Site banner: see how a simulated sweat imprint (my wet hand pressed down onto dark fabric) responds magnificently to 3D-rendering computer software (ImageJ) before and after tone-reversal (negative back to positive image). Remind you of anything? Like those supposedly “unique” and “encoded” 3D-properties of the Shroud of Turin body image? For a more realistic aged/yellowed sweat imprint, see the many postings on this site since 2014 obtained with the aid of my Model 10 (imprinting off parts, notably head and hands, of a real body (mine!) onto linen with white wheaten flour, followed by heat-development of the image to generate carbon-based and thus bleachable straw-coloured melanoidins via Maillard reactions between wheat proteins and reducing sugars).
And now for something completely different (this end-of-the-rainbow posting)!
This posting will shortly list in rank order the first 150 postings that appear under a (shroud of turin) Google search. They will go up in batches of approx 15, starting at the lower end, working towards the top. A few will be annotated over a period of time (look for the red typeface) in a manner guaranteed to get some backs up… Sorry, there are things that need to be said – or not said – as the case may be…
That list is the first step in attempting to deduce why some posts appear in Google’s top rankings and not others.
Late insertion: June 16, 2018
This site disappeared from all Google listings under (shroud of turin) over 24 hours ago. Here’s the kind of thing, highlighted in yellow, that has taken its place:
Good, isn’t it? Something is there that has no business to be, unless flagged as an ad’. One begins to see what the $hroud of Turin represents to the Google so-called $earch engine, read e-commerce click-bait directory.
Once Google’s role is interpreted (correctly or otherwise) I’ll move on and look at other factors that might be operating (like self-appointed sindonological ‘gatekeepers’ and self-promoters?). Right now, I suspect that both factors operate in unison … which would explain why my “simulated sweat imprint” interpretation of the Turin Shroud, easily modelled I might add as a white flour facial or other body imprint onto wet linen with subsequent heat-treatment, is and has been effectively suppressed since my first unveiling it in early 2014. (Yes, 4 years ago no less!).
That’s under a simple entry-level search under (shroud of turin) I hasten to add. If one adds (simulated sweat imprint) then one gets an entire page of references to one or other of mine and others’ websites on which the words and concept, dare I say simplifying paradigm, has appeared . In other words, it’s there, but you have to know where to look – Google fails to flag it up under the general search. Think needle, think Google haystack…
See this report that appeared in November 2014 on Dan Porter’s long-since retired shroudstory site:
Here are the two links to which Dan Porter made reference, the first from November 2014, the second earler still (July the same year) both on my sciencebuzz site) :
http://colinb-sciencebuzz.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/checklist-of-reasons-for-thinking-turin.html
http://colinb-sciencebuzz.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/it-seems-so-obvious-now-why-man-on.html
( Added as an afterthought: Yup, this blogger was attempting to use the internet some 3 years ago and more to float the idea of Joseph of Arimathea’s linen sheet being seen first and foremost by our medieval modellers as an impromptu stretcher (not self-evidently intended in the biblical account to double as a subsequent burial shroud!), of sweat and blood being notionally imprinted en route to the tomb, of white flour as a likely imprinting agent in the medieval modelling, of a number of options for image chromophore colour development (nitric acid, heat) etc etc. Years of asserting the same interpretation, the same message, bar variations in detail, which I consider plain commonsense, with what result? Answer: scarcely a word from tight-lipped ‘sindonology’! Bizarre! Truly bizarre! Whatever happened to the ‘world of ideas’? Has it been killed off by publicity-hungry sindonological pseudoscience, MSM dumbing-down, social media, fake news, so-called ‘search engines’ that may search initially, then curate/filter/window-dress, air-brush etc etc?
No, it should NEVER have been referred to as the “Shroud” of Turin, given the ambiguity as to where acquisition of an image in the biblical context could have taken place and precisely onto what. “Shroud” is too loaded a term. It should have been called the “Deposition Linen of Turin“, which is essentially how it’s described in the first three Gospels – the receipt of the crucified, newly-deceased founder of Christianity by one Joseph of Arimathea, more specifically “taking down of a body”, i.e. “Deposition from the Cross” to use the the Church’s formal terminology).
Late insertion (May 26, 2018). Here’s an update of my “simulated sweat imprint” enigma-dispensing answer, the one for which sindonology, Google, wiki, even non-authenticists wedded to their simplistic “just a painting” narrative have developed a near total blind spot (Dan Porter – see above – for all his genteel put-downs having been a rare exception!)
1. While we see images of a face on the long-lost Veil of Veronica in wikipedia and other photo-archives, most resembling fully-fledged works of art, one or two are less-well defined:
The artist has made some allowance for imaging via a supposed imprinting mechanism initially from a sweat/blood coated face – later enhanced (whether artistically, divinely or both!). The 14th century creators of the Shroud took that notion to its ultimate conclusion, attempting to visualize the primary image, prior to that credulity-stretching enhancement, all the way back to the primary near-invisible imprint that might be imagined to have been acquired as latent image within minutes of death and/or removal from a cross. They then set out to simulate how that initial latent image might have yellowed over the course of centuries to become visible – but only just. (I reject the mainstay argument of Charles Freeman that because engravings exist of the Shroud being held aloft to giant crowds of alleged relic-viewers/worshippers in the early pre-Turin days of open-air display, post 15th century, ipso facto it must have been a bold image, visible from afar. Has Freeman and others never heard of artistic licence?).
2. Accounts for the negative,i.e. tone reversed image (as expected of a contact imprint, not just a 1st stage product of silver emulsion or other pre-digital era photochemical image-capture)
3. Explains the colour (supposedy 13 centuries old yellowed sweat, only just visible – not too much).
4. Explains imprinting of front and back, not the sides – J of A’s linen having notionally acquired its double-body imprint during brief transport when the linen was used as an improvised stretcher with scarcely any contact with SIDES of body.
Here’s the imagined scenario as per the 1st 3 Gospel accounts, with the newly crucified body of Jesus being received into Joseph of Arimathea’s ‘fine linen’. If the latter were pictured as being used as a makeshift stretcher, with no appreciable ‘wrap-around’ of the sides, contact being exclusively with top and recumbent underside of body, it explains why those 14th century modellers decided to make the body image look the way it does, i.e. negative (tone-reversed) contact imprint, no sides … (Yes, contact-imprinting only – no photography of any description!). Modelled imprinting pre- NOT post-interment in tomb, while sweat and blood still not fully dry.
Notionally, the transport linen was intended to be replaced by more specialized burial ‘clothes’ after arrival at the rock tomb but post-Sabbath.
5. Explains good imprinting of blood – notionally still very fresh during transport immediately following death, so no need to invoke all those complex mechanisms that try to explain imprinting of blood days later via exudation from otherwise dried-on blood clots etc.
6. Explains imprinting of soles of feet. No, not rigor mortis as some would have us believe but linen having notionally been turned up around the soles of feet during transport. Explains too the relative absence of imprinting off the top surfaces of the feet. Those fabricators of the TS body image imprint were sticklers for detail!
7. Why it’s exactly life size – not intended to be seen as a painting but an actual whole body imprint (cleverly simulated!).
8. Why no recognizable artist’s paint pigment? (Straw or tan-coloured melanoidins instead from roasted wheat flour in my Model 10, such as remain after a final soap/water rinse).
9. Why scourge marks are, we’re told, imprinted solely as blood, not body image. Open wounds, or arguably weeping weals too, would (after all) produce blood, less probably sweat.
10. Any method of producing a simulated sweat imprint which involved an oven heating step or equivalent to develop colour in an imprint would additionally produce general yellowing of the entire fabric, non-imprinted as well, such that the linen becomes artificially aged – by some 1300 years! Two birds killed with one stone!
11. Proof of the hunch/hypothesis? Or maybe just corroborating evidence for starters? Not easy. Even if one had access to the Shroud, there are mere traces of the chromophore. At best one could maybe use a microanalytical method to chemically ‘fingerprint’ the chromophore, i.e. the straw-coloured chemical responsible for the body image and compare against known references. But what?
Here’s 2 for starters. First, scan linen fibres (probably with mass spectrometry in the first instance) before and after coloration by exposure to radiation (ultraviolet etc) as proposed in those models based on ‘resurrectional incandescence’. Second, do the same scan using linen that has received a flour imprint that is then roasted and finally washed, i.e. my Model 10.
I say the TS body image chromophore will give a better match with the melanoidins derived from roasted white flour.
Top 150 Google rankings
1: Shroud of Turin – Wikipedia
The Shroud of Turin or Turin Shroud is a length of linen cloth bearing the negative image of a man who is alleged to be Jesus of Nazareth. It is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, northern Italy. The cloth itself is believed by some to be the burial shroud that Jesus was wrapped in when …Present location: Cathedral of Saint John the B… Size: 4.4 by 1.1 metres (14 ft 5 in × 3 ft 7 in) Material: Linen
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shroud_of_Turin
My personal observations:
Not bad as regards TONE (which is almost as important as CONTENT when dealing with a major controversy). From the word go it adopts a thoughtful distance from some of those wilder claims (like those attempts to impugn the motives of the 1988 3-centre radiocarbon daters especially which are frankly shameless).
But there is a problem with this (and so many other) wiki entries. It’s not sufficiently cutting-edge. Too much there has a stale dated look to it.
Advice to wiki: do something about that hideous Talk/Edit facility, laden as it is with insider jargon, guaranteed to scare of anyone concerned for their own short-term sanity.
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: still No. 1. No surprises there.
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2: The Shroud of Turin Website – Home Page
The Shroud of Turin is a centuries old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man. A man that millions believe to be Jesus of Nazareth. Is it really the cloth that wrapped his crucified body, or is it simply a medieval forgery, a hoax perpetrated by some clever artist? Modern science has completed hundreds of thousands …Late Breaking Website News! · Examine the Shroud · Shroud of Turin Books Online
My personal observations:
I’m pleased to see that the Documenting Photographer on the celebrated STURP enterprise of 1978 can -and does – contribute freely to the Shroud debate in his role as President of STERA (Shroud of Turin Education and Research Assn.) and site-owner of shroud.com. But self-styled globe-trotting interview-giving “scientific expert”?
How was he able to acquire that tag?
The interview he gave to Ann Schneible, CNA/EWTN NewsCatholic Online back in 2015 provides some of the answer. I’ve highlighted the, er, occasional intrusion of that authority-conferring S-word!
“Barrie Schwortz, now a retired technical photographer and frequent lecturer on the shroud, was a member of the 1978 Shroud of Turin Research Project, which brought prestigious scientists together to examine the ancient artifact.
“The Shroud challenges (many people’s core beliefs) because there’s a strong implication that there is something beyond the basic science going on here,” Barrie Schwortz, one of the leading scientific experts on the Shroud of Turin, told CNA.
Admitting that he did not know whether there was something beyond science at play, he added, “That’s not what convinced me: it was the science that convinced me.”
The Shroud of Turin is among the most well known relics believed to be connected with Christ’s Passion. Venerated for centuries by Christians as the burial shroud of Jesus, it has been subject to intense scientific study to ascertain its authenticity, and the origins of the image.The image on the 14 feet long, three-and-a-half feet wide cloth is stained with the postmortem image of a man – front and back – who has been brutally tortured and crucified.
As a non-practicing Jew at the time, he was hesitant to be part of the team and skeptical as to the shroud’s authenticity – presuming it was nothing more than an elaborate painting. Nonetheless, he was intrigued by the scientific questions raised by the image.
Despite his reservations, Schwortz recounts being persuaded to remain on the project by a fellow scientist on the team – a NASA imaging specialist, and a Catholic – who jokingly told him: “You don’t think God wouldn’t want one of his chosen people on our team?”
In addition, Schwortz soon encountered one of the great mysteries of the image that still entrances its examiners to this day.
He explained that a specific instrument used for the project was designed for evaluating x-rays, which allowed the lights and darks of an image to be vertically stretched into space, based on the lights and darks proportionately.
For a normal photograph, the result would be a distorted image: with the shroud, however, the natural, 3-D relief of a human form came through. This means, “There’s a correlation between image density – lights and darks on the image – and cloth to body distance.”
“The only way that can happen is by some interaction between cloth and body,” he said. “It can’t be projected. It’s not a photograph – photographs don’t have that kind of information, artworks don’t.”
This evidence led him to believe that the image on the shroud was produced in a way that exceeds the capacities even of modern technology.
“There’s no way a medieval forger would have had the knowledge to create something like this, and to do so with a method that we can’t figure out today – the most image-oriented era of human history.”
“Think about it: in your pocket, you have a camera, and a computer, connected to each other in one little device,” he said.
“The shroud has become one of the most studied artifacts in human history itself, and modern science doesn’t have an explanation for how those chemical and physical properties can be made.”
While the image on the Shroud of Turin was the most convincing evidence for him, he said it was only a fraction of all the scientific data, which points to it being real.
“Really, it’s an accumulation of thousands of little tiny bits of evidence that, when put together, are overwhelming in favor of its authenticity.”
Despite the evidence, many skeptics question the evidence without having seen the facts. For this reason, Schwortz launched the website http://www.shroud.com, which serves as a resource for the scientific data on the Shroud.
Nonetheless, he said, there are many who still question the evidence, many believing it is nothing more than an elaborate medieval painting.
“I think the reason skeptics deny the science is, if they accept any of that, their core beliefs have been dramatically challenged, and they would have to go back and reconfigure who they are and what they believe in,” he said. “It’s much easier to reject it out of hand, and not worry about it. That way they don’t have to confront their own beliefs.”
“I think some people would rather ignore it than be challenged.”
Schwortz emphasized that the science points to the Shroud being the burial cloth belonging to a man, buried according to the Jewish tradition after having been crucified in a way consistent with the Gospel. However, he said it is not proof of the resurrection – and this is where faith comes in.
“It’s a pre-resurrection image, because if it were a post-resurrection image, it would be a living man – not a dead man,” he said, adding that science is unable to test for the sort of images that would be produced by a human body rising from the dead.
“The Shroud is a test of faith, not a test of science. There comes a point with the Shroud where the science stops, and people have to decide for themselves.”
“The answer to faith isn’t going to be a piece of cloth. But, perhaps, the answer to faith is in the eyes and hearts of those who look upon it.”
When it comes to testifying to this meeting point between faith and science, Schwortz is in a unique position: he has never converted to Christianity, but remains a practicing Jew. Moreover, this, he says, makes his witness as a scientist all the more credible.
“I think I serve God better this way, in my involvement in the Shroud, by being the last person in the world people would expect to be lecturing on what is, effectively, the ultimate Christian relic.”
“I think God in his infinite wisdom knew better than I did, and he put me there for a reason.”
This is how our interviewee later described that science-riddled session with Ms.Schneible:
Later that afternoon I met with Ann Schneible of the Catholic News Agency in Rome, who had come up to Turin by train to conduct an interview with me. We spent a few hours talking together and the resulting article was published on August 4, 2015 and was titled, How One Skeptical Scientist came to believe the Shroud of Turin. Of course, it immediately generated something of a buzz on the blogs because the author referred to me as a “scientist.” As everyone knows, that’s not something I’ve ever claimed (I am just a photographer), but that was how Ann described me.
I don’t believe she intended for anyone to take it that literally, but in the Shroud world there is always someone willing to find fault, even on such a minor issue as this. After a while, you just get used to it. That evening I had dinner with and gave my final presentation to the second American tour group, who were leaving early the next morning for their next destination city.
” … the author referred to me as a “scientist … but that was how Ann described me.”
Whatever gave her that idea I wonder? 😉
Nuff said for now methinks … But I may add a few words later recalling my first encounter with the STERA President, and the manner in which he attempted to trash the initial approach adopted by this (real!) scientist, which was referred to as the “scorch hypothesis” at the time, which I now refer to as “Model 2” . (Model 1, December 2011 was ‘thermostencilling’ using radio-opaque charcoal as sensitizer to radiant heat). I’m currently on Model 10 (flour powder imprinting)! Science (real science) advances via serial modelling (and re-modelling!)… Not many people (in sindonology that is) seem to know that..
Yes, my hot metal template Model 2 was finally abandoned (though not for the reasons given by our photographer-turned-scientist and others taken more seriously, notably the gifted but elusive Thibault Heimburger MD). But that was not before it had yielded any number of hugely valuable insights into contact-imprinting phenomena, 3D-response especially (knocking clean on the head any notion that the TS body image has “unique” 3D properties not shared by modern paintings, photographs, imprints etc.).
Has our born-again “scientist” ever referred so much as once to this retired PhD scientist and his 6 years of original hands-on research on that website of his?
Nope. Not once, despite claiming that it provides regular research updates. Where the TS is concerned, STERA and its President are – and never have been – part of the solution. STERA and its President are part of the problem where sindonology is concerned, especially the use/misuse made of the internet. Google rankings are played like a fiddle … Google of course is partly to blame.
Google can only count (links to other sites that is). It cannot and does not WEIGH.
The cult-like brand of authenticity-fixated, authenticity-promoting-at-every-available-opportunity sindonology knows that – and indeed thrives on it …
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: still No. 2. No surprises there.
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3: Blood Splatter Discovered On Shroud Of Turin, Could …
– YouTubeVideo for shroud of turin blood spatter youtube
19 Jul 2017 – Uploaded by Beyond Science
The shroud of Turin has been a constant debate as to whether or not it was indeed a cloth used to wrap the …
My personal observations:
This, believe it or not, is just the first of 15 (yes, 15!) sensationalist reports on some research reported from Italy in July 2017. Yes, 10% of Google’s top 150 rankings no less are devoted to this one paper, widely reported in the popular press and any number of TS authenticity-promoting websites.
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Late insertion, July 20, 2018! Open-access journal PLOS ONE has retracted the paper in question by Carlino, Fanti et al. See end of this post for more details. For now, here in my italics is what one sees if/when going to the paper in question:
Retraction
Concerns have been raised that the data presented in this article [1] are not sufficient to support the conclusions drawn; the provenance, integrity and availability of the material used for the study have also been questioned. In light of these issues, the PLOS ONEEditors reevaluated the published article in consultation with members of our Editorial Board.
Based on our internal assessment and advice received from the Editorial Board members, the PLOS ONE Editors are concerned that there are not sufficient controls to support conclusions referring to human blood or physical trauma. For example, period ink and animal blood controls were not included in diffraction and STEM analyses, as would be needed to rule out alternate interpretations regarding the material on the fiber, and the creatinine findings do not provide definitive evidence of trauma or violence. Thus, we consider that the main conclusions of the article, including the following statements, are not sufficiently supported:
- “On the basis of the experimental evidences of our atomic resolution TEM studies, the man wrapped in the TS suffered a strong polytrauma”
- “the fiber was soaked with a blood serum typical of a human organism that suffered a strong trauma”
- “at the nanoscale it is encoded a scenario of great suffering recorded on the nanoparticles attached to the linen fibers”
In addition, the results of this article were based on analysis of a single fiber (approximately 1mm in length and 15μm in diameter) from the Turin Shroud. The reliance on a single small fiber taken from the Turin Shroud in 1978 calls into question the validity of statements in the Results and Conclusions sections which compare the new findings to those reported in previous studies of the Turin Shroud. It has not been demonstrated that findings from the fiber used in the PLOS ONE article can be generalized as applying to other samples taken from the Turin Shroud, or that contamination of the sample can be ruled out.
Furthermore, the Competing Interests statement for this article [1] should have declared that the sample was provided by the Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association Inc. (STERA).
In light of these issues, the PLOS ONE Editors are concerned about the validity of the conclusions and the reproducibility of the results, and so we retract this article.
EC, LDC, CG, and GF do not agree with the retraction and stand by the results in the article.
19 Jul 2018: The PLOS ONE Editors (2018) Retraction: Atomic resolution studies detect new biologic evidences on the Turin Shroud. PLOS ONE 13(7): e0201272.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0201272 View retraction
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Claim? That a “pristine” fibre from the dorsal foot of the Turin Shroud, retained in 1978 by STURP’s Documenting Photographer bears evidence of traces of blood from a victim who endured traumatic torture. The marker for that torture? Answer: “nanoparticles ” of inorganic iron bound to creatinine, the latter a degraded component of muscle and blood. (All very scientific-looking one might think, or at any rate assume, but read on).
So what one might ask are the academic credentials of the journal reporting the new data? Answer: it’s one of those somewhat controversial “open access” journals.
So (tomorrow) we’ll be taking a closer look at the research, where it was published, and how it managed to acquire such a high presence in Google rankings. I shall not be pulling my punches. Why? Because what we see here is frankly a huge misuse/abuse of the internet, one that would not be possible were Google (“the world’s favourite search engine”) to invest in a system that weighs rather than merely counts those links between one website and another.
So where else do those semi-fossilized nanoparticles of somewhat questionable physiological relevance appear in the rankings below, apart from this videoclip?
Answer: No. 4,9,10,11,12, 13, 67, 79,94,115,119,120,122,123.
67 has been bolded: that’s where the E.Carlino et al paper itself appears.
“Atomic Resolution Studies Detect New Biologic Evidences on the Turin Shroud.”
Beware: the English translation leaves much to be desired (or meaning deciphered!).
SPECIFIC POINTS
1. Regarding the description given to Shroud fibre used for ‘atomic resolution study’.
Quote, first sentence of abstract:
We performed reproducible atomic resolution Transmission Electron Microscopy and Wide Angle X-ray Scanning Microscopy experiments studying for the first time the nanoscale properties of a pristine fiber taken from the Turin Shroud
Definition of “pristine”:
Now read what the authors say about the source and contamination of the single fragment of supplied Shroud linen fibre:
The fiber, of about two millimeters, comes from an area of the feet (dorsal image) containing some red crusts, of about one micrometer, visible by optical microscope [17]. TEM experiments were performed in areas of the fiber away from red crusts.
The fiber was provided by B. M. Schwortz [18], as part of the Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association, Inc. (STERA Inc). The fiber analyzed is taken from a sticky tape (1HB) applied to and lifted from the surface of the TS in 1978 [1].
The sample is extremely sensitive to the high-energy electron beam and has a high degree of hydro-carbon contamination [19] due to the prolonged exposure of the TS to the environment.
(The authors seem to have overlooked the fact that some – perhaps most – of that hydrocarbon contamination will almost certainly have been due to STURP’s Mylar adhesive lifting-tape!).
Shroud Spectrum International No. 43 Part 3 – Shroud.com
Using a special Mylar tape with a proprietary toluene soluble hydrocarbon polymer adhesive. (supplied by 3M Corp.), Rogers removed specimens from the surface of the cloth (fibrils and particles) from identified locations by a “sticky tape” sampling technique for chemical analysis. Each tape was about 5 cm2 in area and 36 …
So to describe that fibre as being in “pristine” condition seems somewhat bizarre to say the least. The whole point of the exercise was surely to identify the various contaminants that render it NON-PRISTINE. So how come the journal Editor and referees (single referee?) allowed that entirely redundant, non-applicable word “pristine” to be deployed? What possible purpose was served by deploying that term? More about the refereeing side of things later, but already a warning bell needs to be rung!
Reading on (Results):
The atomic resolution HRTEM experiments at the nanoscale enable to access a range of TS features never explored so far. The morphology and the size of the particles detected on the TS fiber, see Fig 3 and S2 Fig, are very similar to those of proteins like hemosiderin [27], or to ferritin-based proteins typical of blood [28,29,30].
To describe the authors’ approach as over-ambitious, indeed precocious one might say, is a huge understatement. Chemists do not identify unknown molecules by their “morphology and size” when intact. That is more appropriate for the biology lab’, e.g. in identifying different cell types.
Chemistry is a science in its own right, with analytical techniques, modern-day microanalytical ones especially (e.g. by fragmentation pattern on glc-mass specrometry) having been developed to a high state of accuracy and precision.
Indeed, it was mass-spectrometry that this long-since retired biomedical scientist used in his very first published paper, back in 1972:
Evidence for conversion of bilirubin to dihydroxyl derivatives in the Gunn rat
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0006291X72906171
Since when has microscopy – any kind of microscopy – been an exploratory technique for use with a minuscule sample, one whose provenance is obscure, especially to identify conjectured contaminants of ‘semi-fossilized’ blood on a centuries old fibre?
How did this paper get past the referee(s)?
OK, so my own research is not submitted to journals, not even the soft-touch open-access ones. My results are published straight to the internet. But the crucial experiments are always ones that can be performed in people’s own homes. requiring no specialized equipment. Indeed, they are usually reported as a series of photo-illustrated steps, specifically to allow sceptics to check them out for themselves.
Critique of the much-trumpeted ‘torture/nanoparticle’ paper continued under following entry No.4 (which as indicated is just one of 15 in the top 150!).
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 6.
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4: What Should Evangelicals Think About the Shroud of Turin?
