The Fraud of Turin

Researchers in France have successfully created a duplicate of the Shroud of Turin using a technique that would have been available in the Middle Ages. This is signficant because:

The experiments…answer several claims made by the pro-Shroud camp, which says the marks could not have been painted onto the cloth.

I'm not sure, however, that the headline "Turin Shroud confirmed as fake" is justified. Just because the image definitely could have been created by mundane means long after Jesus's death in a process consistent with the technology of the time doesn't necessarily mean that the image wasn't in fact the product of a miracle. And that's the point. Nothing will ever prove that the image wasn't the product of a miracle. (Link via Sploid.)

Comments

[Sandy]

Alex Tabarrok has been making some arguments with much the same logical flaw. To wit, if you posit the existence of an omnipetent and omniscient being, there is nothing you can't explain as a miracle, and the whole of science, including not least free-market economics, is invalid because any and all of it can be explained as "because god made it that way."

[kmw]

Daniel,

You're new around here, so I'm going to clue you in on a little secret... Starting a discussion about proof/non-proof of religious beliefs is like putting a bleeding cow in a piranha tank.

You should just be thankful that Gary Gunnels won't be here to lay into you.

[WSDave]

Does this mean that Jesus didn't really die? Did he actually hop a bus to New Mexico by way of Vegas just to avoid the whole marriage...I mean death...thing?

By the way, I've been away for awhile. What happened to Gunnels?

[kmw]

He got his ass banned. Harshed Tim's buzz one too many times.

[Shawn Smith]

This is news?

I remember seeing a show several (maybe ten or fifteen) years ago (I think it was Nova) where one guy took a sculpture of a head, wallpapered a cloth on top of it with water, and then used a brush to lightly dab some powder on it, with the more prominent parts of the cloth getting more powder and therefore darker. It looked a lot like the Shroud, and it was also a photographic negative. Was I high when I saw that, or just asleep?

[m]

I saw the shroud with my very own eyes over 20 years ago, and I can confirm that it looked *exactly* like a miraculous shroud would look if it were in fact miraculous.

[kevrob]

Nothing will ever prove that the image wasn't the product of a miracle. - DK

Of course nothing can't. The statement,....the image wasn't the product of a miracle is a negative, and you can't prove a negative.

What has been disproved, however is this statement: "The Shroud was created by some process impossible for humans to recreate at time X." Occam's Razor should lead us to assume that, if one natural process could create something, then the similar/identical product of a "miracle" was probably created naturally, too.

Of course, those intent on believing in the "miracle" will rationalize that their divine power created the Shroud, no matter what people today are or in the Middle Ages were capable of.

Kevin

[MikeP]

If reporters, headline writers, and editors can't grasp the simple logical error in that headline, what good is it trying to get them to understand anything -- especially science, including not least free-market economics.

[anonymous coward]

Was Gunnels really banned? That's a bummer. I'd heard that before, but I assumed it was just a crazy rumor. He was certainly an abrasive and arrogant sort, and he often let his hostility undermine his arguments. Even so, I thought he was one of the most informative posters on this board. I don't know, it seems like just because a guy is a jackass, doesn't mean he should be purged.

[Ken Shultz]

What? The shroud could be a fake!

Oh no! Now I'll have to abandon my faith completely! What will I do?

...I guess I'll just have to wander around in circles until I get hit by a car! ...there's no Jesus to save me!

Might as well close all the churches 'cause there's nothing left to do but become an atheist now--now that we know the shroud is a fake!

[Shawn Smith]

<offtopic>

AC,

The full discussion is over here. He wasn't actually banned, he left because he simply didn't want to follow the rules Tim laid out for only him.

</offtopic>

[Agammamon]

". . .will ever prove that the image wasn't the product of a miracle."

Not even the church's own findings that the shroud is a fake - a finding that was made almost immediately after the shroud's first appearance in the mid 1300's?

