unknown hydrogen" (S.V. Digonsky, V.V. Ten)

The monograph "Unknown Hydrogen" became such a lever, which was literally "imposed" on me by one of its co-authors Sergei Digonsky, for which I am extremely grateful to him. Having opened the monograph, I could no longer tear myself away from it and, despite the abundance of specific terminology, literally swallowed avidly, since it made it possible to reveal very serious errors in the very principle of constructing a geochronological scale, that is, in the very foundations of the currently accepted picture of the history of our planet. And in addition, the ideas of the monograph largely supplemented and developed the theory of the "growing" Earth. As a result, in 2009, another online article was born with a title that spoke for itself - "History of the Earth without the Carboniferous Period" (this article was also included as an appendix in the book "Inhabited Island Earth").

It remained to take the last step - to decide to plunge into the vast world of basic knowledge of geology, geophysics and paleontology. And three events pushed me to this step at once.

Firstly, almost immediately after the publication of the article on the Carboniferous period, Sergei Digonsky sent me materials of some research in the field of geology, which, although carried out as early as fifty years ago, remained deeply in the shadows, since they contradicted the accepted concepts. As it turned out, geology also has its own "alternatives" who do not agree with the dominant approaches and dogmas in this science.

Secondly, an employee of the Mineralogical Museum. Fersman Institute of RAS Leonid Pautov, who helped us in researching some historical artifacts, being an adherent of traditional views in geophysics and geology, tried to "return me to the right path," for which he gave me a look at the book, which outlined the history of the formation of modern geological theories. The result turned out to be exactly the opposite - the book made it possible to understand exactly where and why the scientific community made fatal mistakes, and where exactly one should look for the weaknesses of modern theories.

And thirdly, already during one of the discussions of the collected materials, I was significantly helped by another person - candidate of physical and mathematical sciences Viktor Panchelyuga, who introduced me to a selection of articles on the latest research in the field of the half-life of radioactive isotopes. An area now playing a key role in the absolute dating of geological rocks.

The result of all this was an online article "A little about the current situation in geochronology", which has not yet been published in paper form. It is this article that constitutes the main pivot of this book, which includes other mentioned articles, as well as materials used in their preparation, but not previously published for one reason or another.

But before finally moving on to a meaningful presentation, I consider it necessary to warn the dear reader that reading a book will require certain mental efforts from him. Although I tried to simplify the text as much as possible, translating into ordinary Russian the numerous specific terminology that experts are so fond of flaunting, but, alas, it was not always possible to complete it everywhere. In addition, in order to really understand the presented material, the reader still needs to have some basic knowledge (at least in physics and chemistry).

I express my deepest gratitude to all those who, in one way or another, helped the birth of this book. Not only to those whose names are named above, but also to those whom I did not mention, but who helped in collecting material, in discussing previously published articles and ideas at various stages of their formation.

Special thanks to all those who helped in organizing and financing the expeditions, during which the material for this book was collected along the way.

I dedicate the book to my family and friends: wife Natasha, son Maxim, brother Vladimir and his wife - also Natasha, who are always there and are always ready to help in any business.

Caption photo: Wallpaper @ eskipaper.com

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It has been a long time since the Earth appeared. Moreover, according to the scientific point of view and according to biblical teachings, the data on the age of our planet do not coincide at all. So how old is the Earth according to the Bible? Let's consider in more detail.

History of the creation of the world

From the events described in the Bible, you can calculate her age.

As a result, the age of the Earth according to the Bible is 6 108 years (until 2017).

From the Bible, we learn in detail about everything that happened on Earth from the first day of its creation. Reading and analyzing this holy book, we more and more understand that it contains historically accurate data.

The proof of this is the exact dates of birth and death of people, real events that took place with the indication of specific numbers.

