After some banter back and forth, someone wrote: “So I don’t think trying to debunk religious artifacts should be looked at as trying to steal away the piece of mind of religious followers.”

Then someone who calls himself BUCKinFL and uses a football helmet for an avatar wrote:

I don’t think there is anything wrong with being a skeptic.  A little often overlooked fact is that most Christians are also skeptics regarding religious artifacts.  In fact the site that was posted, the skeptic site that is skeptical of that Ark site is in fact a Christian site.  I think what a lot of people, Christians mostly, resent is the snarky elitist attitude that many atheist skeptics take.  It shows a lack of tolerance to other people’s rights to believe hat they want to.  Or more importantly, it shows a lack of tolerance for the rights of people to see things differently when the facts are not totally clear.  The toast?  yeah, I don’t think most Christians think this is anything but a hoax, likely done for one reason, to cash in on the idea that at least one sucker would come forward with money to own it.

The shroud however, has not been debunked and thus, how it was made is an unknown.  It has been proven that it was not made by any known means in the past  It is clearly from before the time of Da Vinci since it appears with known identifiable marks, well before Da Vinci and well before the dates of the C14 tests.  In fact, not only is it known to not have been created through any known means available in the past, it wasn’t created by any known means even available today.  In addition, there are many things about it that have been proven through research that suggest authenticity because they fly in the face of what was believed by people during the times it would likely have been created had it been created as a hoax, shortly before its introduction in Europe.

For instance, the fact that it can be proven that the blood stains are scientifically proven to have gotten on the cloth from an open wound, not through manual application.  The ability to know the difference is a recent technology and not one that a hoaxer would have even suspected would be available.  Nor would they know that in the future they could tell the difference between human or animal blood, not would they suspect that we could determine whether or not the blood was somebody who had been tortured.  The fact that the hoaxer would have had to torture somebody and then applied the cloth to that person while they were still bleeding just makes it so unlikely as to make it you really have to stretch rational belief to believe that this was done.

The hoaxer would also have to understand the concept of a negative exposure, which is what the image is.  When was photography created?

The hoaxer seems to have been able to predict the future, had access to advanced science not known for many centuries later, and also not hold to common misconceptions of the time.  Given this, it seems as likely that the hoaxer is alien, or from the future as it is the authentic burial cloth of Jesus Christ with the image created during his rise from the grave.

The most intelligent thing anyone can say with regards to the shroud is, "I don’t know."

Hat tip: Joe Marino

It was in the documentary’s omissions that the greatest faults lay. The voice-over stated that the image is not painted, giving the impression that nobody could explain the colouring other than that it’s a “degradation of the cellulose” in the linen fibres. That’s not quite correct. What is seen on the shroud is a chemical darkening of a starch and polysaccharide coating on some of the fibres: it’s not the fibres themselves, but something applied to them after manufacture. In other words, pigment. And if that’s not paint, I really don’t know what is. One of the members of the STURP team, Walter McCrone, concluded during the study that the image was painted using red ochre and vermillion pigments. The programme didn’t mention him or his conclusions!

. . .

The scientists at the radiocarbon laboratories noted contamination of the samples with cotton, while McCrone had already drawn attention to the mixture of cotton and linen. This means that they were able to deal with it. They recognised the cotton and removed it, dating the linen fibres, which is what they were asked to do. The preparation of samples for dating involves rigorous cleaning to remove potential contaminants, such as these stray cotton fibres. There is no reason to suspect that the three laboratories undertaking the dating did not do their basic cleaning, especially as they had spotted the contaminants.

The programme brought up the old claim that the image on the shroud somehow encodes three-dimensional data and, using the same computer program used to create a three-dimensional image of the face on the shroud, showed that it does not work with photographs. How dishonest! We’re not dealing with a photograph on the shroud but with a painted image. The comparison should have been with a painting. Talk about prejudged conclusions! Besides, if we’re dealing with an image produced by draping a cloth over a corpse, it ought to be far more three-dimensional than we see: where are the sides of the body that the cloth would have touched? The fact that they aren’t there is good evidence that the image is painted.