5 Aug 2017 – New research indicates that the Shroud of Turin shows signs of blood from a torture victim, and undermines arguments that the reputed burial shroud of Jesus Christ was painted, the Catholic News Agency reports. If you have no idea what that sentence was about, you’re not alone. Many evangelicals …
My personal observations:
Now onto the meat of that ‘nanoparticle’ paper.
No, it’s not the easiest of papers to read (and not just because of the English!). Why not?
Those nanoparticles comprise two main components we’re told – ferritin (or the inorganic iron oxide degradation products thereof) and creatinine (an end product of energy metabolism in muscle and other body tissues).
So how many sentences would one expect have a mention of “ferritin”? 20? 30? Maybe more? In fact it’s just 13, and that includes two in the Abstract!
That gives an immediate warning of the challenge that faces the reader – the sheer density and economy of words!
To better make my point I’ve copied/pasted all 13 sentences that make reference to ferritin in one or other of its forms. That’s (a) native ferritin (b) the iron core only of ferritin (c) ferritin released into blood stream from damaged muscle tissue etc (d) age-degraded ferritin on the TS fibre candidate bloodstain.
Let’s see what each of them says, bearing in mind that while there are small amounts of ferritin in blood (an extracellular fluid ) it is largely seen as an intracellular marker, it being a storage protein for iron, keeping that useful but potentially toxic ingredient safely bound to protein until needed. Red font is mine.
Abstract (1 and 2)
1. “The kind, size and distribution of the iron oxide nanoparticles cannot be dye for painting but are ferrihydrate cores of ferritin. ” (Focus placed on the inorganic iron-centre only of the ferritin protein)
2. “The consistent bound of ferritin iron to creatinine occurs in human organism in case of a severe polytrauma.” (Tissue iron-storage ferritin seen as the sole origin of surplus inorganic iron in TS blood or serum)
Introduction (3 and 4)
3. “TEM analyses show that the fiber is fully covered by creatinine nanoparticles, 20–100 nm in size, embedding small (2–6 nm) nanoparticles, made of defected (sic) ferrihydrite, typical of biologic ferritin cores.” (“Defected”? Meaning?) Inorganic iron as ‘ferrihydrate’ i.e.hydrated iron oxide, now referred to merely as a “typical” component of ferritin.
4. “Indeed, a high level of creatinine and ferritin is related to patients suffering of strong polytrauma like torture.” (Whole ferritin, i.e. native intact iron-storage protein as present intracellularly in muscle cells etc prior to trauma, leakage into bloodstream)
Results (5,6,7)
5. “The morphology and the size of the particles detected on the TS fiber, see Fig 3 and S2 Fig, are very similar to those of proteins like hemosiderin [27], or to ferritin-based proteins typical of blood [28,29,30].” ( That word ‘typical’ again, with reference to whole ferritin – iron-storage protein – in the healthy individual, a world apart from a single bloodied TS fibre)
6. “EDXS experiments performed on individual large particles, as the one shown in Fig 3, reveal the presence of Ca, O, C, N, Fe, S, K, Cl (see S3 Fig), which are compatible with ferritin-based proteins [31,32].” (These ubiquitous elements of life-forms “compatible with” – not as specific as “derived entirely from” – whole intact ferritin)
7. “It is worthwhile to remark that the six-line ferrihydrite iron oxide has been proposed for the core of the iron-storage ferritin [34,35].” (Further distancing from a ‘sole source of’ claim with “proposed for” origin for inorganic iron oxide from ferritin protein originally in muscle and other tissue cells)
Discussions (8,9,10,11)
8. “Hence, on the basis of the experimental evidences, the particles covering the TS fiber are creatinine nanoparticles with inside biological ferritin cores of ferrihydrate.” (Now back to attributing the original origin of the inorganic iron oxide to iron-storage ferritin in tissues prior to trauma)
9. “There is a wide recent literature reporting on interaction between creatinine and ferritin in fatal accidents [41,42] or as a consequence of the rhabdomyolysis due to torture [43].” (That’s the route by which otherwise intact ferritin protein escapes from damaged tissue locations into the general bloodstream, via a temporary association with the creatinine – the latter having accumulated as it tends to in muscle and other tissues)
10. “In particular, the patients with AKI present a high level of creatinine and ferritin in the blood serum”. (Yes, creatinine and ferritin being in vivo markers for damaged kidneys – a secondary result of tissue damage when the kidney becomes overloaded with debris, e.g. muscle myoglobin – another input of iron)
11. “The creatinine strongly binds to the iron nanoparticles [38] of the ferritin and this relationship is hence a signature of the occurrence of a strong polytrauma.” (Precise meaning and context – pre or post-mortem, pre or post centuries of decomposition unclear)
Conclusions (12,13)
12. “This is the first time that the TS is studied at this resolution and this range of view produced a series of experimental results, which thanks to recent studies on ancient dye painting, ferritin, creatinine and human pathology can be connected and understood in relationship with a macroscopic scenario in which the TS was committed [41,42,43].” (“Can be connected” arguably not same as “has been definitely demonstrated as a direct cause-effect relationship”)
13. “The bond between the iron cores of ferritin and creatinine on large scale occurs in a body after a strong polytrauma [41,42,43].” (But still leaving a permanent signature centuries later on a non-pristine linen fibre 2mm in length, encrusted with red material, possibly, probably blood in an advanced state of decomposition, releasing its own source of finally inorganic iron aggregates – from haemoglobin?)
Already one sees that there is something wrong with this paper, something seriously wrong, something the referee(s) has/have missed. Putting one’s finger on it (when one’s not closely acquainted with the technology) is/will not be easy. But rest assured I will try. A paper that monopolizes 10% no less of Google’s top 150 rankings cannot be allowed to go unchallenged, especially when one’s own 350+ internet postings over 6 years and more get squeezed out by this kind of sudden out-of-the-blue arrival, coming not from an accredited journal, but via that so-called “open-access” route!
The nanoparticle paper appears again at No.9 in the Google rankings. I’ll continue this long hard look, nay detailed scrutiny there, doing a similar exercise for the other crucial component of the trauma claim – namely the creatinine. How much of that is new and appropriately-targeted experimental fact, how much mere parallel-drawing and conjecture? Bastion of new knowledge or house of cards? We shall see.
In the meantime, let’s now take a look at Number 5-8 inclusive in the ranked series (more red font!).
In passing, I’ve just entered (shroud turin simulated sweat imprint) into Google. This new posting with that unique 3-word tagline of my own creation has yet to appear alongside its predecessors from as far back as 2014 , despite being several days old …
Yes, posted 5 days ago to be precise, yet it does not even appear under Google’s Past Week listing (accessed via the Tools tab).
Mine and other blogger’s postings constitute a free resource for the likes of Google and lesser search engines. Each day my WordPress stats display lists the diverse postings that have been accessed these last 6 years, generally between 20 and 40 per day. One might have expected something back in return, like a speedy listing of one’s latest posting. But no, Google gives little or nothing back in return, being concerned purely with pursuing its own interests, massaging its bottom line.
In fact, what I haven’t said is that from appearing on Page 6 of thereabouts on a general Google search under (shroud of turin) some weeks ago, I began slipping further and further down, and finally off the the entire 24 page list altogether. Yet average number of daily visits to the site have actually increased slightly over the same period – but most probably from regulars and those searching with additional search terms, probably not complete ‘newbies’ to the TS.
So why the cold shoulder Google? Might it be that you do not like site owners like myself who post increasingly acerbic comments re your sloppy performance, who question your fitness-for-purpose, who begin to ask whether you should really be allowed to operate world-wide in the way you do?
Might you be having a sulk, Google? Have you flicked a switch out of pique? Oh, diddums!
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: still No. 4
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5: ‘The Precise Image of What Jesus Looked Like’: 3-D … – CBN.com
7 Apr 2018 – One of the most-well known relics in archeological history is leading researchers to believe that they know “the precise image of what Jesus looked like on this earth”. The Shroud of Turin is a 14-foot linen cloth that is believed to have wrapped the body of Jesus Christ after the crucifixion. Researchers in …
My personal observations:
This is the first of some 8 (maybe one or two more) listings of the press release from that authenticity-promoting production plant in Italy, headed by Professor of Mech Engineering, Giulio Fanti.
So what’s new, one may ask, given that 3D-rendering of the TS body image has been around since 1977 or thereabouts (see John Heller’s 1983 book for the manner in which it was first seen by a meeting between John Jackson and the recently deceased Bill Mottern)?
Yes, the TS body image can be 3D-rendered, but then so can any number of other images, imprints, photographs, paintings etc that have differences in 2D-image intensity. Yes, John Heller points out in his book that photographs give ‘distorted’ 3D images, unlike the TS. But is that surprising, given that photographs are usually taken with an angled shadow-creating source of external illumination: the 3D software has no way of knowing what’s flesh and what’s shadow, elevating both according to image intensity. Is it any wonder that there’s distortion with a photograph that one does not get with a shadow-free imprint – any kind of imprint!
So let’s now take a look at that latest(?) publicity-blitz from our friend Prof Fanti, aided and abetted 8 times over by his pal, the Google search engine…
More to follow …
Search Results
‘The Precise Image of What Jesus Looked Like’: 3-D Replica Created …
www1.cbn.com/…/the-precise-image-of-what-jesus-looked-like-3-d-replica-created-fr…
7 Apr 2018 – The Shroud of Turin is a 14-foot linen cloth that is believed to have wrapped the body of Jesus Christ after the crucifixion. Researchers in Padua …
Turin Shroud: the latest evidence will challenge the sceptics …
catholicherald.co.uk › … › Turin Shroud: the latest evidence will challenge the sceptics
3 Aug 2017 – Sceptics may dismiss the Turin Shroud, but there is good evidence the relic is authentic.
Experts in HUGE Turin Shroud discovery – is this proof at last? | World …
https://www.express.co.uk › News › World
17 Jul 2017 – Experts in HUGE Turin Shroud discovery – is this proof at last Jesus WAS wrapped in cloth? … SCIENTISTS have made a huge breakthrough in their investigations of the Shroud of Turin, with theorists claiming it finally proves Jesus was wrapped up in the famous linen.
The Shroud of Turin – The Review of Religions
The Shroud of Turin is the ‘alleged’ burial cloth of Jesus Christ(as). The cloth measures 4.37m by 1.1m (approximately 14 feet across) and exhibits a faint image …
Turin Shroud may date from time of Jesus – Telegraph
11 Feb 2014 – The Turin Shroud may not be a medieval forgery after all, after scientists discovered it could date from the time of Christ. The shroud, which is …
Is the Shroud of Turin Real? | History | Science – Acharya S
The Shroud of Turin is a world-famous piece of cloth alleged to have been the burial garment of Jesus Christ. The shroud is held up by believers as evidence not …
Blood on the Shroud: An Interview with the Blood Investigator of the …
6 Mar 2018 – In 1978 a large team of American scientists under the auspices of the Shroud of TurinResearch Project (STURP) spent over two years prior to …
Shroud of Turin – RationalWiki
The Shroud of Turin is a length of linen cloth claimed by some members of the Christian community to have been Jesus’s death shroud. The provenance and …
The Shroud of Turin and the Facts – National Catholic Register
23 Jun 2017 – Some time ago a mainstream media outlet reported on the Shroud of Turin and said, “Pope Francis prayed Sunday before the Shroud of Turin, …
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6: 8 Reasons Why The Shroud Of Turin Might Be … – Reasons for Jesus
25 Apr 2017 – By Brian Chilton| The Shroud of Turin is perhaps one of the most controversial artifacts of all-time. Either it is one of the most incredible, holy relics related to Jesus of Nazareth or it is one of the most ingenious hoaxes ever invented. The Shroud of Turin is a 14′ 5” x 3′ 7” linen cloth that holds the image of a …
8 Reasons Why The Shroud Of Turin Might Be The Burial Cloth Of Jesus
My personal observations:
Same old, same old…
Amazing – all one has to do is periodically trot out the same old list of ‘compelling’ reasons for regarding the TS as authentic 1st century, even to the extent of implicating the 1534 Poor Clare nun’s patching as the cause of the ‘wrong’ radiocarbon date (!) and hey presto, one’s virtually guaranteed a superior Google ranking! What is going on one asks?
There be something rotten in the State of Denmark California…
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 9.
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7: BBC iWonder – Does it matter if the Shroud of Turin is a fake?
This cloth has provoked both controversy and devotion. Why do some objects, like the Shroud of Turin, generate such devotion and awe among believers?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/zssf34j
My personal observations:
Keep this handy for next time you’re having a bout of insomnia. It’s an alternative to counting sheep…
Again, how did it manage that superior Google ranking?
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So what can be done about Google?
One things’s for certain: there’s no point in waiting for Google to put its own house in order. That would have happened a long time ago if Google was in the slightest bit interested in those old-fashioned values like fair play etc etc. Every month or so I get an email, inviting me to take advantage of an SEO service (Search Engine Optimization), sometimes guaranteeing a Page 1 ranking! If that’s what an external operator can achieve, think what Google itself can do, either reactively (responding to protests, orchestrated ones especially) or pro-actively (window-dressing its returns).
Solution? Here’e one for starters. Google must have an obligatory feedback channel for site owners like myself. If we feel aggrieved at our low ranking, and suspect foul play, from whatever quarter, we should be allowed to lodge a protest and ask for corrective action. If that action is not taken, then Google should be made to publish our protest, and give a category for the nature of our protest. As an extreme measure, that listing of protests should appear as a link at the bottom of every page return under standard search terms (e.g. shroud of turin). Link: protests
Google must no longer be allowed to operate as a free agent. It has done next to nothing these last 20 years and more to generate or earn trust. The Google search engine is a veritable secret garden. Correction, jungle. Correction secret jungle.
If Google won’t put its house/garden/secret jungle in order, voluntarily, it should be regulated closely everywhere, at least outside its own country, preferably inside as well!
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 10.
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8: Blood on the Shroud: An Interview with the Blood Investigator of the …
6 Mar 2018 -In 1978 a large team of American scientists under the auspices of the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP) spent over two years prior to embarking for Turin, planning a large number of specific data gathering tests, on the sacred Shroud of Turin, believed by millions of Catholics around the world to be …
My personal observations:
Interviewer (Peter Shield): The 3D image that appears on the cloth, did that impress you in any way?
STURP’s Alan D Adler (RIP): “It sure does, because that is the thing we can’t explain…in a simple way. We don’t have any simple process that we have been able to find that would explain why an image is the particular type of image that we see! It is definitely NOT a contact image.”
Not a contact image? Wrong, wrong, wrong…
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: slipped to No. 18!
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9: Jesus’ face in the Turin Shroud may be REAL, experts claim …– The Sun
17 Jul 2017 – THE Shroud of Turin is stained with the blood of a torture victim – according to a new study which backs up claims it was used to bury Jesus.
My personal observations:
Ah, that hugely publicized “nanoparticle” paper again from approx a year ago, one that I began to scrutinize closely on its previous No.4 ranking.
There you may recall I pulled out all the sentences that contained the word “ferritin”, claimed to be the precursor of the inorganic iron nanoparticles detected on that single TS fibre. There were fewer (13) than expected!
I’ve now repeated the exercise for the other trauma-signalling nanoparticle component, claimed to be creatinine. This time there are more, far more, a respectable total in fact (24). But be wary of that figure, for reasons that will become shortly become apparent when one places each of the creatinine-containing sentences into one of three categories: DATA, LITERATURE, PART DATA/PART LITERATURE, LITERATURE.
Authors’ “Abstract”
1. “We found evidence of biologic nanoparticles of creatinine bounded with small nanoparticles of iron oxide.”
Type of evidence? Suggestive or definitive, or somewhere in between? DATA 1 (summary)
2. “The consistent bound of ferritin iron to creatinine occurs in human organism in case of a severe polytrauma.”
A far cry from a centuries old linen fibre. LITERATURE 1
Authors’ “Introduction”
3. “TEM analyses show that the fiber is fully covered by creatinine nanoparticles, 20–100 nm in size, embedding small (2–6 nm) nanoparticles, made of defected ferrihydrite, typical of biologic ferritin cores.”
How reliable are data obtained by this type of microscopical observation, lacking any assessment of chemical properties, elemental analysis etc. DATA 2
4. “Indeed, a high level of creatinine and ferritin is related to patients suffering of strong polytrauma like torture.”
Modern day physiology. How firm is the link to a centuries old TS fibre? LITERATURE 2
########################
No mentions of creatinine in either Materials and Methods or Results!
#########################
Authors’ “Discussions”
5. “Indeed, the explanation comes from some recent studies on the binding between creatinine and urea with iron-oxide nanoparticles investigated, in a completely different field, for possible application in dialysis to reduce waste molecules accumulation in blood [38].”
“… the explanation…”? THE explanation? The only explanation? LITERATURE 3
6. “In particular X-ray studies on iron oxide nanoparticles tagged with urea and creatinine indicate exactly a suppression of the Bragg diffraction peak corresponding to the 0.25nm spacing [38].”
So, invoking creatinine (and urea) helps account for an anomaly as regards the iron oxide atomic spacing. Not the same as independent confirmatory data LITERATURE 4
7. “We hence focused our attention to identify the structure of the big embedding nanoparticles comparing their HRTEM images and diffractograms with the relevant full dynamical calculations of diffraction patterns for urea and creatinine [39].”
Yes, but urea and creatinine just happen to be nitrogenous compounds capable of forming bonds with iron in its various forms. There are no doubt many more: interest has centred on creatinine (especially) on accounts if its diagnostic value in detecting kidney problems, especially those following muscle trauma. Have the authors narrowed the field to creatinine because it’s the best fit to the nanoparticle studies, OR because they like the link to trauma physiology, and can accommodate their data (such as it is) to fit… PART DATA, PART LITERATURE 1
8. “As a result, all the identified diffractograms belong to creatinine. A representative example of our findings is shown in Fig 6 (see also S5 Fig for other examples).”
Can one really be so certain? PART DATA,PART LITERATURE 2
9. ” Fig 6 (caption) Fig 6. Characterization of creatinine particles a): HRTEM image; b): magnified view of the square region marked in a); c): diffractogram of b); d): simulation of the diffraction pattern of creatinine in [1–10] zone axis with reported the lattice spacing relevant to the observed intensities.”
Beware selective simulations that are just that – selective – focusing interest in too narrow a fashion, too soon. DATA 3
10. “The diffractogram in Fig 6 belongs to creatinine oriented along the [1–10] crystallographic zone axis with respect to the direction of the direct electron beam, as demonstrated by the relevant diffraction pattern simulation shown in Fig 6D.”
Thinking aloud (for now): have the authors taken the trouble to state exactly what they mean by “diffractogram” in the present context? Is it related entirely to regularities in crystal form, e.g. planes of atoms, and if so, can the paper’s title “atomic resolution” really be justified if individual atoms (and molecules) are not really being visualised, but much larger arrays thereof? If the latter, how capable is the technology at identifying specific molecules (notably creatinine) as distinct from merely observing behaviour deemed to be “consistent” with the molecule of interest. DATA 4
11. “In the latter, for ease of reading, we highlighted those reflections that enable the identification of the creatinine removing the systematic reflections that are not transmitted, or poorly transmitted, by the contrast transfer function of the objective lens [19,20].”
There’s a hint here of the authors having encountered some difficulties which are not fully described. DATA 5
12. “These two Friedel’s pair correspond respectively to (002) and (22–1) spots of creatinine, as shown in the relevant simulation.”
Again, a simulation based on a model-driven narrowing down of options? DATA 6
13. “Hence, on the basis of the experimental evidences, the particles covering the TS fiber are creatinine nanoparticles with inside biological ferritin cores of ferrihydrate.”
Yes, but how objective are the “experimental evidences” if selective, influenced by prior hunches? DATA AND LITERATURE 3
14. “The lack of the 0.25nm spacing evidenced during our experiments is due to the bond between ferrihydrate cores and creatinine in agreement with the evidences in the x-ray spectra of the creatinine bounded to iron oxide nanoparticles where the peak corresponding to the spacing at 0.25nm is suppressed by the interaction between the protein and the iron [38].”
Being able externally to model an effect is not the same as demonstrating beyond doubt its operation in the particular system under study, given the existence of so many other chemical species that could mimic the action of creatinine etc. Correlation – real or spurious, i.e. maybe just a chance association?
DATA AND LITERATURE 4
15. “High levels of creatinine in the blood are observed in the case of strong trauma”.
Correct, but establishing the presence of creatinine on a TS fibre merely as a ‘nanoparticle’ is quite a leap. LITERATURE 5
16. “There is a wide recent literature reporting on interaction between creatinine and ferritin in fatal accidents [41,42] or as a consequence of the rhabdomyolysis due to torture [43].”
Yes, but there will be a much wider range of breakdown products of an iron-binding nitrogenous nature in a blood-stained centuries old fibre than the bloodstream of someone who has suffered trauma but still alive, still with some kidney function, albeit reduced. LITERATURE 6
17. “In particular, the patients with AKI present a high level of creatinine and ferritin in the blood serum.”
LITERATURE 7
18. “High level of creatinine are also in the case reported by Schwartz et al [42] in the study of patients of emergency room with skeletal muscle trauma.”
Yet more repetition of the in vivo physiology, but of questionable relevance to a TS fibre (and a mere 2mm sample at that). LITERATURE 8
19. “The creatinine strongly binds to the iron nanoparticles [38] of the ferritin and this relationship is hence a signature of the occurrence of a strong polytrauma.”
Repeating what’s already been said. LITERATURE 9
Conclusions
20. “This is the first time that the TS is studied at this resolution and this range of view produced a series of experimental results, which thanks to recent studies on ancient dye painting, ferritin, creatinine and human pathology can be connected and understood in relationship with a macroscopic scenario in which the TS was committed [41,42,43].”
“Can be connected” but whether legitimately or not is open to question.
DATA AND LITERATURE 5
21. “In fact, the fiber was soaked with a blood serum typical of a human organism that suffered a strong trauma, as HRTEM evidenced that the TS is covered by well-dispersed 30nm-100nm creatinine nanoparticles bounded with internal 2nm-6nm ferrihydrate structures.”
Can one really be so categorical as to the precise chemical nature of the naonoparticles? DATA AND LITERATURE 6
22. “The bond between the iron cores of ferritin and creatinine on large scale occurs in a body after a strong polytrauma [41,42,43].”
As stated previously LITERATURE 10
23. “This has been the target of our work and the obtained results are not compatible with a painting but evidenced the presence of nanoparticles of pathologic blood serum related to the presence of creatinine bound with ferrihydrate, which are typical of an organism that suffered a strong polytrauma, like torture.”
Again, that word “typical”, lifted from an in vivo context and applied to a centuries old supposedly post-mortem (non-forgery) context, one where “wounds” relied entirely on blood (or “blood”) with scarcely if any supporting imagery of broken skin (inevitably?) in the overlying body image. DATA AND LITERATURE 7
24. “S5 Fig. Experimental diffractograms.
Further examples of diffractograms of creatinine.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0180487.s005 ”
DATA 7
Summary of my 3-way breakdown:
DATA 7
LITERATURE 10
PART DATA, PART LITERATURE 7
Total 24
That’s just 17 with new data, with or without accompanying literature references.
More to follow later today ( May 8) –
Ranking at 08.00, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 3! Wow!
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10: Turin Shroud: the latest evidence will challenge the … – Catholic Herald
3 Aug 2017 – Sceptics may dismiss the Turin Shroud, but there is good evidence the relic is authentic
My personal observations:
Choc-a-bloc with the all routine over-simplifications and common fallacies regarding the TS. They don’t go away. Why not? Because the pro-authenticity tendency rarely if ever responds to detailed arguments from the other side and/or NEVER link to sceptical sites such as this – deliberate strategy I suspect to keep their own show on the road.
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 12
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11: Shroud of Turin ‘stained with blood from torture …- The Independent
20 Jul 2017 – The Shroud of Turin is stained with the blood of a torture victim, scientists have claimed. Analysis of the linen cloth, purportedly used to bury Jesus after his crucifixion, contains “nanoparticles” of blood which are not typical of that of a healthy person, according to …
My personal observations:
May 9, 2018
I think I’ve spotted the fatal flaw in that torture/trauma paper. There’s a word missing – imidazole.
What’s special about creatinine that would make it bind to iron ? Answer: its 5-membered imidazole ring, with 2 nitrogen atoms separated by 1 or 2 spacer carbon atoms depending on which side of the ring you look.
So what’s so special about that configuration, of relevance to the TS?
Answer: some TS fibres appear to have at least real blood (1st century? 14th century?).
Real non-trauma blood has iron-binding haemoglobin. What is the component in real blood that binds the iron? Answer: a particular histidine residue in the globin protein. And which part of the histidine molecule has the iron-binding properties?
Answer: (yes, you may have guessed). It’s the imidazole side chain of the histidine residue!
So how many mentions are there of haemogobin, histidine and its iron-binding imidazole side chain, ones that would take the focus away from other authenticity-friendly iron-binding species like ferritin protein, ones that authenticity-promoting fanatics can link to crucifixion trauma, torture etc?