• Genesis 5 reveals to us the sequence and length of life of Adam and his descendants. In total, this period takes 1,056 years.
• Genesis 7 and 11 cover a long period from the beginning of Noah's life and the Flood to the birth of Abraham - 2,008 years.
• Genesis 21 speaks of the life of Abraham and his son Isaac - 2,108 years.
• Genesis 25 and 26 show us in detail the time from the birth of Jacob to his campaign in the Egyptian lands. The earth is already 2,298 years old.
• Genesis 47 tells the story of life in Egypt and the departure from this country - 2,298 years.
• The book of Exodus (chapter 12) leads us to the building of the temple. This is already 3,208 years old.
• The Book of Kingdoms (Chapter 6) ends this period of time with the captivity of the Babylonians and stops at 3553 BC.

An era begins, which was marked by the appearance, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We know that Jesus started his ministry when he was 30 years old and ended it at 33 years old. The events of this time are also listed in chronological order:

Different versions of chronology

For a long time mankind has been concerned about the creation of the world. How did the Earth appear, how old is it? In total, there are 3 main theories in the world: philosophical, biblical and scientific. Which of these positions to choose and which to believe, everyone must decide for themselves. But science and philosophy are limited by reason and cannot go beyond mathematical thinking. This is just science fiction, nothing more. According to these two versions, the age of the Earth is 4.5 billion years, with which the supporters of the biblical version fundamentally disagree.

Divine theory is based on a document called the Bible. This is where you can find out specific numbers and years. It is worth noting that famous scientists adhere to this theory: Sergei Golovin, Karl Bach and Henry Gellay.

If we stop believing in the Bible, we can say that our ideas about faith are also wrong. Is it correct?

Earth is the third planet from the sun. One of the largest planets in the solar system. The only planet, according to scientists, on which intelligent life exists.

It is inhabited by over 6 billion people. And more than a million other biological species.

But few scientists can answer one very simple, but incredibly complex and controversial question. How old is planet Earth?

Attempts to determine the age of our planet for many centuries have haunted and haunted scientists.

Some say that the Earth was formed about 4.54 billion years ago through evolution. Others - call more modest numbers - about 6-10 thousand years ago and tend to believe in the element of Creation! That someone (God, for example) or something created (about) the earth.

The first, let's call them scientists-A, argue that in the distant past, planet Earth was a small star. The star roamed the vastness of the galaxy, gradually fading away. The more it went out, the more it lost its mass and energy, falling under the influence of other cosmic bodies. So she came under the influence of the sun. And at some point, it finally disintegrated, forming a gas and dust cloud.

After some time, a planet appeared in the place of the cloud, which is now commonly called the Earth. According to scientists-And this happened 4.5-5 billion years ago. To substantiate their theory, they cite data from two main methods of radioisotope and geological dating.

The method of radioisotope (or radiometric) dating is reduced to the fact that an object is taken that contains any radioactive isotope (carbon-14, uranium-238, tolium-232, potassium-40) and the fraction of its decay is investigated. Knowing the exact half-life of a given isotope it is quite possible to calculate the age of the sample.

Geological dating is much simpler. Soil, fossils and other fossils and specimens are being investigated.

The second researchers - scientists-B, cite the arguments from the Bible in their favor.

Indeed, according to Scripture, Adam (the first man) was created on the sixth day of the existence of our planet. Based on the calculation that there are 24 hours in a day, taking into account the genealogy of Adam and all his descendants recorded in the fifth and eleventh chapters of Genesis, as well as the chronology of his movement, we can say with a high degree of probability that the approximate age of our Earth is about 6-10 thousand years.

In addition, there are currently over eighty different methods used in geochronology (the science that determines the age of the Earth), confirming precisely the young, and not the billionth age of the planet.

Remarkably, geochronology is based on a very simple principle of the theory of evolution, which is that the present is nothing more than the key to knowing the past. That is, if, for example, natural phenomena such as volcanic activity, the raising and lowering of land occur in the present at a certain speed, then there is high degree the likelihood that these same phenomena have occurred at the same rate in the past.

