How Old is the Earth?

[msc545]

[lightbulb27]

Depends how you count age... counting is a logical thing. Aapparently we all came from a neutron star... given that's where the iron in our blood would come from, and who knows how that star got there and how old it was before it "blew". So we are the remnants of some other massive explosion... which, I guess in universe years, we can round up to infinitely old... since everything that is, always was... and nothing "goes away", just changes form. It's dang old stuff...

But the ball of yucky dirt itself, that formed at some point, who knows... a few billion "years" ago... whatever that is. Those are rotations around the sun, but that orientation... seems weird... the earth wouldn't have just been hanging out around the sun, took a while to grab it from somewhere and form the space dust into a ball.

And we only live a 100 years to sort this out... pretty smart creatures, but kinda hard to understand it with our limited, but high energy, brains... running on the power... of a form neutron star. The emotional part side maybe has a better chance, but gets no credit, since it doesn't do time like the left.

Maybe some creature in the future, made up of what is the cooked up remnants of us, will be trying to figure it out as well...

[KrakenAttackin]

Last I heard Mother Earth was about 4 billion years old.

[supercutebutt]

Basically, Earth is as old as I am. Anything that happened before me isn't really worth discussing.

[NathanDavis]

4, 482, 342, 024 years...

[exitseven]

nobody reallly knows. It is billions of years old at least.

[msc545]

We do know to a degree...

[thorboy]

No one really knows... they just take guesses, write it in a text book and BAM!!

[goaded]

Is that really how you think science and education work?

[thorboy]

@goaded I don't know... science apparently changes all the time based on agenda or for whatever reason.

Education doesn't mean intelligent. A Million Americans graduate every year, and millions are stupid as heck.

I don't really associate myself with anything. I'm merely watching on the sidelines.

[goaded]

Science changes in response to new information. Every new hypothesis has to explain all the same data as the one it's trying to replace, preferably better. It's never on a whim.

[genericname85]

that's pretty much a philosophical question. at what point would you define "earth" as a distinguished thing? cause for all we know, the physical matter that we now label "earth" could have infinite age.

[msc545]

ok. How old is the water?

[genericname85]

i don't know at what point exactly that molecule formed for the first time. but just cause "i" don't know this doesn't mean "we" as in humanity don't have at least a rough idea of it. i'd have to spend some time researching that. but for now all i can give you is that "i don't know".

[Ad_Quid_Orator]

There are these minerals called zircons that only form in liquid water and the oldest one is 4.3 billion years old.

[genericname85]

@Ad_Quid_Orator cool. didn't know that. i figure water itself is probably way older than that tho.

[Quackthulu2]

Around 4.5 billion years.

[Anonymous]

4.5 billion years old. some say 4.6 billion years old

[DarkLegacy]

About 4.3 billion years

[Ad_Quid_Orator]

About 4.6 billion years old.

[QuietRunner]

Older than I think it is