C-14, Radiocarbondating is it acurate?

Question

What is the half-life of C14? Does C14 give us an acurate picture of the age of an object?

Answer 1

like any physical parameter derived from measurement, results should be reported with a +/- experimental uncertainty. unfortunately when these numbers are repeated in the media, rarely do they get repeated. (and in fact, often scientists neglect to even publish them. jerks.)



anyway, a typical error bar for radiocarbon dating seems to be anywhere from 30-50 years. so you can consider it accurate to within that margin of uncertainty. however, depending on the data, sometimes this can increase to an error margin of several centuries! (see 2nd link)

Answer 2

Radiocarbon dates are obtained by taking samples from organic materials (such as charcoal, wood, seeds, and human or animal bone) and measuring the amount of the radioactive isotope Carbon 14 (C14) that they contain. Organic materials absorb C14 throughout their lives and steadily lose it after they die. Thus the less C14 that remains in a sample, the older that sample is, and since the rate of radioactive decay can be measured, an accurate date can be given; however, radiocarbon dating is effective only for obtaining dates between about ad 600 and, with an increasing margin of error, about 50,000 bc.

Answer 3

not very accurate, but right now it's all we have