This is a self-parody, right? It has to be a self-parody.
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Miracle of the Shroud / Blood on the shroud
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This is a self-parody, right? It has to be a self-parody.
OK. Well, you realise that you have been directly contradicting yourself?
That is -
- first you said there was an invisible repair (or patch).
- then you changed your mind and accepted that any such repair could not have really been invisible.
- then as the highlight below shows, you again said it might not be visible after all.
- then you say that perhaps the evidence was visible, but the C14 scientists ignored it because they were biased against the shroud.
- then I point out to you that since all three labs measured the same date, any patch must have been big enough to cover then entire 7cm piece cut for dating.
- and then you go back to saying perhaps none of the C14 labs noticed that the entire thing was a patch
What you are actually saying is that this is a patch that appears and disappears at will, depending on what you would like the answer to be.
Here (above) you are again going back to saying the patch might not have been visible (see the highlight again). But I just explained to you how, if all three labs measured effectively the same date (and you agreed that they had all measured that same date), then the patch must have been so big that it covered the entire area of all samples cut for C14 dating.
How could a patch as large as that be “invisible” to all the numerous people who have examined that precise area of the shroud since the Raes sample in 1973, and who had all been specifically looking for any such repair?
Remember that the entire Vatican and Turin committee from those 10 years of meetings, had frequently discussed how to take a C14 sample well away from any repairs or damage etc.
Remember that in the last few meetings just before cutting the sample, they specifically discussed where to cut, how the weave of the shroud was unique & unmistakable & known to everyone present, and how it would always be instantly identifiable to anyone, and thus could not really allow blind testing … Flury Lemberg and others even stressed that unique visual identification.
Remember that the committee had already decided to take the C14 sample from an area close to the Raes sample, because that area was already agreed to have been thoroughly examined in 1973 and in 1978 and was agreed by everyone to be nowhere near any repairs or fire damage. And as Antonacci reminded us, that same Raes area has been photographed in microscopic detail many thousands of times.
Remember that all the numerous people present when the C14 strip was cut, spent a further 2 hours specifically deciding where to cut so that everyone present agreed that it was not from an area of any repair of fire damage etc.
Remember that all three C14 labs checked their samples under research level microscopes in proper research labs (unlike Ray Rogers who was only using his home microscope to view some unknown loose fibres from Gonella), and none of them found any sign at all of an repair or patch.
Remember that the photos taken by the three labs show the unique and unmistakable weave of the Shroud (as emphasised repeatedly by Flury Lemberg and others at all the 10 years of meetings).
Remember that when the C14 paper was published in Nature, all three labs stated on the paper that their samples had been specifically and deliberately taken from an area where everyone involved had agreed there was no repair, patch or other significant damage etc.
Remember too that nobody ever said that the C14 strip was one large "invisible" repair, until after the C14 results showed the date to be 1260-1390AD
Remember that Ray Rogers got the entire “invisible patch” idea from a commercial book by Benford and Marino who had themselves never seen the shroud when the C14 sample was cut, and never seen any of the C14 cloth samples.
Remember that Rogers also was not present when the C14 sample was cut and had no opportunity to see if there was any patch or repair (which everyone had agreed was not there anyway), and further that Rogers never saw any of the samples used by the C14 labs.
Remember too that Ray Rogers only claimed to see microscopic colour evidence of what he thought were non-original threads, but where those few microscopic were sent to him by Luigi Gonella, and where Rogers himself actually could have no idea where those threads really came from
Remember also that after Rogers published his paper on those few microscopic threads, Flury Lemberg and professor Ghiberti both took the trouble to publish official statements (more than once) saying that they were astonished that Ray Rogers could have ever published said a badly mistaken claim of a “patch”, because they had personally spent a whole month examining that area of the shroud in 2002 and specifically stated that there was definitely no such patch in that area.