[Ruthless]

"You're new around here, so I'm going to clue you in on a little secret... Starting a discussion about proof/non-proof of religious beliefs is like putting a bleeding cow in a piranha tank."

kmw,
If you had read the Phyllis Diller cookbook, you would know, that a discussion of politics and religion around the dinner table can cover for short-of-gourmet-cookin'.
That was not at all to imply Daniel Koffler is serving up half-baked threads.

Bleeding cow in piranha tank... yum yum.

[Ruthless]

Over the centuries, has anyone ever taken a sample from the Shroud, pretending it was for the purpose of carbon-dating, or some such, when, in fact, the sampler had come to the end of his roll of toilet paper and was just desirous of a glistening, shall we say glowing, shall we say "transfigured" anus?

[Jeff]

But science will never prove that the image of Mary in the cheese sandwich is false.
Or the oil stain...
Or the bridge girder rust...
or the window grime...

[Eddy]

No, no, no, don't you all see. The ability to reproduce the shroud is a miracle and it was only through the grace of god that mankind was given that gift. If anything, this actually proves the authenticity of the shroud because it shows how difficult it was to find a method of forging it that was available hundreds of years ago.

[thoreau]

I've seriously considered scraping an image of Mary into a piece of fried fish and selling it on Ebay.

Can we bring Gunnels back for this thread?

[phocion]

I remember seeing this problem before with AFP. Powerful headline that isn't quite completely justified by the article itself. Unfortunately I can't think of another example off the top of my head.

[Toxic]

Not to mention that some Bishop actually got the guy who created the damned thing to confess not long after it was created centuries ago.

[Ken Shultz]

Finally foiled! The shroud is false! Heaven has fallen!

...Gimmie a break.

[GOD]

THE SHROUD OF TURIN IS A FORGERY.

THAT IS ALL.

[Ersatz Datura]

It's real. I have two words for you: Time travellers.

[James Leroy Wilson]

France? An AMERICAN debunked it back in February:
http://www.shadowshroud.com/.

[Son of Gunnells]

My name is Diego Gunnells, and you killed my father. Prepare to die!

[Eric the .5b]

But...would a miracle of the Shroud require a magic neutron bomb?

[James Kabala]

The Vatican has always been skeptical of the shroud. It was the Vatican that sponsored the 1988 carbon dating tests. It's really only in recent decades that the Shroud has become such a big issue. Before that, it was like any other obscure relic.

[Eric the .5b]

Oof. Another one:

Is this evidence of Intelligent Secret Design?

[Twba al-Infidel]

The shroud is as authentic as Huck Finn's raft. I don't waste my time looking for fictional artifacts. I also guarantee that Noah's Ark is not to be found on any mountain in Turkey or Iran.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Perhaps if Gary Gunnels is indeed dead to this board, we should make a shroud of him, and 2,000 years from now it would be considered a sacred relic.

[Twba]

Praise Gary! Gary loves you. Gary is my copilot.

[Noah]

"I also guarantee that Noah's Ark is not to be found on any mountain in Turkey or Iran."

Maybe because it isn't. Maybe it's in Syria. I have no clue.

I lived a very long a virtuous life, and I get rewarded for it by having to build a gigantic fucking boat and having to rustle up two of every animal. Can you imagine the logistics of this feat, not to mention the given time period? I have no idea how I did it. None.

And then I have to spend 150 days on this fucking thing getting soaking wet, shoveling shit, and trying to keep the animals from fucking killing each other, not to mention us.

Jesus fucking Christ, a little gratitude here, please?

[Ham]

Noah, are you lying naked in your tent again? Don't make me come over there!

[crimethink]

I don't have a dog in this fight -- my faith does not depend on the Shroud being authentic -- but one thing about this explanation strikes me as odd.

Why would someone living in say 1300, go to all this trouble? I mean, they could have just painted the image on and it would have been impossible for anyone using 1300s technology (ie, no microscopes or carbon dating) to spot it.

[wellfellow]

I'm with crimethink, I could care less either way, but he has a point.

Also, what miracle couldn't be explained by other processes? I thought miracles were supposed to mimic what could naturally occur other ways, except they were catalyzed at a specific time for the religious purpose at the time. That was the whole reason Jesus wouldn't turn a rock into bread, 'cause it was unnatural. I could be wrong, but this is what I've always been told.

