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45. Molten Earth?
For decades, textbooks have taught that the early Earth was molten, because it formed by meteoritic bombardment. If so, the heat released by the impacts would have melted the entire Earth for hundreds of millions of years.a Had Earth ever been molten, dense, nonreactive chemical elements such as gold would have sunk to Earth’s core. Gold is 70% denser than lead, yet is found at the Earth’s surface.b Therefore, the entire Earth was never molten and did not form by meteoritic bombardment.
Radioactive dating of certain zircon minerals also contradicts a molten Earth. Trace elements within those zircons show that the zircons formed on a cold Earth (less than 212°F).c However, according to radioactive dating, those zircons formed on an extremely young Earth, when, according to evolutionists, it should have been molten (exceeding 1,800°F)—an obvious contradiction. Either the molten Earth idea or the radioactive dating method must be wrong; perhaps both are wrong.
Meteorites contain much more of the element xenon than Earth’s surface rocks, relative to other noble (inert) gases such as helium, neon, and argon. Had Earth formed by meteoritic bombardment, Earth’s surface rocks would have a different composition, and our atmosphere would contain up to ten times more xenon than it has.d If Earth did not evolve by meteoritic bombardment, it may have begun as one large body. [See “Melting the Inner Earth” on pages 428–432.]