First of all, they establish age of mountains... When traveling in the mountains, you can always find such stones that easily disintegrate into pieces, or even completely crumble with slight pressure. This convincingly suggests that the stone does not remain unchanged, but under the influence of weathering it ages and gradually collapses. The mountains are getting old too. Mount Montserrat. It is known to exist. The old ones include the Ural Mountains; to the young - the Caucasus Mountains, Crimean, Carpathians, Alps, Himalayas and others. Some mountains appeared a very long time ago, others much later, some reached their heyday, while others once completely disappeared from the face of the Earth. In addition to the old mountains, there were those that do not exist now, of which not a trace remains. Such are, for example, the Donetsk tori, or the Donetsk ridge, the existence of which can only be judged by those underground folds that were clearly revealed during the construction of coal mines and other structures.

Among the mass of stones that come across along the way, along the river, in the ravine and in the old quarry, you can always find petrified shells. Sometimes there are so many of them in the breed that it is called shell limestone... These shells are not at all like those that can be seen in a pond, on the banks of a river or the sea.
Shell limestone. If in some area you often come across fossilized shells or the remains of marine animals, this definitely indicates that here, on the plain, there was once a sea, and even very warm. The richest tropical vegetation grew along the shores of this warm sea. Colonies of thermophilic corals nested at shallow depths, and sea ​​spaces predatory voracious sharks and such antediluvian monsters up to 13 meters in length were worn, which combined the characteristics of a fish, a dolphin and a crocodile. Maybe someone will be lucky enough to find the vertebra of this monster in the black clay of deep ravines somewhere in your area. Fossilized shells and other remnants of marine organisms are often found on high mountains. How could they get there? Was it possible that the seas once covered even the tops of the mountains? Was there ever a worldwide flood? Not at all: the remains of the most ancient organisms do not lie on top, not on the surface, but in the very thickness of the rock that composes the mountains.

Sea and land for long history Earth repeatedly changed places... The outlines of continents and oceans were changing. More startling changes also took place.
Sea and land were swapping places. This once again suggests that not only repeatedly the land and sea changed places, but there were also deeper changes when the bottom of the ancient sea crumpled into folds, and mountains and volcanoes arose in those open spaces where waves once walked, erupting streams lava. This was the case, for example, in the distant past of the Urals and the Caucasus. Unrecognizably changed. Great changes took place in the flora and fauna.

Development of flora and fauna

The study of the geological age of the Earth convinces us that, judging by the preserved traces on the stone, judging by the fossil remains, flora and fauna developed very slowly, (more:). In his development from the simplest organisms to humans, he passed a difficult path. Indeed, all nature, starting from a grain of sand and ending with the Sun, starting from the simplest primary organism and ending with man, is, as scientists say,

in eternal arising and annihilation, in continuous flow, in relentless movement and change.

The most valuable contribution to the knowledge of the life of the Earth was made by the brilliant son of the great Russian people - Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov. More than two hundred and fifty years ago, he spoke with conviction that in nature there have always been

great changes, they are taking place now, and hardly ever will cease.

But how do you know how long ago certain geological events took place? You can find out this, and even quite accurately.