Extraordinarily bad archaeology being practiced here fellows. Did they really say?

What is seen on the shroud is a chemical darkening of a starch and polysaccharide coating on some of the fibres: it’s not the fibres themselves, but something applied to them after manufacture. In other words, pigment. And if that’s not paint, I really don’t know what is.

It’s not paint. Did you mention that the coating is 200 to 600 nanometers thin? Paint that! Did you mention some real science used to test for paint? Ray Rogers is quoted below:

We tested all pigments and media that were known to have been used before 1532 by heating them on linen up to the temperature of char formation. All of the materials were changed by heat and/or the chemically reducing and reactive pyrolysis products. Some Medieval painting materials become water soluble, and they would have moved with the water that diffused through parts of the cloth as the fire was being extinguished. Observations of the Shroud in 1978 showed that nothing in the image moved with the water.

The Shroud was observed by visible and ultraviolet spectrometry, infrared spectrometry, x-ray fluorescence spectrometry, and thermography. Later observations were made by pyrolysis-mass-spectrometry, laser­microprobe Raman analyses, and microchemical testing. No evidence for pigments or media was found.

Did you say the labs detected cotton and removed it? Did they ask why cotton was there? Cotton isn’t the contaminant here. It suggests the possibility of other contaminants. Did they do a chemical analysis of the samples? Madder root dye, aluminum products, gum were subsequently found. They overlooked that. Cotton was a clue that the sample might have material intrusions from repairs. The repairs might have been made with newer linen with cotton spun in among the linen fibers to hold dye needed to make newer cotton look old. Evidence suggests that is so. Did you mention that the test results fail basic statistical tests for sample homogeneity? Did you mention that what was tested was chemically unlike the whole cloth. Did you mention that the cloth contains measurable vanillin but that the carbon dating samples do not the cloth does not contain measurable vanillin but that the carbon dating samples do? (Corrected)

Good archaeology means considering all the facts, not just those that are convenient. 

You did say, also:

In the event, three laboratories were chosen (Arizona, Oxford and Zürich) and asked to perform several tests on each of four samples taken from different parts of the cloth. . . .

No, they did not take samples from different parts of the cloth. One sample from one corner was cut. Part of it was divided into three roughly equal portions for each of the labs. They then made further divisions. Bad archeology includes bad factual statements, does it not?

Do we need to review this?

The programme brought up the old claim that the image on the shroud somehow encodes three-dimensional data and, using the same computer program used to create a three-dimensional image of the face on the shroud, showed that it does not work with photographs. How dishonest! We’re not dealing with a photograph on the shroud but with a painted image.

Maybe on the television program in question someone compared the shroud image to a photograph. But it has also been compared to numerous painted images. A little basic research would have revealed this. It is irrelevant anyways. It shows a complete lack of understanding about the 3D properties of the shroud image. You might want to check out The so-called 3D Encoding of the Shroud.

For centuries belief that the Shroud of Turin really bears the likeness of the crucified Jesus Christ had to be a matter of faith alone. Then in 1898 it was photographed for the first time, and suddenly the negative image revealed an astonishingly life-like wealth of detail of a tall bearded man horribly tortured with whip, nails and crown of thorns. Virtually overnight, the age-old faith of the pilgrims seemed to be vindicated. Surely this was the very image of Jesus?

Who is the Temple of Mysteries? Here is a quote from the home page:

Learn about the enigmatic Knights Templar and their devotion to Mary Magdalene. Why did Leonardo da Vinci revere her and was he responsible for faking the known Templar artefact, the Turin Shroud?

Discover the secrets of sacred sites such as Rennes-le-Château and why it is of interest to groups such as The Illuminati and The Priory of Sion.