Answer. Zero. One big fat zero!
More to follow tomorrow. But let’s just leave it at saying for now that the big enemy of hot-from-the-press sham scientific claims, especially those that are lightly refereeed (as is the case with the New Age ‘open access’ journals) are:
(a) tunnel vision
(b) blind spots.
Beware non-chemists pretending to be chemists, kidding themselves – and the rest of the world – that the electron microscope and x-ray diffraction can replace the boring old test-tube and rigorous identification of atomic and molecular species. Pseudo-chemistry is just one branch of pseudo-science…
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No.8
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12: Turin Shroud is stained with the blood of a torture victim | Daily Mail …
17 Jul 2017 – Experts have claimed the Shroud of Turin is stained with the blood of a torture victim, supporting claims it was used to bury Jesus. They say the linen cloth, believed to have been used to wrap Christ’s body after crucifixion, contains ‘nanoparticles’ which are not typical of the blood of a healthy person.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4703018/Turin-Shroud-stained-blood-torture-victim.html
My personal observations: Later
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No.7
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13: Experts in HUGE Turin Shroud discovery – is this proof … – Daily Express
17 Jul 2017 – Experts in HUGE Turin Shroud discovery – is this proof at last Jesus WAS wrapped in cloth? … SCIENTISTS have made a huge breakthrough in their investigations of the Shroud of Turin, with theorists claiming it finally proves Jesus was wrapped up in the famous linen.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/829735/turin-shroud-jesus-pictures-proof-experts
My personal observations:
Yes, it’s those nanoparticles yet again, hogging the Google rankings. Sindonology has certainy got its publicity machine firing on all cylinders. To what extent Google might be complicit, as distinct from its algorithm being merely manipulated, is anyone’s guess.
But as the title of this posting makes clear, the proselytizing of the authenticity message is not only about making one OTT claim after another, based 95% of the time on pseusoscience. It’s also about SUPPRESSION of those negative message, like the one I’ve been touting for the best part of 4 years – the Shroud of Turin was an attempt (and a very successful one) to model what an ancient yellowed sweat imprint of an entire naked man’s body, front and rear, might look like 1300 or so years later. (It’s the additions of blood, or “blood” in all the right places that indicate who the man was, or suppised to be, and the manner in which he was abused then crucified.
Suppression of ideas, even ones, correction, especially ones, that don’t initially find favour, is not something one expects of a supposedly free society, with a supposedly free press.
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: still No.13
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14: (Array of Google-selected images only)
My personal observations: No comment
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15: This 3D “carbon copy” of Jesus was created using the Shroud of Turin
28 Mar 2018 – “This statue is the three-dimensional representation in actual size of the Man of the Shroud, created following the precise measurements taken from the cloth in which the body of Christ was wrapped after the crucifixion,” explains Giulio Fanti, teacher of mechanical and thermal measurements at the …
This 3D “carbon copy” of Jesus was created using the Shroud of Turin
My personal observations: Yes, it’s that organ-grinder-in-chief again…
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: not in top 20 checked thus far, but replaced at No.5 by a more recent posting from the site’s same owners.
Update at 10:30, Sat 26 May. Has slipped to No.24
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16: Shroud Of Turin – Archaeology
Shroud Of Turin – Is this cloth authentic? Was it the cloth that covered the body of Jesus Christ? What does the evidence show?
https://www.allaboutarchaeology.org/shroud-of-turin.htm
My personal observations:
Archaeology is just one of dozens of subject headings on this Christianity-focused site, and the Shroud just one of many topics listed under Archaeology. Here are some of the sub-headings:
Shroud Of Turin – Is this cloth authentic? Was it the cloth that covered the body of Jesus Christ? What does the evidence show?
- Is there a second image on the Shroud of Turin?*
- Leonardo Da Vinci and the Shroud of Turin – Did Da Vinci produce the image?
- What is the history of the Shroud of Turin?
- Why do some people call it “the Holy Shroud of Turin”?
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: not in top 20 checked thus far. Expect more details later re current position…
Ranking at 10.20, now No.24, down from 16 approx 4 weeks ago
17: The Shroud of Turin – The Review of Religions
The Shroud of Turin is the ‘alleged’ burial cloth of Jesus Christ(as). The cloth measures 4.37m by 1.1m (approximately 14 feet across) and exhibits a faint image of what looks like a crucified man. Between 10 April and 23 May this year, approximately two million visitors flocked to the northern Italian city of Turin to observe …
My personal observations:
“For Ahmadi Muslims who believe in Jesus Christ(as) having survived the Crucifixion, the Shroud of Turin is a powerful piece of evidence in support of this view because the Shroud does point to Jesus(as) having survived the Crucifixion.”
Whilst respecting the “Love for all, hatred for none” principle, I’m less than enamoured of this polemical reason for their interest in the Turin Shroud. Neither do I understand why Barrie M.Schwortz, President of the Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association, feels the need to put in an appearance each year at the Hampshire UK annual Ahmadiyya convention.
STURP (which brought this Documenting Photographer to public attention, indeed endowed him with his celebrity status, was about determining what the Shroud is or is not, not what it represents in symbolic terms for one or other religious standpoint, whether Christian, Muslim, Jewish etc. So why does he continue to make that annual visit? What has he got to say that he hasn’t said already on his previous trips (3? More than 3?). If his and others’ reasons are because they reject the divinity of Jesus Christ, could they not find other more direct ways to express their theological views, rather than going mixing science with non-science to create an unnecessary distraction fron the key questions.
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18: Negative image – The Shroud of Turin, age regression … – CBS News
In 1898, Secondo Pia was allowed to photograph the Shroud. The image he saw in his darkroom startled the world: The Shroud, it turns out, is like a photo negative. The Italian police created…
https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/the-shroud-of-turin/2/
My personal observations:
Ho hum picture gallery with short captions, mainly images of the TS and its public display.
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No.15
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19: Turin Shroud may date from time of Jesus – Telegraph
11 Feb 2014 – The Turin Shroud may not be a medieval forgery after all, after scientists discovered it could date from the time of Christ. The shroud, which is purported to be the burial cloth of Jesus – showing his face and body after the crucifixion – has intrigued scholars and Christians alike. But radiocarbon dating carried …
My personal observations:
Ranking at 08.45, Sat 26 May, 1 day short of 4 weeks later: now No. 16
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20: Is It a Fake? DNA Testing Deepens Mystery of Shroud … – Live Science
23 Oct 2015 – Editor’s Note: This story was updated at 1:55 p.m. E.T.. Is it a medieval fake or a relic of Jesus Christ? A new analysis of DNA from the Shroud of Turin reveals that people from all over the world have touched the venerated garment. “Individuals from different ethnic groups and geographical locations came …
https://www.livescience.com/52567-shroud-of-turin-dna.html
My personal observations:
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21: Professor creates 3D ‘carbon copy’ of Jesus and His … – LifeSiteNews
29 Mar 2018 – March 29, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Using the Shroud of Turin, a professor at the University of Padua has created a 3D “carbon copy” of Jesus Christ after being tortured and crucified. The Shroud of Turin is believed to be a cloth in which Jesus was wrapped after he died.
My personal observations:
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22: Why the Vatican Believes in the Shroud of Turin | Smithsonian
Video for shroud of turin smithsonianmag
23 Jun 2017
While many experts believe the Shroud of Turin is a medieval forgery, historians at the Vatican have found …
My personal observations:
Short video clip focusing on the greatest mystery of all – how Dr.Barbara Frale of the Vatican (not so) Secret Archives manages to see all that peripheral writing on the Shroud, allegedly a ‘death certificate’. Bizarre, truly bizarre!
Beyond this point I shall now be somewhat selective as to where to attach “personal observations” or not. Caveat: skipping a particular item does not necessarily mean I’m indifferent to it – there are some topics to do with the Shroud on which I either don’t have sufficient background (like geological location of this or that limestone dust, e.g. “travertine aragonite”) or feel the technique can never produce definitive evidence for or against authenticity one way or the other (like pollen analysis).
No.24 , i.e. Philip Ball’s summary for the BBC of the current state of play (well, 2015) of the Shroud controversy , is definitely worth a closer look. Indeed I may try annotating the whole thing (if only to correct the occasional error or two!)
Ranking: now 28 (May 27, 2018)
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23: The Shroud of Turin and the Facts – National Catholic Register
23 Jun 2017 – Fr. Dwight Longenecker. Some time ago a mainstream media outlet reported on the Shroud of Turin and said, “Pope Francis prayed Sunday before the Shroud of Turin, a strip of cloth that some believe was used for the burial of Jesus Christ. The shroud appears to bear the image of a man who resembles …
http://www.ncregister.com/blog/longenecker/the-shroud-of-turin-and-the-facts
My personal observations:
Ranking: now 20 (May 27, 2018)
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24: How did the Turin Shroud get its image? – BBC News
19 Jun 2015 – On Sunday, Pope Francis will “venerate” the famous Shroud of Turin, which is thought by some to be the burial wrapping of Jesus Christ – and by others to be a medieval fake. Whatever it is, it’s a mystery how the cloth came to bear the image of a man. Science writer Philip Ball discusses the theories.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33164668
My personal observations:
(Skip Introduction)
“But regardless of the continuing arguments about its age (summarised in the box near the bottom of this page) the Shroud of Turin is a deeply puzzling object. Studies in 1978 by an international team of experts – the Shroud of Turin Research Project (Sturp) – delivered no clear explanation of how the cloth came to bear the faint imprint of a bearded man apparently bearing the wounds of crucifixion.
There’s no shortage of hypotheses. Some suggest that the image came about through natural processes; some impute considerable ingenuity to medieval forgers of relics; others invoke wondrous physical processes associated with the Resurrection. But do any have any merit?”
As stated earlier, there are no “wounds” of crucifixion, at least not in the body image. There are merely blood (and/or “blood”) stains in the regions that correspond to nailing to a cross, scalp injury from crown of thorns (absent), lance in side etc. (I once had to chide Giulio Fanti for claiming the lance wound was visible!). Shroud investigation has been bedevilled by those who use the words “blood” and “wounds” interchangeably.
One can also take issue with the description “bearded” man. Even pro-authenticists say the “beard” is incomplete, allegedly having had tufts pulled out in pre-crucifixion harassment and torture. But one has to ask how a real beard (and moustache) could have been imaged in a manner virtually indistinguishable from body skin, and explain how dark coloured head and facial hair in a NEGATIVE (tone-reversed) image would correspond with grey or silver hair in the ‘original’ positive (e.g. Secondo Pia’s celebrated tone-reversed photographic plate). Wasn’t Jesus Christ supposed to have been 33 years old at time of death, not 63!
I have proposed an answer which like all my others is studiously avoided (or summarily dismissed) by mainstream pro-authenticity sindonology.
The image is NOT a photograph and should not be interpreted as such. Just because it can be tone-reversed by photography does NOT make the as-is body image a photographic negative – those who claim it does being guilty of arriving at a logical non-sequitur. So what is the body image, if not a photograph?
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“It’s a painting
If this were true, it should be possible to identify the pigments used by chemical analysis, just as conservators can do for the paintings of Old Masters. But the Sturp team found no evidence of any pigments or dyes on the cloth in sufficient amounts to explain the image. Nor are there any signs of it being rendered in brush strokes. In fact the image on the linen is barely visible to the naked eye, and wasn’t identified at all until 1898, when it became apparent in the negative image of a photograph taken by Secondo Pia, an amateur Italian photographer. The faint coloration of the flax fibres isn’t caused by any darker substance being laid on top or infused into them – it’s the very material of the fibres themselves that has darkened. And in contrast to most dyeing or painting methods, the colouring cannot be dissolved, bleached or altered by most standard chemical agents. The Sturp group asserted that the image is the real form of a “scourged, crucified man… not the product of an artist”. There are genuine bloodstains on the cloth, and we even know the blood group (AB, if you’re interested). There are traces of human DNA too, although it is badly degraded.”
While Heller and Adler attempted to bleach the body image fibres, and finally succeeded, they curiously did not report tests with standard “bleach” as such, i.e. sodium hypochlorite. Why they failed to do so is anyone’s guess, but reading Heller’s 1983 book one can see the thought-processes at work: they were working their way through various theoretical means by which substances that have acquired a yellow colour can be made to lose the colour, thereby giving clues to the means by which colour was acquired in the first instance, e.g. oxidation, reduction. Common bleach presumably acts via one or more mechanisms (oxidation, chlorination etc) that did not fit with their model-building.
Having myself found that melanoidins generated by heating a white flour imprint can be decolorised with standard bleach, I firmly believe that Heller and Adler would have been able to see the same with their image fibres. Why? Well, to start with they achieved bleaching with alkaline hydrogen peroxide, as I have as well – further evidence for melanoidins being the chromophore. They also achieved decolorisation with diimide (N2H2) which I regard as a major, posssibly the most crucial of STURP’s findings. Why? Because while diimide is not a well known chemical, and while Heller refers to it merely as a “powerful reducing agent” in his book, it has a highly specific mode of reducing action, one which Heller and Adler (to say nothing of the rest of the world) have failed to accord proper importance.
Diimide has a highly specific hydrogenating action on C=C double bonds.
-CH=CH- + NH=NH -> -CH2-CH2- + N2 (nitrogen gas)
Why is that so important? Answer: because the yellow colour of organic chromophores (as distinct from inorganic pigments like red ochre etc) is generally due to conjugated double bonds ( -CH=CH-CH=CH-CH=C-H etc). One has only to hydrogenate one of the C=C double bonds, preferably towards the middle of the sequence, and hey presto one interrupts the conjugated series and knocks out (“bleaches”) the colour. Heller and Adler’s positive result with diimide pretty well confirms that the body image colour is NOT due to artists’ paint pigments, but is ORGANIC in nature ( cue those melanoidins!). It simply makes no sense at all for that hugely important diimide finding to have been played down or ignored, allowing the tedious “just a painting” dogma to survive decades longer than it should.
I blame widespread chemical illiteracy myself, aided and abetted by the liberal arts background of most of those in the mass media. Freelance science writer Philip Ball, previously on the editorial staff of ‘Nature’, is I gather a biochemist by training. Hopefully he’ll read this posting in due course and , who knows, maybe use his influence and contacts to set the record straight?
More Philip Ball to follow tomorrow.
Final para from “It’s a painting”
“That didn’t prevent the American independent chemical and microscopy consultant, Walter McCrone, who collaborated with the Sturp team, from asserting that the red stains attributed to blood were in fact very tiny particles of the red pigment iron oxide, or red ochre.
John Heller’s quotes re McCrone and his uncompromising iron oxide microscopically-acquired ‘take’ on the body image:
(Heller, J.H., “Report on the Shroud of Turin,” Houghton Mifflin Co: Boston MA, 1983, pp.139-141)
“Following my presentation, McCrone came to the lectern. Everyone was eager to hear what he had to say. He began. He had examined some of the Shroud fibers and stated that the body images had been made by red iron-oxide earth pigments.
Iron oxide is familiar to everyone as rust. It occurs in the ground in a variety of geological deposits, and has been used for millennia as a paint. African tribes like the Masai still use it to daub their bodies and their hair. The painter’s pigment known as Venetian red is made of it.
McCrone is a particle expert who has written a five-volume atlas that is the definitive work in this field. Nevertheless, Sam Pellicori, who came to the STURP project via astronomy and physical optics, was at the moment thinking, “I don’t believe this. I’ve measured the spectrum of iron oxide dozens of times. The color’s totally wrong, for what he’s claiming. Based on the spectrophotometry and the X-ray fluorescence findings, there’s no way that the Shroud images are composed of iron oxide. I may be young and naive, and McCrone may be the master, but he’s wrong.”
Jackson was thinking that McCrone’s analysis contradicted the Gilberts’ reflectance curves.
McCrone stated that, in his opinion, the iron oxide had been applied by a finger, and the pictures were therefore finger paintings. He referred to what he had seen as `snow fencing,’ indicating that the iron oxide had piled up on the lee side of the fibers. He concluded by saying that the blood was also made up of an iron-oxide paint. Slide after slide was projected on the screen, with McCrone pointing out red dots on the fibers, and stating that they were typical red iron earth pigments.
I was bewildered. Here was a particle expert claiming that (a) the images were the result of iron-oxide red paint and that (b) the `blood’ was iron oxide, too. This was completely at odds with the data presented by the X-ray fluorescence team, who saw no increase of iron signal between image and nonimage areas, but only where there was blood. It was at variance with what Lynn and Lorre had found in their image analysis, as well as the Gilberts’ analysis that the images had a spectrum similar to the light scorch areas. It also left the 3-D aspect of the images unaccounted for. My seven microfibrils may not have held blood, but they surely were not coated with iron oxide. Most confusing. McCrone finished up by stating that he was 90 percent sure that the Shroud was a painting – or perhaps there may have been a very faint pre-existing image that was later touched up by an artist using red iron oxide earth pigments. I had a flock of questions to ask. However, before I had a chance to ask any, other team members stepped in.
(Questions from floor in bold, McCrone’s answers not in bold)
`Dr. McCrone, how do you know those red dots are iron oxide?’
`Experience.’
`Did you test them chemically?’
`I don’t have to. Experience. Besides, it’s birefringent.’
`How do you explain the X-ray fluorescence studies and the Gilberts’ curves?’
`They must be wrong.’
`How does your iron-oxide paint jibe with the negative image and the 3-D information?’
`Oh, any competent artist could have done that.’
`Do you mean that you just looked through your microscope and, without doing specific tests for iron oxide, can proclaim it a painting?’
`Yes.’
And with that, he left the meeting, and I did not see him
again.
So, on the face of it, there’s a seeming discrepancy. The image chromophore is organic (covalently linked carbon-based) in nature, dare one say dye or stain-like in nature? On the other it’s particulate, i.e. visible as specks under McCrone’s microscope. Can the two be reconciled?
Yes, most certainly they can, if one is willing to accept that the straw-yellow colour of the image fibres is not due to chemical modification of the linen cellulose by chemical oxidation and/or dehydration, as surmised by Heller and Adler, but to that class of high molecular weight polymeric MELANOIDINS, as first proposed by Raymond N Rogers, and that said melanoidins are derived NOT from the flax plant (source of the linen fibres) but from external sources. In Rogers’ diffusion model, the reactants are (a) volatile amines, notable cadaverine and putrescine etc released to the atmosphere from a decomposing body and (b) reducing sugars derived from a Roman-era starch coating on the linen (said to be a processing aid for weaving). In my much simpler Model 10, both the amines (from amino-side chains on lysine residues in protein etc ) and reducing sugars – hexose and/or pentose sugars- are supplied from a single external source, namely white flour used as imprinting agent. Naturally, there needs to be obligatory contact between body and linen for the imprinting agent to leave an imprint – no contact, no imprint. In Rogers’ model there can be air gaps, with his volatile amines able to cross those air gaps via gaseous diffusion (that being arguably the major defect of the model – the greater the gap, the greater the random diffusion, the less well defined the presumed image).
Returning to the original point – how can melanoidins end-products comprising the body image be reconciled with McCrone’s particulates? Answer: The clue are those terms that describe the nature of melanoidins, i.e. “high molecular weight” and “polymeric”. That means that the melanoidins are particulate (or micro-particulate) SOLIDS, with no reason why they should not be visible as minute specks under the microscope, given a sufficiently high magnification. Their precursors msy hsave entered linen fibres (briefly) in liquid form, then undergone near instant polymerisation to solids, effectively entrapping the melanoidins at their furthest point of penetration, explaining their resistance to being detached or dissolved out, explaining their durability and colour-fastness of the faint image over the centuries
“Like just about every other aspect of the shroud, McCrone’s evidence is disputed; few now credit it. Another idea is that the image is a kind of rubbing made from a bas-relief statue, or perhaps imprinted by singeing the fabric while it lay on top of such a bas-relief – but the physical and chemical features of the image don’t support this.”
No, not a bas relief statue, but a real person, probably living and cooperative, like somewhere on Geoffroy de Charny’s Lirey landholding in 14th century Champagne, France, not far from the city of Troyes. Someone who agreed to be coated with a white flour imprinting agent, then having linen pressed down onto his body contours.
Singeing a fabric, from a hot metal statue or bas relief? No, for a number of technical reasons. But one can learn a lot about the nature of superficial imprints, notably their 3D response towards appropriate computer software by working with scorch imprints, as I did with my Model 2 back in 2012/13.
More to follow. (It’s now May 13, 2018)
Halleluja! This site has suddenly reappeared under a simple ‘shroud of turin’ Google search. It’s currently on Page 8 listings, having been nowhere to be seen on any of the first 20 pages for some weeks, the subject of much grinding of teeth, spitting of blood, staring daggers etc etc!
Continuing from Philip Ball:
2. It was made by a natural chemical process
If the coloured imprint comes from the darkening of the cellulose fibres of the cloth, what might have caused it? One of the doyens of scientific testing of the shroud, Raymond Rogers of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, argued in 2002 that a simple chemical transformation could do the job. He suggested that even very moderate heat – perhaps 40C (104F) or so, a temperature that post-mortem physicians told him a dead body could briefly attain if the person died from hyperthermia or dehydration – could be enough to discolour the sugary carbohydrate compounds that might be found on the surface of cotton fibres. It doesn’t take a miracle, Rogers insisted. This is a reassuringly mundane idea, but there is little evidence for it in this particular circumstance – it’s not as if it happens all the time on funeral shrouds.
Another idea is that the discoloration of the fibres was caused by a chemical reaction with some substance that emanated from the body. The French biologist, Paul Vignon, proposed in the early 1900s that this substance might have been ammonia, produced by the breakdown of urea in sweat. That won’t work, though: the image would be too blurry. In 1982, biophysicist John DeSalvo suggested instead that the substance could be lactic acid from sweat. This compound is one of those responsible for so-called Volckringer images of plant leaves, left for years between the pages of a book: substances are exuded from the leaf and react with paper fibres to produce a dark, negative image.
My personal observations:
Oh dear, Mr. Ball. There’s a lot of mixing up between one thing and another here. Where does one begin?
Let’s lay Paul Vignon’s ideas to rest first, while recognizing they may have influenced Ray Rogers’ thinking, but not as one might suppose from the above account.
Vignon proposed that image formation involved gaseous ammonia, formed as stated by post-mortem decomposition of urea in sweat, but reacting with the biblical spices, notably aloes, to produce a darkening of the cloth and image formation (though arguably more blurred than the one we see on the TS). But those biblical spices have never been shown to be present on the TS, at least in the more authoritative studies, notably the 78 STURP visit.
Rogers modified the Vignon model. In place of ammonia, we have heavier amines (cadaverine, putrescine etc), also products of post-mortem decomposition – but of body proteins, not simple urea, also gaseous (just, their natural state on the laboratory shelf at ordinary environmental temperatures being vapour-releasing liquids). Instead of biblical spices, we have starch and its (alleged) breakdown products (simpler dextrins etc with reducing properties). The two react via amino-carbonyl reactions (between amine and sugar respectively) i.e. via Maillard reactions, finally to form yellow or brown melanoidins. Philip Ball’s account of the Rogers’ model has left out the amines, making it seem as if Rogers’ model involved the effect of somewhat elevated temperature on sugars only. But that mechanism of darkening is NOT a Maillard reaction, nor is the end product a melanoidin. That mechanism of darkening, involving heat on reducing sugars only is called CARAMELIZATION,. It generally requuires a higher temperature than Maillard reaction . I’m personally not aware that Rogers did more than pay lip service to caramelization as making a significant contribution to the TS body image.
There’s one final detail that needs to be flagged up, and that’s a possible role for alkaline pH in addition to heat. Maillard reactions are favoured by alkaline pH, and it’s not unusual to see ammonia and other amines being assumed to act merely via their ability to raise pH. No, their prime function is to provide the amino function (-NH2), though raising pH as well may increase the rate of Maillard reaction. Standard alkalis (e.g. sodium hydroxide, sodium bicarbonate) also increase rates of Maillard reactions, leaving those amines free to serve their primary role as reactants. The mechanisn by which alkali speeds up Maillard non-enzymatic browning reactions is well known: the amino functions in proteins, simple amines etc are usually predominantly in protonated form (-NH3+) at or close to physiological pH where they are less chemically reactive than unprotonated -NH2. Adding a little alkali deprotonates the -NH3+ to -NH2 and hey presto one gets a speedier amino-carbonyl reaction, better, faster browning . Pretzel bakers exploit the alkali effect! End of today’s chemistry lesson…
3. It’s a photograph
Secondo Pia’s photograph showed that the image on the cloth is a negative: dark where it should be bright. This deepens the mystery, and Pia himself casually suggested that the shroud could have been made by some primitive kind of photography. That idea has been inventively pursued by South African art historian Nicholas Allen, who argues that it could in principle have been achieved using materials and knowledge available to medieval scholars many centuries before genuine photography was invented. The key to the idea is the light-sensitive compound silver nitrate, the stuff that darkened the emulsion of the first true photographic plates in the 19th Century, as light transformed the silver salt into tiny black particles of silver metal.