Determination of the geological age of the Earth

Determining the geological age of the Earth, or the geological prescription of certain events from the life of the Earth, it is always necessary to proceed from the fact that the processes occurring on the surface of the Earth and in its depths took place before. Rain streams also eroded loose rocks, contributing to the growth of ravines, and devastating floods occurred. The earth shook repeatedly from devastating earthquakes. From the splits, powerful lava flows poured out, then solidified as a continuous cover on the Deccan Peninsula, in Eastern Siberia, in the Western states of America, in Iceland and in many other territories. Some examples help to look more confidently into the past of the Earth. The river carries sand, clay, silt into the sea, sometimes in huge quantities. This material settles both at the mouth of the river, gradually forming a series of islands that make up its delta, and is carried away far out to sea. Having determined the amount of sediment contained in one cubic meter of river water, and also calculating how many cubic meters of water on average the river carries out annually, it is easy to calculate the total amount of sediment accumulated at the river mouth over a given period of time. Finding any historical objects in coastal marine sediments (for example, ancient weapons, coins, parts of lost ships, etc.) provides some indications for determining the age of a given sediment stratum. The layering of the sediment helps to determine the time of formation of the entire rock mass. At the bottom of salt lakes, for example Baskunchak, a layer of salt is deposited annually, which is separated from last year by a thin layer of spring silt. When drilling salt deposits, a mass of such layers of silt is found. Having counted them, it is not difficult to determine the time of formation of deposits. At one salt deposit, a drilling rig was laid, which, before reaching the bottom of the deposit, gave ten thousand layers. Consequently, it took at least 10 thousand years to form only the passed strata. Sometimes the measure of time can be, for example, the sediment stratum that has buried certain historical structures. Thus, the famous buildings erected in Egypt by Pharaoh Ramses II, who lived about 3000 years ago, are covered with a three-meter layer of sand. In other words, sediment formation proceeded at a rate of one meter per millennium. The accumulation of marine sediments is much slower: it takes about 7000 years to form a layer with a thickness of one meter.
Sedimentary rocks. The total age of the entire stratum of sedimentary rocks crust, which, however, has not been completely preserved anywhere, can be adopted, according to scientists, for two billion years.

The age of the earth

The determination results are very different. And only in our time, for about the next quarter of a century, scientists have managed to approach the solution of this innermost secret of nature, but in a completely different way. There are substances in nature that transform any rock containing them into a truly magical clock with a plant for billions of years. And as if looking into such a wonderful stone, we can determine the time it has captured and say when it was formed. Such a wonderful substance is chemical element Uranus, which over the course of many hundreds of millions of years spontaneously turns into lead. The average life span of uranium is 8 billion years. Over this long period, it turns into uranium lead, which a specialist scientist can easily distinguish from ordinary lead. Knowing how much lead is released from one gram of uranium per year (and this is well known to physicists), and determining how much uranium lead is per gram of uranium in a given rock (chemists will accurately calculate this), it is possible to determine the time of formation of the rock itself, that is, her age. These studies are carried out by means of particularly sensitive sophisticated equipment. With the help of it, it was possible to establish that the rocks of one of the regions of Karelia were formed over one billion seven hundred million years ago. Researches of scientists from other countries have discovered even more ancient rocks - over two billion years old. It can be assumed that the earth's crust is about three billion years old. The formation of the earth's crust is the beginning of the geological chronology. The total age of the Earth is determined by modern science at least five billion years. By carefully observing the geological processes taking place before our eyes, we are really convinced of the changes that

now occur and hardly ever will cease,

as the thoughtful researcher of nature Lomonosov wrote about it. He rightfully belongs to one of the first places in the creation of the scientific foundations of geology, the science of which is subject to the study of the earth's interior in search of minerals and to determine the geological age of the Earth.

For a long time in most countries, only the theological theory of the creation of the world was recognized, but with the advent of modern research methods, it was possible to approximately establish the time of the formation of the planet and the appearance of life on it. According to the latest scientific data, the age of the Earth is 4.5 billion years.

4.5 billion years is the approximate age of planet Earth, which was determined by radioisotope dating of meteorite samples. Credit: NASA.

Methods for determining the age of the planet

There are several theories regarding the age of planet Earth, some of which have been developed over the past 100 years. The development of science has already made it possible to refute many of them. Only a few theories have been substantiated by research.

The most informative way to determine the age of a planet is radiometric dating. The study of ancient rocks that emerge on the surface made it possible to establish that the age of some of them is more than 4-4.5 billion years.

Less accurate data allow obtaining methods for studying the accumulation of salts in layers and water, studying canyons and mountain ranges, as well as the Moon.

