Miracle of the Shroud / Blood on the shroud

[catsmate]

- My objective for the moment is to present the best case I can muster for Ray Rogers’ claim that the corner selected for carbon dating was not representative of the larger cloth. <snip>
- At this point, whether or not the corner was (or, included) a patch is not my focus.

Yes it is. You're using Rogers as basis for your claims and this is Rogers' entire, flawed, thesis and it's been comprehensively and repeatedly debunked.

The radiocarbon sample has completely different chemical properties than the main part of the shroud relic.

As has already been established this is a lie on Rogers' part.

I don’t see this as “hand-waving” (per ladewig), as I will happily address the patch issue if we get that far.

I repeat: Rogers' thesis was that the radiocarbon dated samples were from a patch (“was not part of the original cloth”). This is rubbish.

In my opinion, the more we can examine the overall Shroud issue one baby-step at a time, the more likely we are to actually ‘get somewhere’ in our debate.

No. The evidence should be examined in its entirety rather than following the usual believer tactic of trying to nibble away pieces, aka "The Salami Strategy".

Could be that patience is the primary virtue when trying to honestly resolve disagreements.

I would suggest honesty is a greater virtue. There's not a lot of it to be found in the lies promulgated by shroudies.

- I don’t know how you guys get to the Rogers article,<snippage>

This is rubbish. As part of his efforts to support his belief that the shroud is genuine Rogers has two points:

• The carbon dating was flawed because the sample was for a patched area of the cloth
• His (Rogers) dating technique, using chemical decomposition of lignin, is superior and dates the cloth to biblical times.

Both of these claims are rubbish. I've dealt with the first one, repeatedly, as have others; Rogers' claims do not stand up to scrutiny.
The lignin decomposition technique is also rubbish; Rogers' himself admits that it's accuracy is vastly inferior to ¹⁴C (1,700 years against 150) and it is more susceptible to outside factors, such as heat. Remember the shroud fire of 1532?


Now, my take on your points.

1) Were those who selected the sample crooked, or were they simply incompetent?

Neither. The selected a representative area, took a sample and it was correctly analysed. Unfortunately for believers the cloth is a fake and the dating shows this.

2) Lot of credible researchers claimed that there were no patches in that area of the cloth.

No credible researchers claim the sampled area was a patch; neither does the evidence.

3) STURP people didn’t object to the sample until the results came in.

A demonstrated fact.

4) Rogers simply lied – the sample was destroyed during the testing.

Also a fact.

5) If the sample was a patch, why didn’t it test out as originating in 1567?

Some shroudies claim that the dating was some soft of average, this has no validity.

6) The 2002 study showed no difference in the area next to the sample.

Yes.

7) Mixing of weaving styles and material would not be noticed?

It would show up easily under analysis.

 

[realpaladin]

I emailed the vanillin thingy to some forensics guys. Will report when they get back to me.

 

[catsmate]

I emailed the vanillin thingy to some forensics guys. Will report when they get back to me.

Joe Nickell has an article that mentions it.

 

[pgwenthold]

- My objective for the moment is to present the best case I can muster for Ray Rogers’ claim that the corner selected for carbon dating was not representative of the larger cloth.


- At this point, whether or not the corner was (or, included) a patch is not my focus.

But how can you separate those two issues?

If the corner is "not representative of the larger cloth" then how does that happen?

You have to have a mechanism for how that could be. We've seen a couple proposed, but they are pretty much laughfests.

If you are going to claim an older cloth, you have to account for the C14 dating. ANY case you are going to make for it to be older is going to have to account for it, so it makes no sense to start any where else. If you don't have an explanation for it, then there really is no discussion to have. As soon as you show a REAL potential explanation for why it is wrong, I will listen. But without a plausible mechanism to account for the isotopic dating, you really are just howling at the wind.

 

[Jabba]

Not representative of the larger cloth?

- I think it's useful to find out where we agree (if anywhere).

- Do you guys generally agree that the sample selection was problematic? To me --
1) Limiting the sample to one small piece, rather than several small pieces spaced out over the Shroud; and
2) Using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years (at least)
-- are both problematic to being comfortable with the results, whatever the results might be.