This substance does seem to have been known in the Middle Ages, Allen says: it was described in the writings of the 8th Century Arabic alchemist, Jabir ibn Hayyan, and also by the German Dominican Albertus Magnus in the 13th Century. It could have been coated on to the cloth in a darkened chamber and exposed to sunlight through a lens – made of quartz not glass, since the silver is in fact darkened by ultraviolet light, which glass absorbs but quartz does not. Allen has made replicas of a shroud this way using model figurines. But how the image stays on the cloth when the silver is removed, and how mediaeval forgers gathered all this sophisticated knowledge about optics and chemistry without there being any trace in surviving documents poses problems for the idea. So do various issues about the exact shape and contrast of an image made this way. For most Turin Shroud theorists, Allen’s idea is a triumph of ingenuity over plausibility.
My personal observations:
I too could respond to that question and ask “Is it a photograph”? But I’m not going to. Why not? It’s my response to the indecent haste with which contact imprinting was dismissed right from the start, notably by STURP team-leader John Jackson, allowing photography, correction, resurrectional photography to take centre stage, where it’s been ever since – the best part of 40 years no less!
Yes, it’s understandable why photography should have been given serious consideration right at the start, with Secondo Pia’s discovery that the TS image resembles a photographic negative, inasmuch as tone-reversal produces a more natural-looking positive image, one in which the extremities are brighter than the shadowy recesses. That’s because in light photography, there is more light reflection off the extremities, back into the camera lens, and thence onto 19th century silver salt emulsion, from which the positive then needs can then be generated in a second step.
But it’s not just light that preferentially interacts with raised relief to produce a negative image. So too does a tactile process in which linen is physically pressed onto those same raised contours, also generating a negative, tone-reversed image if there’s an imprinting medium present.
So on what basis was contact-imprinting so hastily dismissed, allowing resurrectional selfie-image acquisition able to acquire alleged scientific semi-respectability? Answer: through theologically driven arguments that were not just superficial but laden with tunnel vision and blind spots, inviting no debate, no counter-arguments. In short, religion pre-empted, nay hijacked science.
How realistic is imprinting by direct contact? To read the following account in Mark Antonacci’s book (“The Resurrection of the Shroud”) one could be forgiven for thinking it was scarcely worth a moment’s consideration:
From Page 63, under heading Direct-Contact Theories:
“A fundamental problem with all direct-contact theories can be demonstrated in a simple experiment by rubbing charcoal over a person’s face and then draping a cloth over it. The resulting image will possess no three-dimensional information, appear grossly distorted, and bear scant resemblance to a human face”.
We’ll come to the problematical face shortly. For now, let’s consider a cleaner more friendly experimental system, the one used to create the banner on this blogsite. My hand was simply plunged into water and then, after flicking off surplus liquid, pressed down onto dark fabric (OK, I’m repeating myself from earlier).
Does the imprint look distorted, compared with a real hand? Answer: NO!
Does the imprint bear scant resemblance to a human hand? Answer: NO!
Does it possess no three-dimensional information? Answer NO – it responded magnificently to ImageJ 3D-rendering software, both as the initial negative imprint, and as the tone-reversed positive.
What about imprinting off the face, not with messy charcoal, but a more user-friendly imprintimg medium, flour slurry as in my Model 9?
Antonacci continues:
“STURP scientists Jackson, Jumper and Ercoline attempted to reproduce direct-contact models capable of matching the image characteristics found on the Shroud. They used a plaster mold of a face that was treated with different combinations of liquids and oils at different temperatures and draped with linen resembling the Shroud. The experiment identified several weaknesses in the direct-contact theory: When the cloth was draped over the face mold that had been coated with ink, two different types of shading effects were produced. An image was imprinted only where the cloth and face made contact; no impression was left if the cloth and face were separated by space. Yet, as discussed in Chapter 3, the Shroud body image was imprinted even where there must have been some distance between cloth and body (for example the sides of the nose). When the investigators pressed the cloth onto those surface points where contact was not made during the natural draping over the face mold, the resulting image was grossly distorted. The VP-8 analysis of the direct contact photographs yielded even more pronounced image distortions (Fig 42), which means that direct contact methods cannot produce the correct three-dimensional information.”
More to follow in a day or two
(I shall be annotating the above paragraph from Antonacci line by line, sometimes word by word. Maybe one has to be a scientist by training – as distinct from a legal attorney – to spot the repeated departure from strict scientific objectivity – displaying that lawyerly tendency to select so-called facts that build a case with a pre-determined conclusion, namely that the direct-contact theory is riddled with fatal flaws, meaning it can be consigned without further ado to the dustbin of history. Really? We shall see…)
Annotated version of above:
“STURP scientists Jackson, Jumper and Ercoline attempted to reproduce direct-contact models capable of matching the image characteristics found on the Shroud.
Really?
They used a plaster mold of a face that was treated with different combinations of liquids and oils at different temperatures and draped with linen resembling the Shroud.
Er, why did they decide to use a plaster mould of a face, i.e. a rigid, non-deformable “face”? How many times have we been told that there’s a swollen cheek, a deformed flattened nose, serious damage to a bony eye socket, and asked to believe this fits 100% with the biblical account. Who’s to say the less-than-perfect face on the Shroud is unrelated to biblical events, and everything to do with medieval imprinting off a real DEFORMABLE human face, applying manual pressure to linen that has been draped over a face precoated with imprinting medium? A properly objective, scientifically rigorous attemopt to “match image characteristics of the Shroud” would either made no prior assumoptiuons about authenticity OR would have drawn up a list of the different scenarios, 1st versus 14th century, and modelled each accordingly. More to follow.
The experiment identified several weaknesses in the direct-contact theory:
Now there’s a surprise…
When the cloth was draped over the face mold that had been coated with ink, two different types of shading effects were produced. An image was imprinted only where the cloth and face made contact; no impression was left if the cloth and face were separated by space.
“Two different types of shading effect”? Like an either/or effect, as expected of a contact imprint – either image, or no image, with no in-betweens? Like a muddy footprint on a tiled floor? Yes, that’s what one expects of a contact-imprint! One doesn’t need to do an experiment to know that an imprinting medium cannot cross airgaps, assuming it’s either liquid or powdered solid.
Yet, as discussed in Chapter 3, the Shroud body image was imprinted even where there must have been some distance between cloth and body (for example the sides of the nose). When the investigators pressed the cloth onto those surface points where contact was not made during the natural draping over the face mold, the resulting image was grossly distorted. The VP-8 analysis of the direct contact photographs yielded even more pronounced image distortions (Fig 42), which means that direct contact methods cannot produce the correct three-dimensional information.” Repeat: contact-imprinting is an either/or effect.
Yet, as discussed in Chapter 3, the Shroud body image was imprinted even where there must have been some distance between cloth and body (for example the sides of the nose).
Is that the best we can do – focusing on one tiny part of the entire double-body image, front versus back, pinpointing the sides, yes SIDES!, of the nose as the place where there’s allegedly no ‘either/or’ effect, assuming in other words that there’s no possibility under any circumstances whatsoever of linen ever making contact with the sides of the nose?
Experimental conditions? Loosely-draped linen, i.e. a biased, non-objective pro-authenticity situation, one where linen might certainly make a bridge between the highest point of the nose and the lower cheek, making little or no contact with the sides? But what about a medieval forgery scenario, one in which linen was manually pressed down onto body features, maybe flattening somewhat that awkward extremity we call the nose, such that there was then contact between linen and the sides of the nose.
What’s the nose like on the TS body image? Any evidence that it was indeed compressed? How does is respond to elevation of 2D image intensity onto a third dimension (3D-rendering)? Might there be evidence that the nose was indeed flattened in the process of being imaged from a real person, one with deformable body features, NOT a plaster mould?
This was discussed in detail on a recent posting on this site.
(Nov 16, 2017, with title that begins: “Hello all you media reporters…” )
When the investigators pressed the cloth onto those surface points where contact was not made during the natural draping over the face mold, the resulting image was grossly distorted.
I too did that experiment back in 2014, using a flour slurry as imprinting agent (Model 9) pressing linen against my face, with pressure on the nose. There was no further image development, beyond drying and applying additional contrast with MS Office Picture Manager. But there was a difference: I did NOT see gross distortion, certainly no more than what one sees on the TS:
Nor was it a typical photographic image, being subtly different- like seeming to show a beard and moustache, when at best there was merely a 24 hour stubble onto which the imprinting medium appears to have accumulated more efficiently.
But then neither does the TS have a typical photographic image, being, er, like, you know, subtly different.
The VP-8 analysis of the direct contact photographs yielded even more pronounced image distortions (Fig 42), which means that direct contact methods cannot produce the correct three-dimensional information.”
Let’s distinguish, shall we, between “image distortions” and “failure to see a 3-response”? From the word go, pro-authenticity sindonology has tended to use those two expressions as if they are one and the same thing. One sees it in the John Heller book from 1983:
Yes, this is a colour plate from John Heller’s book.
(The photos are protected by copyright, attributed to the late Vernon Miller (a colleague of STERA’s President Barrie M.Schwortz from the Brook Institute), but should be permissible here on this site which is non-commercial, and devoted entirely to reseacrhing the Turin Shroud.)
Let’s look closely at the captions:
From under the first of the above two plates: “The three-dimensional attributes of the VP-8 Shroud images cannot be reproduced by any artistic endeavour”.
Oh yes they can! I showed as much way back in 2012, displaying for my part hideously non-artistic endeavour – spending just a few minutes with a stick of artist’s charcoal – to execute the crudest of crude copies of the face of the Man on the TS. That graphic monstrosity was then uploaded to ImageJ (the modern digital equivalent to the analogue VP-8):
From May 4, 2012, posted to my short-lived ‘strawshredder’ site (an allusion to those who repeatedly clutch at straws):
Yes, one can do a crude charcoal sketch of the TS face, upload to ImageJ, and obtain a 3D-rendered image. It’s the software that generates the 3D image from the 2D input. There’s no “encoded” 3D information on the input, merely variations in 2D image intensity that are elevated proportionately onto an entirely imaginary vertical axis.
So even artistically, correction, non-artistically, one can get a 3D-rendering using appropriate software. It really is time that sindonology ceased its promotion of the TS image as having “unique” 3D properties that are somehow “encoded”.
It’s time to let go of your jewel in the crown, sindonology. It ain’t a diamond – it’s artificial, man-made.
Oops. I nearly forgot to mention that second caption, the one that reads:
“A VP-8 of a photo of William Ercoline. Note the gross distortion of all features and the two-dimensional quality of the VP-8 – both characteristics of a VP-8 taken from a 2D surface. The only exception is the Shroud.”
Certainly, there is some distortion (but when it’s distortion of the face on the man on the the TS that’s instantly explained away as injuries inflicted by Roman soldiers and/or hostile onlookers). But some distortion is only to be expected with a photograph, as distinct from an imprint. Why? Because photographs are invariably taken with a lateral source of illumination which creates shadows and, with it, apparent depth of field and a degree of pseudo-3D-ness. But the 3D-rendering software has no way of knowing what’s shadow as distinct from recessed area. So is it any wonder that there’s a distortion in the 3D-rendering of a photograph, unless the latter has been taken (with a degree of difficulty) with a light source directly behind the camera and maybe the photographer as well (if no timed or remote control shutter).
As for the suggestion, nay claim, that the VP-8 has failed to elicit 3D from William Ercoline’s photograph, words fail me! That is TOTAL misrepresentation (yet is strangely at odds with the body of the text in Heller’s book that only shifts into head-shaking pro-authenticity mode right towards the end). It’s almost as if this and the previous caption had been an afterthought, maybe by an editorial assistant at the publisher’s, maybe without full consultation with the author. Regardless of reasons, the damage has been done. The alleged “uniqueness” of the Shroud’s “encoded” 3D-properties has now become so deeply embedded in sindonology as to have become Holy Writ, with ridicule and Invisible Man status to anyone who dares question it.
(more to follow shortly)
4. It was made by some kind of energy release
According to an international team of scientists and other interested folk called the Yahoo Shroud Science Group, hypotheses about the genesis of the shroud “involving the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth cannot be rejected”. Among them, the group members write, “are hypotheses correlated to an energy source coming from the enveloped or wrapped Man, [and] others correlated to surface electrostatic discharges caused by an electric field”. Since these hypotheses appear to invoke processes unknown to science, which presumably occur during a return from the dead, it’s technically true that science can’t disprove them – nor really say anything about them at all.
Some, however, are not deterred by that. Italian chemist Giulio Fanti of the University of Padua has proposed that the image might have been burnt into the upper layers of the cloth by a burst of “radiant energy” – bright light, ultraviolet light, X-rays or streams of fundamental particles – emanating from the body itself. Fanti cites the account of Christ’s Transfiguration, witnessed by Peter, John and James and recounted in Luke 9:29: “As he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became as bright as a flash of lightning.” This is, to put it mildly, rather circumstantial evidence. But Fanti suggests we might at least test whether artificial sources of such radiation can produce a similar result on linen.
According to Raymond Rogers, all kinds of pseudoscientific theories have been put forward that invoke some mysterious radiation, which not only made the image itself but distorted the radiocarbon dating. In general they start from the notion that the shroud must be genuine and work backwards from that goal, he said. Little has changed in the decade and more since Rogers made this complaint. But still it has to be said that the piece of cloth Pope Francis will venerate is genuinely and stubbornly perplexing.
My personal observations:
I can’t disagree with any of that – except to say that it’s polite, far too polite, towards those who move effortlessly back and forth between science and pseudoscience in their search for ‘compelling’ evidence for authenticity (the latter rushed out, instalment by instalment, into the public domain, all the while massaging those Google top rankings!). Meanwhile science, my kind of footsoldier science, is allowed to go unnoticed, and where Google is concerned, been allowed until recently to wither on the vine. (But am now back on Page 8 of a Google search under (shroud of turin), as flagged up a few days ago)
One detail: Giulio Fanti is credited with all the “radiation” models.- an umbrella term. In fact, his name is best linked with the corona discharge hypothesis (ionization of air molecules around a object with a build up of electrostatic charge). It is his fellow countryman Paolo Di Lazzaro who is more usually associated with what I call ‘resurrectional incandescence’, based on his model studies with uv excimer lasers.
What do I think of those experiments (which when reported in the Independent newspaper back in December 2011, with a follow-up on Tom Chivers’ now terminated Telegraph blog raised my ire, under the username ‘newsjunkie’ )?
Back in 2012 I described Paolo Di Lazzaros’ over-reported modelling of the Shroud body image, deploying his oh-so-21st century uv excimer lasers – generating a mere patch of yellowish discoloration on linen (no image!) – as “Mickey Mouse ” science.
Much abuse was heaped on me for saying so, notably from the host of the then (seemingly) influential shroudstory.com site.
I repeat: Mickey Mouse science!
Laser technologists should stick to laser technology, and leave science to scientists!
Yesterday I was thinking of attempting a summary of PDL’s laser studies. Having just glanced again at summaries of his ‘findings’ I’ve changed my mind. Everything he writes is so vacuous, so chemically uninformative, so intent on propping up a hugely unscientific proposition (like a body emitting ultraviolet radiation) that there are a million better uses one can make of one’s time – like dozing in one’s deckchair on the patio. The sooner PDL and his colleagues at ENEA employ a chemist the better,
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25: Shroud of Turin – RationalWiki
6 Jan 2018 – The Shroud of Turin is a length of linen cloth claimed by some members of the Christian community to have been Jesus’s death shroud. The provenance and authenticity of the shroud has been debated for many centuries. There is no record of where the shroud came from before the 13th century, and …
Technical problems · History · Theories · Is the Shroud of Turin …
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Shroud_of_Turin
My personal observations:
Expect them to arrive in a day or two. (It’s now May 18).
Again, it’s worth going through the rationalwiki posting on the TS, and to ask : Has the site hit the nail on essentials? (I say it has not, and will later say why):
It starts here:
Shroud of Turin
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“”The two attributes central to the shroud’s alleged religious significance — that it wrapped the body of Jesus, and is of supernatural origin — are precisely those neither science nor history can ever prove.
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| —Philip Ball, Nature (May 2008) |
The Shroud of Turin is a length of linen cloth claimed by some members of the Christian community to have been Jesus‘s death shroud.
The provenance and authenticity of the shroud has been debated for many centuries. There is no record of where the shroud came from before the 13th century, and indeed scientific dating tests have shown it to be from around that time.
Yes, despite all those alleged sightings (“Image of Edessa” etc) there’s no iconic head-to-head double-body image in history until the Lirey Pilgrim’s badge, circa 1357, with the de Charny/de Vergy coat of arms. How likely is it that so striking, so compelling an image would exist in one or other hands for the best part of 13 centuries without appearing?
Even if the shroud was authentically proven to come from 1st century Judea, this would only show that someone was crucified, and crucifixion as a common punishment at the time has never been disputed. There would be no reason to presume it was Jesus in particular.
No reason? What about the bloodstains in the scalp – which can be linked with the biblical crown of thorns? What about the bloodstain corresponding with a lance wound in the side? What about the bloodstains corresponfing with hundreds of scourge marks?
One can question why all these correspondences with the biblical account are in the form of bloodstains, not the body image (making it more likely they are the work of a forger). But one can hardly maintain that the image could be from just one of hundreds of crucifixion victims, given the distinguishing features.
Despite the overwhelmingevidence to the contrary, Pope Benedict XVI declared it “the authentic burial robe” of Christ.[1] This papal declaration would appear to be “authoritative but non-infallible“.[2]
Sindonology is the “scientific” study of the Shroud of Turin. Unfortunately, most of this “science” is directed at trying to prove that the shroud is the actual burial cloth of Jesus Christ, making it on par with Lysenkoism in the sense that it is attempting to prove the already falsified.
Yes, sindonology is essentially a prior conviction of authenticity in search of corroborating evidence, studiously avoiding or hastily dismissing evidence that argues in favour of 14th century forgery. I say the TS was inspired by the ‘Veil of Veronica’, an alleged imprint of the face of Jesus onto alady bystander’s square of head covering en route to the place of crucifixion, The TS was intended to be seen and interpreted as an analogous whole body imprint in sweat and blood, post- rather than pre-mortem.
Appearance
The Shroud is rectangular, measuring some 4.4 by 1.1 meters. The cloth (specifically linen) is woven in a three-to-one herringbone twill composed of flax fibrils. It shows faint but distinctive sepia images of the front and back of a naked man with his hands folded across his groin. The body image is muscular and 1.70 to 1.88 meters, or about 5’7″ to 6’2″, tall, with wound points as though they could have been caused by the process of crucifixion, but there is no generally accepted theory to explain how the image was impressed onto the cloth. However, it is accepted that the image is not anatomically correct — the head is 5% too large for its body, the nose is disproportionate, and the arms are too long. To the unaided eye the image is not obvious but appears much more defined as a black and white photographic negative, as revealed when the shroud was first photographed in 1898.
Yes, but it’s the negative, tone-reversed image that should be discussed first. No, not a photograph, but an imprint (see this site’s banner)! Correction, a simulated imprint of the body of the crucified Jesus, as might have been left (conceptually speaking) on Joseph of Arimathea’s fine linen, used to receive the body from the cross for dignified transport to the place of entombment.
More to follow …
Technical problems
No examples of complex herringbone weave are known from the time of Jesus when, in any case, burial cloths tended to be of plain weave. In addition, Jewish burial practice utilized — and the Gospel of John specifically describes for Jesus — multiple burial wrappings wrapped tightly around the body with a separate cloth over the face:
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“”Then cometh Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linen clothes lie, And the napkin, that was about his head, not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself…
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| —John 20:1:6, King James Version |
This is particularly curious because the Christian relic industry has been so proficient at producing multiple Holy Foreskins and multiple complete sets of Jesus’ baby teeth. It must be a “miracle” that there is only one shroud!
Additionally, none of the gospels make any mention of any miraculous burial cloth after Jesus’s resurrection. Curious that the most holy relic in all of Christendom doesn’t even get so much as a word in its holy texts, isn’t it?
Yes…
There are also claims of “bloodstains” on the cloth, but Hebrew law dictated cleansing of the corpse before wrapping and bodies don’t bleed after death. Chemist Walter McCrone identified the substance as a “combination of red ochre and vermilion tempera paint.” However only fibrils lifted from the shroud on sticky tape were tested for blood (This was done in order to avoid damaging the cloth). It should be pointed out though that the color observed was still an unfaded red, which would not be expected of real blood, which browns with age.
Yes. The Alan Adler “explanation” that the permanent red colour is due to admixture of an abnormal variant of haemoglobin and ‘trauma’ bilirubin simply does not hold up. Bilirubin becomes quickly degraded on exposure to light – ordinary visible light (especially the blue component) – that being the basis for the phototherapy of neonatal jaundice.
Dr M. M. Baden, a pathologist, pointed out the blood trickles from the scalp are evidence of forgery, on the grounds that blood from a scalp wound does not flow in rivulets but mats the hair.[3]
Sindonology has an explanation for that. The blood was really on the face we’re told, but imprinted onto the head hair of the body image, a result of the body image being out of stereoregister with the blood due to different non-simultaneous imprinting mechanisms. Ingenious, probably wrong!
Also of note is the lack of wrap-around distortion. For a shroud that was supposedly wrapped around the body of Christ, the lack of wrap-around distortion across the torso, thighs and legs is striking. If the cloth were genuine, the face and body should be hardly recognizable as such, and should look something more like this. The figure does not satisfy the geometric conditions of contact formation.
Much nonsense is written about ‘wrap-around distortion’.
First, for there to be wrap- around distortion, two conditions have to be met. First, there has to be contact between the vertical sides as well as flatter upper planes of the body (torso, head, limbs etc). In short, there has to be ‘wrap-around’!
Secondly there has to be an imprinting mechanism in place such that wrap-around contact results in image capture. If either is absent there can be no ‘wrap-around- distortion’. So a loosely draped sheet of linen might make contact with the sides, and in a pro-authenticity scenario (those flashes of radiation etc) one expects imaging of sides and distortion. But there is little if any visible on the TS! Why not? Because the TS body image required the presence of a material imprinting agent.
Fast forward to the 14th century, to a forgery scenario, one where there was no ‘loosely-draped linen’ but a determined attempt to simulate, i.e. mimic the appearance of a aged, yellowed sweat imprint. How precisely? Answer: one either applies one’s imprinting agent ONLY to the places one wants imaged – and doesn’t bother if the linen makes contact with other parts – OR one devises a procedure whereby an imprinting medium can only access (settle on!) the higher flatter planes, NOT the vertical sides.
It is the first of those options that was deployed in this invesitigator’s Model 9, using a wwet flour slurry as imprinting agent, painted/daubed onto the parts I wanted imaged, NOT the vertical sides to avoid lateral distortion.
It is the second option that was deployed in later Model 10 using solid white flour as imprinting medium, sprinkled from above, settling for the most part on higher flatter planes, failing to do so by and large on vertical faces. Imprinting was then done using WET linen to which the flour efficienty transfers under manually-applied pressure. The key advantage of Model 10 is that the result of imprinting mainly off those higher flatter planes, with a fairly sharp (but still somewhat fuzzy cut-off towards the sides) is that one achieves a homogeneity of imaging thanks to the uniform effects of gravity and flour adhesion/non-adhesion to skin across the entire body, front and rear (we’ll return to the rear later). What’s more, the resulting image with its flat ‘cardboard cut out’ look, with front, back but NO SIDES has that desired imprint look about it that could be ‘sold’ to visiting pilgrims as a genuine 1300 year old sweat imprint, with the added bonus of blood having been added ‘in all the right places’.
Why a TS image with front and rear imprint only, apart from the reason already given (a general “imprinted” look, NOT painted as if by an artist). This is where it gets interesting, dare one say subtle. Three of the 4 Gospels refer to the body of Jesus being received direct from the cross into Joseph of Arimathea’s linen, with no suggestion that the linen was intended to serve as more than a temporary ‘transport shroud’. Using the linen as a transport stretcher meant folding it back over the head, back down to the feet, such that contact was predominantly with the front and rear only – NOT THE SIDES. The creators of the TS were looking to extend the idea previously used to create the Veil of Veronica, one based on BRIEF contact with the more accessible planes that did not require wrapping fabric around the sides of a face or body. The creators of the TS were in their own way aiming for authenticty, though not in the usual meaning of that term – authenticity that was faithful to the biblical account, one where there’s no hard evidence (except for a certain kind of biased interpretation) that J of A’s linen was ever used or even intended as the final burial shroud, that being in the form of later ‘winding strips’ referred to in the fourth Gospel.
More to follow.
