Quote Originally Posted by David88vert View Post
Find me a case of a new species evolving currently. To show that it is creating a new species, you should have multiple instances of species one, multiple instances of species two, species two must be able to reproduce to sustain the new species, and you should be able to show the specific genetic changes between the two species - presumably it should have multiple genetically mutated versions of species one.
I'll save you the trouble - there aren't any. Hence, evolution is not progressing in an observable way. of course, stopped is a poor term, considering that would mean that it had to be moving along previously - which is far from proveable.
Ok how about chimpanzees and humans (only a few percent genetic differences). If you are looking for an example on the verge of a split, I would say look at dogs and wolves. Was there a certain percentage of genetic differences you are looking for?

Quote Originally Posted by David88vert View Post
Fossils exist, but our current methods for dating rely on many assumptions that do not take into account historical events. Do you realize that volcanic eruptions affect the amount of carbon and affect the results of dating via that process? Do you realize that the Industrial Revolution did this as well? Do you realize that the half life is 5730 years, so do you think that it can be used accurately back past 11,460 years? Do you realize that not all plants process C14 the same? And that they usually test older than they are?
I will respond to all carbon/radiometric dating below but I just wanted to point out that carbon dating is actually considered valid for up to 50,000 to 75,000 years, not 11,460 (that's only two half-lives).

Quote Originally Posted by David88vert View Post
For any radiometric measurements of isotopes, you have to make these assumptions:
1. The starting conditions are known (no daughter isotope present at the start, or that we know how much was there).
2. Rate of decay is constant.
3. Systems were closed or isolated so that no parent or daughter isotopes were lost or added.

Those are some pretty big assumptions. You may chose to accept them, but if you do, then you are doing it on faith, and are making science into a religion.
Nice copy and paste from http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aig/aig-c007.html. Still these are valid but I think you overestimate the innacuracy such factors can introduce. Fossil dating is done through numerous methods other than carbon/rediometric dating including:

dating against objects with a known age
cyclical sedimentary deposits
glacial cycles
coral cycles
tree rings
luminescence

Now you can attack the possible innacuracies in any of these methods as you did with radiometric dating but when mulitple methods give consistent answers, eventually you gotta think it's more than coincidence.