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Carbon 14
Since the subject of carbon 14 dating came up, let me mention the C14 Web page
which gives a lot of information in a consize form :
http://www2.waikato.ac.nz/c14/webinfo/int.html
In a nutshell, these are the points that relate to our subject,
the new-found texts of Qumran:
* Pottery _is_ mentioned in the article as one of the materials dateable
by C14 - probably, as somebody mentioned, by biological inclusions, since
C14 can be directly applied only to bio-material.
* There are two recent improvements to the traditional C-14 method, whose
precision is estimated at 5%-10% of the artifact age:
1) Accelerator Mass Spectrometry method [AMS] which requires only some
milligrams worth of matter. This is the method that was used
in case of the Turin Shroud.
2) High-precision dating - claimed to be as accurate as +-16 years.
The technology necessary for these two methods is available only in some
laboratories - a great number of smaller places use the simpler, and less
precise, older method. I do not know what is available in Israel - perhaps
somebody else could through light on the situation?
Best, Asia