The Shroud of Turin: An Enigmatic Anomaly

[seycyrus]

I'm not making any oppressive sounds other than the clack of typing.
And now, back to the shroud.

You laid the foundation of all human suffering at the feat of religion, Specifically Christianity.

BTW my online search shows that the epistles of Mark and Matthew are substantitively unchanged. I know the Old Testament hasn't changed. Which books of the bible were you referring to?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

This thread is about the shroud or Turin; not religion and not the bible.

 

[baywax]

This thread is about the shroud or Turin; not religion and not the bible.

Although we can use the bible as a reference to the origin of the idea of a Mandylion Cloth... the [I'm not sure if the story of the Mandylion Cloth appears in the bible but if it does] the story could have been inserted at anytime during the first 500 years after crucifixion-style executions were in fashion. And with that story inserted into the minds of all those who were devoted to this book, of course someone was going to take advantage of this opportunity. Whether they forged a miracle for re-sale or for protection is of no consequence. What remains is the fact that the story of the Mandylion Cloth, and other cloth relics associated with the Jesus figure, carried on through the centuries only to land in the hands of someone who could bring it to life as "the true" shroud of turin".

There are suggestions that point out how the negative of the figure wears a mask that is in the likeness of Leonardo. The edge of the mask is said to be discernible stretching across the chest of the cadaver that posed for the camera obscura. I promise to dig up this reference in a minute.

Other anomalies concerning the shroud of Turin include the measurements of the figure's frontal view and the figure's back view. The figures height in the front is considerably shorter than the figure's back measurements. This suggested that two different cadavers (which da Vinci had unfettered access to while staying in Turin to paint the Mona Lisa) were used in making this masterpiece. Using two cadavers would have lessened the amount of decomposition time to endure.

Now I'll go and try to find some sources to back my statements up there.

First off.. you can measure the image yourself right here:

http://www.bridgewater.edu/%7Erschneid/FocusProjects/Shroud/ShroudMeasure/sindoneImg.html

Its pretty obvious that the back view of "the Jesus figure" is much taller than the frontal view. There is some foreshortening to take into account. But that doesn't account for the difference in height. And, why would there be foreshortening in this image if it was not a photograph?

The man's height: Various experts have estimated the man's image to be 5' 11½" to 6' 2" tall. Jews who lived in the 1st century were much shorter than this. Writer William Harwood comments: "According to a medieval writer, [the Jewish historian] Josephus described Jesus as an old-looking man, balding, stooped, with joined eyebrows and approximately 135 cm (4ft 6 in.) tall." 2 This is based on the standard 46 cm. long regular cubit -- an ancient unit of distance. Using the 53 cm. special cubit, Jesus' height would have been about 156 cm (5ft 1in.). An analysis of skeletons from 1st century CE Palestine has shown that the latter figure is typical. Harwood also makes the point that if Jesus were really 6 feet high, his height would have been so remarkable that he would certainly have been described as a giant in the Christian Scriptures (New Testament) The image on the shroud is about a foot too tall for Jesus, using the best data available.

(This site has scads of info on the artifact...)

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_shro2.htm




As for the mask comment:

The search will continue regarding a source for the idea of a mask on the figure's head. Try looking for the arc of it's bottom, from shoulder to shoulder on the figure.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

From what I have read of the latest tests, there is credible controversy as to the year of origin of this cloth. If in fact the carbon dating was done on a section of cloth that had been repaired around the 16th century, then at best we don't have good evidence by which we can determine a date of origin.

The best evidence may be the pollen, which seems to take it back to the first century.

 

[Cyrus]

I saw something on TV a while ago. Some guy figured out exactly how the con-artist made it. You use a piece of glass and an image and let it sit in the sun. It then somehow burns an image that looks ghostly like a face but in reverse. It was a stupidly simply solution he found too, one that was entirely possible for someone to do during their time. Its all a sham.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

From what I have read of the latest tests, there is credible controversy as to the year of origin of this cloth. If in fact the carbon dating was done on a section of cloth that had been repaired around the 16th century, then at best we don't have good evidence by which we can determine a date of origin.

The best evidence may be the pollen, which seems to take it back to the first century.

