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Miracle of the Shroud II: The Second Coming

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Slowvehicle . I apologise for having mistaken what you wrote as your own thoughts. I have ploughed through just too many weird things about the Shroud for there to be any surprises left. There have been several hundred comments of all sorts in various places on my own article in History Today ( e.g comments on the Guardian article on my article) and, like Hugh Farey, have debated endlessly with the Shroudstory crowd so it is all too easy to miss where someone is coming from. Again my apologies - there are few more devastating blows to someone's reputation for logical thinking than to link them to the Shroudies.
I hope the fun you and others might have from reading about Sue Benford's views on the pyramids ( if you have not already been there) is some sort of compensation. All best, Charles
 
Does dispersion entails the not homogeneity of the fabric?

There are some things I don’t understand.
1. What means here “dispersion”? Dispersion between the global results of the different labs? Dispersion with the detailed results of the different measurements on a single sample (Nubian, for example)?
2. If some dispersion is detected in the Turin sample, why it has to be ascribed to the absence of homogeneity of the fabric? What about an error in the manipulation, for example?
I will be glad if the possible answers are featured in a plain language without many technical expressions. Thank you.
 
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Charles Freeman said:
Slowvehicle . I apologise for having mistaken what you wrote as your own thoughts. I have ploughed through just too many weird things about the Shroud for there to be any surprises left. There have been several hundred comments of all sorts in various places on my own article in History Today ( e.g comments on the Guardian article on my article) and, like Hugh Farey, have debated endlessly with the Shroudstory crowd so it is all too easy to miss where someone is coming from. Again my apologies - there are few more devastating blows to someone's reputation for logical thinking than to link them to the Shroudies.
I hope the fun you and others might have from reading about Sue Benford's views on the pyramids ( if you have not already been there) is some sort of compensation. All best, Charles
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No harm, no foul, cobber!
 
hugh farey said:
No idea, David. Who said it and when?
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“Although the spread of measurements is relatively small, it is sufficient to cast doubt on the homogeneity of the three laboratories’ samples, and justifies Riani and Atkinson’s claim of the probability of a genuine chronological gradient across the samples”. (Hugh Farey: “Radiocarbon Recalibration”, British Society for the Turin Shroud News, 80, Dec. 2014).

“Spread” is not the same or similar to “dispersed”? What difference?

NOTE: Riani, Atkinson and Fanti would be more exact.
 
David Mo said:
“Although the spread of measurements is relatively small, it is sufficient to cast doubt on the homogeneity of the three laboratories’ samples, and justifies Riani and Atkinson’s claim of the probability of a genuine chronological gradient across the samples”. (Hugh Farey: “Radiocarbon Recalibration”, British Society for the Turin Shroud News, 80, Dec. 2014).

“Spread” is not the same or similar to “dispersed”? What difference?

NOTE: Riani, Atkinson and Fanti would be more exact.
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What is the original quote you are asking about? "Dispersion" doesn't appear in what you've just quoted.

Can you give some context? You seem to be jumping into the thread and asking about something published elsewhere without giving any clues what you're talking about.
 
Carbon Dating Doubts/Memorandum Fraud?

Jabba said:
Hugh,
- But the memo apparently never sent was only one of about 15 contentions (it's difficult to separate the more specific contentions in the summary) against d'Arcis' credibility.
- You must surely be the most shroud knowledgeable on this site -- as well as, the most objective (including myself)... What am I missing, or confusing, regarding the d'Arci memo? Why don't you think these claims are (albeit, circumstantial) evidence?
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Hugh,
- Going back to the Scavone paper, you never really answered the above question.
 
Jabba said:
Hugh,
- Going back to the Scavone paper, you never really answered the above question.
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Good Morning, Mr. Savage!

I wonder if there is any way to point out to you the ironic oddness of the phrase, "...you never really answered the...question...", aimed, by your hand, at another poster.

Is it, perhaps, an attempt at humour?
 
