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LABORATORY EIGHT
Dating of Rocks, Fossils, and Geologic Events
BIG IDEAS: Geologists use relative and numerical dating techniques to determine
the ages of geologic features and events. Relative dating is the process of determining
the order in which geological events occurred. Numerical dating is the process of
determining the age of a geological material or event in years, generally through the
analysis of certain radioactive isotopes and their stable daughter products that are present
in minerals and rocks. The geologic time scale provides a graphic way of identifying
major phases of Earth’s history along with the numerical ages of the beginning and
ending of those phases. Geoscientists developed the time scale over centuries of work,
initially using fossils to define different parts of the time scale before we could determine
numerical ages of geologic materials. Many of the boundaries are related to extinctions
that are evident in the geological record of life on Earth.
STUDENT MATERIALS
Remind students to bring items you check below.
_____ laboratory manual with worksheets attached to assigned activities
_____ laboratory notebook
_____ pencil with eraser
_____ calculator
_____ ruler (cut from GeoTools sheet 1 or 2)
_____ pen
INSTRUCTOR NOTES
1. It is an ethical imperative to treat students with respect. The worldview that some
students bring with them to a geoscience course can make the ideas of deep time
and biological evolution very difficult for them to process. The job of a geoscience
instructor is to present clearly the scientific methods geoscientists use to determine
the relative or numerical age of geological material or events.
As geoscientists and science educators, we make statements like “Our best
scientific estimate of the age of this material is 23 ± 0.5 Myr.” This is a reproducible
scientific fact, and scientific facts can be connected to one another with testable
hypotheses. Science is our best method for acquiring reliable information about
physical reality based on reproducible data and testable hypotheses.
Beyond providing students with the most reliable scientific information explained
as clearly as we know how, we should respect their right to consider and process that
information within their own context. If a discussion of cultural or religious views
about Earth’s history arises in your class, you should interpret this as a positive
indication that you have engaged the students in a way that causes them to ask
questions. That is a good development. However, it would be best to defer the
discussion until a later time so that you preserve the scheduled lab time for scientific
inquiry and learning. Postpone the discussion, but do not suppress their interest in the
topic.
4. Figures A8.6.1 and A8.6.2 both have two identical images: one printed in color, and
the other in black-and-white. Student responses are intended to be placed on the
black-and-white side so that they will be more legible for grading.
8 7
7 6
5
6
4
5
4
3 3
2 2
1
1
8.1B 1. The red layer at the bottom of Figure A8.1.2 (next page) is the oldest. It is an
ancient soil or paleosol, and had to have already formed before the other
layers could be stacked on top of it. This is an application of the principle of
superposition.
3. The fractures must be younger than the lava flow layer. The lava flow must
have existed before it could be cracked. This is an application of the principle
of cross-cutting relationships.
4. The clasts are eroded bits of the lava flow that existed before they were
incorporated in the soil horizon. The lava flow is under the brown soil, so it
must have been there before the brown soil developed on top of it. It is also
true that the igneous rock is older than the clasts eroded from that rock, and
it is older than the modern soil. This interpretation is an application of the
principle of inclusion.
8.1D Reflect & Discuss Appropriate answers include some combination of the
Law of Original Horizontality, Law of Superposition, Law of Cross-Cutting
Relationships, and/or Law of Inclusion.
Cambrian
H Bright Angel Shale H
I Tapeats Sandstone I
A ap
we s
nko p ale R
Na Grou Sh e ss R
uar on Ba mite
Ch n dst o
x Sa zite Do
l GRAND CANYON
B Do u art INNER
oQ e GORGE
m hal
Precambrian
inu iS
C Sh ta
H aka sal
t
vel
Ba Gra
D F Vishnu
Schist
S Zoroaster
L M Granite K
E J
8.2B Reflect & Discuss Refer to the annotated version of Cross Section 2 from
Figure A8.2.1, shown above.
8.3A 1. The brachiopod is Mucrospirifer and the trilobite is Phacops (Figure 8.13).
2. The age of the rock is middle to late Devonian. This is based on the part of the
geologic time scale during which both Mucrospirifer and Phacops existed at
the same time. The range zones during various fossil forms existed is
indicated by the vertical bold black lines on Figure 8.13.
3. Students will estimate different times based on the range zone lines printed on
Figure 8.13, but the range should be around 465 Myr to 359 Myr.
3. Students will estimate different times based on the range zone lines printed on
Figure 8.13, but the range should be around 100 Myr to 78 Myr.
8.3C 1. The brachiopods are Strophomena, an index fossil for the Ordovician Period.
The trilobite is Flexicalymene, an index fossil for the middle to late
Ordovician.
3. Students will estimate different times based on the range zone lines printed on
Figure 8.13, but the range should be around 465 Myr to 443 Myr.
2. A reasonable estimate of the time range of Phacops is between 425 and 360
Myr. The estimated range for Olenellus is between 530 and 515 Myr. (The
information provided in Figure 8.13 does not allow for greater precision.) If
Olenellus occurs up to the disconformity at the top of Formation C and
Phacops occurs from that disconformity upwards into Formation D, the
minimum time represented by the discontinuity is 514 – 425 Myr or about 90
Myr. The maximum time would be somewhat less than 170 Myr if erosion
removed most of the Devonian (Phacops-bearing) strata down into middle
Cambrian (Olenellus-bearing) strata.
minimum: ~90 Myr maximum: less than ~170 Myr
8.3E Reflect & Discuss Rock units A–D were tilted and erosion produced a surface
(E) on which the younger strata (F) were deposited. That contact is an angular
unconformity.
