Miracle of the Shroud / Blood on the shroud

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Jabba said:
HighRiser,
- There is so much chance of getting a sample that is not representative of the greater shroud if you sample only one small location.
--- Jabba
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You have no way of knowing that.

The ONLY way for the sample to be non-representative, given the fact that the contamination was removed (the use of multiple cleaning techniques that resulted in the same results proves that) is for the sample ot contain foreign material. In over a year you've been entirely unable to present even the slightest bit of evidence suggesting that there was any.

That means that we can only conclude that the entire shroud is made of the same material. In which case hte odds of getting a non-representative sample are 0. There is NO chance, NONE, of getting a sample that's not representative.

Garrette said:
Quick and easy example: Under "Military Presentations" he lists West Point Military Academy. I will check later to see if this actually even happened, but for now it is sufficient to say that no such place exists. It is the United States Military Academy.
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Wow. That's just....wow. If someone can't get the name of an institution they (allegedly) attended right, they have zero credibility.
 
Dinwar said:
You have no way of knowing that.

The ONLY way for the sample to be non-representative, given the fact that the contamination was removed (the use of multiple cleaning techniques that resulted in the same results proves that) is for the sample ot contain foreign material. In over a year you've been entirely unable to present even the slightest bit of evidence suggesting that there was any.

That means that we can only conclude that the entire shroud is made of the same material. In which case hte odds of getting a non-representative sample are 0. There is NO chance, NONE, of getting a sample that's not representative.

Wow. That's just....wow. If someone can't get the name of an institution they (allegedly) attended right, they have zero credibility.
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I agree on zero credibility, but he wasn't claiming to have attended there, only to have presented there. Of course, he gives no information regarding date, topic, or auspices. Lots of people and organizations present there; Eisenhower Hall can be rented, after all. So I seriously doubt he presented there under the invitation of the Academy itself but rather as a privately funded speaker on a matter of no interest to the institution and attended only by those who chose to spend their free time at such an event.
 
Jabba said:
HighRiser,
- There is so much chance of getting a sample that is not representative of the greater shroud if you sample only one small location.
--- Jabba
Click to expand...

There doesn't seem to be any evidence that the sample area is not representative of the whole cloth. What you have presented as evidence of your claims regarding patching and contamination is all unsubstantiated speculation.

The opinion that the shroud is the burial clothes of the biblical Jesus is unsubstantiated by objective evidence. The court of public opinion cannot change that.
 
Jabba said:
HighRiser,
- There is so much chance of getting a sample that is not representative of the greater shroud if you sample only one small location.
--- Jabba
Click to expand...

Why?


Garrette said:
I had never heard of Breault until Jabba mentioned him, so I did a quick perusal of his website. It takes almost no time at all to realize he is some combination of conman, liar, and fool.

Quick and easy example: Under "Military Presentations" he lists West Point Military Academy. I will check later to see if this actually even happened, but for now it is sufficient to say that no such place exists. It is the United States Military Academy.

Then under "University Presentations" he lists West Point University. Again, no such place exists. It is the United States Military Academy. Sometimes the extension "at West Point" is added, but it isn't part of the name.

So Breault gives conflicting names for one of the world's premier military institutions (as well as one of the U.S.'s better engineering schools) and gets it egregiously wrong both times.
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Ouch.
 
Garrette said:
I agree on zero credibility, but he wasn't claiming to have attended there, only to have presented there.
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Ah. Thanks for the correction; I misread the statement. :)

Still, not knowing the name is rather a bad sign.
 
I must retract my criticism of Mr. Breault for not getting the name of the Military Academy correct. He did get it incorrect, but it turns out that it is not unreasonable for him to have done so.

I did a bit of checking/googling and then contacted Mr. Breault through his website. I asked about the dates, nature, and auspices of his presentations. He replied quickly and politely, but first asked the context of my questions. I responded truthfully, telling him that I am involved in a discussion about the shroud, that I come down on the side of medieval hoax, and that his name and website came up in the discussion.

He again replied quickly and politely, not with specific dates, but with information that satisfied me and coincided with the small amount of information that my Googling had provided.