Charles Freeman said:
The reweave theory was always a desperate one. It was the brainchild of one Sue Benford who believed in the special energy of pyramids and her husband Joe Marino a former monk. Neither could show the slightest experience or knowledge of ancient textiles or weaving methods. They claimed that the corner of the Shroud from which the r-c sample was taken had been rewoven in medieval times. What they never explained was why there should be meticulous reweaving in this obscure corner of the Shroud when areas closer to the images which were in desperate need to reweaving were left untouched.
They believed that they had the support of Raymond Rogers who, working only from threads and not an actual weave, claimed that he had evidence that cotton had been placed in a reweave. Cotton there certainly was but only in small fibres that had already been noticed in 1973 and attributed by a Belgian expert Gilbert Raes to spinning or weaving of the flax(linen) in an atmosphere where there were drifting cotton fibres. After 1200 in particular, the enormous influx of raw cotton into Europe and the fact that spinners and weavers worked on both in the same work places made the presence of these small fibres hardly surprising. Inevitably the amount of cotton in each part of the Shroud would vary according to where the different skeins of yarn were spun and, as Raes suggested, the closeness of the weave to the edges of a loom which had previously been weaving cotton. It would be a long and tedious job to see which parts of the Shroud have cotton in it and which parts not as it is not easy to spot the fibres within the structure of the yarn. The presence of these cotton fibres certainly suggest a date after 1200 and if there is ever an intense examination of the Shroud for cotton fibres and they are found this would give supporting evidence for the spinning and/or weave of the Shroud in the medieval period.
When the Oxford lab checked out their sample of the weave before they tested it, they spotted a fibre of cotton which was removed, so there is no reason to suppose that the presence of cotton had anything to do with the dating or that the Oxford sample had been rewoven with cotton.
Although the authenticists do not mention this, Rogers, Benford and Marino were soon effectively challenged. John Jackson,a member of STURP, had photographic evidence of the different bandings of linen in the Shroud and these showed conclusively that they continued uninterrupted through the area where reweaving was supposed to have taken place.
Then in 2002, a restoration of the Shroud was out into the care of Mechthild Flury-Lemberg, an authority on ancient weaves. She was well aware of the claims of a reweave so she looked carefully at this corner and saw, like Jackson, that there was no sign of a reweave. Her article can easily be found online under Flury- Lemberg, 'The invisible Mending of the Shroud, the Theory and the Reality'. She makes the point that not a single textile expert who has examined this corner of the Shroud has ever been able to spot any sign of a reweave.
Still the reweavers simply go on their way, confusing the issue and deceiving the unwary.
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Charles - this is a very well-thought out and described post. Of course, everything you say has been said in this thread multiple times, and there is only apparently one person participated who doesn't seem to get it.

But thank you for the succinct summary.
 
PhantomWolf said:
I have never figured out the whole argument about the shroud, to me it's cut and dried.

If you accept the Bible (which believers in the Shroud probably should) then it is worth looking to see what it says on the matter.

The linens are mentioned two of the gospels, Luke and John. Luke says (NIV)....



So it talks about "strips" of linen. Other translations say "linen clothes" but it is clear that the writer is speaking of multiple linens. If we look in John the author makes it clearer what these are...



So the writer is saying that no one was Jesus wrapped in strips of linen, but that he had a separate cloth about his head. It's clear from the Bible than that a single Shroud was not used on him but rather was wrapped in strips of linen and a separate head cloth. If you accept what the Bible says, then you can't accept the Shroud. Simple.
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I would think that experts in ancient history burial could provide more details about how bodies were wrapped in that region at that time, but I've always envisioned that "linens" thing as being basically wrapped like a mummy. That's why the shroud has never made any sense to me in the first place, because, like, who wraps a dead body like that in the first place? Especially with the mention of the head cloth - that's obviously going to be wrapped around their head, and not over it, isn't it?
 
It's time for the quarterly question:

Has any reliable evidence been proffered in favor of shroud authenticity?

I'll hang up and listen to my answer.
 
Slowvehicle said:
Good Morning, Mr. Savage!

I wonder if there is any way to point out to you the ironic oddness of the phrase, "...you never really answered the...question...", aimed, by your hand, at another poster.

Is it, perhaps, an attempt at humour?
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Or trolling, which is where my money is.
 
Sorry, Jabba; things moved on. Dan Scavone offered 15 contentions against d'Arcis' credibility, did he? Let me see...

1) D'Arcis did not send the letter.
Even if this is true, it is not evidence against its truthfulness, especially as he had just been sworn to perpetual silence whatever he thought.

2) D'Arcis does not name the painter who painted the Shroud.
This is true, but he may not have known who the painter was. His claim was that Bishop Henri investigated the Shroud and discovered the painter, not that d'Arcis had.

