The headline, seemingly everywhere reads, “Science Proves Miraculous Origins of Shroud of Turin.” While not viral, the message in this YouTube video from RealCatholicTV.com is being spread among Christian websites, particularly Catholic sites. It exaggerates the ENEA report. It sensationalizes it. Watch it. It’s not long:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6nuyWTqOtA
And here is some accompanying text:
How do we know that the Holy Shroud is real? Modern science is incapable of replicating the image.
While the second sentence is true, it doesn’t prove the first. Does this sound like God-of-the-gaps reasoning? Isn’t this just like the Intelligent Design (uppercase ID) folks trying to argue irreducible complexity? This makes pseudoscience out of science.
There is nothing wrong with the ENEA Report. It is how it is being reported. In my mind the authors of the report need to issue a clarification for the media. Or maybe I just don’t understand. In that case the authors of the report need to issue a clarification for us dummies.