So in the light of all the above we are still stuck with the same question for you -
Q - how could all three labs, and all the committee members, Flury Lemberg, Prof Ghiberti, and everyone else since 1973 (inc. STuRP and Ray Rogers himself in 1978), when they were all specifically looking for any such patch in that precise area, fail to notice that the entire sample cut for C14 was not actually from the shroud at all, but was instead just a patch from something else entirely?
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wardenclyffe
Master Poster
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I welcome your thanks, Jabba. I still think you are wrong-headed in your thinking on this subject, but I was trying to frame your thinking in a way that might help the skeptics (me included) understand the lens through which you view this.
I know you are a fan of conspiracy theories and I was trying to point out how much blinding you would have thought necessary. But honestly, we both know that even if every imaginable blinding technique had been used, you still would not be satisfied with the C14 results. You'd still have your visible-invisible patch. I'll confess that I'm a little disappointed at your "retreat" based on I-don't-know-what new evidence or information.
But you are still welcome,
Ward
Belz...
Fiend God
Sad but understandable. Legends are meant to evoke emotional responses -- the same mechanism that's at work in superstition. It's no wonder people give more weight to claims that make them feel than ones that make them think. One comes naturally, the other does not: you have to practice your brain, and it requires quite a bit of effort to ignore one's natural tendencies.
Belz...
Fiend God
IanS,
- I don't know.
- But I really want to believe there's something to the shroud.
- It's my bias, I guess. But everyone has a bias, including the scientists involved in the C14 testing.
- I still don't know how the patching could be invisible, but I don't think it's impossible.
- Sorry, all this is very difficult for me. I'm still looking for information about patching.
- I'll be back with some answers soon.
--- Jabba.
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pakeha
Penultimate Amazing
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I did. If i ever go insane, i make you two responsible for that. Pakeha for not immediately mentioning to better not click on it, and catsmate1 for coming up with it in the first place.
Also, i want to know what drugs those guys from that link are using. Just so that i can stay far, far away from them.
Greetings,
Chris
Interesting.
My thoughts were:
What do those people smoke for breakfast?
Where do they buy it?
Another instance of posting from the breakfast nook, IMO.
Jabba
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Ian,
- We seem to be passing in the night...
- I admit to holding contradictory suspicions at the same time. I think that I live with a lot of cognitive dissonance.
- I also admit to holding contradictory beliefs at different times -- I change my mind a lot.
- But, there's nothing wrong with either of those.
- And, I don't admit to holding contradictory beliefs at the same time.
- Are you thinking that I do hold contradictory beliefs at the same time?
--- Jabba
Slowvehicle
Membership Drive , Co-Ordinator,, Russell's Antin
Personally, I think you are ignoring the reasons that you are willing to throw three labs and several authorities under the bus...
Many people believe contradictory ideas at different points in their life. You appear to believe contradictory ideas on different days of the week. And instead of changing your mind in response to evidence you change your mind in spite of the evidence, in whatever way is necessary to defend the authenticity of the Shroud at that moment.
You have reached a preformed conclusion and as each of your arguments are shown to be incorrect, you just return to a previous,disproven argument.
This is largely irrelevant. The fact that you're unwilling to work towards resolving these conflicts is what's annoying.Jabba said:
So do I. The difference is, I change my mind based on the data available. You change your opinion of the data based on what best suites your a priori conclusions.
Technically true. The thing is, they're irrelevant to this discussion.
Honestly, no. You have been remarkably consistent this entire conversation. Every scrap of data, no matter the validity, that proportadly supports your pet hypothesis is 100% absolutely true to you, and all evidence, no matter the validity, that contradicts it is 100% absolutely false.
In other words, it's not your conclusions, beliefs, or any of that garbage that we object to. It's your methodology.
If you think there is nothing wrong with you switching between contradictory explanations on different days, then that’s a matter for you to decide how that reflects on the credibility of your answers.