3) There is no record of the "inquest" Bishop Henri held.
This may be true, but I don't think it matters. Three possibilities occur: a) The "inquest" was nothing more than an "inquiry", not a formal commission, and no written record was made. b) There was a written record but, like most records, it has disappeared over time. I don't believe the relevant archive is anything like complete. c) There was a written record, but after the Shroud had become generally accepted, it was destroyed deliberately.

4) The only communication we have from Bishop Henri to Geoffrey de Charny was to "praise, ratify, and approve a divine cult of this sort." Well maybe it all went sour or Henri changed his mind, as, even after this letter was sent, the Shroud nevertheless disappeared for 30 years.

5) D'Arcis cathedral collapsed in 1389, so d'Arcis wanted money.
This is not evidence of his dishonesty.

So I don't find these five amount to evidence against d'Arcis, and I can't find the other ten. If you could list them, I'll explain their value to you.



David. Even the Nature paper found that there was only a 1 in 20 chance of the measurements coming from a homogeneous sample, given the data submitted. There are a number of possible reasons for its occurrence, however.
a) That 1 in 20 chance just came up!
b) The data was not correctly submitted, because the error ranges were mistakenly made too narrow. (the Nature solution)
c) There was some contamination variously affecting the age of each sample. (the Riani et al. solution)
d) The dates are wholly random. (quite a popular solution among authenticists, but statistically more unlikely than a!)
My own preference is for c, probably with a bit of b mixed in.

And yes, I omitted Fanti. I'm not sure what his contribution to the paper was. Perhaps Riani et al. would be the best, although I think Atkinson was actually the statistician.
 
hugh farey said:
2) D'Arcis does not name the painter who painted the Shroud.
This is true, but he may not have known who the painter was. His claim was that Bishop Henri investigated the Shroud and discovered the painter, not that d'Arcis had.
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Ironically, the fraudulent nature of the shroud must have been more obvious early on, when the actual paint was still on the cloth. Now it's more mysterious because it's all faded and what remains is essentially stained cloth.
 
Belz... said:
Ironically, the fraudulent nature of the shroud must have been more obvious early on, when the actual paint was still on the cloth. Now it's more mysterious because it's all faded and what remains is essentially stained cloth.
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I think this is an interesting point. It is apparent that the actual appearance of a miraculous relic did not bother its worshippers during the early period - the assurance of its being a relic by appropriately qualified clerics was enough - whereas now it has to at least look a bit 'unnatural' to gain acceptance. Fortunately, the growing deterioration of the Shroud has exactly matched the growing necessity for greater 'miracleness', so that its credibility has maintained value.
 
hugh farey said:
I think this is an interesting point. It is apparent that the actual appearance of a miraculous relic did not bother its worshippers during the early period - the assurance of its being a relic by appropriately qualified clerics was enough - whereas now it has to at least look a bit 'unnatural' to gain acceptance. Fortunately, the growing deterioration of the Shroud has exactly matched the growing necessity for greater 'miracleness', so that its credibility has maintained value.
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This is the coincidence that I have trouble swallowing with Charles Freeman's theory. Of the supposed many similar painted shrouds of the era, this is the one that needed to be declared a fraud in the 1300s. The others were accepted as paintings, but this one was different enough that someone thought they could get away with saying it was the true shroud and that someone else had to say, "liar." Now that same painted cloth has deteriorated enough that it has been re-declared authentic (by some). That seems a little too coincidental to me. Perhaps the original painting deteriorated very quickly---within 50 years of its creation---and looked pretty much how it does today in the late 1300s. Fifty Easters is actually a pretty long time of folding and unfolding and perhaps exposure to the elements. I dunno. I just think the forgery letter works against Charles Freeman's hypothesis, not as much as it works against the hypothesis of the authenticists, but still.

People of the era knew what a painted cloth looked like. Perhaps it was a situation where people were simply being ripped-off, like at a circus side-show. Some carnival barker was charging people money to step inside a tent to see the true shroud. People paid a groat to enter the tent only to see an obvious painting. Complaints were lodged, a letter was written and the rest is the future. That's one possibility, but I'm not entirely satisfied.

Ward

P.S. I know that people in medieval France would not pay a groat.
 
As Hugh has recently mentioned to Jabba, he (Hugh) is doing battle over at http://shroudstory.com/ (in the comments sections) with a bunch of believers in the invisible reweave theory. They seem to willfully refuse to understand a simple logical argument.

Ward
 
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