--- Jabba

 

[pgwenthold]

- I think it's useful to find out where we agree (if anywhere).

- Do you guys generally agree that the sample selection was problematic? To me --
1) Limiting the sample to one small piece, rather than several small pieces spaced out over the Shroud; and

Why? Is there any reason to think that the shroud is not more or less a homogeneous cloth? Isn't it a single weave?

2) Using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years (at least)

What's wrong with that?

Do you even know what C14 dating is? It examines the isotopic makeup of the material in the cloth itself, and is not examine the surface. Shoot, what you want to do is to actually remove as much off the surface as possible, which, of course, is what the labs did (because they are not idiots).

 

[Ladewig]

- I think it's useful to find out where we agree (if anywhere).

I am pretty sure the answer is nowhere, but I am still interested in why you think the first 12 pages involved any progress.

- Do you guys generally agree that the sample selection was problematic? To me --
2) Using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years (at least)

Fingerprints do not effect C14 dating, so the only way that handling could distort the date would be if someone were eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich before handling the cloth or if someone wiped his nose before handling the cloth. Even then the only way one could end up with a result in the 1300's would be if the contamination on the Shroud sample weighed more than the Shroud sample itself. Please think about that: for the it-was-handled-too-much argument to hold any water at all, one has to accept

1) that the dirt and grime weighed more than the fabric sample itself!
2) that a collection of more than a dozen people using microscopes DIDN'T NOTICE that much dirt and grime on the fabric!
3) that professional C14-dating labs were too incompetent to properly wash and prepare the samples!

 

[Ladewig]

- I think it's useful to find out where we agree (if anywhere).

- Do you guys generally agree that the sample selection was problematic? To me --
1) Limiting the sample to one small piece, rather than several small pieces spaced out over the Shroud;
-- are both problematic to being comfortable with the results, whatever the results might be.

--- Jabba

For us to consider that the sample selection was problematic, you will have to address all the items brought up in post #537 and the related posts.

The only reason that the sample selection is problematic to you is that you want the Shroud to be the burial cloth of Jesus. If the C14 results said exactly 33 C.E. then
NO ONE on the believer side would be complaining that the selection of the test material was to limited to be accurate.
NO ONE on the believer side would be calling for more C14 testing.
NO ONE on the believer side would be asking if contamination or reweaving caused an error in the dating.

 

[Jabba]

Not representative of the larger cloth?

- Hmm. I really thought you guys would agree with that... Oh well.

 

[Ladewig]

- Hmm. I really thought you guys would agree with that... Oh well.

Do you understand why we don't agree that those are serious concerns?


...................

Also, when you say that there is a problem with "using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years," how many times do you think that that particular 70-square centimeter piece was touched ? Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands?

 

[realpaladin]

Ok, I got a reply that digresses into chemistry, but basically there are a lot of ways that lignin, which is a 'difficult' compound, can transform into vanillin.

Using that transformation as an age indicator can only be valid if all external circumstances are known, precisely because of that multitude of methods of decay.

The method described for the shroud is but one of them, but contact with various, naturally occurring, chemicals is another.

So at best it is an unreliable method, at worst it is a useless method.

Sorry Jabba, we can not use the chemical analysis to oppose the C14 confidently.

 

[realpaladin]

Do you understand why we don't agree that those are serious concerns?

...................

Also, when you say that there is a problem with "using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years," how many times do you think that that particular 70-square centimeter piece was touched ? Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands?

Experimentation is the key here... you can try this at home!

I asked my partner to fold up a few bedsheets before putting then in the laundry. I asked her to put some blue chalkdust on her hands before handling each sheet.

Then I showed her a few foldings (as much as I gathered from Googling images and the Edessa cloth iconography) and she went to work.

I won't spoil the end result, but Jabba, I suggest you try this yourself and then answer which area was touched most.

One important thing: the folder must not know your motive!

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

- Hmm. I really thought you guys would agree with that... Oh well.