For the military presentations, Mr. Breault said that since he lives near Fort Bragg (and has for sometime), he has frequently been "sponsored by the U.S. Army Chaplaincy." This makes sense, as the Chaplains Corps is separate from the remainder and is active in bringing religious support to the troops. (Of course, it raises a separate question of why the military is spending money on such things). It further explains why Mr. Breault got the name of the Academy wrong. Officially, the name is the United States Military Academy, but it is commonly known -- even among those who attended there -- as West Point. Further, even their official website prominently features "West Point" as the informal name. So it is understandable that someone not formally associated with it would assume an incorrect name.

For universities, Mr. Breault says that his presentations there have occurred primarily over the past three years and that "Sponsorship varies--sometimes through campus activities as part of a program related to Multiculturalism or Spiritual Diversity, other times I am sponsored by a campus ministry such as the Wesleyan foundation."

So while I suspect I would find many reasons to disagree with Mr. Breault's presentation, I must say that I can find no real fault with his listing of sites where he has presented. My apologies.
 
Sample Selected

Garrette,
- Thanks.
- I wrote to Mr Breault about our discussion, and per usual, he answered right away. I wrote back asking if I could quote him, and am now waiting for his response.
--- jabba
 
Sample Selected

Hugh,

- I think that, in a discussion between persons who disagree with each other re their topic, it’s essential that they accurately paraphrase their “opponent’s” position. Too often, the opponents are not quite saying what they think they are saying…
- Anyway, here’s what I think you are now saying.

- You agree that in purely scientific terms (having no concern about damage to the shroud), the labs would have preferred testing MULTIPLE locations.
- And, since you haven’t responded to my #7590, I’m hoping that you now accept that 1) even truly moral, but also objective, scientists would have asked for multiple locations; 2) if a “dud” sample had, in fact, been forced upon the labs, they might never admit such; and, 3) if the labs had a choice about the general location of the sample-to-be, but were allowed only one location, they would not have asked for a corner, let alone that particular corner.

- How’s that?

--- Rich
 
I love how you're ignoring what people who've actually taken C14 samples are saying, Jabba. And the implication that not taking multiple samples--which would have NO impact on the dating WHAT SO EVER, since there was no patch--is a moral failure.

Jabba said:
2) if a “dud” sample had, in fact, been forced upon the labs, they might never admit such;
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Except that this is exactly what would have happened--they'd have come out with their own report outlining the problems involved. Exactly like they did with the Mt. St. Helens "dud" sample. Again, funny how you completely ignore that.

3) if the labs had a choice about the general location of the sample-to-be, but were allowed only one location, they would not have asked for a corner, let alone that particular corner.
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Considering careful analysis by textile experts and other competant scientists demonstrated that there was no reason to not select that corner, there's no reason to assume that the labs wouldn't have selected it.

This is nothing more than a smear campaign against the researchers and an attempt to ignore the fact that the C14 was valid. It's transparently dishonest, and immoral in so far as it consists of slander against the C14 dating labs involved.
 
Jabba said:
3) if the labs had a choice about the general location of the sample-to-be, but were allowed only one location, they would not have asked for a corner, let alone that particular corner.

- How’s that?
Click to expand...


Well, they might not have, for other reasons, but, as I have pointed out, if they wanted to avoid an "invisible patch" they couldn't have chosen a better spot.

Since you seem to be concerned about the invisible patch possibility, then you should be very happy with their selection.
 
Jabba said:
I think that, in a discussion between persons who disagree with each other re their topic, it’s essential that they accurately paraphrase their “opponent’s” position. Too often, the opponents are not quite saying what they think they are saying…
Click to expand...
That's very true.

Anyway, here’s what I think you are now saying.

- You agree that in purely scientific terms (having no concern about damage to the shroud), the labs would have preferred testing MULTIPLE locations.
Click to expand...
Probably, yes. Provided time/money/archaeology/religion etc.etc. didn't come into the consideration at all, then the more tests you do, the more accurate you may suppose the result (up to a limit, after which the probable reduction in error becomes too small to be significant). However all these things do come into consideration, and I think that the labs were content with a single sample weeks, if not months, before they arrived in Turin.