History
Little reliable information is known of the shroud before the 15th century, beyond it being present in France in the 14th century. In 1453 Margaret de Charny deeded it to the House of Savoy, and in 1578 the then-Duke transferred it to Turin. The description of the Turin cloth at this point differs from that of the original cloth first presented in the 14th century.
That’s news to me. Do tell us more!
In 1983, the Savoy heirs gave it to the Holy See, who had it restored in 2002. Today it is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin.
The practice of faking holy relics was widespread during the Middle Ages and indeed the first undisputed mention of the Shroud is a very skeptical 1390 report from French Bishop Pierre d’Arcis to then (Anti-)Pope Clement VII denouncing the Shroud as a fraud.
OK, that’s maybe the first documentary evidence. But with something like a physical artefact with distinctive features, one must surely acknowledge other types of clue or evidence to an earlier existence. I’m thinking especially of the Lirey Pilgrim’s badge with the coats of arms of both Geoffroy de Charny and his wife, Jeanne de Vergy. That badge is the first known representation of the TS in history. Since de Charny died at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356 (he was bearer of the Oriflamme, his king’s standard) that does suggest, does it not, that Bishop Pierre d’Arcis was accurate, at least as regards chronology, in recounting the outrage of his predecessor Henri de Poitiers, de Charny’s local Bishop of Troyes towards the end of his life?
[note 1] In 1988 three independent teams of scientists analyzed fragments of the cloth using radiocarbon dating and concluded that it dated from the Middle Ages. However, some critics who were skeptical of the dating claimed that the pieces of cloth which were analyzed were not part of the original shroud but repairs following fire damage in 1532.
1532 fire damage? Repairs by those Poor Clare nuns? Crude patching? There’s some misunderstanding here in attempting to link with the much-maligned radiocarbon dating. The authors need to get acquainted with the invisible mending hypothesis, which if true would have preceded the 1532 fire. Personally I reject all that hugely over-hyped ‘modern’ contamination stuff – believing as I do that the entire TS came into existence in the mid-14th century, probably on the Lirey estate, probably as a result of a collaborative venture involving Geoffroy de Charny and his sovereign (King John II, aka Jean le Bon). Motive? I can think of at least two: first, as a ceremonial object initially for the newly founded Order of the Star (‘Ordre de l’Etoile, de Charny being a prime mover, his idea taken up enthusiastically by his King as a counterpart to the English Order of the Garter). Second: to generate income to repay the King via instalments for earlier delivering a huge ransom to the English for release of the captured de Charny. (It was shortly John’s turn to be captured and ransomed – Battle of Poitiers, again, 1356).
This claim holds no water, though; as mentioned above, flax from which the shroud was made grew, according to radiocarbon dating, no later than 1390 and it is assumed the shroud would have been made about that time. Said critics might insist this is due to the repairs being made with older threads that date back then. However, this claim is not supported by evidence either. Regardless, the Catholic Church has refused further tests, though whether this is out of genuine concern for the cloth’s condition or because of butthurt over the results not going their way is yet to be seen.
Given the abuse heaped upon the three dating labs, for decisions that were probaby not of their making, ike restricting the initial tests to an inconspicuous corner of the linen, or allegedly for departing from an initially agreed protocol (not written on tablets of stone!), then yes, the Shroud’s owners shoud do the decent thing: commission a second round of tests. No need apparently to remove squares of fabric if sampling from more conspicuous central sites: apparently small lengths of individual threads can be extracted from the weave whose absence should scarcely be noticed.
It should be noted that although the testing dates the cloth to circa 1260 to 1390, it does not necessarily mean the image itself also dates to 1390. The date only indicates approximately when the flax from which the Shroud was made grew. It is assumed the shroud cloth was woven at about the same time because flax fibers or thread would not normally be stored for long periods.
So that’s suggesting that the image came later than 1390? As stated earler, that’s hardly likely to be the case, given the Lirey Pilgrim’s badge with the first known appearance of the iconic head-to-head dual body image is almost certainly mid 1350s or thereabouts, given the de Charny/de Vergy coats of arms.
Theories
Leonardo da Vinci
One proposed hypothesis is that Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned to replace an earlier version of the Shroud of Turin that was exposed as a poor fake, which had been bought by the Savoy family in 1453 only to disappear for 50 years.[4] Da Vinci created a “new” Shroud of Turin using a camera obscura technique involving a mirror and lens, on cloth impregnated with silver sulphate in a darkened room. The techniques required to create primitive photographs had been available since the 11th century in the book of optics, by Ibn al-Haytham, or Alhazen as he was known in the west. The silver sulphate acted as a negative which propagated an image onto the cloth when exposed by light through the lens. Silver sulphate and the camera obscura technique were known in the 15th century. In January 2009, visual arts consultant Lillian Schwartz at the School of Visual Arts in New York, compared the face on the Shroud of Turin with that of a portrait of Leonardo da Vinci, and found they matched.[5][6]
More from the School of Gravity-Defying Aerial Fortifications (building castles in the sky)…. Better to keep feet (and any surrounding stonework foundations of a defensive nature) on terra firma methinks…
Jacques de Molay
Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas in a 1997 book, The Second Messiah: Templars, the Turin Shroud and the Great Secret of Freemasonry, argue that the image on the Shroud is of Jaques de Molay, the last Grand Master of the Knights Templar. De Molay was tortured and burned at the stake in Paris on March 11, 1314 by orders of the French King Philip IV, Le Bel, when the king succeeded in having the Templar order disbanded by Pope Clement V, and attempted to seize all of the Templar assets. Using the radiocarbon evidence, flax from which the Shroud was made grew sometime between 1260 and 1390.[7] The Shroud is known to have been in France during the fourteenth century, lining up with de Molay’s death in 1314. Knight and Lomas contend that the image which allegedly resembles that of de Molay, was created between the time de Molay was tortured and burned at the stake, at the direction of the Chief Inquisitor of France, William Imbert. They speculate that his torture consisted of his arms and legs being nailed in a manner similar to crucifixion, possibly to a large wooden door. Then de Molay was laid on a length of linen cloth on a soft bed. The cloth was then pulled over his head and body and de Molay was left to recover from his wounds, before his later slow death by fire.
The authors based their image of de Molay on a nineteenth-century lithograph by French artist Chevauchet.
My personal observation:
Way back in early 2012, a few months after starting hands-on research into the TS, this investigator too became to suspect that the image on the Shroud might have been at least influenced by the fate of the Templars earlier in the 14th century. Interest centred not so much on the Grand Master of the Knights Templar (Jacques de Molay) as on his close confidante Geoffroi de Charney, with a surname almost but not quite identical to the later Lord of Lirey, first known owner of the Shroud, Geoffroi (aka Geoffroy) de Charny.
Here’s an image of my first posting on the subject:
So what prompted the suspicion of there being a possible link between the Man on the Shroud and someone who had executed some decades previously via burning at the stake, i.e. in in Paris, 1314?
More to follow…
It’s now Thursday 24th May 2018
Have just looked to see whether this site with its major TS hypothesis (“simulated sweat imprint”, mid 14th century origin, in tune with the radiocarbon dating) has improved since a couple of days ago ( then tail end of Page 7 listings under (shroud of turin). Guess what? It’s disappeared yet again from the entire listings (as far as Pages 1-20).
Well, we’ve been here before, many times. So what’s the reason? Is it a faulty Google search engine? Or is it dirty tricks on the part of those SEOs? It hardly matters – either way Google is largely responsible, either for having a lousy algorithm (or post-algorithmic curating) OR for allowing its algorithm’s credibilty to be constantly invalidated by a day-to-day ‘now you see it, now you don’t’ ranking system.
This retired scientist chose the internet as the medium for reporting results from a long-running research project, starting end 2011. That has been reported through some 350 ore more postings progressing through 10 different models, the last of those having survived my own attempts to falsify for some 3 years. But the major search engine confers anoymity spasmodically, varying hugely on a day-to-day basis, while certain pro-authenticity sites scarcely change position from day to day, month to month, year to year.
Coincidence? I think not!
More to follow… Probably not a lot, given the world’s ‘favourite search engine’ is in my view simply not fit for purpose… It’s effectively censoring new ideas…
Friday May 25, 2018
I say that the returns one sees on entering (shroud of turin) into the world’s favourite search engine are not only being window-dressed, but being actively manipulated on a daily basis, either by algorithm, via manual screening/filtration, or a combination of both. Result: try entering “simulated sweat imprint” (just that, no need to mention shroud) to see a page full of returns to my as yet unfalsified ‘solution’ to the TS controversy, 6 years in the making. This very posting with those three key words appears at the top of the list, helped no doubt by having ‘simulated sweat imprint’ in its title (so Google’s not totally word-blind where my titles are concerned). That’s followed by 9 more (mainly from Nov 2014 postings on this site, to Dan Porter’s retired shroudstory.com and to my sciencebuzz site). But enter ‘shroud of turin’ as I have just done, and not only is there no appearance of the key concept ‘simulated sweat imprint’ but no appearance yet again of this site on any of the first 20 pages of returns, listing 200 sites, despite briefly reaching Page 8 in the last week or so.
There is a concerted attempt being made to keep “simulated sweat imprint” out of sight to anyone doing an entry level search under (shroud of turin). I regard this as essentially akin to Soviet era Kremlinesque airbrushing out of the picture. Musn’t allow the masses to know there’s a new kid on the block with new ideas, new insights, must we? Must keep plugging the authorised version of the Shroud, the one that says the radiocarbon dating is wrong, that the TS body image is a ‘selfie’, generated by resurrectional incandescence bla bla.
I’m now thinking of letting this site lie fallow, for weeks, maybe months. Why waste a single minute longer in trying to put “simulated sweat imprint” into the public domain via the internet? I repeat: the internet is simply not fit for purpsoe where dissemination of new ideas is concerned. Google must take a major share of the blame (though unwillingness of that handful of long-established pro-authenticity websites, top-ranking ones especially, to recognize (and thus advertise!) one’s existence must play a major part too in rendering one invisible or nearly so. Maybe best to take a break and see if that conspiracy of silence begins to crumble of its own accord, maybe helped by one or two free spirits who refuse to mouth the usual tedious litany of platitudes…
For those unfamiliar with the ssi interpretation of the negative, imprint-like origin of the TS body image – an imaginative 14th century ‘conversation piece’ – once could do a lot worse than start with the wiki entry on the Veil of Veronica.
Think of the TS as the ‘whole body’ Veil of Joseph of Arimathea!
Saturday May 26, 2018
Here’s today’s addition, which, as indicated yesterday, will be the last until its so-far suppressed ‘simulated sweat imprint’ (ssi) message gets picked up in the public domain with no further help from me. I’ve also added it to the start of the posting by way of preamble, serving hopefully as a brief summary for those encountering the ‘ssi’ concept for the very first time.
Why simulate (‘fake’) an ancient yellowed sweat/blood imprint, intended to be identified as belonging to the newly deceased Jesus immediately post-crucifixion. The aim was to imagine Jesus being received into Joseph of Arimathea’s ‘fine linen’, intended for use as a quickly summoned-up as a one-piece, up-and-over transport stretcher only – not as the final burial shroud, the latter more probably in the form of winding strips as per Gospel of John?
1. While we see images on representations of the long-lost Veil of Veronia in the wiki and other galleries that resemble fully-fledged works of art, one or two are less-well defined, i.e. the artist has made some allowance for imaging via a supposed imprinting initially from a sweat/blood coated face – later enhanced. The 14th century creators of the Shroud took that notion to its ultimate conclusion, attempting to visualize the primary image, prior to that artistic (or divine) enhancement, all the way back to the primary near-invisible imprint that might be imagined to have been acquired as latent image within minutes of death and/or removal from a cross. They then set out to simulate how that initial latent image might have yellowed over the course of centuries to become visible – but only just. (I reject the mainstay argument of Charles Freeman that because engravings exist of the Shroud being held aloft to giant crowds in the initial days of open-air display, post 15th century, ipso facto it must have been a bold image, visible from afar. Has Freeman never heard of artistic licence?).
2. Accounts for the negative,i.e. tone reversed image (a contact imprint)
3. Explains the colour (supposedy 13 centuries old yellowed sweat, only just visible – not too much).
4. Explains imprinting of front and back, not the sides – J of A’s linen having notionally acquired its double-body imprint during brief transport when the linen was used as an improvised stretcher with scarcely any contact. Notionally, the transport linen then replaced by more specialized burial ‘clothes’ on arrival at the rock tomb.
5. Explains good imprinting of blood – notionally still very fresh during transport immediately following death, so no need to invoke all those complex mechanisms that try to explain imprinting of blood days later via exudation from otherwise dried-on blood clots etc.
6. Explains imprinting of soles of feet. No, not rigor mortis as some would have us believe but linen having notionally been turned up around the soles of feet during transport. Explains too the relative absence of imprinting off the top surfaces of the feet. Those fabricators of the TS body image imprint were sticklers for detail!
7. Why it’s exactly life size – not intended to be seen as a painting but an actual whole body imprint (cleverly simulated!).
8. Why no recognizable artist’s paint pigment? (Straw or tan-coloured melanoidins instead from roasted wheat flour in my Model 10, such as remain after a final soap/water rinse).
9. Why scourge marks are, we’re told, imprinted solely as blood, not body image. Open wounds, or arguably weeping weals too, would (after all) produce blood, less probably sweat.
10. Any method of producing a simulated sweat imprint which involved an oven heating step or equivalent to develop colour in an imprint would additionally produce general yellowing of the entire fabric, non-imprinted as well, such that the linen becomes artificially aged – by some 1300 years! Two birds killed with one stone!
11. Proof of the hunch/hypothesis? Or maybe just corroborating evidence for starters? Not easy. Even if one had access to the Shroud, there are mere traces of the chromophore. At best one could maybe use a microanalytical method to chemically ‘fingerprint’ the chromophore, i.e. the straw-coloured chemical responsible for the body image and compare against known references. But what?
Here’s 2 for starters. First, scan linen fibres (probably with mass spectrometry in the first instance) before and after coloration by exposure to radiation (ultraviolet etc) as proposed in those models based on ‘resurrectional incandescence’. Second, do the same scan using linen that has received a flour imprint that is then roasted and finally washed, i.e. my Model 10.
I say the TS body image chromophore will give a better match with the melanoidins derived from roasted white flour.
I am now signing off temporarily from the site as poster for a trial waiting-period, but will still be available to respond to comments (always welcome, if civil and constructive).
PS: Just to say that in the next day or two I will report in small instalments on changes in those first 150 Google rankings under entry-level search (shroud of turin) that have taken place in the last 4 weeks or so.
PPS: this site has now reappeared in Google listings (Sunday May 27), still under its previous title and tagline on Page 11 of a (shroud of turin) search.
(I modified the title this morning and replaced the tagline with a completely new one).
Previous title: Is the Shroud of Turin really a supernatural ‘selfie’?
New title: Is the Shroud(!) of Turin really some kind of supernatural photographic ‘selfie’?
Previous tagline: Nope, not unless you’ve fallen prey to the fanciful notion of ‘resurrectional incandescence’ and the puffed-up pseudoscience that accompanies it
New tagline: Time to get real! It’s an ingenious medieval modelling of how a sweat imprint left on an impromptu linen STRETCHER might look after 13 centuries of ageing and yellowing (+ identifying bloodstains)!
Bye for now.
(Rational wiki continued)
Is the Shroud of Turin older than we think?
There are many articles[8] online that say two scientists, Giulio Fanti, and Saverio Gaeta, have reexamined the shroud, and found it to be from around the time Jesus existed.
There are three problems with this pronouncement.
First, just because the shroud is from that time does not mean it was necessarily the shroud of Jesus. Yes, the shroud looks like the man was crucified, but it is widely accepted that crucifixion was the most common way to execute people during the First Century CE. Also the 14C-based date of the material doesn’t mean the object was manufactured at that time, it is the date when the plants used to weave the cloth were alive. These usually correspond to the same approximate date within the error range of 14C dating unless the weaver is using unusually old plant material or the cloth being used was already old when it was used.
Second, both scientists are Catholics. I think we all know the track record of claims by Christians in matters of the faith. Also, there might be some motivation for Catholics to want to prove the shroud is real in that Pope Benedict XVI declared it the “official burial shroud of Jesus”.
Third, the methods used. Infrared rays are able to determine the age of something very recent, and not the ancient past. The other method was spectroscopy, which has absolutely nothing to do with the age of the object.
Hypocrisy
Of course some “Shroudies” will claim the skeptics and critics are in denial. However, they seem to have forgotten all the times they’ve been questioning the Shroud just because of the “right date”. The reasons the carbon dating didn’t work was for the nitpickiest of reasons. So it’s tested again on the “right date”, and we find something wrong with that test. Suddenly it’s the skeptics and critics who are being nitpicky! It’s not uncommon for Christian fundies to do this, rather it’s a pretty standard M.O.: Calling critics closed-minded for not subscribing to fundiemumbo jumbo, while at the same timedenyingevolution even when the evidence for it is presented, and evolution denialists’claims to falsifyevolution have never held water.
Ranking: now 19 (May 27, 2018)
26: Why Shroud of Turin’s Secrets Continue to Elude Science
… is unlikely science will provide a full solution to the many riddles posed by the shroud,” Italian physicist Paolo Di Lazzaro, a leading expert on the phenomenon, told National Geographic.
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27: Museum of the Holy Shroud (Museo della Sindone), Turin – TripAdvisor
Rating: 4 – 362 reviews
Museum of the Holy Shroud (Museo della Sindone), Turin: See 362 reviews, articles, and 120 photos of Museum of the Holy Shroud (Museo della Sindone), ranked No.49 on TripAdvisor among 438 attractions in Turin.
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28: Shroud of Turin — Christ’s Blood Is Both There and … – National Review
16 Apr 2016 – Blood and markings on two relics venerated as burial cloths of Christ match, providing physical evidence of His torture, execution, and resurrection.
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29: The Shroud of Turin (Blogspot)
This is the eighteenth (which is updates of the sixteenth and fourteenth) installment of part #15, “Fourteenth century (2)” of my “Chronology of the Turin Shroud: AD 30 – present” series. …… Pageviews: At midnight on 31 March 2018, Google Analytics [Below (enlarge)] gave this blog’s “Pageviews all time history” as 871,539.
http://theshroudofturin.blogspot.co.uk/
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30: Shroud of Turin display at Shrine of Our Lady of …
– La Crosse Tribune30: Shroud of Turin display at Shrine of Our Lady of … – La Crosse Tribune
9 Apr 2018 – The authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, one of the most studied artifacts in human history, remains polarizing centuries after it was first displayed, with both skeptics and believers weighing.
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31: Shroud of Turin | Define Shroud of Turin at Dictionary.com
Shroud of Turin definition, a linen cloth kept in the Cathedral of Turin, Italy, since the late 1500s that bears a faint life-size human image venerated by some as the imprint of the dead body of Jesus. See more.
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/shroud-of-turin
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32: First Friday Club of Cleveland attendees ‘encounter’ Shroud of Turin …
First Friday Club of Cleveland attendees ‘encounter’ Shroud of Turin · April 5, 2018. If there was no resurrection and our … Before offering the final blessing, Auxiliary Bishop emeritus Roger Gries, spiritual moderator of the club, remarked, “They say you are what you eat. If you eat the Eucharist and drink of the blood, the …
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33: Council for Study of the Shroud of Turin – Duke
The Shroud of Turin, called by some the Holy Shroud, is an ancient piece of linen 14.3 feet long by 3.7 feet wide which bears many images, the most noticeable of which are the front and back images of a crucified man. It has been housed in the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin, Italy, since 1578, and may well be the …
http://people.duke.edu/~adw2/shroud/
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34: 3D Sculpture of the Man in the Shroud of Turin Created | Mysterious …
5 Apr 2018 – A 3D sculpture of the Man in the Shroud of Turin, which many believe to be the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth, has been created.
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2018/04/3d-sculpture-of-the-man-in-the-shroud-of-turin-created/
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35: DR. BILL STILES: The Shroud of Turin — the burial cloth of Jesus …
30 Nov 2017 – Thirty-four years ago I discovered The Shroud of Turin. It has been a source of fascination ever since. I have studied everything produced in print in movies, DVD’s, through lectures.
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36: The timeless wonder of the Shroud of Turin – The Tablet
2 Apr 2018 – The more scientific research is done on the Shroud, the more evidence builds that it is authentic. Get instant access NOW. Register for 6 FREE articles per month. Subscriptions. Subscribe to The Tablet from just £7.99 for 30 days 3 options available. Print Edition. Delivered to you each week.
Online Access.
http://www.thetablet.co.uk/blogs/1/1154/the-timeless-wonder-of-the-shroud-of-turin-
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37: New test dates Shroud of Turin to era of Christ – USA Today
30 Mar 2013 – Although the Vatican makes no claim on the shroud’s authenticity as a relic, Pope Francis introduced a special TV appearance of the burial cloth on Holy Saturday. … New scientific tests on the Shroud of Turin, which went on display Saturday in a special TV appearance introduced by …
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/03/30/shroud-turin-display/2038295/
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38: KLM Travel Guide – The shroud of Turin
The shroud of Turin is probably the most controversial piece of fabric in the world. One version claims that after Jesus died on the cross, his castigated body was wrapped in this shroud. Scientists do agree that this is not the original cloth; however, the story behind the shroud continues to be remarkable and ..
https://www.klm.com/destinations/gb/en/article/the-shroud-of-turin
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39: Shroud of Turin | History, Description, & Authenticity | Britannica.com
Shroud of Turin, also called Holy Shroud, Italian Santa Sindone, a length of linen that for centuries was purported to be the burial garment of Jesus Christ. It has been preserved since 1578 in the royal chapel of the cathedral of San Giovanni Battista in Turin, Italy. Measuring 4.3 metres (14 feet 3 inches) long and 1.1 metres …
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Shroud-of-Turin
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40: What is the Shroud of Turin? – Quora
4 Oct 2010 – The so called “Shroud” is an extremely interesting example of Medieval art that was fraudulently presented as the genuine burial shroud of Jesus in the heyday of faked relics, the Fourteenth Century. All of the evidence clearly indicates that it is a piece of Medieval art and not a genuine First Century artefact: 1. Documentary …
Is the Shroud of Turin a fake? 6 answers 17 Jul 2017
If it turns out that the Shroud of Turin is the burial … 20 answers 23 Sep 2016
What are the theories behind the Shroud of Turin? 3 answers 17 Oct 2015
Is there evidence supporting the validity of the Shroud … 18 answers 15 Oct 2015
More results from http://www.quora.com
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-Shroud-of-Turin
41: The Shroud of Turin | Book | CMJ Marian Publishers
The Shroud of Turin — A Critical Summary of Observations, Data, and Hypotheses, by John Jackson, PH.D., and The Turin Shroud Center of Colorado. The Shroud of Turin is…
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42: Is the Shroud of Turin Real or Fake? : Christian Courier
The controversy surrounding the so-called “Shroud of Turin” likely will never die. Interest in the controversy waxes and wanes. Exactly what is this mysterious object? Some Roman Catholic authorities contend that it is the burial cloth of Jesus Christ (along with other sacred items, e.g., wood from the cross, a fragment of …
https://www.christiancourier.com/articles/1092-is-the-shroud-of-turin-real-or-fake
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43: The Shroud of Turin – Villanova University
28 Feb 2018 – The Shroud of Turin is a centuries-old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man, a man that millions believe to be Jesus Christ. The Villanova University Art Gallery has invited a speaker who has spent 30 years studying the Shroud in all its aspects. He will display a life-size replica of the Shroud.
https://www1.villanova.edu/villanova/studentlife/artgallery/other-news/the-shroud-of-turin.html
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44: Is the Shroud of Turin Real? | History | Science – Acharya S
Although true believers keep attempting to prove otherwise, through one implausible theory after another, the Shroud of Turin is counted among this group of frauds: There were at least 26 “authentic” burial shrouds scattered throughout the abbeys of Europe, of which the Shroud of Turin is just one…. The Shroud of Turin is …
http://www.truthbeknown.com/shroud.htm
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45: Shroud of Turin a ‘concrete’ proof of Jesus’ love | ABS-CBN News
29 Mar 2018 – Despite scientific debates surrounding the Shroud of Turin, venerated by Catholics as the burial garment of God’s son, it is a concrete evidence of the love of Jesus Christ according to a youth group.
http://news.abs-cbn.com/life/03/29/18/shroud-of-turin-a-concrete-proof-of-jesus-love
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46: The Shroud of Turin: blood or artist’s pigment? – Accounts of Chemical …
by WC McCrone – 1990 – Cited by 45 – Related articles
1 Mar 1990 – Cold Acid Postmortem Blood Most Probably Formed Pinkish-Red Heme-Madder Lake on Madder-Dyed Shroud of Turin. Adrie A. M. van der Hoeven. Open Journal of Applied Sciences 2015 05 (11), 705-746 …
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ar00171a004
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47: The Shroud of Turin – Iowa State University
Anna C. Hersey. The Shroud of Turin. Description and Background. The Shroud of Turin is a piece of linen which is purported to be the burial cloth of Jesus Christ. It measures 4.4 meters by 1.0 meter. In the center of the cloth, the faint front and back imprint of a man’s body can be seen. The man’s image bears signs of …
http://www.public.iastate.edu/~rhetoric/105H17/ahersey/cof.html
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48: Urban Dictionary: turin shroud
The distinctive imprint pattern left on bed sheets after a particularly sweaty encounter, formed typically by the back/underside of the male participant. Like the actual Turin Shroud, but not involving Jesus…probably. …”better throw the covers back over, don’t want your mother seeing the Turin Shroud!”.