That's odd because I heard the pollen evidence agreed with the carbon dating, and that the carbon dating was taken from an unremarkable part of the cloth, ie that matched the rest precisely. Mind you unfortunately the only source of this is not available, which is typical.

Even if the pollen evidence is that old. That only suggests the cloth was a composite, not that it is an original, shorud of Christ. Logically it can't be both ~800 years old and ~2000 years old.

Because of controversy the cloth has been tested from different parts of the cloth more than once. I think though their is some spin going on somewhere, not sure what propaganda to believe?

 

[baywax]

That's odd because I heard the pollen evidence agreed with the carbon dating, and that the carbon dating was taken from an unremarkable part of the cloth, ie that matched the rest precisely. Mind you unfortunately the only source of this is not available, which is typical.

Even if the pollen evidence is that old. That only suggests the cloth was a composite, not that it is an original, shorud of Christ. Logically it can't be both ~800 years old and ~2000 years old.

Because of controversy the cloth has been tested from different parts of the cloth more than once. I think though their is some spin going on somewhere, not sure what propaganda to believe?

There is a lot of spin on this artifact. If the pollen is from the first century that doesn't date the cloth as being from that time... pollen can hang around that long and get into clothing with no problemo.

If the cloth dates from year 1 this doesn't mean the image dates from that time. There will have to be a method of dating the image to confirm, in the least, that this is not a forgery of what it is claimed to be.

Some reports say the weave of the cloth is a "herring bone" weave that was not used during the 1 century AD. Other reports say that the clothiers of the 1st century had no problem weaving a herring bone weave.

Round and round we go.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

That leaves us with only one undeniably reliable bit of evidence with which to make a conclusion, no? The carbon dating which places the shroud in the middle ages according to several different samples from the cloth. Essentially the rest is just a matter of interpretation.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

That's odd because I heard the pollen evidence agreed with the carbon dating, and that the carbon dating was taken from an unremarkable part of the cloth, ie that matched the rest precisely. Mind you unfortunately the only source of this is not available, which is typical.

There are a number of reasons to suspect that the carbon dating is flawed: Enzymes that were found to be growing on the material; deposition of materials due to its exposure to fire in the middle ages; repairs done later. The only reason that we still have controversy is that the carbon dating is now seriously doubted. In fact I posted one link where the man who invented carbon dating admitted that the results can't be trusted. Since then more has come to light.

And no, only one very small corner of the cloth was tested. This is all discussed in earlier links in this thread.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

There are a number of reasons to suspect that the carbon dating is flawed: Enzymes that were found to be growing on the material; deposition of materials due to its exposure to fire in the middle ages; repairs done later. The only reason that we still have controversy is that the carbon dating is now seriously doubted. In fact I posted one link where the man who invented carbon dating admitted that the results can't be trusted. Since then more has come to light.

And no, only one very small corner of the cloth was tested. This is all discussed in earlier links in this thread.

Not according to QED, because the first sample was questionable The Vatican allowed them, to take several more samples this time from all over the cloth.

If that evidence is doubtful then you have to say there is no evidence that it came from ~33AD any more than there is that it came from 800 AD. So in other words, its probably a fake but no one can prove it.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What they say flies in the face of every report that I've read in recent years - including interviews with the scientists who did the testing. I guess I will have to do a little checking. The NBC story makes the point that the Catholic Church wouldn't allow additional samples to be taken after the first test.

Based on what I've seen and read, what I stated is well established as fact. It may be that some of the sources such as QED are unreliable.

Historically, one of the problems has been that the church only allows extremely limited access to the shroud, and especially so if actual samples are desired. They don't want people chopping it up.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

Actually I think I can work out why there is a difference. The QED program according to my sources was shown before the second image was found, thus I am working on preceding information. With that in mind I accept that the complications that arise leave us with a mystery.

http://iidb.infidels.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=119693

You might want to look through this thread as well it has a lot of extra material you might not of seen. None of it appears completely convincing either way though.