Find out whether the Templar descendant Prince Henry St Clair (Sinclair) sailed across the Atlantic in 1398 to discover America long before Christopher Columbus and whether there is evidence of his voyage encoded in Rosslyn Chapel.

The real mystery is who are/is these guy(s) ?  It’s not the $3.68. Any takers?

Artists’ self-portraits can tell us both what someone looks like and what makes them tick. He’s placed himself in front of a wall neatly covered with images. A picture of the dead Christ from the Shroud of Turin [far right in picture] might serve as a reminder of his recent conversion to Roman Catholicism. A reproduction of an Eastern European icon of Mary holding the Christ child and a photograph of Ukrainian dancers hint at his roots. He liked to paint from photographs — and memory.

Hat tip to Joe Marino.

But some here, notably Paulette, might care to take a glance at the paper’s introduction. Note the claimed 7cm difference in length of the front and rear images (see her earlier comment and the scorn she heaps on me for pointing out how obvious it is, even in the images avaliable on the internet). But first she will have to get down off that school ma’am’s high horse of hers ;-)

Ah, the soft rubber tip on the foil: the smiley ;-)  In looking at what Paulette wrote we see that she did not so much heap scorn on Sciencebod for pointing out anything but for not pointing out anything. It isn’t about a claimed difference in length between the front and back images or even if it is obvious. It is about his slapdash approach to analysis, which to my way of thinking is a perfect example of the gee-whiz science he so disdains. Why not say, “I’ve noticed . . . has anyone seen any research on this? . . any thoughts? . . . am I onto something?” Sciencebod seems rather to parry attacks and and declare touché. What does he expect?

Here is what Paulette wrote (I added links and images for clarity):

The author of science buzz tells us that his blog is primarily about his “scepticism re media-hyped gee-whizz science, especially ‘pseudo-science’, as previous postings will demonstrate, NOT religion…”

Well it certainly isn’t about science, either. Consider his 5th item in which he tells us, “Dorsal and ventral imprints may have been obtained from two different templates. Some claim dorsal and ventral images are not consistent. A quick play around with my laptop would suggest as much.”

He is out of his league. Look at the picture of the dorsal and ventral images that he put together in his blog (above). This isn’t scientific thinking. As a science teacher I would have given one of my 9th graders a failing grade if he turned in something like this. He has lined up the rightmost and leftmost edge of the cloth as though the feet were aligned to those edges. The best he can do is write, “some claim.” Who? What documentation? Forget the fact that hundreds of scientists spent thousands of hours studying the images on the shroud. Compare his “quick play around with my laptop” with the fifteen page paper, “Computerized Anthropometric Analysis of the Man of the Turin Shroud” detailing the real scientific work of Giulio Fanti, Emanuela Marinelli and Alessandro Cagnazzo of the Interdepartmental Center for Space Studies and Activities at the University of Padua. They are consistent.

Almost all of his 37 points are like point 5, not researched, not carefully thought out. Joe Nickell move over. You have competition.

In reference to  He’s back and it’s a doozy « Shroud of Turin Blog

Though my faith does not rest upon the authenticity of the Turin Shroud and though the practice of relics has never been part of my spiritual journey yet the story and debate about the Shroud has always fascinated me. It has been no problem for me to accept its authenticity and I rather like the image of resurrection power acting like some power almost unknown to man.

Alan Neale, was born in London, England. He received his first degree from the London School of Economics. A second degree in Theology from Oxford University followed. Ordained in Exeter Cathedral, he served in the city-centre church St. Andrew of Plymouth, Devon, The University of Christ Church, Southampton and St. Andrew, Stanstead Abbots, Hertfordshire. In 1988, with his wife Wendy and three children, he moved to Brookings, South Dakota. After thirteen years as Rector of St. Columba’s Chapel Middletown, Rhode Island, Alan became Rector of Philadelphia’s Holy Trinity in June, 2004.