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=turin%20shroud
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49: Turin Shroud: “Blood” Still Fake | Center for Inquiry
28 Jul 2017 – “New research,” reports the Catholic News Agency (July 14, 2017), indicates that the “Shroud of Turin Bears Blood of a Torture Victim.” Actually, it was the research that was tortuous: questionable science in the service of confirmation bias. At issue is the article “Atomic resolution studies detect new biologic …
http://www.centerforinquiry.net/blogs/entry/turin_shroud_blood_still_fake/
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50: Is the Shroud of Turin authentic? – Got Questions?
16 Apr 2007 – Answer: The Shroud of Turin is a linen cloth that some believe to have been the cloth that Jesus Christ was buried in. Each of the three Synoptic Gospels mentions Jesus being wrapped in a cloth when He was taken down from the cross (Matthew 27:59; Mark 15:46; Luke 23:53). The Shroud of Turin was “discovered,” or at …
https://www.gotquestions.org/shroud-of-Turin.html
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51: The Shroud of Turin – Magis Center
The Shroud of Turin. Can science prove that this burial shroud, imprinted with marks that reflect the wounds of crucifixion, was used to cover Jesus of Nazareth? READ MORE. March 29, 2018. Professor Creates 3D Image of Christ from Shroud of Turin. Giulio Fanti, a professor at the University of Padua, has created a 3D …
https://www.magiscenter.com/the-shroud-of-turin/
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52: STURP
STURP. In 1978 a large team of American scientists traveled to Turin, Italy to conduct an in-depth scientific examination of the Shroud. In Turin they were joined by a number of international colleagues. The expedition, under the auspices of the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP), was the first such extensive scientific …
http://www.shroudofturin.com/sturp.html
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53: “Finding Jesus: Faith. Fact. Forgery.” The Shroud of Turin (TV … – IMDb
Rating: 5.5/10 – 15 votes
Documentary · Examines an ancient cloth to determine whether it is the actual burial cloth which wrapped Jesus’ body. It is inter-cut with scenes of the flogging of Jesus, his walk to the crucifixion, and the crucifixion itself.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4593256/
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54: Is Shroud of Turin really Christ’s burial cloth? Conference will give …
8 Dec 2017 – The Shroud of Turin may be only 14½ feet long and 3½ feet wide, but its fame, history and mystery stretch much, much further. For centuries, it has been revered as an icon, relic or reminder of Jesus of Nazareth’s brutal, bloody death on the cross. Just as often, however, the scarred linen burial cloth has …
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55: EXHIBIT: HOLY SHROUD OF TURIN : Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe
9 Apr 2018 – The Shroud of Turin is a centuries’ old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man, who millions believe to be Jesus of Nazareth. Modern science has completed hundreds of thousands of hours of detailed study and intense research on the Shroud. It is, in fact, the single most studied artifact in human …
https://www.guadalupeshrine.org/exhibit-shroud-of-turin
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56: See the Shroud of Turin exhibit at Our Lady of the … – Herald & Review
13 Jan 2018 – Mike Brettl reads the material that is in The Shroud of the Turin exhibit is on display Thursday at Our Lady of the Holy Spirit in Mount Zion. The exhibit is filled with photos and illustrations regarding the Shroud of Turin, believed to be the burial cloth of Jesus.
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57: Is an earthquake behind the Shroud of Turin image? – HeritageDaily …
An earthquake in Old Jerusalem might be behind the famous image of the Shroud of Turin, says a group of researchers led by Alberto Carpinteri of the Politecnico di Torino in Italy in an article published in Springer’s journal Meccanica. They believe that neutron radiation caused by an earthquake could have induced the …
https://www.heritagedaily.com/2014/02/is-an-earthquake-behind-the-shroud-of-turin-image/102058
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58: The Truth About the Shroud of Turin: Solving the Mystery: Amazon.co …
Buy The Truth About the Shroud of Turin: Solving the Mystery by Robert K. Wilcox (ISBN: 9781596986008) from Amazon’s Book Store. Everyday low prices and free delivery on eligible orders.
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59: The Shroud of Turin: The Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ?: Amazon.co.uk …
I’ve read a LOT of Shroud books and this has a LOT of information not mentioned elsewhere — from two of the INSIDERS in Shroud research. This is the earliest book I’ve found that discusses the Sudarium of Oviedo and its relationship to the Shroud. This is LOADED with color photos. Most Shroud books — especially those …
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60: Shroud of Turin | Inters.org
I. The Birth of the Problem – II. The Linen Sheet known as the “Shroud of Turin” – III.
The Information displayed by the Linen and the Information given by the Gospels about the Crucifixion and the Burial of Jesus of Nazareth – IV. Main Historical Steps of the Path of the Shroud – V. Analysis of the Experimental Sciences on the …
http://inters.org/shroud-of-turin
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61: CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: The Shroud of Turin – New Advent
The Holy Shroud (of Turin) This name is primarily given to a relic now preserved at Turin, for which the claim is made that it is the actual “clean linen cloth” in which Joseph of Arimathea wrapped the body of Jesus Christ (Matthew 27:59). … That the authenticity of the Shroud of …
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13762a.htm
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62: Shroud of Turin: Visiting the Shroud Museum – Italy Travel Guide
Come with me for a tour of the Museum of the Shroud of Turin, Turin’s most famous attraction, complete with video!
https://www.italylogue.com/featured-articles/shroud-of-turin-visiting-the-shroud-museum.html
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63: Shroud of Turin – McCrone Research Institute / Chicago
According to Dr. Walter McCrone and his colleagues, the 3′ by 14′ foot cloth depicting Christ’s crucified body is an inspired painting produced by a Medieval artist just before its first appearance in recorded history in 1356.
http://www.mccroneinstitute.org/v/64/The-Shroud-of-Turin
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64: John Calvin and the Shroud of Turin – CSI
Yet he does not (for reasons that will become clear) list that most famous of shrouds, the Shroud of Turin. Nevertheless, he does seem to refer to it when he mentions Jesus’ shroud having borne “the full-length likeness of a human body on it” (Calvin 1543, 239). Except for later copies, the Shroud of Turin is apparently …
https://www.csicop.org/sb/show/john_calvin_and_the_shroud_of_turin
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65: Shroud of Turin – 1st century relic, or medieval … – Abroad in the Yard
The news that scientific experiments carried out at the University of Padua have apparently dated the Shroud of Turin can be back to the 1st century AD is just the latest in series of claims and counter-claims about its authenticity. The Turin Shroud is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who appears to have suffered …
http://www.abroadintheyard.com/shroud-of-turin-1st-century-relic-or-medieval-forgery/
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66: Shroud of Turin Center — MARY MOTHER of the CHURCH ABBEY
The Shroud of Turin Center was established in 1997 to provide educational services to the public and to conduct scientific and historical research. The Center houses full-size color transparencies and full-size black-and-white negative transparencies of the Shroud, and a full-size replica of the Cross of the Crucifixion.
http://richmondmonks.org/home/shroud-of-turin-center/
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67: Atomic resolution studies detect new biologic evidences on the Turin …
by E Carlino – 2017 – Cited by 3 – Related articles
30 Jun 2017 – Citation: Carlino E, De Caro L, Giannini C, Fanti G (2017) Atomic resolution studies detect new biologic evidences on the Turin Shroud. PLoS ONE 12(6): e0180487. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0180487. Editor: Yogendra Kumar Mishra, Institute of Materials Science, GERMANY. Received: March 8 …
Abstract · Introduction · Materials and methods · Conclusions
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0180487
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68: Local lecturer brings world class Shroud of Turin … – Cleveland.com
19 Feb 2018 – MIDDLEBURG HEIGHTS, Ohio — The late Pope John Paul II called the Shroud of Turin a “challenge to our intelligence.” “It first of all requires of every person, particularly the researcher, that he humbly grasp the profound message it sends to his reason and his life,” the pope, now saint, said during his 1998 …
http://www.cleveland.com/middleburg-heights/index.ssf/2018/02/post_88.html
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69: The Shroud of Turin: A Mystery Across the Ages / OrthoChristian.Com
by FA Young – Related articles
Is it not providential that today, in this age of science’s hegemony, they are being challenged by a mysterious piece of cloth, the Shroud of Turin, believed by many to be the burial shroud of Jesus Christ? To say that the Shroud is a challenge to hard-line materialists is not to say that the debate over its authenticity is neatly …
http://orthochristian.com/81330.html
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70: Shroud of Turin – St. Nicholas Ukrainian Church
The Shroud of Turin is a long linen cloth made of out flax and measures 14 feet long and 3.5 feet wide. It bears the faint image of a bearded, crucified man with bloodstains that match the wounds of crucifixion suffered by Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in all four gospel narratives. It has been in Turin, Italy since 1578, over …
http://www.st-nicholas-church.org/shroud-of-turin.html
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71: Seeing the Shroud of Turin in Torino, Italy – Luxe Adventure Traveler
Torino, site of the 2006 Winter Olympics, is located on the left bank of the Po River. Aside from being a city of porticos, Torino is also well known as the home of the Shroud of Turin. The Shroud of Turin is a centuries old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man; a man that millions believe to be Jesus of Nazareth.
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72: Radiocarbon dating of the Shroud of Turin | Nature
by PE Damon – 1989 – Cited by 288 – Related articles
P. E. Damon; , D. J. Donahue; , B. H. Gore; , A. L. Hatheway; , A. J. T. Jull; , T. W. Linick; , P. J. Sercel; , L. J. Toolin; , C. R. Bronk; , E. T. Hall; , R. E. M. Hedges; , R. Housley; , I. A. …
Very small samples from the Shroud of Turin have been dated by accelerator mass spectrometry in laboratories at Arizona, Oxford and Zurich. As controls, three samples…
https://www.nature.com/articles/337611a0
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73: A hoax? A sacred cloth? Shroud of Turin goes on trial next week …
17 Feb 2018 – In this pool photo taken Sunday, June 21, 2015, and made available Monday, June 22, Pope Francis prays in front of the Holy Shroud, the 14 foot-long linen revered by some as the burial cloth of Jesus, on display at the Cathedral of Turin, Italy, Sunday, June 21, 2015. Francis visited the long linen with the …
http://www.virginiamn.com/news/local/a-hoax-a-sacred-cloth-shroud-of-turin-goes-on/article_e82b22c4-142f-11e8-aaa6-737f57725eeb.html
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74: Mounting evidence for the Shroud of Turin’s … – Denver Catholic
16 Apr 2018 – Many Catholics have held the Shroud of Turin to be the main linen burial cloth discovered by the disciples in the tomb. Then the Shroud was carbon dated in 1988 by three different labs. The test showed the linen to date from 1260–1390 AD, seeming to prove the Shroud a medieval fake! Since then …
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75: THE SHROUD OF TURIN – ER – NASA
In the “truth is stranger than fiction category” a phone call to NASA’s JPL from a member of the Christ Brotherhood in New Mexico, requesting image analysis of a religious relic, has drawn two men from JPL’s image processing lab into a fascinating investigation of the famous “Shroud of Turin.” The controversial shroud is a 4 …
https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/shroud.html
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76: Shroud of Turin life-size replica arrives in Shreveport – KSLA News 12 …
12 Feb 2018 – “First of all, my eye is drawn to the face of Jesus himself,” pointed Father Peter Mangum as he showed us this life-size replica of the Shroud of Turin. It will soon be the centerpiece of a special public exhibit in mid-March at the Cathedral of Saint John Berchmans in Shreveport.
http://www.ksla.com/story/37488923/shroud-of-turin-life-size-replica-arrives-in-shreveport
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77: Shroud of Turin Unveiled for Youth in Documentary – EWTN Ireland
27 Mar 2018 – With Holy Week, a skeptical world is ripe to hear these messages again, especially youth. That’s why The Holy Winding Sheet: Exploring the Shroud of Turin comes with a fresh twist: It’s made specifically for young people. The Holy Winding Sheet (HolyWindingSheet.com) — titled after the name the shroud …
http://www.ewtnireland.com/shroud-turin-unveiled-youth-documentary/
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78: Turin Shroud Goes on Display – ABC News
Veiled in mystery, the Shroud of Turin, one of the world’s most famous religious relics, is on display starting today for 70 days — the longest time in its history. There have been only four expositions of the shroud in the 20th century. It last went on display in 1998. The shroud, a piece of herringbone twilled linen cloth …
https://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=82905
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79: Shroud Jesus was allegedly wrapped in gets … – New York Post
18 Jul 2017 – The Shroud of Turin is stained with the blood of a torture victim, according to a new study which backs up claims it was used to bury Jesus Christ. The linen cloth, believed to have been used to wrap the body of Jesus after his crucifixion, contains “nanoparticles” which are …
https://nypost.com/…/shroud-jesus-was-allegedly-wrapped-in-gets-scientific-support/
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80: The Big Bang and the Shroud of Turin | Fr. Dwight Longenecker
2 Apr 2018 – The Big Bang and the Shroud of Turin. I remember once hearing a skeptic chortle that the Genesis story was all hokum because God created light on the first day, but the sun, moon and stars were only created on the fourth day and that was dumb because how could you have light without the sun, moon …
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81: The Shroud of Turin – the ticking time bomb – Religion News …
21 Sep 2017 – How ironic that Christianity’s most precious relic, widely held as validating Jesus’s resurrection, actually denies it. So concludes author J. Thomas Devins in his recently published book, The Illusion of Death. The Shroud is Jesus’s burial cloth. It contains a faint image of His prone, naked body complete with …
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82: Shroud of Turin replica exhibit comes to Saginaw | MLive.com
16 Feb 2018 – A national Shroud of Turin replica exhibit has come to Saginaw.
http://www.mlive.com/news/saginaw/index.ssf/2018/02/shroud_of_turin_replica_exhibi.html
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83: The Passion of Christ In Light of the Holy Shroud of Turin – Lighthouse …
The Holy Shroud of Turin was called the greatest relic in Christendom by Pope John Paul II. In fact, the Shroud is the most studied scientific object in the entire world. Fr. Peffley presents new and detailed scientific and medical evidence for the authenticity of the Holy Shroud. This presentation brings greater clarity as to the …
https://www.lighthousecatholicmedia.org/store/title/the-passion-of-christ-in-light-of-the-holy-shroud-of-turin
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84: Holy Winding Sheet: Home
The Holy Winding Sheet. Exploring The Shroud of Turin … This fascinating program traces the Shroud’s journey from Jerusalem to Turin, explores the controversial 1988 carbon dating test, and shows how the image of the crucified man could not have been faked.
http://www.holywindingsheet.com/HolyWindingSheet/index2.htm
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85: The Truth About the Shroud of Turin: Solving the Mystery: Amazon.co …
Buy The Truth About the Shroud of Turin: Solving the Mystery by Robert K. Wilcox (ISBN: 9781596986008) from Amazon’s Book Store. Everyday low prices and free delivery on eligible orders.
My personal observations:
This is an advertisement Google. So what’s it doing ranked as No.85? Why is it not flagged as an ad’?
Do you have a cosy relationship with Amazon?
Each time an ad is included in top ranking, a non-commercial website is pushed one down the rankings, maybe out the rankings altogether (given the generally finite number of pages returned per search).
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86: The Shroud of Turin – Dixit Ciencia
by VOFAF PATHOLOGIST
For four centuries, a piece of linen cloth, 4.3 x 1.1 meters in size and bearing the frontal and dorsal images of a human body, has been kept in Turin, Italy. Individual and group scientific studies have been performed on this cloth, known as the Shroud of Turin. The most exhausting study was done in 1978. 1 . Prior to 1978 …
Click to access ssi05part3.pdf
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87: Shroud of Turin – Cathedral of St.John Berchmans
Barrie Schwortz was the Official Documenting Photographer for the Shroud of Turin Research Project, the team that conducted the first in-depth scientific examination of the Shroud in 1978. Today, he plays an influential role in Shroud research and education as the editor and founder of the internationally recognized Shroud…
https://sjbcathedral.org/shroud-of-turin/
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88: VIDEO: How to Fake the Shroud of Turin from Secrets: The Turin …
Video for shroud of turin video how to fake
Without the use of pigment or paintbrushes, could the Turin Shroud have been faked? Luigi Garlaschelli …
https://www.smithsonianchannel.com/videos/how-to-fake-the-shroud-of-turin/21535
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89: The Shroud of Turin is a Forgery
The Shroud of Turin has become the single-most important religious relic on the planet. Said to be the cloth that was wrapped around Jesus of Nazareth after his crucifixion, it is not surprising that it has become so revered. The shroud does indeed contain the image of a man and many of the features on the cloth do show …
http://shroudturinfake.yolasite.com/
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90: The Shroud of Turin: A Mystery Across the Ages / Православие.Ru
by FA Young – Related articles
On this day, the Church celebrates the icon of the Savior “Made Without Hands”—the prototype of which is believed to be an image of Jesus Christ’s holy face, left on a cloth used to cover His face at burial after the crucifixion. An exhaustively researched and highly interesting article by Fr. Alexy Young, Nun Michaila, and …
http://pravoslavie.ru/81330.html
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91: Was the Turin shroud ‘painted’ by bacteria? | Guardian Weekly …
But a respected American microbiologist has done just that, and he has lathered himself in germs to persuade the rest of us. Stephen Mattingly of the University of Texas Health Science Centre in San Antonio believes the image on the Turin shroud was created not by human hands or any mystical power, as has been …
https://www.theguardian.com/guardianweekly/story/0,12674,979921,00.html
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92: Is the Shroud of Turin Really Christ’s Burial Cloth? by … – The Epistle
(6) As Jesus ‘CARRIED THE CROSS by himself’ to Golgotha (John 19:17), so abrasions on the left shoulder blade and right shoulder area of the Shroud man … Jesus’ wealthy benefactor would explain how the Shroud man got wrapped in an expensive 3:1 herringbone linen burial cloth.122 (10) The Gospels tell us that …
http://epistle.us/articles/shroudofturin2.html
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93: Professor Creates ‘Precise’ 3D Image of Jesus Using Shroud of Turin
An Italian professor has created a 3D image of Jesus based off of the Shroud of Turin, claiming that it is the “precise image of what Jesus looked like on this earth.” … By Michael Gryboski , Christian Post Reporter | Mar 28, 2018 4:41 PM. (Screenshot: YouTube/TgPadova Telenuovo)A 3D image of Jesus Christ, based off of …
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94: New research: Shroud of Turin bears blood of a torture victim
Turin, Italy, Jul 14, 2017 / 02:30 am (CNA/EWTN News).- New research indicates that the Shroud of Turin shows signs of blood from a torture victim, and undermines arguments that the reputed burial shroud of Jesus Christ was painted. Very small particles attached to the linen fibers of the shroud “have recorded a scenario …
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95: Christ is Risen! A TED Talk on the Shroud of Turin — Monomakhos
Christ is Risen! A TED Talk on the Shroud of Turin. April 8, 2018 68 Comments. Christ is risen to all my brothers and sisters here at Monomakhos! I trust you all had a spiritually profitable Lent and a joyous Feast of Feasts. As for myself, I’ve resolved to continue my abstention from Demon Weed (at least that’s the game plan …
http://www.monomakhos.com/christ-is-risen-a-ted-talk-on-the-shroud-of-turin/
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96: December | 2015 | Shroud of Turin Blog
15 Dec 2015 – The feature article in the December 2015 issue of the New Oxford Review is an article by Maria Hsia Chang, The Virgin Birth: Where Science Meets Scripture. If that occurs — if replicability is achieved for the DNA data from the Shroud and Sudarium — it means Jesus indeed was an XX male. We are then …
https://shroudstory.com/2015/12/
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97: The Turin Shroud: The earliest painted representation? | Christie’s
Does this 16th-century prayerbook,auctioned at Christie’s in July 2016, show the earliest recorded image of the undamaged holy relic?
https://www.christies.com/features/Turin-shroud-prayerbook-7442-1.aspx
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98: The Shroud of Turin and the Facts – Catholic Education Resource Center
Here are some of the basic points shroud doubters have to answer. Some time ago a mainstream media outlet reported on the Shroud of Turin and said, “P…
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99: The Shroud of Turin – In Defense of the Cross
The Shroud of Turin | Resources, Facts and Images of the Sacred Relic owned by the Catholic Church which appears to be the Burial Cloth of Jesus Christ
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100: OSA | Scientific investigation of the Shroud of Turin
by EJ Jumper – 1980 – Cited by 41 – Related articles
Abstract. This article introduces three research papers discussing various scientific tests run on the Shroud of Turin—an ancient piece of linen that appears to bear faint images of a man’s body. It also briefly reviews the chemical, photographic, and x-ray tests not dealt with in the three research papers, which are concerned ..
https://www.osapublishing.org/ao/abstract.cfm?uri=ao-19-12-1909
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101: Shroud Research – CONFERENCE-2017
The International Conference on the Shroud of Turin (ICST-2017) was held July 19 to 22, 2017, in Pasco, Washington. The conference, twenty-fourth in the conference series, included top researchers from Italy, Spain, France, Mexico, Australia, and the United States, and included 34 hours of PowerPoint presentations and …
http://www.shroudresearch.net/conference-2017.html
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102: Shroud of Turin expert, replica to be at library – Fort Morgan Times
Posted: 11/30/2017. A life-size replica of the Shroud of Turin will also be on display. The Shroud of Turin will be the subject of a special Brown Bag lunch and program on Tuesday, Dec. 12, at noon, downstairs in the Children’s Library at the Fort Morgan Public Library and Museum. John Jackson from the …
http://www.fortmorgantimes.com/entertainment/ci_31491901/shroud-turin-expert-replica-be-at-library
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103: THE SHROUD OF TURIN for Children – HOME
HOME · Here is the Story…… En Español: · Some Interesting Facts: · Your Drawings & Paintings: Picture. READ ABOUT THIS AMAZING PICTURE OF JESUS! LEARN ABOUT THE HISTORY FIND OUT ABOUT THE SCIENTIFIC STUDIES
http://www.shroud4kids.com/index.html
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104: holy winding sheet: exploring the shroud of turin – EWTN Religious …
HOLY WINDING SHEET: EXPLORING THE SHROUD OF TURIN Parker Dow, as part of his senior thesis at a St. Louis high school, chose to investigate the Shroud of Turin over a 6-month period. His research focused on that of five leading experts in the field, who all concluded that the Shroud was indeed the burial cloth of …
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105: Professor creates 3D image of Jesus based on Shroud of Turin …
29 Mar 2018 – An Italian professor has created a 3D image of Jesus based on the Shroud of Turin, declaring it the ‘precise image of what Jesus looked like on this earth’.
https://www.christiantoday.com/article/professor-creates-3d-image-of-jesus-based-on-shroud-of-turin/127925.htm
My personal observations:
One hardly knows where to start, with the good professor become more dogmatic, more strident, more OTT with each passing day.
One could of course start with the facts, which are totally misrepresented in the following quote from this posting:
Fanti explained that the 3D image allowed for the many wounds on the figure believed by many to be Jesus to be examined.
‘I counted 370 wounds from the flagellation, without taking into account the wounds on his sides, which the Shroud doesn’t show because it only enveloped the back and front of the body,’ he said.
No, the scourge marks cannot be confidently referred to casually as “wounds”. Why not? Because we are told they are NOT represented in the body image. They are entirely due to blood (or “blood”). So unless one can be absolutely certain that the TS is not a medieval forgery, then those scourge marks could have been brushed or painted onto a human subject (e.g. volunteer) after applying an imprinting medium but BEFORE draping over linen and pressing down to deposit a body/blood imprint (thereby conforming to the “blood before body image” presumption based on the enzyme-digestion studies of STURP’s Heller and Adler).
There is also the small matter of 3D-rendering. Any 2D image, imprints especially, that has gradations of image intensity can produce a 3D response using the appropriate software (e.g. modern downloadable ImageJ). Even the scourge marks on the ShroudScope (Durante 2002 photograph) respond magnificently to ImageJ as I showed some years ago.