Source:

Walter McCrone's book tells you all you need to know:

“In order to get a supernatural explanation out of the “Shroud�?, one must be Scientist. But if someone gets a supernatural explanation out of the “Shroud�?, then one is not Scientist. But in order to…�? Walter, I’m glad to see that my work was not in vain and that the Pursuit of Truth has finally overtaken perceived truth. The title alone, “Judgment Day For The Shroud Of Turin�?, is worth the price of the book (30 pieces of silver). The fact that Heller’s book, arguing for the authenticity of the Shroud has long since fossilized in the Apologist’s Hall Of Fame and gone out of print while your book remains popular kind of says it all. The beauty of the book is that while McCrone puts the “Shroud�? under the microscope, in a typology which ironically is so crucial to many Church doctrines, McCrone at the same time puts the faith of a Church which believes its leader is infallible but couldn’t even tell you if it was going to rain tomorrow under the microscope as well. So, in addition to presenting overwhelming and then some evidence that the “Shroud�? is really a shroud the book becomes a wonderful illustration of the nature of Apologetics. Ignore/deny superior tests for supporting conclusions and create/cling to inferior tests supporting assumptions thus placing the usual scientific process backwards (isn’t this evidence of Satan?). If McCrone is guilty of anything it was baiting the Church into thinking that he was exactly the type of scientist wanted by the Church, top credentials but sympathetic to the cause of the Church and determined to prove the Shroud authentic. In his initial letters to Father Rinaldi, offering his services to research the Shroud, McCrone titled his letters, “Authentication Of The Turin Shroud�? and wrote, “The provenance for the Shroud is known dependably for more than 600 years with considerable evidence extending this date back to the time of Christ…The protection of this information through proper channels must remain uppermost in our minds…I sincerely hope we may be able to work on this most interesting project and hope that we will be able to obtain data supporting the conclusion that this linen was indeed the one used as Christ’s Shroud after the cruxifixion.�? As a scientist McCrone should have known before he started his testing that the Shroud was 14th century as he was familiar with the extant letters from the Bishops of Lyons (yes, “Lyons�?) to the then Pope stating that the creator of the Shroud had confessed that it was a painting (this fact more than any other illustrates the absurdness of the necessity to even test the Shroud for authenticity as the situation is that we have second and third hand evidence that the “Shroud�? is a fraud while we have no hand or even foot evidence that there even was a burial shroud of Jesus). Even the supporters of the “Shroud�? generally agree that these letters are authentic but they claim that they refer to some other burial Shroud of Jesus near Lyons at the same time (ignore/deny). McCrone had also studied the results of testing by the 1973 Italian Commission, the first group of Scientists, hand picked by the Church, to test the Shroud whose results strongly implied that the Shroud was a 14th century painting. Aside from the conclusive evidence that McCrone found indicating the Shroud was a fraud the Church and Christian scientists involved in the study of the Shroud also came to hate McCrone because they felt that his initial portrayal of being sympathetic to the Church was a false appearance to induce the Church to use him and hid his true belief that the Shroud was a fraud and he wanted to prove that it was to feed his ego and build his reputation as a great scientist. The bulk of the book consists of McCrone explaining the necessity, procedures, analysis and conclusions of scientific testing of the Shroud in terms easily understandable to the non-scientist and this is where McCrone excels as in addition to superior scientific skills he displays supreme communication skills as a teacher as well. McCrone proves through the use of state of the art microscopic technology that the Shroud image consists almost entirely of paint pigments popular in the 14th century. While generally conceding that there is some paint pigment on the Shroud, supporters of the Shroud deny that the image is a painting because there is no evidence of brushstrokes when examined microscopically. To answer this objection McCrone demonstrated that if the paint was sufficiently diluted in a water base there would be no detectable brushstrokes. McCrone recreated shrouds using the same paint materials used on the Shroud and reported that there were no visible brushstrokes on the recreations and that under the microscope the particles were identical between the recreations and the Shroud and challenged any Shroud supporter to try and tell the difference (a challenge which is still untaken). McCrone next demonstrated that there is no actual blood in the “blood�? image areas of the Shroud. Dried blood under the microscope is always black but the blood areas of the Shroud were red. Chemical analysis of the blood image areas also indicated that they lacked major chemical components of blood such as potassium. Shroud supporters, such as Heller, conclude that the blood image areas are blood because they contain some chemical components of blood such as calcium and iron but they ignore that paint pigments also contain calcium and iron. When asked to explain why the usual tests for the presence of blood fail here, such as black color and existence of potassium, they explain that the explanation is some unknown process (ignore/deny). These then were the two significant conclusions of McCrone, the image is a painting and there is no evidence of blood. McCrone wrote up the results of his testing in articles for peer reviewed and accredited scientific journals and his results are largely accepted by the scientific community at large. McCrone also deals with claims of Shroud supporters who are then forced to rely on inferior issues to support their beliefs. Regarding the common supporter claim that the “Shroud�? is a perfect negative image McCrone points out that the hair and blood images of the Shroud are positive, not negative images. The other popular supporter claim is that the Shroud contains a collection of pollens which support a journey from the Middle East, to Turkey and then to Europe. McCrone notes that his examination of the Shroud indicated that the majority of these pollens were concentrated in one extremely limited area of the Shroud and recognizing that he is not a pollen expert provides a special section in his book detailing the report of a pollen expert who has serious doubts as to the credibility of the Scientist (Frei) who reported the pollen findings. McCrone builds such a strong case for the Shroud being a 14th century painting that when McCrone reports towards the end of his book the results of carbon dating showing a 14th century date (surprise) it’s actually anti-climactic. McCrone also describes his impressive credentials, tools and talent for such a project and is quite merciful in describing the lack of corresponding qualifications of his Christian “scientist�? opponents instead limiting himself to objectively describing their limited qualifications and use of inferior equipment. John Jackson for instance, perhaps McCrone’s biggest critic, had the main qualification for studying the Shroud of being a captain in the U.S. Air Force. Generally, the Christian scientists supporting the Shroud have not had peer reviewed articles published in accredited scientific journals. McCrone’s reward for his work was to be ostracized and shunned by the Church and fellow Christian scientists who in addition to obviously not liking his results were incensed that unlike some predecessors who had similar findings McCrone had the courage to make POSITIVE conclusions (“The Shroud is a 14th century painting�?) rather than play the Church’s game and avoid positive conclusions indicating the Shroud was not authentic (“I did not find evidence that the Shroud is from the 1st century�?). In the face of this persecution McCrone displays a timely and welcome sense of humor during his book giving appropriate placed applicable quotes such as Ambrose Bierce’s “Faith, n. Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel.�? Walter, Did you ever know you are my hero? You are the cleaning solution beneath my microscope slide. By golly, you and your microscope were right all along. You’ve convinced me and I hope your book will convince others. With best wishes and keep up the good work. Galileo"