And, since you haven’t responded to my #7590, I’m hoping that you now accept that 1) even truly moral, but also objective, scientists would have asked for multiple locations; 2) if a “dud” sample had, in fact, been forced upon the labs, they might never admit such; and, 3) if the labs had a choice about the general location of the sample-to-be, but were allowed only one location, they would not have asked for a corner, let alone that particular corner.
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No, that's not my position. I think you're still thinking in terms of 'the church' versus 'scientists,' when I have repeated said that I don't think such a dichotomy existed. I replied in detail to your #7590 with my #7598, which tried to explain firstly that the spirit of confrontation you postulate didn't exist right up to the morning of the sample-taking, and even then the contention was between the two church scientists, not 'the church' and 'the scientists.' I don't believe anybody looked at the shroud, selected what seemed the least contaminated area and demanded the sample came from there and nowhere else. I have no doubt at all that the less cleaning a sample requires, the happier a test laboratory will be, but I don't think that the introduction of other considerations, and the selection of a less than ideal piece, means that appropriate cleaning can't be carried out. As for the exact choice of area, I repeat my earlier speculation; if any of the lab representatives had been left alone in the room with a pair of scissors and a free hand - would they have done any different from what was actually done? I think some might have gone for sample from under a patch (with reservations about altered proportions of C14 due to the fire) and others might have gone for a different corner (but why spoil a so far undamaged bit, when the top corners were already missing?

So (1) Being real people, I don't think the scientists felt they required or actually demanded multiple locations.
(2) If they had suspected they were watching a non-representative sample being cut out, they would certainly have said so at the time.
(3) If they had had a free hand about were to snip, they would have taken a sample either from under a patch, or from one of the two top corners.
 
Jabba said:
Hugh,

- I think that, in a discussion between persons who disagree with each other re their topic, it’s essential that they accurately paraphrase their “opponent’s” position. Too often, the opponents are not quite saying what they think they are saying…
- Anyway, here’s what I think you are now saying.

- You agree that in purely scientific terms (having no concern about damage to the shroud), the labs would have preferred testing MULTIPLE locations.
- And, since you haven’t responded to my #7590, I’m hoping that you now accept that 1) even truly moral, but also objective, scientists would have asked for multiple locations; 2) if a “dud” sample had, in fact, been forced upon the labs, they might never admit such; and, 3) if the labs had a choice about the general location of the sample-to-be, but were allowed only one location, they would not have asked for a corner, let alone that particular corner.

- How’s that?

--- Rich
Click to expand...


I think we can all agree that the best, most representative sampling of the shroud would have been to remove all the visible patches, and the backing, and grind the whole shroud to dust after cleaning it, and run the 14C dating on the remaining dust.

That would eliminate claims of inhomogeneity and invisible patches.

Would Jabba then accept any medieval 14C dates for the shroud?

Of course he wouldn't. Nothing will ever change his a priori conviction that the shroud is the authentic 1st century burial cloth of Jesus.
 
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John Jones said:
I think we can all agree that the best, most representative sampling of the shroud would have been to remove all the visible patches, and the backing, and grind the whole shroud to dust after cleaning it, and run the 14C dating on the remaining dust.

That would eliminate claims of inhomogeneity and invisible patches.

Would Jabba then accept any medieval 14C dates for the shroud?

Of course he wouldn't. Nothing will ever change his a priori conviction that the shroud is the authentic 1st century burial cloth of Jesus.
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I think the scientists would have clipped away the charred/heavy contaminated parts to simplify cleaning.
A plus for this method would be the destroying of this fake.
But you are right about Jabba never accepting reality, that would endanger his believe and therefore his identity.
He has a complete different concept about reality than most JREF members.
 
Ward, Hugh and others,
- This is what I got from Russ Breault.

I am not sure where to find specific documentation for the exact number of times it has been exhibited and held at the corner cut for C-14 dating. Beginning in 1578 it was exhibited numerous times with May 4th designated as the official feast day of the Holy Shroud. It was displayed numerous times on that day. Since it was owned by the Savoy family since 1450, it was also exhibited during special royal occasions, mostly weddings. I have a catalog of the Savoy collection that has numerous etchings of these public exhibitions beginning in 1578. The issue to be made is that the carbon labs as well as the Pontifical Academy of Sciences should have been cognizant of the "handling history" and clearly should have avoided that corner. While this history doesn't prove the Shroud was rewoven at that corner, logic would dictate that there would have been a higher risk of contamination and should have been avoided.


--- jabba
 
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