ANTH201 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Willard Libby, Radiocarbon Dating, Dendrochronology
22 Sep 2016
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Document Summary
A different method of dating for particular time period. All chronometric techniques except dendrochronology produce estimates of age, along with a statement about the precision. The techniques are based on physical processes that on average occur at a fixed rate. Whenever you see a date produced with a chronometric technique, remember it is an estimate of the time span of that year, not specifically that year. The methods that ate used depend on the presumed age of the site and artifacts excavated. For instance, if a site is believed to be over 100,000 years, dendrochronology and radiocarbon dating could not be used. Although you can use potassium-argon, fission track or amino acid racemization etc In order to use these techniques you need: a product, which is detectable (the clock, the rate of production of that product must be known (the ticking clock, the product amount is 0 (clock set to 0)
