Posted on 02/26/2005 8:43:02 PM PST by ETERNAL WARMING
Surprising new study on Shroud of Turin Simple technique could have been used to produce image
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: February 26, 2005 1:19 p.m. Eastern
By Aaron Rench © 2005 Assist News Service
MOSCOW, Idaho – The Shroud of Turin has long baffled scientists and scholars, Christians and skeptics for over seven centuries. The cloth bears a photonegative image of a man crucified and is thought by many to be the miraculously preserved burial cloth of Christ. Over the years, skeptics have been unable to convincingly demonstrate how any medieval forger could have produced such an image.
N.D. Wilson, a fellow of literature at New St. Andrews College in Moscow, Idaho, believes that he has done just that.
"The Shroud has always been particularly mysterious because the image is both three-dimensional and a photonegative," Wilson says. "Artists are simply not able to produce images like that on their own, and so many conclude the Shroud is an authentic relic of Christ's resurrection. What I've done is demonstrate how easy it could have been for a medieval to create a three-dimensional photonegative."
Wilson, who describes his experiment in an article published in Books and Culture, (March/April, 2005) as well as on his website, began his experiment by painting faces on glass. The painted panes of glass were then set on top of linen and left in the sun for various lengths of time. Dr. Scott Minnich, a microbiologist well-known in Intelligent Design circles, provided Wilson with scientific advice on structuring his experiment. Minnich was not expecting the results the experiment produced.
"The success of these experiments was a surprise to me," Minnich said. "And as Nate [Wilson] aptly concludes in his paper, it doesn't disprove the Shroud's authenticity. However, it does show an alternative hypothesis for its making that has not been considered to my knowledge. And I don't think he goes beyond the data in his interpretation."
Commenting on Wilson's lack of scientific credentials, Minnich said, "It is the irony of science that often someone out of the mainstream shoots an outside shot with such accuracy."
Though the images Wilson produced look remarkably similar to the Shroud of Turin, he does not believe he has proved the relic to be a fraud.
"I believe it to have been faked. But that's not something I can prove," he said. "What I have demonstrated is that in order to produce an image like the one on the Shroud, nothing more is required than the cloth itself, and a painting on glass. All things available to a medieval. A forger would have three-dimensionally encoded a photonegative onto cloth, without even being aware of the completeness of his art, or for how long he would be confusing the rest of us."
Antonio Lombatti, a fellow researcher of medieval church history at the Deputazione di Storia Patria in Parma, Italy, was quite interested in Wilson's findings.
"I am eager to examine his results under the microscope to check the chemical properties of his shroud. … What I really find interesting about Wilson's experiment is that his shroud has encoded 3D data even if it was not produced with a real face or a bas-relief."
Wilson said that his faith has surprised people: "I’m a Trinitarian Christian. I believe in the Resurrection and all that it means for this world. Either the Shroud is genuine or, as I believe, it is a lie about a great truth. I think Christians should want to see religious fraud exposed wherever we can find it."
Scientists from around the world have already begun requesting samples of Wilson's shrouds. When asked if he would distribute samples from his experiments, Wilson was unsure.
I haven't thought that far ahead."
One of Wilson's Shrouds, as it appears to the eye (left) and as it appears in photonegative (right)
p-p-p-ping
And the bits of pollen, insects, etc. that are only found in the specific corner of the world Jesus was crucified in that just happen to be stuck all over the shroud? Was that faked, too? How about the 3D nature of the head wounds, as if the bloody, matted hair passed through the shroud at a point in time? I suppose that was faked as well?
Sorry, just b/c this guy has found a technique that duplicates a single aspect of the shroud doesn't come anywhere close to showing it as a forgery.
When was glass invented?
About 2000 BC.
thank you
As hard as many, many people have tried, no one has been able to create an exact reproduction of the shroud, nor can anyone explain all of the evidence that suggests it actually is a genuine ancient death shroud of a crucified man. So many attempts to reproduce it are like this example, which fails to consider the limited medical and technical knowledge of even the most learned men of the 1300s.
A medieval man "could" have built the same phonograph that Edison built in 1877.
And the 3-D characteristics of the Shroud are NOT apparent to the human observer. It is only when a computer is used in order to plot the brightness of each point on the image onto a graph, that the three-dimensional information in the image becomes apparent.
Making any fuss about this particula experiment makes no more sense than waving a piece of fabric about and declaring: "The Shroud is made of cloth, and here is a piece of cloth manufactured in the 18th century, therefore the Shroud could have been created in the 18th century!"
Very clever. Now perhaps he can explain the pollen evidence and the amazing "coincidence" of the same blood type being on both the Mandylion ("Shroud") and the Sudarium (Head cloth of Christ - which is documented to have arrived in Spain ahead of the Mohammedan invasion of North Africa in the 700s, after having been in Alexandria for the previous 700 years.)
Good luck to him on explaining away that one.
glass panes?
Moscow, Idaho? Isn't that a forgery?
Well, there are only 8 different blood types. And all the shroud had to do was spend some time in the part of the world where that pollen was located. You state in your comment examples of pices of cloth moving great distances over time.
Comments?
Pollen studies show that the Mandylion ("Shroud") traveled from Israel through Turkey to Constantinople (from where it was removed to Turin, either by the Crusaders who sacked Constantinople, or to save it from the Turks - we'll probably never know exactly which one).
The Sudarium pollen studies show it traveling from Israel through north Africa to Spain.
Corroborating the historical/traditional explanations of the travels of both objects.
Not only are the blood types the same, but the blood and wound patterns visible on the sudarium appear to match perfectly the dimensions of the head on the Shroud, as well as the location of the wounds on that head.
And, again - the history of the Sudarium is documented all the way back to the eigth century in Spain, and earlier in North Africa.
[Artists are simply not able to produce images like that on their own, and so many conclude the Shroud is an authentic relic of Christ's resurrection.]
I'm amazed at the number of people who insist that our ancestors were idiots and were incapable of crafting and constructing things that impress us today.
Why is it so difficult to believe that dedicated people living thousands of years ago built great pyramids and constructed accurate astronomical stone timepieces and created realistic human faces on cloth for artistic reasons?
Oak Hay, Oak Hay... I confess... I did it... It was me... All by myself... I created the Shroud of Turin while I was time traveling !!!
Now please take the panties off my head... I can't stand any more of this brutal torture !!! ;-))
About the 10th or 11th century.
About 2000 BC.
A far better question is "when was transparent glass formed into sheets like windowpanes invented?"
Early glasses were mostlly opaque. Window glass was not produced in the UK until 1226, and it was of poor quality. ref: http://www.londoncrownglass.co.uk/History.html
Early window glass was very expensive and not likely to be wasted in producing a forgery. Going to the hardware store and buying a windowpane was not really possible until fairly modern times.
While the Romans had glass and even transparent glass, it was all hand blown and used for drinking glassses, bottles, vases and the like. No windowpanes.
No matter how many painted bottles you collect, you will never replicate anything like the shroud.
Our ancestors may not have been idiots---but humans have been a bit slow to figure this one out.
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