I’m not sure why we should bother. Joe NIckel, Sciencebod and other skeptics like them have already made up their mind and just keep recycling tired old arguments. They enter the debate with closed minds that it’s a fake and then muster outworn arguments, coupled with mockery and derision, to try to make their case. This is not the way to do good science, and is a complete contrast to the objective, fair-minded and analytical approach taken by those working closely with the artifact. Most of Nickel’s other arguments are answered by reference to Ian Wilson’s most recent book “The Shroud”, Random House, 2010.

Despite Bishop D’Arcis’ most carefully worded letter of 1389 to Avignon Pope Clement VII, he was unable to provide a single documented reference supporting his charge that Bishop Henry of Troyes had looked into the matter “some 34 years ago or thereabouts” and found that it “had been cunningly painted”, Note that he is even unspecific about the date, even though any supporting documentation would still have been available to him. The truth of the matter is that very likely all the churchmen, Bishops Henry, D’Arcis and the Canons of Lirey, were all moved by avarice to meet their debts, as apart from the Shroud, they had missed out on the largesse of other relics seized from the sack of Constantinople. Pope Clement VII may have known more about it than he let on. He had a close connection with the de Charny family, and he enjoined D’Arcis to perpetual silence on the matter under pain of excommunication.

We do not know the history of the Shroud, as its original owner in the West, the gallant and most honourable knight Geoffrey de Charny was killed at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356 defending his king, before he was able to reveal how he came by it. However Ian Wilson attempts a credible reconstruction of its history as the Mandylion of Edessa, and musters several sound arguments to support it. This may not suit the pedants who insist only on facts, but it is the unavoidable vagueness of the history of those turbulent times. That so much can be reconstructed is a credit to Wilson’s perseverance and energy.

Wilson also itemises several criticisms of the C14 tests, and describes the jostling for control between John Paul II’s chief scientific advisor Dr Carols Chagas and Turin’s Professor Luigi Gonella. Chagas’ well thought-out protocol was scrapped, and Gonella and the AMS laboratories had their way. Without even touching on the likelihood that the C14 sample was a patch, and not the original material at all, Wilson lists the following criticisms:-

1. Choosing only of labs using the AMS method, all three being clones of one another;
2. No involvement of a professional textile conservator in choosing the sample;
3, Taking just one single sample, from one single area;
4. Choice of site for the sample being well-documented as subject to prolonged repeated handling during the centuries;
5. No provision for any chemical analysis of the sample;
6. Unofficial purloining by Gonella and Riggi of unused portions of the sample for their own personal research purposes;
7. Denial of any other synchronous scientific approaches to the Shroud.

Nevertheless, no amount of logical argument will change the minds of the skeptics. They have made up their closed minds on the issue. And still retain the gall to call themselves scientists. Maybe they’d make good lab technicians, and not attempt to be more ambitious.

See: Correcting Joe Nickell « Shroud of Turin Blog

The word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious came to mind when I saw the wonderful improvements to Barrie’s shroud.com.  As you will recall Mary Poppins uttered that famous word rather than admit to being speechless. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.

So I’m sure that everyone who keeps up to date on the Shroud has heard about the recent experiments by ENEA which were able to reproduce the superficiality of the Shroud image using bursts of light. My point in writing this though is to show the blatant fallacious writings of skeptic Joe Nickell, who is repeating the same false facts that I heard far too many Shroud skeptics tout:

“Given the tremendous evidence against the ‘shroud’ — its incompatibility with Jewish burial practices, lack of historical record, bishop’s report of the forger’s confession, the still-bright-red ‘blood’ which failed forensic serological tests, the presence of pigments and paints throughout the image, three laboratories’ radiocarbon dating of the cloth to the time of the confession (1260–1390), and much additional evidence — it would seem that Di Lazzaro is straining at a gnat and attempting to swallow a camel. Let him produce a shroudlike image according to whatever theory he can muster, and we’ll talk again.”

Let’s break this down line by line.