This bit can be found on page 4.

 

[baywax]

Not according to QED, because the first sample was questionable The Vatican allowed them, to take several more samples this time from all over the cloth.

If that evidence is doubtful then you have to say there is no evidence that it came from ~33AD any more than there is that it came from 800 AD. So in other words, its probably a fake but no one can prove it.

There is some speculation (mostly on my part) that, since the Mona Lisa was painted in Turin and Da Vinci had to be there to paint it... the technique Leonardo used to create the Shroud of Hoax was also, theoretically used to capture the likeness of Mona Lisa... Given such a case, the Mona Lisa herself may have sat for the Camera Obscura and perhaps found this procedure amusing enough to have her quirky smile forever immortalized by Da Vinci.

This idea stems from the photographic-like features of the Mona Lisa portrait where the gradation of light to dark on her face is practically too perfect for just the observations and methodology of Da Vinci to have achieved.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

If this is purely a memory issue then I would say that you are in error. The problem has been the limited access.

I would add that it seems ridiculous to me to say that 1500 year old pollen was just floating around and happened to contaminate the cloth. To me that comes under the heading of a crackpot theory. Do we find 1500 year old pollen on samples of today's clothing?

Maybe the pollen expert was in error, but I don't see contamination as likely or even possible.

 

[baywax]

If this is purely a memory issue then I would say that you are in error. The problem has been the limited access.

I would add that it seems ridiculous to me to say that 1500 year old pollen was just floating around and happened to contaminate the cloth. To me that comes under the heading of a crackpot theory. Do we find 1500 year old pollen on samples of today's clothing?

Maybe the pollen expert was in error, but I don't see contamination as likely or even possible.

Here's an account of someone who didn't find any pollen on a sample of the shroud.