It really is time that Professor Fanti and others ceased misrepresenting the image characteristics of the TS, those “wounds”, “scourge marks” and “3D properties” especially. Reminder: Religion-smitten* Prof Fanti is a mechanical engineer by profession, not a scientist. He lacks the scepticism and objectivity that one expects of the genuine investigative scientist
*Here’s how he ended an interview with Louis Figueiredo:
“I will end this discussion by saying something about my convictions after studying the TS from many points of view over seventeen years. The TS is a linen sheet that cannot be restricted to scientific studies. It goes beyond this because it is a man-made textile showing an image not made by human hands. I will go even further by stepping out of the realm of science for a moment. The TS is the only “photograph” that Jesus Christ left for us to remember how much He suffered for us also showing by means of a burst of energy used to impress the body image that there is life after death.”
Speaking for myself I believe that science needs to be kept strictly separate from religious faith WHEN PLACING CLAIMS BASED ALLEGEDLY ON EXPERIMENTATION INTO THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. That’s especially if using those somewhat controversial, lightly-refereed ‘open access’ journals that can convey an air of solid academic respectability, all too often undeserved).
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106: Shroud of Turin’s 3D encoded info — how’d it get there? – WND.com
22 Mar 2018 – This weekend marks the beginning of Holy Week, beginning with Palm Sunday and culminating in Easter Sunday when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ after his Good Friday crucifixion and death on the cross. Christianity is the world’s largest religion, with 3.2 billion members – most …
http://mobile.wnd.com/2018/03/shroud-of-turins-3d-encoded-info-howd-it-get-there/
My personal observations: Yet another attempt to make the response to 3D-rendering software seem more mysterious than it really is.
See the banner at the top of this website. All I did was to wet my hand and press it down briefly onto darkish denim to leave an imprint. That was photographed, then uploaded to ImageJ.
3D-rendering was then applied using ImageJ software, before and after light/dark inversion (“negative” to “positive”).
Yes, all it takes is plain water to generate a splendid 3D response! How much longer will we be subjected to the twaddle about the “unique response” displayed by the TS image to 3D-rendering software?
It’s the software that produces the effect, merely by elevating image density on a virtual (imaginary) height dimension. The resulting 3D result is an entirely man-made artefact (an apt description some might say for the TS itself – approx 1260-1390 manufacture!
That’s not to say that the imprinting procedure (pressing linen onto 3D body contours) does not contribute to final “3D-ness”. But if one does not have the template to hand, then one can only speculate as to the precise shape (and history) of the template if having only the final 3D-rendered image! One is deep into artefact territory!
Update: May 6, 2018
Tried googling (shroud of turin 3D) a few minutes ago, wondering if or where this site might appear (“meegling”!).
Guess what? This site did appear, but only because of this particular listing against No.106 of someone else’s posting:
Is the Shroud of Turin really a supernatural ‘selfie’? | Nope, not unless …
106: Shroud of Turin’s 3D encoded info — how’d it get there? – WND.com. 22 Mar 2018 – This weekend marks the beginning of Holy Week, beginning with Palm Sunday and culminating in Easter Sunday when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ after his Good Friday crucifixion and death on the cross.
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107: Shroud of Turin – evidence it is authentic; the real shroud of Jesus Christ
Below is a summary of scientific and historical evidence supporting the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin as the ancient burial cloth of the historical Jesus of Nazareth. by J. Michael Fischer, adapted from the original article by John C. Iannone. THE SHROUD AS AN ANCIENT TEXTILE ..
https://www.newgeology.us/presentation24.html
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108: The Shroud of Turin (1355) – The Museum of Hoaxes
The Shroud of Turin first came to the attention of the public in 1355, when it was exhibited at the Church of St. Mary in Lirey, France. It had been given to the church by a French knight, Geoffroy de Charny, who probably acquired it in Constantinople. Its supporters claim that this fourteen-foot piece of cloth bearing the image ..
http://hoaxes.org/archive/permalink/the_shroud_of_turin
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109: Man of the Shroud Touring Exhibit – National Shrine of St. Maximilian …
The Shroud of Turin has long been venerated by the faithful and is believed by many to be the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth. The Shroud is one of the most scientifically studied religious icons in history. As science has progressed, so has the speculation on how the image of the crucified man of the Shroud was made.
https://kolbeshrine.org/shroud-of-turin-exhibit
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110: The Shroud of Turin Replica & Talk | Archdiocese of Baltimore
5 Nov 2017 – Considered one of the greatest mysteries of our time, the Shroud of Turin continues to amaze and baffle scientists, doctors, historians, artists and theologians. Scientists cannot explain the source of the image which contains photographic and 3-D properties on a cloth centuries old. But is this the actual …
https://www.archbalt.org/event/shroud-turin-replica-talk/
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111: Is the Shroud of Turin a Genuine Miracle? : Strange Notions
In June I had the joy to spend a week in Italy. One reason for my pilgrimage was to venerate the Shroud of Turin. I had been intrigued by the supposed burial cloth of Christ since I was in college, and as I was in England leading a pilgrimage with Joseph Pearce, I did not want to miss the chance of traveling to Turin to see the …
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112: Shroud of Turin exhibit coming to St. Mary Catholic … – FOX6Now.com
16 Apr 2018 – WAUKESHA — The Catholic Community of Waukesha has announced it will host The Man of the Shroud Exhibit, exploring the Shroud of Turin from Friday, April 20 through Monday, April 23. The exhibit will be open to the public from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. each day at the St.
http://fox6now.com/2018/04/16/shroud-of-turin-exhibit-coming-to-st-mary-catholic-church-in-waukesha/
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113: Shroud of Turin Facts Check: Carbon 14 Dating Biggest Mistake
The Shroud of Turin: Facts and Fiction about the Shroud of Turin that millions believe is the burial shroud of Jesus Christ.
http://www.factsplusfacts.com/
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114: Shroud of Turin “Shocking Evidence” with Barrie … – Blog Talk Radio
9 Mar 2018 – The Shroud of Turin is not just some piece of medieval forgery, but an unbelievable piece of history pointing to the Truth of Jesus of Nazareth. Join with world leading expert on the Shroud of Turin, Barrie Schwortz. The scientific evidence will blow you away!!! You can keep up with Barrie at his website …
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115: Is this proof that the Turin Shroud was used to bury Jesus … – Daily Mirror
› News › World news › Jesus of Nazareth
17 Jul 2017 – Experts have revealed that the Shroud of Turin shows signs of blood from a victim of torture – supporting claims it was used to bury Jesus. The linen cloth, believed to have been used to wrap the body of Jesus after crucifixion, contains ‘nanoparticles’ which are not typical of the blood of a healthy person.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/proof-turin-shroud-used-bury-10815665
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116: ‘Finding Jesus’: Shroud of Turin Q&A – CNN – CNN.com
9 Feb 2017 – Religion professor and “Finding Jesus” series consultant Mark Goodacre answers viewers’ questions about the first episode, “The Shroud of Turin.”
https://edition.cnn.com/2015/03/03/living/finding-jesus-q-a-shroud-turin/index.html
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117: Shroud Of Turin Goes Back On Display In Italy For A Limited … – NPR
19 Apr 2015 – Archbishop Cesare Nosiglia presents the Holy Shroud during a preview for the news media at the Cathedral of Turin, Italy, on Saturday. … The Shroud of Turin, an artifact that many people believe to be the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth, goes back on public display today for the first time in five years in …
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118: shroud of Turin – The Skeptic’s Dictionary – Skepdic.com
29 Oct 2015 – Apparently, the first historical mention of the shroud as the “shroud of Turin” is in the late 16th century when it was brought to the cathedral in that city, though it was allegedly discovered in Turkey during one of the so-called “Holy” Crusades in the so-called “Middle” Ages. In 1988, the Vatican allowed the …
http://skepdic.com/shroud.html
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119: New examination of Shroud of Turin produces … – Catholic Online
11 Jul 2017 – Detailed look at fiber reveals blood and torture. The Shroud of Turin is an amazing artifact that dates back at least to medieval period. The shroud is typical of those used to wrap the bodies of the …
https://www.catholic.org/news/hf/faith/story.php?id=75457
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120: Scientists publish new data on the Shroud of Turin – UOJ – the Union of …
15 Jul 2017 – Andrea Tornelli, in an article published in the Italian newspaper La Stampa, spoke about the new results of a scientific research of the famous Shroud of Turin – a linen cloth, in which, according to Christian tradition, the body of Jesus Christ was wrapped after the crucifixion. The study showed that the fabric …
http://spzh.news/en/news/44466-scientists-publish-new-data-on-the-shroud-of-turin
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121: History Channel – The Real Face of Jesus from the Turin Shroud on …
Video for shroud of turin history channel real face▶ 1:27:56
9 Aug 2012 May the true and living God who is found ONLY in our Lord Jesus Christ be blessed and praised for ever and …
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122: The Turin’s Shroud – Leonardo Da Vinci is innocent | Beyond Thirty-Nine
1 Jul 2017 – The Turin’s shroud which, according to an ancient tradition had been used to wrap up the mangled body of Jesus had been really in contact with human blood. The result has been scientifically reached in Italy using a thread taken from the back part of the linen fabric. This is the conclusion reached …
https://beyondthirtynine.com/the-turins-shroud-leonardo-da-vinci-is-innocent/
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123: Analysis of blood stains on Turin Shroud reveals … – National Post
nationalpost.com › News › World › Israel & Middle East
18 Jul 2017 – Analysis of blood stains on Turin Shroud reveals ‘severe polytrauma’ and a violent death. Iron particles on the cloth purportedly used to wrap the body of Christ are consistent with multiple extremely painful and likely fatal injuries. An exact copy of the Shroud of Turin, the linen cloth that wrapped the body of …
http://nationalpost.com/news/world/israel-middle-east/blood-stains-on-the-turin-shroud-are-no-cruci-fiction-the-guy-was-in-a-lot-of-pain-study
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124: The Shroud Of Turin: No Ordinary Bed Sheet | Stuff You Should Know
30 Mar 2017 – The Shroud of Turin is no ordinary bed sheet. Some think it’s the burial cloth of Jesus. Others think it’s an amazing piece of artwork. The truth is, we’ll probably never know what it really is. The mystery of the Shroud of Turin awaits you…
https://www.stuffyoushouldknow.com/podcasts/shroud-turin.htm
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125: Shroud of Turin Not a Medieval Forgery, According … – History Channel
28 Mar 2013 – As the Christian world prepares to mark Jesus Christ’s resurrection on Sunday, a highly prized and intensely controversial artifact associated with him comes to the fore. A scientific analysis has yielded a new age for the Shroud of Turin, contradicting claims that the relic is nothing but a medieval forgery.
https://www.history.com/news/shroud-of-turin-not-a-medieval-forgery-according-to-new-book
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126: Pope Francis and the Shroud of Turin | National Catholic Reporter
1 Apr 2013 – While the outside world forms general impressions of Pope Francis, insiders tend to see any new papacy through the prism of their own particular interests. Liturgical traditionalists, for instance, have already voiced some reservations about Francis’ penchant for informality and setting aside the rules, while …
https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/pope-francis-and-shroud-turin
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127: Shroud of Turin Formed by Earthquake? That’s … – The New Republic
20 Feb 2014 – A recent paper by Carpinteri et al. in the journal Meccanica (full reference in margins) demonstrates the two ways that religion is actually a pseudoscience. The first is that it relies on empirical claims to buttress its dogma. While Sophisticated Theologians may argue that God is beyond all evidence, being an …
https://newrepublic.com/article/116689/shroud-turin-formed-earthquake-thats-just-pseudoscience
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128: What Finding Jesus’ Private Parts in the Turin … – The Daily Beast
26 Mar 2017 – What Finding Jesus’ Private Parts in the Turin Shroud Says About Faith. His gender has been used to justify a male-dominated church, so the debate has caused quite a stir. Candida Moss …
https://www.thedailybeast.com/what-finding-jesus-private-parts-in-the-turin-shroud-says-about-faith
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129: The Origins of the Shroud of Turin | History Today
A rectangular linen cloth 4.37 metres long and 1.13 metres wide, the Turin Shroud, housed in that city’s cathedral since 1578, is famous for its two images of a … Charles Freeman, surprised by the lack of research into one of the great unsolved mysteries, reveals for the first time his groundbreaking examination into the …
https://www.historytoday.com/charles-freeman/origins-shroud-turin
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130: 2 studies show that the shroud of Turin in fact dates from the Middle Ages … – Sciences et Avenir
22 Apr 2015 – The shroud said to have been that in which the body of Jesus was wrapped has been put on public display from 19 April in Turin. This will be only the third showing of the …
https://www.sciencesetavenir.fr/decryptage/2-studies-show-that-the-shroud-of-turin-in-fact-dates-from-the-middle-ages_21858
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131: Up close: The Holy Shroud of Turin – Our Sunday Visitor
31 May 2015 – By OSV Staff. On display for the first time in five years, millions of pilgrims are expected to visit the Shroud of Turin, which for centuries has inspired the faithful and stirred debate about its authenticity.
https://www.osv.com/Article/TabId/493/ArtMID/13569/ArticleID/17518/Up-close-The-Holy-Shroud-of-Turin.aspx
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132: The debates go on and on: Could the Shroud of Turin be … – GetReligion
8 Apr 2017 – MARK’S QUESTION: Is the Shroud of Turin really the burial cloth of Jesus? THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER: Is Italy’s celebrated Shroud of Turin an authentic relic of Jesus Christ from the 1st Century that undergirds belief in his crucifixion and resurrection? Or a hoax from medieval times? Or an ingenious …
https://www.getreligion.org/getreligion/2017/4/3/the-debates-go-on-and-on-could-the-shroud-of-turin-be-jesus-actual-burial-cloth
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133: Shroud of Turin – ReligionFacts
17 Mar 2015 – It is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, Italy, from which it derives its most common name. Some believe the Shroud of Turin is the burial cloth of Jesus and that his image was recorded on its fibers at his resurrection. Others contend it is a medieval hoax or forgery.
http://www.religionfacts.com/shroud-turin
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134: Shroud of Turin mystery deepens as DNA from ‘all over Earth’ is found …
20 Oct 2015 – A group of Italian researchers have uncovered new information about the Shroud of Turin that adds even more mystery to what some Christians believe is the burial garment of Jesus Christ. The scientists tested the DNA of pollen and dust on the linen cloth and found that it came …
http://www.kansascity.com/living/religion/article40491456.html
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135: Shroud Of Turin DNA Indicates Global Origins | HuffPost
19 Oct 2015 – There’s a surprising new wrinkle in the story of the celebrated Shroud of Turin. A group of Italian researchers have found that the 14-foot-long garment — believed by some to be the burial cloth of Jesus Christ, even though scientific research suggests that’s not the case — contains DNA from plants found all …
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/turin-shroud-global-dna_us_561d252de4b028dd7ea52ccd
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136: The Shroud of Turin – Ignatius Press
24 Jan 2017 – This DVD can only be sold in the US and Canada. This is the definitive, most up to date collection of 4 stunning films on the Shroud of Turin that spans 38 years of award-winning filmmaking on the Shroud by acclaimed British film producer and director David Rolfe. This incredible collection includes the …
https://www.ignatius.com/The-Shroud-of-Turin-P2224.aspx
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137: Italian scientist reproduces Shroud of Turin – Reuters
5 Oct 2009 – ROME (Reuters) – An Italian scientist says he has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, a feat that he says proves definitively that the linen some Christians revere as Jesus Christ’s burial cloth is a medieval fake. … But scientists have thus far been at a loss to explain how the image was left on the cloth.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-shroud/italian-scientist-reproduces-shroud-of-turin-idUSTRE5943HL20091005
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138: What is the Shroud of Turin? – Catholic Straight Answers
Many of the faithful sincerely believe that the Shroud of Turin is the actual burial cloth of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Without declaring its authenticity, Pope John Paul II has clearly attested to the value of the Shroud. For instance, in 1980, the Holy Father stated, “The Holy Shroud, the most splendid relic of the passion and the …
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139: If the Turin Shroud is the work of a medieval artist, it’s … – Spectator Blogs
27 Apr 2015 – Last week something rather unusual happened in the quiet Italian city of Turin. Inside the 15-century cathedral, an ancient, stained, and burned piece of medieval linen was removed from its airtight, bulletproof case and put on display. The exhibition will last 67 days. Last time the intensely controversial …
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140: Shroud of Turin – New World Encyclopedia
The Shroud of Turin is an ancient linen cloth which some believe is the cloth that covered Jesus of Nazareth when he was placed in his tomb. It bears the image of a man who appears to have been physically traumatized in a manner consistent with crucifixion. The idea is that his image was somehow recorded as a …
History · The Controversy · Theories of image … · Analyses of the Shroud
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Shroud_of_Turin
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141: Trial of the Shroud of Turin | Catholic Answers
19 Jul 2016 – Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, it’s been a long trial, and we thank you for your close attention to the experts we’ve presented. You’ll recall those experts established the journey of the Shroud from Jerusalem in A.D. 30 to its site at the time of the theft in the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin, Italy …
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/trial-of-the-shroud-of-turin
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142: Shroud of Turin replica unveiled in Delco
24 Apr 2017 – Caroline Jushchyshyn, left, leans over the Shroud of Turin replica and examines up close the image of a man, presumed to be Jesus of Nazareth, whose wounds consistent with that of a crucifixion left imprints of his suffering permanently affixed to the piece of fabric. RICK KAUFFMAN — DIGITAL FIRST …
http://www.delcotimes.com/general-news/20170424/shroud-of-turin-replica-unveiled-in-delco
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143: Scientist who tested the Shroud of Turin will discuss … – LancasterOnline
19 Mar 2017 – Is the Shroud of Turin the funeral cloth Jesus was buried in after his crucifixion?
https://lancasteronline.com/features/faith_values/scientist-who-tested-the-shroud-of-turin-will-discuss-what/article_8ab95250-0b39-11e7-83b6-b715ee37720a.html
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144: Dating the Turin Shroud—An Assessment | Radiocarbon | Cambridge …
by HE Gove – 1990 – Cited by 17 – Related articles
18 Jul 2016 – Dating the Turin Shroud—An Assessment – Volume 32 Issue 1 – H E Gove.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/radiocarbon/article/dating-the-turin-shroudan-assessment/F8B07488491458E5272FD3D135379278
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145: The mystery of the Holy Shroud of Turin – Michael Journal
1 Jun 2010 – Last May 2, Pope Benedict XVI went to Turin, Italy, to pray before the Holy Shroud, a centuries-old linen cloth that bears the image of a crucified man, a man that millions believe to be Jesus of Nazareth. (The Church says that it is not a matter of Faith, so people are free to believe or not that it is the real …
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146: NELSON PRICE: The truth about the Shroud of Turin | Opinion …
6 May 2017 – The authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, the alleged burial cloth of Jesus Christ, has long been contested, and will be. I have found a clue that settles the issue.
http://www.mdjonline.com/opinion/nelson-price-the-truth-about-the-shroud-of-turin/article_58e5734a-32d9-11e7-9c07-6fe78ea2b3e7.html
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147: For 600 Years, Shroud of Turin Has Been Known as a Forgery – The …
13 Nov 1988 – To the Editor: James P. McGovern, S.J., objected (letter, Oct. 31) to your having called the Shroud of Turin a ”medieval forgery.” He said there was no evidence to support the use of the term ”forgery” or the implication that the shroud had been fashioned with an intent to deceive. However, your …
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148: Beyond the Linen – The Shroud of Turin | Jesuits in Britain
19 Apr 2015 – Today (19 April), the Shroud of Turin will go on display in the Cathedral of St John the Baptist, where it will be exhibited for 67 days. Among the many thousands of visitors who will see it will be Pope Francis, when he visits Turin on 21 and 22 June. The prospect of discovering the ‘relic of all relics’ is bound …
https://www.jesuit.org.uk/blog/beyond-linen-%E2%80%93-shroud-turin
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149: Modern Science Can’t Duplicate Image on Shroud of Turin
4 Apr 2017 – The Shroud of Turin, revered by Catholics as the sacred burial cloth of Our Lord in His tomb, is considered by some to be a hoax or forgery. Scientists who’ve examined it, however, understand that what caused the image to form on the cloth can’t be reproduced with the current state of science. After five …
https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/modern-science-cant-duplicate-the-image-on-the-shroud-of-turin
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150: Shroud Of Turin Accidentally Washed With Red Shirt – The Onion
10 Mar 2008 – VATICAN CITY—The Shroud of Turin, an ancient linen cloth believed to bear the image of Christ and considered by many clerics and devotees to be one of the holiest relics of the Christian faith, was inadvertently dyed a light shade of pink after being washed with a red T-shirt, sources reported Tuesday.
https://www.theonion.com/shroud-of-turin-accidentally-washed-with-red-shirt-1819569675
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Postscript: Sat June 2, 2018
This site appeared briefly on a Google search under (shroud of turin) early this morning (approx 7am).
But it was no longer visible 30 mins later, or well over 12 hours later. Now you see it, now you don’t…
What we see is the dirty tricks brigade at work, determined to prevent the facts being known, of preventing folk in their homes being able to see ‘joined-up thinking’.
Late addition: July 20, 2018
Halleluja! The open-access journal PLOS ONE was mentioned earlier in this post for carrying the Carlino and Fanti “nanoparticle/blood trauma paper “, Atomic Resolution studies detect new biological evidences on the Turin Shroud”. That paper was roundly criticized here for numerous shortcomings, mainly methodological. Well, guess what? PLOS ONE has responded to the criticism, maybe including mine, maybe not, and retracted the paper (ignoring objections from the authors!). Here’s a screen grab of the PLOS ONE announcement:
Well done, PLOS ONE. I raise my hat to you for maintaining standards (while reminding them that prevention – at the refereeing stage – is better than cure).
The real scandal remains unreported. Of the first 150 under Shroud of Turin displayed on the posting from early May this year, no less than 15 are repetitions of the mass media reporting of the Carlino and Fanti paper – 10% of the total. Yet there is currently no mention of this scientist’s findings over 6 years of reporting his research findings via some 350+ postings, here and on his sciencebuzz site, also communicated in well over 2000 comments posted to Dan Porter’s now lapsed shroudstory site. What we see is the ludicrous preference being given by the Google search engine to mass media and other ‘vehicles’ that it judges to confer authority – usually for having at best a merely nominal refereeing/scrutineering system – treating the personal blog as grossly inferior despite display of actual experimental data, photographic evidence, comments facility etc.
Google is a shabby and disreputable operation, one that is hugely distorting and debasing the world of original scholarship and research. I have all but given up posting to my sites, given the dead hand of Google that strangles new insights at birth… It’s the same with my researches and new thinking re Stonehenge and other Neolithic stone circles.
Update: Saturday July 21
Have just this minute submitted the following comment to “Retraction Watch” (which first alerted me yesterday to the ignominious – and some might think, well-deserved fate – of the hugely over-publicized Carlino, Fanti et al PLOS ONE paper on those “trauma nanoparticles”:
As ths screen grab shows, the comment is presently awaiting moderation:
Update: Sunday July 22, 2018
I got to wondering if or when STERA (Shroud of Turin self-styled Education, self-styled Research Association ) would get its oar in on one or other of the two recent controversies regarding Shroud blood. Sure enough, there’s a headline just appeared on the shroud.com site from its President, Barrie M.Schworz, replendent in his ‘kindly regard me as a scientist’ hat, having a pop at Carlini and Garlaschelli in the immediate wake of their formal publication of their forensic BPA (blood pattern analysis) modelling exercises. STERA has placed a longer swipe on its Facebook page, couched in its now customary derisive language, about as far a cry from “education” and “research” as is possible to imagine. (Yes, STERA is about promotion of authentity – fair enough – but also about attempts to attack or suppress anything and everything that questions authenticity by whatever means – which frankly I consider the pits, the absolute pits).
I did consider doing a point by point rebuttal of that Facebook diatribe as a new posting. But that would interfere with proselytising MY current gripe, which is the failure of “simulated sweat imprint” to gain traction in the sindonological literature – something for which I hold STERA’s shroud.com and similar authenticity-promoting /sceptic suppressing sites at least partly responsible. Yes, I’m minded to keep this current posting in place with its title’s reference to “simulated sweat imprint”, even if Google continues to leave me out its listings under a simple ‘shroud of turin’ search. (Yes, Google is the other chief culprit where suppression of new science-based thinking is concerned, as already indicated).
I may decide to add a point-by-point rebuttal of STERA’s litany of cheap put-downs, with its continuing attempts to talk up the reputation of the cobbled-together STURP team personnel right here, (plus Documenting Photographer’s attempt to bask in their reflected glory, whether real or imagined) possibly in the next day or two.
For now I’m morbidly content to sit back and see what else crawls out the rabidly pro-authenticity pond…
Update, Wed 25 July 2018
Added this yesterday evening as a comment to my own site (it kinda says it all):
The time for being restrained and polite is over. Why?
I have just privately listed some 8 or 9 sindonology sites, all pro-authenticity needless to say, none, I repeat NONE of which have so much as breathed a single word of my “simulated sweat imprint” take on the Turin Shroud.
