Yeah, I’m reevaluating my perspective on this. I would watch UTD on Hulu at lunch; if I can replicate this with LB that might work out.
Not knowing enough of sciencey stuff to say where that is wrong. But assuming that carbon dating wouldn’t work on diamonds, which are a form of carbon, wouldn’t/couldn’t it work on the metal ring itself?
If you could determine the age of metals, they’d be a uniform 15 billion years old (appx).
Carbon dating only works on once-living things. Plants, for example, anything that absorbed carbon while living and stopped once it died.
The rescue plane didn’t land, the pilot bailed out.
And while yes, the mushroom thing was a stretch, there appeared to be several pack loads.
This show is bad, but I am enjoying it, anyway.
It does have the stupid movie trope that all carnivores are always hungry and always attack, which Jurassic Park carried to a ridiculous extreme…
Absolutely not. To be very pedantic, “carbon dating” refers only to determining age based on the amount of the radioactive isotope Carbon-14 is in an organic sample, and the testing range tops out at around 50 thousand years. But even if you allow the term to apply to all radiometic dating, those methods work only for specific isotopes in specific circumstances, for instance determining the amount of Uranium that has decayed into Lead in specific types of crystals.
Ignorance fought.
This is pretty technical, but it might interest you.
I am aware of a few other other “absolute chronology” methods for dating artifacts that archaeologists can use, but I don’t think any would be particularly useful on a loose diamond ring.
Thermoluminescence can tell you how long it has been since a piece of stone or ceramic was last heated in a fire. Obsidian hydration can tell you how long it has been since the edge on an obsidian tool was knapped into shape. Dendrochronology lets you compare patterns of tree ring growth in a wood sample against the climate record and other wood samples to find what years the tree was alive. Stratification lets you date artifacts by the age of the layer they are found in, if you can date other artifacts in the surrounding strata.
Maybe they could use carbon dating on the black crud that was visible on the ring? If they had access to the hole where he dug up the ring, they might be able to use stratification to date how long it had been buried there, if Gavin didn’t disturb the area too badly. If the gold in a piece of jewelry is of low purity can they tell how long the other metals in the alloy have been exposed to corrosion? Is a diamond reactive to anything that would allow you to determine how long it has been since the gem was cut, similar to obsidian hydration?
Looks like we’re both right. 
How long do you think it will take before they ‘realize’ that the hopelessly busted whatzit on whichever of the wings the good engine is on can be replaced with the miraculously undamaged whatzit from the wing with the engine that flamed out? And that said repair will require only the tools that can be scrounged from the cars that fell in?
Yeah, I left some characters out of my summary last time. Like the druggie son and father-killer cop mother, as pointed out.
And the nice gay couple – isn’t one of them blind or something? I predict the non-blind one will be trapped in some dire situation soon and he’ll have to give directions to the blind one: There’s a rock to your left! No, further left! Now hurl it towards my voice! No, it’s okay, it won’t hit me, it’ll instantly kill the killer-archaic-ostrich that is attacking me!
So what’s going on with the two sisters – refugees from some sort of cult, maybe?
(I mean, it’s good that you have varied characters, but does everyone have to have some extreme trait for the writers to hook future traumatic events to? Couldn’t someone just be a paper-pusher who was commuting to work, who otherwise had a normal, every day life without dark secrets and tragedies lurking? Or at least wait a few episodes before dumping all these traits in front of us?)
As for this week, two more long hikes through the woods with no one going off course.
Ex-preMed girl had to do doctoring again, of course, though at a much more believable first aid level. But then she was attacked by a super-water-snake! (Is there any fossil evidence of such things?)
But SuperSnake was easily dispatched by HeroicPilot with a single shot, somehow managing to find an instant-kill location in the huge snake even though it was coiled about a wrestling girl underneath the murky water.
I don’t know what to say about the second plane. I would think building a one-off plane like that would cost millions of dollars, and couldn’t possibly be done without the knowledge of the government people who build the first one?
And…they plan to bring back ALL the La Breans in the single plane? How big is that thing, can it possibly take off with that much weight aboard? Though maybe that won’t be a problem, given the rate they’re killing LaBreans at.
Oh, yeah, and now there’s A Killer Electric Shaman. And a mud hut Village of the Damned?
As George Takei is fond of saying, Oh, my.
Unfortunately there was not a single “Run!!” this episode. 
I mean, they include one in next week’s preview, but I don’t think I can really count it for this one. They broke the streak.
My favorite character so far (not really) is the grim faced lady who just seems to wander into every other scene with bad news.
I had the same thought, but if they are basing the plan on the number of people Gavin(? psychic dad) has seen, they’ve got enough space.
Drama will ensue when they discover that there are however many people there are (I think maybe a couple of dozen?).
Carbon dating the diamond ring was my cue to stop thinking while watching this show. It’s entertaining, but only as long as you stop trying to make any of it consistent with Science, History, or common sense.
There certainly were giant snakes, and snakes were found in the tar pits. But afaik, no giant snakes at that place in time. A couple shots, actually.
They did have some markers to go by.
Where was the pilots survival vest, and only one gun?
I suspect that the village was caused by other rifters who went back in time, and taught the locals tricks.
Or just one rifter doing a Col. Kurtz.
Carbon-dating is used for formerly living things.
Favorite scene - our heroine uses her stick to check the depth of the pond, right at the edge.
“It’s not deep”, and throws her stick away. Fortunately, ponds 10,000 years ago didn’t get deeper as you go further from shore.
And, apparently, ponds were also easily distinguishable from the nearby tar pits.
A ripoff of Apocalype Now, which was itself a ripoff of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, would be a fun development. Just keep throwing plot trope ingredients into the stew.
Yeah, my wife and I had a good laugh at that. I swear, anybody who isn’t enjoying this show isn’t watching it right. 
Eh, I think human’s having been differentiating between tar pits and ponds pretty well for a long time now. And, actually, poking what looks like water with a stick would be a good test (not that I think that is what she was doing). I guess it could have been tar farther in (keep the damn stick!) but that’s a quibble (and this is not a show for quibbling).
I guess I need to start watching again. Although my eyeballs might break from rolling them too hard!