A radioactive isotope of carbon, carbon-14, can be used to figure out how old some objects are or when something died. As long as something is on the surface of the earth and taking in carbon, the amount of carbon-14 stays the same. When an object stops taking in carbon, the carbon-14 amount goes down. Because the "half-life" (how long it takes for half of a radioactive isotope to go away) of carbon-14 is 5730 years, scientists can see how old the object is by how much carbon-14 is left.