2. The numerical age of the lava flow is about 352 Myr, or half of the half-life
of U-235. The lava flow must be less than or equal to the age of the zircon
crystals. 0.50 × 703,800,000 yr = 351,900,000 yr (about 352 Myr old).
3. The rocks above the lava flow are younger than the lava flow, so they are less
than 352 Myr old.
4. The rock layers beneath the lava flow formed before the lava flow, so they
must be more than 352 Myr old.
8.4B Fifty percent of the parent has decayed, so one half-life of U-238 (4.468 billion
years) has elapsed. Based on this logic, the Earth is about 4.5 billion years old.
8.4C 1. Ninety-four percent of the parent (C-14) has decayed (because only 6%
remains), so about four half-lives of 5730 years have elapsed. The peat must
be about 4 × 5730 yr old, or about 22,920 yr old.
2. Younger plant roots would contaminate the peat with more C-14 and make it
seem younger, while older limestone would contaminate the peat with more
N-14 and make it seem older.
2. The radiometric age of a crystal in a rock is about the same age as the rock
only if it formed at about the same time as the rock (and has not been
re-heated or isotopically contaminated).
8.4E Reflect & Discuss Carbon dating cannot be used to date materials older than
about 50,000 yr (Figure 8.14B), so carbon dating could not have been used to date
a bone that is 400 million years old. Dinosaurs did not exist 400 million years
ago. They existed about 225 to 66 million years ago (Figure 8.13).
8.5A 1. If we are confident that the basalt is part of a sill, then it is younger than the
shale and sandstone below it. A sill is younger than the rock it intrudes. The
shale is older than the sill and younger than the sandstone. The Fagopsis leaf
fossils in the shale and sandstone establish that they are of mid- to upper-
Paleogene age (Figure 8.13), perhaps between about 45 and 23 Myr old.
2. The zircon crystals probably formed at about the same time as the sill,
before it cooled but while it was being emplaced. Zircon crystals in the sill
have 98.9% U-235 and 1.10% Pb-207, so the U-235 has decayed 1/64 of a
half-life. Thus, the age of the sill is 0.016 × 703,800,000 yr = 11,260,800 yr
(~11.3 Myr).
Argumentative pre-law students or careful novice geoscientists might note
that 1/64 is not exactly 0.016 as indicated in Figure 8.14C, but is 0.015625. If
that number is used rather than 0.016, the computed age is 10,996,875 yr or
about 11 Myr. This illustrates a problem with using rounded numbers within
computations rather than just rounding the final result.
2. Mud was deposited (with Fagopsis leaves) on top of the sand during
Paleogene time.
3. Additional sediments were deposited on top of the mud and sand, and they
were lithified into sandstone and shale.
4. The sill intruded between layers of sedimentary rock above the shale. This
occurred in Neogene time (Figures 8.12 and 8.13) about 11 Myr ago.
6. Erosion of the rocks above the sill occurred to produce the present-day
landscape.
8.6B Reflect & Discuss 1700 Myr − 541 Myr = 1159 Myr
8.6D Reflect & Discuss Analysis of the photograph reveals that layers below the
unconformity form an angle with the layers on top of the unconformity. In a
conformable sequence, the beds should be parallel with one another.
WEB RESOURCES
Geologic Time Scale produced by the International Commission on Stratigraphy:
http://stratigraphy.org/index.php/ics-chart-timescale
REFERENCES
Cutler, A., 2003, The seashell on the mountaintop—A story of science, sainthood, and the humble genius
who discovered a new history of the Earth: New York, Dutton, 240 pp.
Dalrymple, G.B., 1991, The age of the Earth: Palo Alto, California, Stanford University Press, 474 pp.
Faure, G., 1986, Principles of isotope geology [2nd ed.]: New York, John Wiley & Sons, 589 pp.
Gradstein, F.M., Ogg, J.G., Schmitz, M., and Ogg, G., [editors], Geologic time scale 2012: Amsterdam,
Elsevier Science & Technology, 1176 pp.
Lewis, C., 2000, The dating game—one man’s search for the age of the Earth: Cambridge University Press,
253 pp.
Neuendorf, K.K.E., Mehl, J.P., Jr., and Jackson, J.A., 2011, Glossary of Geology [5th edition, revised]:
Alexandria, Virginia, American Geosciences Institute, 800 pp.
Ogg, J.G., Ogg, G., and Gradstein, F.M., 2016, A concise geologic time scale 2016: Amsterdam, Elsevier,
240 pp.
Patterson, C.C., 1956, Age of meteorites and the Earth: Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, v. 10,
p. 230–237.
Repcheck, J., 2003, The man who found time: Cambridge, Massachusetts, Perseus Publishing, 247 pp.
Richardson, S.M., and McSween, H.Y., Jr., 1989, Geochemistry—pathways and processes: Prentice Hall,
488 pp.
Winchester, S., 2001, The map that changed the world—William Smith and the birth of modern geology:
New York, HarperCollins Publishers, 329 pp.