[rmark]

Back in 1300 there was a thriving market in religious relics - finger bones, hair, shrouds? I suspect a good artist went where the money was.

[Umbriel]

Shawn Smith -- I seem to recall the same thing, though I think there was some controversy over whether the image produced was really "photonegative" in the way the original Shroud's is. If the fabric is molded closely over the model's features when the pigment is applied, there's potentially some distortion when it's later layed flat.

crimethink -- There wasn't much forensic analysis of even a rudimentary sort going on back in the 1300s, but I think the reason for this method might have been that it would actually have been easier than painting for a forger with no artistic talent. Alternatively, one might imagine an artist/relic-forger simply experimenting with new techniques who liked the "spooky" effect he got this way.

I've personally always rather liked the "Da Vinci photograph" theory, but that's apparently flawed too, alas -- http://www.shroudstory.com/faq/Shroud-Turin-Photographic.htm

[phocion]

I don't know if motive is all that important to this investigation. People did wacky stuff back then. Hell, people do wacky stuff now.

[crimethink]

wellfellow,

Some miracles are indeed things that occur naturally, but happen exactly at the time that the miracle worker wants them to. Such as, Jesus telling Peter he'll find a fish with two coins in its mouth -- an unlikely but not impossible feat -- so that he can pay a tax.

Others are completely unnatural -- like parting the Red Sea, or raising Lazarus from the dead. Jesus could have turned rocks into bread, but he refused because he was in the midst of a forty-day fast; the devil was trying to tempt him to break his fast.

[wellfellow]

crimethink-

Ah, I see. Forgot about the fasting thing. Thanks.

Although, the red sea thing, isn't impossible in the same way that the rock/bread thing is. In a way it mimics natural events like tides and tsunamis and whatnot.

[crimethink]

Not even the church's own findings that the shroud is a fake - a finding that was made almost immediately after the shroud's first appearance in the mid 1300's

...based in large part on the fact that the nail wounds visible on the shroud are on the wrists, while the contemporary Latin translation of the Bible clearly stated that the nails were driven through the hands. Which is also why every medieval image of the crucifixion has nails going through the hands.

Later it was discovered that St Jerome had erred in translating from the Greek text, which did not rule out the nails going through the wrist. And, of course, modern knowledge of anatomy confirms that the metacarpal bones of the hand are nowhere near strong enough to support the body's weight, so it must have been the wrists that were nailed during crucifixion.

Which again brings up the question of why a forger would depart from the contemporary art in such a radical (though ultimately correct) way.

[crimethink]

And don't assume that church officials are impartial on the authenticity of relics, miracles, etc. In fact, a medieval bishop would have every reason to cast doubt on them, since they would represent a connection to God that he doesn't control.

[gaius marius]

on gg:

I didn't say everybody had to follow those rules. I said Gary had to follow them.

not exactly the finest moment in the history of the rule of law for mr cavanaugh. i think we generally deride this as a bill of attainder. so much for empirical principles and equal protection.

on SoT:

you can't prove a negative

true, mr kevrob -- but then, you can't prove anything, strictly speaking. didn't hume teach us precisely that -- causation itself is faith, and induction by enumeration is therefore invalid reasoning?

there's a difference, i think, between skepticism of faith and religion and hostility toward it. hume's lesson should keep a conscientious observer in the former camp.

i don't think the shroud of turin is actually the funerary wrapping of christ; but i do know that faith in relics have provided and continue to provide, within the context of the church, several meaningful services to the catholic faithful which are part of a way of life that thrived in europe for a thousand years. there is obviously much wisdom and knowledge to be learned about human societies from their continued veneration, which is untouchable to techne.

[thoreau]

i don't think the shroud of turin is actually the funerary wrapping of christ; but i do know that faith in relics have provided and continue to provide, within the context of the church, several meaningful services to the catholic faithful which are part of a way of life that thrived in europe for a thousand years.

