Reply to comment In 1947 a young Bedouin shepherd found some
ancient scrolls while investigating a small opening in the
cliffs near the western shores of the Dead Sea. Three ancient
scrolls were made from leather, wrapped in decayed linen, and
were covered in ancient scripts. In that same year, Willard
Frank Libby of the University of Chicago also discovered
Carbon-14, a radioactive isotope of carbon. This led to a method
of dating once-living materials by measurements of the
radioactivity of the sample. Beta particles (electrons from a
nucleus) are emitted when Carbon-14 present in the sample decays
into Carbon-12 (the latter is a common and stable isotope) and
the rate of these emissions can be measured. During the
following few years, more discoveries were made at four more
sites. Hailed as the theological and historical finds of the
century, these documents were and still are considered to be of
immense importance to Western religion. They have been the
source of much controversy, especially since many sc