Then I can only respectfully conclude that you've not been taking in any of the information posted by anyone anywhere in this thread. There are good reasons why people don't agree with you on this, and they have already been discussed.

 

[catsmate]

- I think it's useful to find out where we agree (if anywhere).

- Do you guys generally agree that the sample selection was problematic? To me --
1) Limiting the sample to one small piece, rather than several small pieces spaced out over the Shroud; and
2) Using a corner piece often handled over the past 700 years (at least)
-- are both problematic to being comfortable with the results, whatever the results might be.

--- Jabba

No. Perhaps you should read up on the methodology before criticising it.

 

[IanS]

- Hmm. I really thought you guys would agree with that... Oh well.

You thought that we would agree with something that for the past 12 pages everyone here has been disagreeing with?

Something seriously wrong with this thread.

 

[tsig]

You thought that we would agree with something that for the past 12 pages everyone here has been disagreeing with?

Something seriously wrong with this thread.

That's because you're only sampling a small part of it. I'm sure if it was woven into a larger tapestry the whole picture would be revealed.

 

[realpaladin]

I got sent the link to a paper on lignin decomposition:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&...nfqeHT&sig=AHIEtbRW0341so4w9zyn9ULyMeIla84eag

 

[Jabba]

Reliability of Lignin Testing

I got sent the link to a paper on lignin decomposition:

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&...nfqeHT&sig=AHIEtbRW0341so4w9zyn9ULyMeIla84eag

Paladin,
- I read the whole paper and understood it totally...
- I think you're just showing the difficulty in having much confidence in lignin testing. If so, my first response is that whatever the problems, the claim by Rogers is that the dating sample shows a totally different result than does the rest of the Shroud -- which would seem to resolve, or at least weaken, that objection re the dating confidence. From the Rogers' article:

All threads from the Raes sample and the yarn segments from the radiocarbon sample show
colored encrustations (or coatings) on their surfaces (Fig. 2 and Fig. 3). The coating material is not
removed by nonpolar solvents, but it swells and dissolves in water. There was absolutely no
coating with these characteristics on either the Holland cloth or the main part of the shroud. When
Raes and radiocarbon-sample threads were teased open at both ends with a dissecting needle, the
cores appeared to be colorless, suggesting the color and its vehicle were added by wiping a viscous
liquid on the outside of the yarn. A marked difference between inside and outside fibers is
characteristic of both the Raes and radiocarbon samples. The yellow–brown coating on the outside
of the radiocarbon warp sample is so heavy that it looks black by transmitted light (Fig. 2).
Chemical tests on both the radiocarbon and Raes samples show their coatings to consist of a plant
gum containing alizarin dye present in two forms. Some is dissolved in the gum, giving it a yellow
color. A variable amount is complexed with hydrous aluminum oxide [AlO(OH)] to form red lakes
(Fig. 3). The lakes are gelatinous and usually very small. A good microscope is required to observe
them, and the gum vehicle for the dye/mordant system on the Raes and radiocarbon samples makes
it difficult to observe the lakes. The gum cannot be removed without damaging the lakes, but it can
be made invisible by matching its index of refraction in a 1.515 index oil. With the gum invisible
or swelled slightly in water, it is easy to see the lakes suspended in the gum and stuck to the fibers.
Fig. 3 shows (upper left) colloidal red dye lakes suspended in the gum. To the right of that, some
discrete lakes can be seen adhering to the surface of a cotton fiber. Several areas of yellow-dyed
gum can be seen. Four cotton fibers and two flax fibers appear in the view. The radiocarbon
sample contains both a gum/dye/mordant coating and cotton fibers. The main part of the shroud
does not contain these materials.

- So,
1) Do you find my claim about resolving, or at least weakening, the objection re the dating confidence coherent? And, if so,
2) Would you agree?

- Thanks,
--- Jabba

 

[Jabba]

Reliability of Lignin Testing

Somehow, I duplicated the above message and am trying to delete the duplicate.

 

[Jabba]

Reliability of Lignin Testing

Here, I'm deleting a triplicate...