I visited Walter McCrone's laboratory in Chicago several times over the years. In 1980 and 1981, I was able to observe several Shroud fiber samples using one of McCrone's polarizing microscopes. While not trained in forensic microscopy, I am an expert sedimentary petrologist and skilled with geological, biological, and micropaleontological microscopy; much of my academic research involved the study of microfossils, I currently consult in the petroleum industry using sedimentary petrology, and I assist my biologist wife with her zoological photomicrography and image analysis; I have six microscopes of various types in my house and access to several others at the local university and geological consulting lab where I work. Using crossed polars and Becke line movement, I quickly and easily identified the thousands of tiny particles I saw as the mineral hematite using its characteristic color and high index of refraction as criteria; this was a mineral I had observed hundreds of times before. Hematite is finely ground to make the pigment red ochre, which has been used throughout human history as the most common red pigment. The particles are definitely not blood shards or alkaline iron precipitates (such as iron sufide, iron carbonate, or iron nitrate); they are unquestionably iron oxide. I also observed some vermilion pigment particles, the mineral cinnabar; McCrone told me this was often used by medieval artists to represent blood. I saw no pollen grains on the slides I examined (I only studied a few), and McCrone told me they were rare. There were other particles in addition to the abundant linen fibers and red ocher particles which I could not identify; McCrone told me these were other pigments, wax, soil, and other particles.

http://www.freeinquiry.com/skeptic//shroud/articles/rogers-ta-response.htm

and...

I was the one who claimed that Max Frei's pollen findings were a hoax, since his sticky tape samples had abundant pollen and cotton fibers from his gloves, and STURP's samples had neither; the nonsensical response was that Frei took his sticky tape samples with more force than did STURP, thus actually getting the pollen from inside the fibers. However, they've never explained the presence of the cotton fibers, which I believe got mixed in with Frei's secreted pollen grains when he covertly touched his pollen stash and then pressed his tape sample with his fingers before applying it to the Shroud. I pointed out that the pollen was at least half-derived from insect-pollinated plants and could not have been wind-blown onto the exposed Shroud in Palestine; the response was that visitors to Jesus' funeral benevolently placed flowers on his Shroud and the pollen fell out! For every critique, the Shroud believers--endowed with immense emotional involvement in its authenticity--come up with some bizarre response or overreaching justification. This process would be sad if the stakes were high, but since it's just the Shroud of Turin, the process is hilarious.

Same source.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

If this is purely a memory issue then I would say that you are in error. The problem has been the limited access.

I would add that it seems ridiculous to me to say that 1500 year old pollen was just floating around and happened to contaminate the cloth. To me that comes under the heading of a crackpot theory. Do we find 1500 year old pollen on samples of today's clothing?

Maybe the pollen expert was in error, but I don't see contamination as likely or even possible.

Quite possibly that's why I edited my response, before you replied. Apologies. However it still leaves the question open atm. I think I'll resort to my default opinion of a page back. That is that atm, with the evidence we have it is unclear. Too much speculation and spin to really know who is right. If the Vatican let's more samples be taken under even more rigorous scientific conditions, then we will have a yes or no answer.

 

[mgb_phys]

How to make your own shroud of Turin

Not, I hope, a surprising or controversial topic to anyone here.

"Italian scientist reproduces Shroud of Turin"
http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE5943HL20091005?pageNumber=1

Basically how you would expect to do it - have somebody pretend to be a body (or originally before ethics committees I assume a real body) + rub paint on them.

 

[seycyrus]

They should have shown some images of their recreation. I think the thumbnails are pictures of the actual shroud.

 

[mgb_phys]

I assume there is a paper in press somewhere and this is just a press release

 

[Evo]

They should have shown some images of their recreation. I think the thumbnails are pictures of the actual shroud.

The picture on the right *is* the reproduction. Apparently it was good enough that you didn't notice.

I know this because the original article went into more detail about the reproduction and said so. You can tell if you look at it closer. They said natural aging of the fabric would lend the additional haziness to the figure.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The thread from social sciences was merged here. A full review of this thread would be helpful to those who don't know the history of the subject. The latest news report is not representitive of the entirety of the facts.

 

[seycyrus]

...
I know this because the original article went into more detail about the reproduction and said so. ...

I can't see the link to the original article. Do you have a link, if so can you please post it?

 

[Evo]

I can't see the link to the original article. Do you have a link, if so can you please post it?