I don't think that the earth was created in 7 days; but I do know that an overly literal interpretation of Genesis has provided and continues to provide, within the context of their church, meaningful service to the fundie faithful which are part of a way of life that has thrived in different sects around the world for more than a thousand years.

[gaius marius]

Why would someone living in say 1300, go to all this trouble?

i think this is the most relevant question, mr crimethink. relics fulfill a human need which few of the rational-monad/efficient-market simulacrum can even acknowledge.

Which again brings up the question of why a forger would depart from the contemporary art in such a radical (though ultimately correct) way.

although, i must say, the forger (if it was one) is presumed to be working in the 14th c -- well into the advent of italian humanism. anyone who had read their galen and avicenna -- and had then further conducted the experiments in anatomy that was one of the first profound effects of the classical revival -- could have come to the same conclusion.

that is was forbidden by doctrine for representations to show the nails anywhere but the palm doesn't preclude the artist from rendering the christ so. the church was far less authoritarian prior to the conterreformation than it has been remembered as since, and was quite tolerant of actions among humanists that would later have been deemed heretical.

[gaius marius]

fundie faithful

fair enough, mr thoreau -- but simply because ridiculous literalism has set in among the wayward sons of christianity doesn't nullify the utility of relics in a healthy human society.

[crimethink]

relics fulfill a human need which few of the rational-monad/efficient-market simulacrum can even acknowledge.

I'm not disputing that, gaius. My question is not why someone would forge a relic, but why they would do it in such a complicated manner, when simpler methods would have done just as well. Of course, Umbriel provided a possible answer to that...

[crimethink]

because ridiculous literalism has set in among the wayward sons of christianity doesn't nullify the utility of relics in a healthy human society.

Even if such relics are frauds?

[David]

Even if such relics are frauds?

I was thinking the same thing. If God exists as he does in the Christian bible, wouldn't faith in a false relic be idolatry of a sort?

[gaius marius]

Even if such relics are frauds?

i think their authenticity hardly matters, mr crimethink. is GOOG really worth $290 for $2.53 in earnings and no dividend? of course not. but one convinced that this goofy search engine is going to take over the world, reality is of diminishingly small importance next to faith. one can think of GOOG as a relic of an age obsessed with commerce, if you like.

[Ken Shultz]

"Jesus could have turned rocks into bread, but he refused because he was in the midst of a forty-day fast; the devil was trying to tempt him to break his fast."

This is one of my favorites!

I think there was something bigger going on. I think the devil was tryin' to tempt Jesus to give the people what they want. So Son of God, wanna be the Son of Man? Feed the people's greed, and they'll follow you instead of me!

In the next temptation, the Devil tempts Jesus to protect people from harm. ...Now those are temptations worthy of God!

Thank goodness he resisted the temptations to give us what we want and to protect us from harm; indeed, our salvation, apparently, depended on it.

P.S. ...ever read "The Grand Inquisitor" chapter from "The Brothers Karamazov"?

[crimethink]

gaius,

I'm sure that the reality of whether GOOG returns their investment is of great importance to those buying its stock. If they find out that they were mistaken, they will not be grateful for their misplaced faith, but curse it. I suspect the same would be true of those with a devotion to the Shroud.

So, gaius, the $64,000 question:

If the Shroud's authenticity doesn't matter, does it matter whether God became man, died on the cross, and rose again 2,000 years ago?

[zach]

sandy -

To wit, if you posit the existence of an omnipetent and omniscient being, there is nothing you can't explain as a miracle, and the whole of science, including not least free-market economics, is invalid because any and all of it can be explained as "because god made it that way."

only assuming that god changes his mind about what he made from time to time. as long as there are constant observable phenomena, science is valid, whether or not you call the whole of existence a "miracle". what would make science invalid is if the rules were arbitrarily changed from time to time by god, that is, the occurrence of "unnatural" miracles.

[zach]

If the Shroud's authenticity doesn't matter, does it matter whether God became man, died on the cross, and rose again 2,000 years ago?

crimethink, i think what gaius is trying to say is that, to True Believers, it's not.

[crimethink]

zach,

No one, not even a true believer, enjoys being duped.

