The problem with this is that determining an estimate for a date is more a problem solving venture rather than just a device which magically displays a date.
Imagine your in a room with a dripping faucet and the sink is clogged. You can estimate the time the sink clogged by measuring the average amount of water per drip and dividing it into the amout of water in the sink.
This will work for this case, assuming there was no water in the sink to begin with.
But then you cannot go to someones glass of water,
and measure the amount of water and divide the drip volume into this volume,
and then exclaim that it took 4 hours to pour this persons glass of water.
This is exactly what RATE is doing. They are applying the methods without first determining if the method is applicable in a specific case.
For example carbon dating can only reliably date something back to 50,000 years. Something 4 million years old would look virtually identical to something 500,000 years old. You can't use this technique for something so old.
To go back to the analogy it would be like using the sink technique for a volume of water which would take months to accumulate. This calculation would not work due to evaporation.
Keep in mind that many of the dates estimated are due to multiple dating techniques, applied with the specific situation in mind. One cannot just apply dating techniques willy-nilly hoping for a reasonable estimate.
For more info check out
this thread.
On a lighter note.
The best dating technique is to be honest...
Multiple dating is usually frowned upon.
and don't take her to cheap place like McDonalds on the first date.
It is not length of life, but depth of life. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
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