Here is an article that clarifies that the image on the right is the new reproduction.

http://www.examiner.com/x-19191-Tuc...aims-proof-that-the-Shroud-of-Turin-is-a-fake

 

[seycyrus]

Here is an article that clarifies that the image on the right is the new reproduction.

http://www.examiner.com/x-19191-Tuc...aims-proof-that-the-Shroud-of-Turin-is-a-fake

Ah thank you!

I prefer the original!

 

[BigFairy]

This is not to be construed as an endorsement or warranty of fitness for any purpose.

 

[ideasrule]

You can bash on religion without having to resort to such fallacies. That's like saying the dictionary has been rewritten thousands of times.

True, which is why I don't consider the dictionary to be the ultimate truth.

 

[seycyrus]

True, which is why I don't consider the dictionary to be the ultimate truth.

Well Holeee...you're responding to a statement I made quite some time ago, but ok...Trying to remember what was being discussed back then...

The argument is simply false. To use a false argument to present an opinion is false. Additionally, when one considers that are plenty of others ways to make said opinion, it is lazy.

 

[BigFairy]

and false..

 

[wavering]

The Turin Shroud, how it was made?

The Turin Shroud is about to be exhibited for the first time in ten years in Turin so this would seem an apposite time for a discussion. Radio carbon dating suggests that it is a 14th century forgery but how did the forgers do it?

I have (modest cough) come up with an explanation of how it could have been made

" If you take the body of a man who has been badly tortured in a very hot and humid climate it will be covered with sweat which contains lactate, urea and possibly other organic molecules. If the body were then wrapped in a cloth, that cloth would absorb many of these compounds. If the cloth were then dried in an oven and accidentally overheated, these chemicals would darken."

The full explanation is here:
http://bobcory.com/shroud/

Comments gratefully received
Bob

 

[jreelawg]

The Turin Shroud is about to be exhibited for the first time in ten years in Turin so this would seem an apposite time for a discussion. Radio carbon dating suggests that it is a 14th century forgery but how did the forgers do it?

I have (modest cough) come up with an explanation of how it could have been made

" If you take the body of a man who has been badly tortured in a very hot and humid climate it will be covered with sweat which contains lactate, urea and possibly other organic molecules. If the body were then wrapped in a cloth, that cloth would absorb many of these compounds. If the cloth were then dried in an oven and accidentally overheated, these chemicals would darken."

The full explanation is here:
http://bobcory.com/shroud/

Comments gratefully received
Bob

except that you would expect a negative.

 

[MotoH]

There was just a documentary on the History channel on how the carbon dating was wrong. I didn't have time to watch it though. I guess they found a lot of blood in the shroud than what was expected when it was examined
(who knows though, it could be one of those monsterquest documentaries where they find anything to be true)

 

[mgb_phys]

Radio carbon dating suggests that it is a 14th century forgery

How do you know that false C14 date wasn't itself a miracle intended to test your faith?

" If you take the body of a man who has been badly tortured in a very hot and humid climate it will be covered with sweat which contains lactate, urea and possibly other organic molecules.

You don't have to torture him, there are lots of other things you can do to a well muscled artist's model to get him hot and sweaty and covered in organic molecules - and quite a few renaissance artists were prosecuted for doing them.

 

[jreelawg]

Of course the radio carbon dating was wrong. Miracle carbon ages much slower than normal carbon.

 

[TurtleMeister]

There was just a documentary on the History channel on how the carbon dating was wrong. I didn't have time to watch it though. I guess they found a lot of blood in the shroud than what was expected when it was examined
(who knows though, it could be one of those monsterquest documentaries where they find anything to be true)

Yeah, I watched that also. The error they claimed is that the sample taken was not representative of the whole shroud. They took a sample from a corner that contained both the original fabric and cotton from a later repair. So the test is invalid.
http://www.ohioshroudconference.com/

 

[GeorginaS]

How do you know that false C14 date wasn't itself a miracle intended to test your faith?


You don't have to torture him, there are lots of other things you can do to a well muscled artist's model to get him hot and sweaty and covered in organic molecules - and quite a few renaissance artists were prosecuted for doing them.

Of course the radio carbon dating was wrong. Miracle carbon ages much slower than normal carbon.

:rofl:

Points to both of you for making me laugh out loud and startling my cat and everything.

We already have a thread about this:

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=151666&highlight=Shroud+Turin"