But regardless of that, your above reply is still making no attempt to address that key question of how absolutely everyone, inc. STurRP and Ray Rogers in 1978 (see the long list in post 6242), could have all failed to detect any subsequently claimed patch (a claim made 10 years after the C14 dating from people who had never even seen either the cut shroud or any of the cut C14 samples), ie you are still left with apparently no attempt at any coherent or consistent answer to the pivotal question -
Q - how could all three labs, and all the committee members, Flury Lemberg, Prof Ghiberti, and everyone else since 1973 (inc. STuRP and Ray Rogers himself in 1978), when they were all specifically looking for any such patch in that precise area, all fail to notice that the entire sample cut for C14 was not actually from the shroud at all, but was instead just a piece of cloth from something else entirely?
Belz...
Fiend God
Actually, there IS something wrong with the first of those, especially when you assume everybody else is doing it, too. Remove that beam from your eye and put your house in order before you start accusing others of being as inconsistent and ignorant as you.
catsmate
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I think specifically the most telling thing about the "patch" theory is why did no-one mention the possibility until after the radiocarbon tests proved the shroud was a medieval fake.
Akhenaten
Heretic Pharaoh
John Jones
Penultimate Amazing
^^^This
pgwenthold
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I think that we need to stop for a minute, and insist upon some clarification. Obviously, there is a pile of problems with the so-called "patch" claim (invisible or not), but before we go on, I think we need to clear something up: how, exactly, does Jabba think that a patch, if it were there, create the outcome that is observed?
Let me explain what I mean.
It's not enough to say that, "there was patch, therefore the dates are wrong." The patch claim needs to explain how a shroud that was made around year zero measures out to year 1300. In order to have that late of a date requires that there is more 14C than expected for an old object.
The patch could account for this in two ways:
1) all the material tested was from a "patch." However, if that is the case, then that patch would have required using material from the year ca. 1300. I don't know when the patching was done, but the material is from 1300.
2) The patch is newer material, and the measurements were made on a mixture of old cloth and new cloth. By my math, in order to get an apparent date of 1300 AD, and the patch was material from the year 2000, then 62% of the sample would need to be patch. If it is 50% modern patch, it dates to about 1000 AD. Now, if the patch is any older than modern, then you have to increase the amount of patch needed in the sample in order to get a 1300 AD date. As indicated in (1), this approaches 100% by the time you get to 1300.
Now here's the problem: so how does Jabba think this patch accounts for the measured date? Is he suggesting that it was a patch that was put on on or about that 1300 time frame, using cloth from that time? That's pretty impressive for a patch that is completely unnoticable, to be made out of material that is 1300 years younger than the original material. Moreover, as others have noted, if it was possible to create undetectable patches in 1300, why are all the other patches so crappy?
Alternatively, the patching was done later on, which means that the samples are mixtures of old shroud and patch. But how does that work? How do three different labs all get small pieces of the shroud that are all ca. 60% patch? Think about how that could be possible. Take a little strip of paper that is 60% white and 40% blue. Divide it in three, and then divide each into maybe 6 more. Now, figure out what it would take to color the strip such that all 18 pieces are 50-70% white. That is what the supposed patch would have to look like (iirc, the standard deviations of the 14C measurements were something like 100 years or so; it's not like they had two samples that measured 1900 and one that measured 0 to give an average of 1300). The patch you get out of that is going to be idiotic.
So I really want to hear a proposal of how a "patch" accounts for the observations. As I said, it's not enough to say, "There was a patch, so the answers are wrong!" They dates are what they are. Even Jabba has admitted that they weren't measured incorrectly. So how does it work? How does a "patch" explain the data?
Let me explain what I mean.
It's not enough to say that, "there was patch, therefore the dates are wrong." The patch claim needs to explain how a shroud that was made around year zero measures out to year 1300. In order to have that late of a date requires that there is more 14C than expected for an old object.
The patch could account for this in two ways:
1) all the material tested was from a "patch." However, if that is the case, then that patch would have required using material from the year ca. 1300. I don't know when the patching was done, but the material is from 1300.
