Comment Promoted: On being lazy or a fool; a pseudoskeptic
John Klotz writes by way of a comment:
What I find amazing is the Asimov article which is a part of blog that started this discussion. It’s Medieval (maybe not so medieval). He adopted of the language and analysis of the Inquisition. Thus we have “orthodox” science defending us against the heretics who dare to publish without imprimatur.
It is a very elitist view and anti-democratic. It’s not that scientific issues should be decided by a majority vote. It’s that even crackpots have a right to free access to what Madison called “the market place of ideas.” The essence of the Asimov view is that only approved ideas can be shared.
Given the scientific investigations of the Shroud of Turin and the published results of those investigations anyone who still argues or tosses off the opinion that the Shroud is, or must be studied as, a painting, is either lazy or a fool, or both.
They are also what Marcello Truzzi called “pseudoskeptics.” They are not seeking to discover truth but to sustain their predetermined point of view. They are truly “true believers.” And yet in the posts to this blog the pseudoskeptics label those who take the scientific findings concerning the Shroud seriously “believers” as if that were a curse word. When it comes to “belief” those who maintain the Shroud is a painting and attack the credibility of those who deny that are the Taliban of science.
The journal that Marcello Truzzi started because he believed that skepticism was being replaced by pseudoskepticism You can see all the comments related to this particular comment by clicking here.
Leave a Reply
Is the Shroud real? Probably.
The Shroud of Turin may be the real burial cloth of Jesus. The carbon dating, once seemingly proving it was a medieval fake, is now widely thought of as suspect and meaningless. Even the famous Atheist Richard Dawkins admits it is controversial. Christopher Ramsey, the director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Laboratory, thinks more testing is needed. So do many other scientists and archeologists. This is because there are significant scientific and non-religious reasons to doubt the validity of the tests. Chemical analysis, all nicely peer-reviewed in scientific journals and subsequently confirmed by numerous chemists, shows that samples tested are chemically unlike the whole cloth. It was probably a mixture of older threads and newer threads woven into the cloth as part of a medieval repair. Recent robust statistical studies add weight to this theory. Philip Ball, the former physical science editor for Nature when the carbon dating results were published, recently wrote: “It’s fair to say that, despite the seemingly definitive tests in 1988, the status of the Shroud of Turin is murkier than ever.” If we wish to be scientific we must admit we do not know how old the cloth is. But if the newer thread is about half of what was tested – and some evidence suggests that – it is possible that the cloth is from the time of Christ.
No one has a good idea how front and back images of a crucified man came to be on the cloth. Yes, it is possible to create images that look similar. But no one has created images that match the chemistry, peculiar superficiality and profoundly mysterious three-dimensional information content of the images on the Shroud. Again, this is all published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
We simply do not have enough reliable information to arrive at a scientifically rigorous conclusion. Years ago, as a skeptic of the Shroud, I came to realize that while I might believe it was a fake, I could not know so from the facts. Now, as someone who believes it is the real burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth, I similarly realize that a leap of faith over unanswered questions is essential.
My name is Dan Porter. Please email me at DanielRobertPorter@gmail.com
I would have to agree with this: “Given the scientific investigations of the Shroud of Turin and the published results of those investigations anyone who still argues or tosses off the opinion that the Shroud is, or must be studied as, a painting, is either lazy or a fool, or both.”
It’s incredible how atheists call themselves
men of science, reason and rationale but they seem to abandon all these things that they supposedly hold dear to them when the evidence is against them.
The shroud is the perfect relic to expose them for what they really are and that is extremist pseudo-skeptics. I bet most of them would have loved it if the shroud didn’t survive the 1972 and 1997 fires. It’s such a pain in their backside because it will not go away and every evidence we continue to uncover is in favor of authenticity.