Radiometric dating

The scientific community has long recognized the age of the Earth that Kelvin obtained. This scientist, based on the theory of thermodynamics, mistakenly assumed that it took about 20 thousand years to cool the molten planet to its current state.

Much later it was revealed that the composition of the young planet had a high content of radioactive isotopes, which, in the process of decay, emitted a large amount of heat, which did not allow the planet to cool down so quickly.

Radiometric dating is based on the study of traces of a radioactive isotope contained in rocks. Credit: Washington University in St. Louis.

Based on the phenomenon of radioactive decay, the young scientist A. Holmes created his own method for determining the age of rocks, later called radiometric dating.

To determine the age of rocks, the content of decomposition products of the following substances in their composition is calculated:

• Uranus;
• thorium;
• rubidium;
• samarium;
• rhenium;
• lutetium.

Despite the fact that these radioactive isotopes began to decay hundreds of thousands of years ago, traces of this process can be determined in the rocks today. The simplest and most studied method is radiometric dating, which involves determining the ratio of uranium and its decay products in the rock.

Radioactive isotopes have a long decay period. Uranus takes 200,000 years to decay to lead. The oldest rocks were found in Canada, Australia and South Africa, their age is 4-4.5 billion years. It is believed that no primary basaltic rocks have survived.

In this way, only minimum age planet, which in reality may be higher. All the factors affecting the rate of radioactive decay have not yet been clarified, and it is also impossible to accurately determine the amount of isotopes present in the rocks of the newly formed planet, and a number of other conditions.

Determination of age by salt accumulation

The first attempt to determine the age of the planet by the degree of salinity of water in the world's oceans was made in 1715 by Edmund Halley. In the future, a number of scientists appeared who considered this theory consistent.

This assumption does not take into account the time it would take for the planet to cool down to the state required for the formation of the earth's crust.

Thus, the study of salinity allows us to establish the approximate age of the world's oceans, but our planet may be much older.

According to this theory, the world's oceans were originally freshwater. Subsequently, the streams of groundwater and sediments were washed out of the rocks of salt. In addition, evaporation contributed to the dissolution and accumulation of salts in the ocean.

The age of the world's oceans calculated on the basis of this assumption ranges from 90 to 350 million years. These results were disproved when studying the rocks and remains of marine molluscs dated to earlier periods.

Age of the Earth along the canyons

Some experts draw attention to geological formations such as canyons as proof of the antiquity of the Earth. Of greatest interest is the Grand Canyon in the United States. On this vast plateau, the Colorado River has carved depressions reaching depths of 1,800 meters over thousands of years. However, this formation is not as ancient as its first researchers assumed.

Presumably, the formation of the canyon began 5-6 million years ago. It is believed that during this period, due to the shift of the lithospheric plate and a number of other geological phenomena, all this vast plateau was raised, while the angle of inclination of the river flow along its surface increased, which accelerated the erosion of soils, which began to wash off into the world ocean.

The formation of the canyon was also facilitated by the fact that this plateau consists of limestone, sandstone and shale. These layers of rocks are soft, and therefore quickly erode and wash away by the Colorado River. The process of deepening the canyon continues today.

Determining the age of the planet by the moon

Some scientists establish the estimated age of our planet by the degree of remoteness of the moon. It was revealed that at an early stage of the formation of the solar system, the Earth, which had not yet had time to cool down, collided with another planet - Thea. A lot of debris was thrown into space, from which a ring was formed within a relatively short time, and then the satellite of the Earth - the Moon.

At first, she was much closer to Earth. Presumably, the Moon was at a distance of 22 thousand km from the surface of the planet. During this period, the force of its gravity provoked megauragans in the primary oceans that formed on Earth. The separation of the satellite is due to the fact that the magnetic field of our planet is gradually weakening.

Observations made it possible to reveal that every year the Moon moves away by about 2-4 cm. Now the satellite is located 400 thousand km from the Earth's surface. Based on the available data, some researchers indicate that the Moon formed 3.5-4.2 billion years ago.