Question

Two laboratories use radiocarbon dating to measure the age of two wooden boat fragments found at the site of an ancient

shipwreck. Lab A finds an age of 515 +/-20 years for the first object; lab B finds an age of 585 +/-30 years for the second
object. Which of the following is true?
a. Lab B's reading is more accurate than Lab A's.
b. Lab B's reading is less accurate than Lab A's.
Lab B's reading is more precise than Lab A's.
d Lab B's reading is less precise than Lah A's
C

Answer 1

Answer d) Lab B's reading is less precise than Lab A's

Step-by-step explanation:

Recall that accuracy is a measure of how close to the actual physical quantity the experiment leads to. In this case, we don't know what the true age is,so we cannot tell which reading is more accurate.

But we can tell which reading is more precise given the value of their reported errors. Since Lab A shows a smaller error in years (+/- 20 years versus 30 years), as well as a smaller percent error (3.9% versus 5.1%), we can say that Lab's A reading is more precise than Lab B's reading.

This agrees with answer labeled d).