Is it possible to fake radiocarbon dating? if possible, what will you choose to fake?

[Braznor]

Is it possible to manufacture something which has a falsely induced difference between C12 and C14 atoms?

Will it be the ultimate fake?

If you can fake such a thing, what will you choose to fake? Assuming you have all the resources to do such a thing only once?

 

[rasczak]

It's possible to fake anything.

 

[DrPizza]

Well, carbon dating would generally be for things that contain... carbon. Organic substances - things that were once alive and got their carbon from the air in their environment. The radioactive isotope of carbon is produced from the interaction of cosmic rays (rays from the sun) and nitrogen in the atmosphere. C14 atoms end up being produced in a secondary process. IIRC, the reaction leaves the C14 atoms "hot", and they quickly react with oxygen to make carbon monoxide, and then carbon dioxide. Due to variations in the sun's output, the process isn't quite at a constant rate, though close enough. Because the age of certain artifacts are known precisely, the carbon dating scale can be very fine tuned for precision.

Anyway, that's not the only way to make carbon 14. I suppose, if you have a nuclear reactor laying around, or some atomic weapons, you could artificially increase the amount of C14 in an environment, stick sheep into that environment long enough for it to take up a lot more C14 than it would in the natural environment, then harvest the wool and make some clothing.

BUT, the outcome of that would be that in 5000 years, someone would say, "wow, according to carbon dating, this thing is like 2 weeks old. It sure looks older than that." If you carbon dated it now, because of the higher than expected level of C14, the lab results would be something like, "weird, the computer just spit out that this blanket was made from wool harvested 5000 years in the future. That doesn't make sense.

So, very expensive to fake - in that direction. What about the other direction? I'm not sure what you would be able to do to a material already containing C14 that could knock it down to C12, without it being detected that you did it. But, I suppose bombarding it with neutrons, or alpha particles or some other radiation might be able to do something.

 

[leftyman]

Interest.

 

[Gibsons]

Anyway, that's not the only way to make carbon 14. I suppose, if you have a nuclear reactor laying around, or some atomic weapons, you could artificially increase the amount of C14 in an environment, stick sheep into that environment long enough for it to take up a lot more C14 than it would in the natural environment, then harvest the wool and make some clothing.

BUT, the outcome of that would be that in 5000 years, someone would say, "wow, according to carbon dating, this thing is like 2 weeks old. It sure looks older than that." If you carbon dated it now, because of the higher than expected level of C14, the lab results would be something like, "weird, the computer just spit out that this blanket was made from wool harvested 5000 years in the future. That doesn't make sense.

So, very expensive to fake - in that direction.

Not too expensive, there's a market for C14 labeled stuff. Really high concentration compared to natural abundance.
for instance: http://www.perkinelmer.com/Catalog/Family/ID/Arginine L14CU

To fake something older, I think you'd want to find something old and feed it to something new. i.e. raise a mouse on nothing but a 2000 year old mammoth carcass. Or grow plants in a sealed greenhouse where a decaying carcass is the only CO2 source.

 

[Raizinman]

The truth is, carbon-14 dating (or radiocarbon dating, as it’s also called) is not a precise dating method in many cases, due to faulty assumptions and other limitations on this method.
For carbon-14 dating to be accurate, one must assume the rate of decay of carbon-14 has remained constant over the years. However, evidence indicates that the opposite is true. Experiments have been performed using the radioactive isotopes of uranium-238 and iron-57, and have shown that rates can and do vary. In fact, changing the environments surrounding the samples can alter decay rates.
A faulty assumption is that the rate of carbon-14 formation has remained constant over the years. There are a few reasons to believe this assumption is erroneous. The industrial revolution greatly increased the amount of carbon-12 released into the atmosphere through the burning of coal. Also, the atomic bomb testing around 1950 caused a rise in neutrons, which increased carbon-14 concentrations.

 

[DaveSimmons]

To fake something older, I think you'd want to find something old and feed it to something new. i.e. raise a mouse on nothing but a 2000 year old mammoth carcass. Or grow plants in a sealed greenhouse where a decaying carcass is the only CO2 source.

To the young earth believers:

To fake the dinosaur fossils that way:
a) you need living dinosaurs.
b) you need 150-million year old food that's still edible, from a period that's 150 million years before you think the Earth was created.
c) you need a way to embed your impossible faked fossils into rock formations.

 

[BurnItDwn]

I would fake a burrito to tell people it's thousands of years old, do you want a bite? Then I will scarf it down!