2) The patch is newer material, and the measurements were made on a mixture of old cloth and new cloth. By my math, in order to get an apparent date of 1300 AD, and the patch was material from the year 2000, then 62% of the sample would need to be patch. If it is 50% modern patch, it dates to about 1000 AD. Now, if the patch is any older than modern, then you have to increase the amount of patch needed in the sample in order to get a 1300 AD date. As indicated in (1), this approaches 100% by the time you get to 1300.
Now here's the problem: so how does Jabba think this patch accounts for the measured date? Is he suggesting that it was a patch that was put on on or about that 1300 time frame, using cloth from that time? That's pretty impressive for a patch that is completely unnoticable, to be made out of material that is 1300 years younger than the original material. Moreover, as others have noted, if it was possible to create undetectable patches in 1300, why are all the other patches so crappy?
Alternatively, the patching was done later on, which means that the samples are mixtures of old shroud and patch. But how does that work? How do three different labs all get small pieces of the shroud that are all ca. 60% patch? Think about how that could be possible. Take a little strip of paper that is 60% white and 40% blue. Divide it in three, and then divide each into maybe 6 more. Now, figure out what it would take to color the strip such that all 18 pieces are 50-70% white. That is what the supposed patch would have to look like (iirc, the standard deviations of the 14C measurements were something like 100 years or so; it's not like they had two samples that measured 1900 and one that measured 0 to give an average of 1300). The patch you get out of that is going to be idiotic.
So I really want to hear a proposal of how a "patch" accounts for the observations. As I said, it's not enough to say, "There was a patch, so the answers are wrong!" They dates are what they are. Even Jabba has admitted that they weren't measured incorrectly. So how does it work? How does a "patch" explain the data?
Belz...
Fiend God
I don't think he thinks that far ahead.
pgwenthold
Penultimate Amazing
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Of course not, which is why I have asked. I think the conversation needs to completely halt until he answers it, because the whole, "there must be a patch, so that's why they date is wrong" crap is worthless without it.
Explain how a patch accounts for the observed results, or forget it. Even before considering the evidence of there being a patch or not, there has to be a reason to think that a patch explanation could even be viable. If no one can explain how a patch could give the observed result, why should it be considered as a hypothesis to consider.
Akhenaten
Heretic Pharaoh
I think that would be placing an inordinate amount of importance on Jabba's contributions.
It's been, and continues to be, an interesting conversation despite his constant interruptions.
That doesn't sound like much fun.
But Jabba has already given this explanation.
It's, "somehow".
I think it's less a case of being "a hypothesis to consider" and more of "in this thread we demonstrate the insane lengths to which some people will go in order to sustain their wierd fantasies".
It's all good.
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Monza
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From what I can gather, I believe that Jabba's thinking is that the sample was taken from a larger patched area. That is, there must be a sizable area that was patched into the original shroud sometime after 1300 AD, and then the C14 samples were cut entirely from within this area. This is what I think he means by the samples not being representative of the entire shroud.
This begs the question of why Jabba has been bringing up bias, errors, and methodology in the C14 tests if he believes the dates (1290-1360 AD) measured were correct. Clearly he is not following the evidence, but is anomaly hunting and frantically jumping from topic to topic to avoid reaching a conclusion based on the evidence.
I agree. If the samples were cut entirely from a post-1300 AD patch area, then that patch has gone undetected by the scores of people who have handled and examined the shroud. This is absurd. As has been repeatedly pointed out by others, such a patch was looked for prior to cutting the samples to verify that the samples would be representative of the entire cloth.
The term "invisible patch" does not mean it cannot be seen. It just means it blends in to the original material to the naked eye. It can be seen from the reverse side and can be detected under microscopic examination. Considering that both of these examinations were done, including an x-ray fluorescence test, the belief that a large patch area actually exists is entirely unfounded.
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