Why not? Answer – because they know it makes sense, and know it would put them and their fanciful “burial shroud/imaging via resurrectional incandescence” straight out of business if more widely known.
The key to understanding the TS is the disconnect between the 4 Gospel accounts. Pro-authenticity sindonology is only interested in the version supplied in John, maintaining a blind spot for what the preceding 3 synoptic Gospels have to say about Joseph of Arimathea’s linen being delivered to the CROSS, not tomb, to receive a body on which the blood was perceived (for medieval modelling purposes) as still moist and thus capable of leaving its imprint, accompanied by SWEAT as well to produce the body imprint as well.
Shhhh! Don’t mention sweat! Sindonology has closed its ears to sweat, more specifically the notion of the TS body image being a SIMULATED SWEAT IMPRINT produced in medieval times, modelled/inspired no doubt by that Veil of Veronica, attracting paying pilgrims galore.
(See my posting from Nov 2014 in which “simulated sweat imprint” is linked with the pre-exisiting Veil of Veronica)
“We can trump the face-only Veil”, thought the secretive clerics of Lirey, and indeed they were right!
i
My answer to the steeped-in-mystique Turin Shroud - evolving gradually from some 10 years of science-based experimental modelling. 
I shall take the liberty of priming my own comments on this – probably my last posting for some time.
After some 6 years of posting on the so-called ‘Shroud’ of Turin (or as I prefer to say, less propagandist, less mind-controlling, ‘Deposition Linen’ of Turin) and having received scarcely any useful or substantial feedback, at least from know-all pro-authenticity authorities (comments on Dan Porter’s now retired shroudstory site making a welcome change) I’ve come finally to a conclusion. There’s a hitherto unrecognized syndrome, read quirk of human nature.
It’s called ‘enigmaphilia’ (you read it here first).
Folk grow up with those so-called unsolvable enigmas in their head, where they become fixed mental furniture. They become loath to part with those oh-so-familiar items that become essential mystique, without which the mind would seem partially denuded of familiar furniture.
The MSM plays on this need for intermittent reinforcement of those comforting certainties, correction , uncertainties.
The MSM helps to keep those uncertainties carefully corralled, carefully hived off from everyday life…
Need I say more?
I sent the following short message this morning to: (a) Mr.Barrie M.Schwortz , President of STERA, owner of the shroud.com website and to (b) Mr.David Rolfe, Editor of the BSTS Newsletter.
The title of my email was “The Deposition Linen of Turin”
Hello again xxxxxxx
Yes, I believe “Shroud” of Turin to be a seriously misleading misnomer, one that has led to much inappropriate theorizing, not to say pseudoscience, regarding events taking place inside a certain 1st century rock tomb.
Here’s a link to my latest posting, well over 6 years and some 350 internet postings in the making.
I say the Deposition Linen of Turin was a medieval modelling of a simulated sweat imprint (with identifying blood in all the right places)
Enjoy.
Colin Berry (MSc, PhD, retired biomedical scientist)
Herts, UK
Postscript (added June 21 2018)
Barrie M Schwortz has just updated his shroud.com site. There’s a small section headed “The Shroud on the Internet” (5th from bottom ) with a few items only. This site fails to get a mention, needless to say. But then it would be totally out-of-character for that site owner to make reference to this one. Having never done so in the last 6 years or more, why start now?
Update on Google listing: whilst round the opposite side of London this morning, using someone else’s iPad, this site briefly appeared under a Google (shroud of turin) search at the bottom of Page 10, i.e. approx. No.100 in the rankings. (I took a photograph!)
That looked promising, but for one thing. Half an hour later the entry had disappeared, and 8 hours later, back on my own laptop, it’s still not reappeared.
I find it hard to believe that Google (unaided) can be responsible for the ‘now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t’ nonsense. What seems far more likely is the work of sinister tendency pursuing an agenda, the so-called SEOs (search engine optimizers) who make their living from promoting sites they are asked/paid to promote and/or to demote the ones that are being targeted for invisibility.
That doesn’t let Google off the hook completely ,far from it, not if it’s turning a blind eye to all kinds of abuse of its search engine rankings. It must surely be able to detect sudden disappearances that can mean only one thing – manipulation of the system that works, we’re told. primarily by clicks in real time to some sites, not others. Clicks can be summoned up probably in their scores or hundreds, all designed to subvert the system, thanks to those shadowy dedicated organizations, ….
It’s time Google began to tame the monster it has created. Get a grip, Google.
I shall create a daily log, summarized every few days or so here on Comments, showing when this site reappears in the rankings, assuming it ever does, and when it disappears again. Let’s look for a pattern… (But why should I be doing Google’s detective work for it?).
Stop pretending you authenticity-promoting sindonologists that you’re muscled Mr. Universe. That you ain’t. Mr.Puniverse.
You’re a skinny, round-shouldered wimp, lurking in the internet shadows, afraid to step forward and do combat. All I ever saw from you in the early days, 2012 on the Porter site especially, was cowardly hit-and-run tactics.
Come on out of that oh-so- shadowy secret garden of yours! Prepare to do combat! Face up to the facts! Like the TS being merely a medieval era project, one designed to model with a degree of imagination an aged, yellowed sweat/blood imprint left on the biblical ‘fine’ linen brought to the foot of the cross by one Joseph of Arimathea. His linen, brilliantlly modelled, probably by mid-14th century Lirey-based clerics, was intended purely, repeat PURELY, for dignified honour-conferring transport purposes (not the final burial shroud!).
The so-called “Shroud” of Turin is not, repeat NOT, the genuine burial garment of the crucified founder of Christianity!
Indeed, it’s not even a faked version of a burial garment!
It’s in fact a faked version of Joseph of Arimathea’s ‘transport’ stretcher. That, in the bible, was used to convey the crucified Jesus from cross to tomb. But relic-fixated medieval clerics and artisans, intent on attracting pilgrims, imagined and then MODELLED with much inventiveness that brief transport to have deposited an imprint of his newly deceased self in both sweat and blood, the sweat component having yellowed with age to leave a tone-reversed negative contact (photographic-like) imprint.
But that ‘modelling’ took place centuries before the discovery of photography with its similar tone reversal (on the initial light-sensitive silver salt -emulsion prior to second-stage chemical development).
It can hardly be said too often – to authenticity-proselytising sindonologists. “Negative” (tone-reversed) images were around a lot sooner – centruries sooner – than relatively recent 19th century photographs!
How many times does one have to say it – before the message sinks in?
The negative image does NOT imply photography! In an earlier, pre-19th century context, it implies contact-imaging! The objections levelled against contact-imaging – by John Jackson and others – are worthless!
Sindonologists should drop their “authenticity” fantasy. There’s not a single shred of evidence to back that up (hard evidence that is).
The Turin so-called “Shroud”, read faked taut-linen transport stretcher, based on the biblical Joseph of Arimathea intervention, was a superb invention on the part of an obscure, tiny, secretive clique of relic-fixated 14th century opportunists.
Why not celebrate the TS for what it is? It was fabricated as a visual aid for simple trusting moneyed pilgrims – summarising key verses of the New Testament – namely those few in the four canonical Gospels that relate the aftermath of the crucifixion – deficient and indeed contradictory as regards essential detail.
It was a stupendous work of genius – one that has hoodwinked generations of yearning-for-mystique true-believers – latterly aided and abetted by the totally irrelevant intrusion of 19th century photography and 20th century 3D-rendering computer software).
It’s time the “Shroud” of Turin fantasy was seen for what it is – wishful thinking – with lashings of pseudoscience – and finally laid to rest…
Sindonology does a disservice to science (real science that is!). Science, real science, attempts objectively to evaluate alternative ever-evolving models. It does not, repeat NOT, fixate upon and seek to underpin the few that happen to support preconceptions.
Sadly there is no distinct dividing line between science and pseudoscience. But one can do a lot worse than seek out those agenda-driven preconceptions that to this day generate the never-ending onslaught of pseudoscience that appears under Google’s (shroud of turin) listings …
Have been monitoring Google and its listing (or NOT listing!) of this site day by day for over a week.
Google is a disgrace – a complete and utter disgrace
Google has given up performing solely as a search engine. It is now attempting to control what folk see – or don’t see – on the World Wide Web.
The sooner Google gets regulated out of existence this side of the Pond the better. Google is yet another expression of Californian Control Freak Tendency.
Bugger off California.
Google triviali$e$, but I can’t for the life of me think why…
Here’s a link to my latest posting on Stonehenge:
It has just been added to, with an explanation for why Stonehenge is where it is, stuck out there on the somewhat bleak and breezy Salisbury Plain (chalk uplands).
Have just been reading the 15-page internet-tome from French-Canadian Mario Latendresse that dominates the latest BSTS Newsletter (Summer 2018). Given the latter is behind a paywall, with copyright restrictions, I refrain from quoting his words verbatim. Suffice it to say that he has placed a seemingly new word into the Shroud literature, namely “trelle” or “treille” (medieval French), apparently “trellis” in modern English. The gist of his comment was that the 14th/15th century literature regarding the first reportings of the Shroud referred (oh so annoyingly!) to the image being on a “trellis”, with no mention of cloth. “Table” also substitutes for cloth.
Those familiar with this site from its inception (2012) will know that “trellis” featured prominently in my Model 2 (“scorch hypothesis”) being the pattern displayed on the reverse side of the Lirey Pilgrims’ badge (not mentioned by Mario in his current article, though mentioned in a handy article on his site under the “Papers” tab – see link below, he reporting his visit to the Cluny Museum in Paris to view the badge in person.).
I now have a new narrative that could possibly account for the “trellis” involvement. It’s to do with the 14th century modelling of the means by which Joseph of Arimathea’s “fine linen” was used to transport the crucified Jesus from cross to tomb. Maybe it wasn’t an unsupported sagging linen used to transport the body. Maybe the linen was envisaged as being first spread over a lightweight wooden trellis, used to provide sufficient but rigid support for an adult body.
That’s why the trellis is shown on the REVERSE side of the Lirey badge. It added to the credibility, seen through the eyes of medieval pilgrims. It was linen plus trellis as stretcher, not just linen per se!
(Late insertion: unfortunately it’s not a simple trellis shown on the rear of the badge, as I pointed out back in 2014, taking an image from Mario’s sindonology.org site and using MS Paint to give added emphasis to the faint trellis pattern:)
https://shroudofturinwithoutallthehype.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/trellis-with-and-without-blue-overlay.jpg?w=640&h=296
More to come, possibly a new posting after a break of well over 2 months!…
Any new posting from this authenticity-rejecting blogger, like its 350+ predecessors, will no doubt be ignored, needless to say, not only by authenticity-fixated/promoting websites, but the Google so-called search engine, at least by those entering simply entering “shroud of turin”…
But one has to put one’s views on record, if only for the benefit of future historians…
More and more, the internet looks like a medium for Californian-driven mind-manipulation, mind-control. To think we used to worry about the Soviets and their ambitions… All that’s changed are the ambitions …
There’s currently an interesting paper in the Journal of Forensic Science from Matteo Borrini of the Liverpool John Moores University. Here’s a link to just one of the several summaries appearing in the popular press:
https://www.news.com.au/technology/science/archaeology/shroud-of-turin-conceals-a-bloody-secret/news-story/a5b1e20e8da9172e8f456935c6e702b4
Caveat: if you thought you’d seen these results before, you were right: they were presented at conferences in Seattle and Orlando in 2014/2015, as reported on Dan Porter’s blog at the time:
The gist is that the bloodstains on the Shroud are too random in their direction to have been realistically acquired from a crucified body onto a sheet of linen. In short, the bloodstains have been faked.
Reminder of my own (hopefully) final Model 10. Two naked adult male subjects, approximately the same height and build, lay on the floor head to head, one face down, the other face up. White flour was sprinkled over the two separate surfaces, one frontal, the other dorsal, from a height. maybe after an initial smear of oil to act as light adhesive. Surplus flour was fanned/blown or otherwise shaken off. A slurry of red clay or similar was then trickled onto the subjects to represent Mark 1 “blood”, for which the subject could have been moved at intervals, or even stood up to account for the Liverpool modelling data with blood going ‘in all directions’, somewhat fanciful (artistic licence etc).
A sheet of wet linen was then pressed down onto the two subjects simultaneousy (after their returning to the recumbent position). The sheet of flour/clay imprinted linen was then gently roasted over glowing embers (or in a large breadmaking oven or similar) to develop the yellow body image (white flour to melanoidins – comparable to brown crust formation in breadbaking) but not in places that received the “blood”. Later, after removal from heat a more realistic substitute for “blood” was painted on top of the red clay areas (maybe using the last meal of human blood from medicinal leeches, better suited to serve as “paint” given its non-clotting tendencies, as I proposed back in 2012 causing a degree of wonder and indignation).
The two step procedure for Mark 1 and Mark 2 blood accounts for the “blood before image” finding from Adler and Heller, and more recent data that reported traces of red clay in a Shroud “bloodstain” (from microscopy experts Gérard Lucotte et al in Paris).
Click to access n85part3.pdf
PS (added 19 July): the fightback has begun, led by Shroud “expert” Emanuela Marinelli (what does one have to do to qualify for that tag?)
http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2018/07/19/shroud-of-turin-expert-criticises-new-study-casting-doubt-on-authenticity/
Shame it fails to acknowledge the realities and limitations of scientific model building, criticizing the use of an inanimate mannequin as distinct from real live (less than static!) real human subject. Shame also that it contained the customary slander of Shroud sceptics, one that betrays some might think an increasingly desperate attempt to defend an increasingly indefensible position.
Speaking for myself, I’m only here for the science (and ever keen to expose the pseudoscience/special pleading that tries to present itself as science, aided and sometimes abetted by our gullible headline-grabbing mass media and so-called internet search-engines).
Late late addition, July 20: Halleluja” PLOS ONE has retracted the Carlino and Fanti “nanoparticle/blood trauma” paper, the subject of major criticism in this posting and elsewhere, and not before time. I’ve tacked a bit on the end of this posting, supplying links and more detail. Bravo PLOS ONE for restoring standards, and holding back the tide of pseudoscience that bedevils sindonology…
I made an interesting discovery yesterday – a comment placed just a month or so ago on STERA’s Facebook site last month by the admirable David Goulet (a one time frequent visitor to this and Dan Porter’s site, author of the “Looney Tombs” , giving a privileged peep as to what goes on discreetly behind the scenes inside Canada’s funeral parlours!).
https://www.facebook.com/stera.inc
The comment is focused on me, yes ME and my 6+ year programme of Shroud research, thus far reported to the internet only!
Here it is in full:
“Robust update! However I would like to recommend that, perhaps at next update, you give a nod to Colin Berry’s website and ongoing experiments that provide a possible man-made narrative for the Shroud. I know Colin is not the most popular Shroud investigator but his research is compelling. His is, imo, the one non-authentic hypothesis that bears serious consideration. If reason is to serve faith, then we must challenge our assumptions and Colin’s site is a place to do that. To ignore the incredible amount of scientific modelling and research he has undertaken would be a disservice to the Shroud.”(
I’ll spare you the response it received from STERA’s President/site webmaster! Suffice it to say that it’s Barrie M Schwortz attempting as ever to justify his attempts to ignore/suppress my simple explanation for the Shroud’s existence and unusual characteristics – namely the product of an ingenious medieval project to model/simulate the image of the crucified Jesus that could have been left on Joseph of Arimathea’s ‘fine linen’ , namely as an age-yellowed sweat/blood IMPRINT. Thus the negative (tone-reversed) body image, scarcely-visible straw yellow in colour, intended to be seen as the way a fresh sweat imprint might look some 13 centuries later!
Some might think it’s time that Barrie M.Schwortz began living up to the title that he, STURP’s Documenting (i.e. non-scientific) Photographer conferred on himself – President of the Shroud of Turin EDUCATION and RESEARCH Association, and less like a slick proponent and salesman of Shroud authenticity, forever ready to stick demeaning labels on folk whom he deems off-message (his message).
(His latest target is Luigi Garlaschelli, Professor of Organic Chemistry at Pavia University, Italy, dismissing the now-formally published paper in conjunction with a Liverpool-based forensics specialist on the non-authentic properties of the Shroud’s blood-flow patterns: Luigi is dismissed as an authenticity-rejecting “atheist”, generating “media hype” bla bla.
It’s high time you cleaned up your act, Mr.Barrie M.Schwortz, President of the Shroud of Turin EDUCATION and RESEARCH Association. It’s time you ceased trying to belittle and suppress genuine and probably significant new research findings. You don’t know the half of it (that much being clear from your superficial and invariably misleading comments regarding the scientific detail – you not being scientifically qualified).
This will no doubt be described as another so-called ad hominen attack. No it’s not – it spelling out some simple plain-spoken home truths…. It’s STERA’s President with those cheapshot demeaning labels that he sticks on real scientifically-qualified researchers that is the real ad hominen attack, especially as they are used to dismiss and/or suppress new findings, new insights…
Sindonology attempts to suppress – or at any rate sideline- my simple “simulated sweat imprint” explanation for the Turin Shroud. I might as well be talking to myself in arguing as I have done year after year that the TS should be seen an ingenious modelling of the imagined body imprint left on Joseph of Arimathea’s ‘fine linen’ during transport from cross to tomb. (No, the image was NOT intended as being seen as formed much later via ‘resurrectional incandescence’ etc. when the bloodstains would have been fully dried and clotted (and let’s please forget those pie-in-the-sky ideas from the late Alan D. Adler and others regarding “exudation of serum from retracted blood clots”).
Sindonology frankly sucks.
Sorry, someone had to say it… I’m probably better qualified than most to make that telling observation.
PS: I see that STERA’s President still tries to overhype the academic credentials of the late Alan D Adler, describing him on Facebook as a “world renowned blood chemist”.
No, he was neither world renowned nor a blood chemist. He was a porphyrin specialist, forever emphasising that porphyrins had importance beyond heme and hemoglobin, e.g. plant chlorophylls. See his daughter’s obituary for her father and his real though more modest accomplishments than those still persistently churned out by STERA’s Documenting Photographer.
http://www.katjaorlova.com/ShroudDadObit.html
One can also check Google Scholar: enter Adler A D to see a listing of his porphyrin papers.
https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=adler+a+d+&btnG=
“Blood” does not make an appearance until he was recruited to STURP by John Heller.
See also Pages 132/133 of Heller’s book to see why and how Alan D.Adler , working in the same building as Heller, came to be recruited to STURP.
Here’s Heller’s exact words:
” I had worked with Dr. Adler on various projects over the years. He would admit to being a physical chemist, thermodynamicist, and a porphyrin nut. He is a Rennaisance man, with an encyclopedic knowledge of the physical and biological sciences, military history, ecology and many other fields. I wondered whether he would be interested, and decided to approach him sideways.
“Al” I said enthusiastically, “how would you like to get involved in a real fun project? It even involves porphyrins.”
No mention of blood, thus far note. No suggestion that his work colleague was “world renowned”.
How much longer do we have to put up with STERA’s President putting out false information about his fellow STERA team members, misrepresenting and overhyping their research specialities and credentials, and by implication his own, as a means of diminishing the stature of others who dare to take a different line on TS authenticity?
The time for being restrained and polite is over. Why?
I have just privately listed some 8 or 9 sindonology sites, all pro-authenticity needless to say, none, I repeat NONE of which have so much as breathed a single word of my “simulated sweat imprint” take on the Turin Shroud.
Why not? Answer – because they know it makes sense, and know it would put them and their fanciful “burial shroud/imaging via resurrectional incandescence” straight out of business if more widely known.
The key to understanding the TS is the disconnect between the 4 Gospel accounts. Pro-authenticity sindonology is only interested in the version supplied in John, maintaining a blind spot for what the preceding 3 synoptic Gospels have to say about Joseph of Arimathea’s linen being delivered to the CROSS, not tomb, to receive a body on which the blood was perceived (for medieval modelling purposes) as still moist and thus capable of leaving its imprint, accompanied by SWEAT as well to produce the body imprint as well.
Shhhh! Don’t mention sweat! Sindonology has closed its ears to sweat, more specifically the notion of the TS body image being a SIMULATED SWEAT IMPRINT produced in medieval times, modelled/inspired no doubt by that Veil of Veronica, attracting paying pilgrims galore.
“We can trump the face-only Veil”, thought the secretive clerics of Lirey, and indeed they were right!
I think you know Big Green Egg (links: https://biggreenegg.com/pizza/ , https://biggreenegg.com/how-do-you-like-your-eggs/ ).
For many people, cooking a perfect pizza is a good reason to buy a Big Green Egg. The Big Green Egg not only allows you to grill, cook stew, pan-fry, smoke and cook at low temperatures, but also, in combination with the ConvEGGtor, to cook like in the oven. Even the pizza …
So I think you can cook your “bread crusts” over the fibrils of the linen cloth …
So… Have you ever tried to do an experiment with the use of a Big Green Egg cooking?
I apologize if you’ve already tried. But I became curious about the results that could be obtained with this device (the “Big Green Egg”) that allows a good regulation of the temperature …
I think that after cooking you’ll can check the results (obtained at different temperatures) even under a microscope (to perform a useful comparison with the fibrils of the Shroud).
I’ve sat through two videos on the Green Egg, each about 10 minutes long, and neither gives details about what’s so special about the placement of charcoal at the base of the closed egg-shape container. One is left to guess as to how much of the heat reaching the pastry is convected hot air, how much direct radiant heat, though I suspect it’s mainly the former.
But I did a posting about a year ago reporting that direct radiant heat gives quicker better browning of my flour imprints than convected heat.
That was based on the observation that it was better to have the flour imprint in direct line with the heated electrical element that lies behind the rotating blade of a modern fan oven. I suggested that gentle roasting of the imprinted linen over an open fire with glowing (red hot) charcoal embers might be better than use of an enclosed oven that had obstuctions between the hot charcoal and the flour.
One can only speculate at this stage as to why flour should be more susceptible to Maillard browning reactions and yellow/brown melanoidin formation from direct radiant heat than to convected hot air. But time is not the crucial factor when making pizzas – there are other considerations like evenness of baking, of getting the right balance between completeness of dough cooking and surface browning with thickish pastry. That’s probably less of an issue when needing merely to colour a thin imprint of flour on thin linen.
In short, I don’t see any immediate benefit from deploying Green Egg design, relying mainly it seems on hot convected air, but I could be mistaken.
The very next time I read a blog, I hope that it doesn’t disappoint me as much
as this one. After all, Yes, it was my choice to read through, however I genuinely believed
you would probably have something useful to talk about.
All I hear is a bunch of whining about something you could
possibly fix if you weren’t too busy searching for attention.
Don’t you just love the internet? The above comment is linked to an Indonesia-based online poker-gaming site, with secondary bases in the US and Germany by the looks of it,. It is using other people’s blog sites to give themselves internet visibility. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Further comments from the above “individual” will be erased ASAP.
But wanna comment that you have a very nice site, I the design it really stands out.
But I see it’s now 18 months Evelyn since I posed the question: why is my shorthand description of the so-called “Shroud” of Turin still getting no mentions?
Yes, the notion that it’s simply a “simulated sweat imprint” of medieval manufacture is/was based on some 7 years of research by this retired biomedical scientist.
Yet I could be talking to myself. Why?
I’m willing to accept my share of the blame. But there’s something deeply, deeply wrong, either with the internet, or with ‘sindonology’ and its astonishing tunnel vision, or maybe a potent combination of the two that leaves folk like myself out in the cold.
Thanks Evelyn. I’m flattered.
But I’m drawing a line under this specialist site. Future postings to do with that Linen – like the last one posted just 4 days ago – by way of a broad (dissatisfied) overview – are back on my generalist science buzz site!
http://colinb-sciencebuzz.blogspot.com/2019/08/re-that-misnamed-so-called-shroud-of.html
Have just posted this comment to another website ( Tim Daw’s http://www.sarsen.org):
I’ve bolded the sentence that is relevant to this site:
“Final comment to this, a largely talk-to-oneself unresponsive site (whether via poster or commentators!).
I’ve now decided that the time has some to set up a new internet forum.
It will be one that posts, invites AND publishes views on the continuing Stonehenge enigma (studiously ignoring all the continuing 300-year knee-jerk guff about “solstice celebration”).
I’ll also be setting up another site on my “Shroud of Turin” interest, if only to show I’m not obsessed with a single topic.
What matters to me is unearthing the truth, albeit via that long, slow, tortuous route called the “scientific method” (but proven time and time again to uncover the real salient facts, not to say “credible explanations” too!).
Here’s looking forward to your next posting Tim (hopefully with some new topic-updating comments, other than my own that is …!).
Cheers”
Colin Berry (PhD ), retired biomedical scientist, 7 years of experience in testing the internet as a (mixed experience!) online learning curve
(In short, I propose, with due degree of modesty, taking over where Dan Porter finally left off with his ‘shroudstory.com ‘! )