[gaius marius]

I'm sure that the reality of whether GOOG returns their investment is of great importance to those buying its stock.

i'm not so sure, mr crimethink. i mean, it matters -- but its also secondary. there are a lot of folks out there who bought yhoo at 200 who are still waiting on that ship.

does it matter whether God became man, died on the cross, and rose again 2,000 years ago?

i think evidenciary authenticity is irrelevant to belief, mr crimethink. facts matter nothing to a man of pure faith. is someone going to prove that god doesn't exist from a lack of evidence?

as for me personally.... are you asking me as a cultural anthropologist or a catholic? 😉

as a catholic, i think god's force is in the church and its canonic exegesis of the bible -- not the bible itself. as such, does it matter if the events of the bible are allegorical? not nearly as much as the social institution that grew from the exegesis, which is an instrument of hellenic philosophy par excellence. even if allegorical, what has been gleaned from the allegory through the exegesis is invaluable.

fwiw, i think the real appreciation of allegory has about died in our literalist, technological age. history as conceived by the ancients was necessarily allegorical -- they saw utterly no conflict in having events cast to serve a proper allegory. and i don't think any of the founders of the constantinian church were belabored by literal details even in the prosecution of heresies; when they fought nestorian, arianic and monophysite heresies, they were fighting to resolve philosophical differences that they felt illustrated by the truths in question.

when paul writes, 'If Christ is not risen from the grave our faith is in vain' -- does he really mean that, if we got the facts wrong, the faith is worthless? obviously not, imo. he means that the event of the resurrection is central to comprehending the view of human life which is christianity.

it's difficult now, i think, for people (including myself) to transport ourselves to a place where the physical facts are so secondary to philosophy -- but one can hardly doubt that such a time existed. (indeed, i think we are experiencing a gradual return to those times.)

[Eddy]

And, of course, modern knowledge of anatomy confirms that the metacarpal bones of the hand are nowhere near strong enough to support the body's weight, so it must have been the wrists that were nailed during crucifixion.

Ummm, that would mean humans couldn't climb and grossly underestimates the strength of not only skin but the transverse metacarpal ligament. It sounds more like common wisdom than physiological fact.

The assertion also denies the weight is distributed among both hands and feet. If we assume a reasonable weight of 165 lb. and 30% is supported by the feet that leaves only 58 lb. for each arm. Further, assuming the current crop of replica nails, about the size of a pencil, are reasonable simulations and the thickness of an average hand is 1.25 inch we can deduce the pressure on the flesh to be about 155 psi. The question now becomes is 155 psi enough to rend skin and ligament? While it is almost certainly painful, I find it hard to believe that is suffecient pressure to tear. For real world examples, a 5 gal. pail full of water weighs a bit more than 40 lb and while uncomfortable to lift with one finger bearing the weight it does not split the skin and there are numerous examples of people who pierce their backs and have their entire weight supported by a pair of hooks going through only skin. As for the good doctor/physician that is quoted widely on the web claiming that nailed hands can't support the weight, he would be more convincing if he wasn't an ophthalmologist.

If anything, I'd wager religious detractors started saying the depiction of the crucification was false because the nails were in the wrong place and after the shroud "turned up" the stories flipped. I know the shroud is real, but I feel it is art not artifact.

[crimethink]

as a catholic, i think god's force is in the church and its canonic exegesis of the bible -- not the bible itself. as such, does it matter if the events of the bible are allegorical? not nearly as much as the social institution that grew from the exegesis,

If the events I was asking about were merely allegorical, the sacraments are worthless, I spend hours of each week in spiritual masturbation, I lend financial support to an organization that's no more than a 1700 year old joke on the human race, and have duped myself into believing that death is not the end of my being.

Yeah, I'd say it matters.

when paul writes, 'If Christ is not risen from the grave our faith is in vain' -- does he really mean that, if we got the facts wrong, the faith is worthless? obviously not, imo.

Then your opinion is obviously wrong. As he goes on to say, '...if our faith is in vain, the dead are lost, and if it is for this life only that we have believed, we are of all people most to be pitied.' Not exactly a ringing endorsement of the Christian view of human life "if we got the facts wrong."

