Working with Radiocarbon Dates
Working with Radiocarbon Dates
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使用放射性碳日期
DOI：
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发表时间：
1971
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
H. Waterbolk
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
H. Waterbolk
C-14年代测定不仅可以为我们提供物体或职业层的绝对年龄的估计，而且，如果有足够的数量，还可以提供文化阶段的开始和结束年代，从而确定它们的持续时间。这一研究的价值是显而易见的：不同地区持续时间的差异，最终可以为有关文化运动方向的长期争议问题提供明确的答案。然而，处理大量的碳-14日期并非完全没有问题。例如，我们经常会遇到年龄相近的年代之间存在较大差异的情况，这种差异不能仅仅用统计误差来解释（Vogel, 1969a），也不能用污染或其他简单原因来解释。我们可以在这一点上停下来，接受C-14日期的有限证明值（例如Steuer和Tempel， 1968），或者我们可以通过计算平均日期进一步尝试，假设（大部分是不正确的）日期太年轻的机会等于它太老的机会（Neustupný， 1968）。这种方法的危险之处在于，人们忽视了每一次测定的个体特征：事实上，一个样本与某一特定文化阶段的发现之间的联系要比另一个样本紧密得多，而且每个样本受到污染或混合的可能性也不同。另一个问题是，人们必须考虑的碳-14日期的数量往往太大，如果没有某种形式的图形表示，就无法消化它们，而在这方面，实践还没有统一的做法。
C-14 datings can not only provide us with estimates of the absolute age of objects or occupation layers, but also, when available in sufficient numbers, with initial and terminal datings for cultural phases, thus defining their duration. The value of this is obvious: differential duration in different areas can at last provide definitive answers to long-disputed questions concerning the direction of cultural movement. Working with large numbers of C-14 dates is, however, not entirely free of problems. We are, for example, regularly confronted with larger differences between datings expected to be of similar age than can be accounted for by mere statistical error (Vogel, 1969a) or which can be explained by contamination or other simple causes. One can stop at this point and accept a limited testimonial value for C-14 dates (e.g. Steuer and Tempel, 1968), or one can try to go further by calculating average dates, assuming (for the most part incorrectly) that the chance of a date being too young is equal to its chance of being too old (Neustupný, 1968). The danger in this procedure is that one loses sight of the individual character of each determination: in fact one sample is much more securely associated and more closely contemporary with finds of a particular cultural phase than another, and the chance of contamination or admixture is different for each sample. Another problem is that the number of C-14 dates that one must take into consideration is often so large that they cannot be digested without some form of graphic presentation, and for this there is as yet no uniformity of practice.