[crimethink]

Eddy,

Hmm... you may be right, according to this analysis.

http://e-forensicmedicine.net/Turin2000.htm

[zach]

crimethink,

the point is that pure faith doesn't rely on evidence, and so evidence doesn't matter to someone who lives by pure faith. obviously if evidence against their faith were accepted as fact by the believer, it would be devastating; but if their faith were "strong" enough, by definition, they would never accept any amount of evidence against their faith as fact. in other words, if you care about material evidence at all, you're not purely a man of faith. that's all.

[gaius marius]

you care about material evidence at all, you're not purely a man of faith.

exactly, mr zach.

If the events I was asking about were merely allegorical, the sacraments are worthless, I spend hours of each week in spiritual masturbation, I lend financial support to an organization that's no more than a 1700 year old joke on the human race, and have duped myself into believing that death is not the end of my being.

why on god's green earth would you believe that, mr crimethink? what about the church and all that it has done for western civilization relies solely on the actuality of events separated from us by two millennia of church development? there's no joke in the essential philosophy and law that the church has been the exponent and defender of for all that time.

[gaius marius]

it's akin to saying that if romulus wasn't raised by the she-wolf, rome is just an empty joke -- or if achilles didn't really slay hector, homer was nothing for mankind. that really is the ultimate rejection of the empirical, isn't it!

if you want to believe in the power of god, look at what the church has done for this civilization. that is the testament of the church's validity.

[David]

if you want to believe in the power of god, look at what the church has done for this civilization. that is the testament of the church's validity.

gaius,

I think that I would choose a different test for the result you seek.

[dhex]

yea verily...

without guilt there can be no civilization.

[dhex]

or to put it less snarkily, what gaius is illustrating is plainly true to anyone who has ever picked up a history book. everyone, everywhere must have some sort of mythos behind their actions - a binding of emotion and words and actions either to some form of ritualization or group identification.

this includes rationalists, libertarians, and even the most haughty objectivist.

[zach]

...and did, long before the establishment of the catholic church.

[speedwell]

"If the events I was asking about were merely allegorical, the sacraments are worthless, I spend hours of each week in spiritual masturbation, I lend financial support to an organization that's no more than a 1700 year old joke on the human race, and have duped myself into believing that death is not the end of my being."

Wow, that's much of the reason I became an atheist, crimethink. May I quote you?

[dhex]

even atheists have their gods; it's part of what makes us human.

humans making gods isn't really the issue, when it comes down to it, unless you're one of those anal-retentive psicop types who beats off to to skeptical enquirer. it's that they make such shitty, broken gods in the process that's a problem.

[zach]

that's kind of loopy reasoning... if humans are incapable of making gods that are "good enough", then doesn't that mean we should just kinda stop?

[Twba]

Gary saves. Trust in Gary.

[dhex]

"if humans are incapable of making gods that are "good enough", then doesn't that mean we should just kinda stop?"

no one is incapable of building good ones...it's just that we're often incapable of being aware of the process as being an artifact of our existence.

that internal process is mistaken as an artifact or evidence of the objective universe, then used to bludgeon/rape/murder/kill/confound/abuse/smack very hard with a dishrag/legislate/obscure/and otherwise annoy our neighbors.

[zach]

so basically, it's OK to "create gods" for ourselves, as long as we don't confuse that with reality.

i don't think the PSICOP folk would have any problem with that.

[dhex]

ahh, well...the psicop crowd thinks they're *not* creating gods.

a more simple version of that is: do you believe in Love?

[zach]

... still a little loopy. the word "love" doesn't imply a metaphysical energy or being (at least when i use it); just a poetic concept. similarly, the word "god" usually implies a metaphysical being, but i can use it poetically to describe an object or concept of extreme importance in someone's life (which is what i thought you were talking about). the two meanings obviously aren't the same.

[dhex]

"the two meanings obviously aren't the same."

but operationally, they are. at least, i can't find a way to separate the two.

it's definitely loopy, no argument there.