Guess who has landed in David Rolfe’s comment section of his Challenge page:
It’s a simple matter to produce a series of scorches of decreasing image intensity, right down to ones that are scarcely visible – or merely a pressure imprint with no apparent pyrolysis – at least to the naked eye. But measuring their thickness without specialist microscopes is another matter entirely. I tried a different tack a short while ago, which was to strip off the epidermal sheets of cells that line the inner scale leaves of onions – which are just a single cell thick – to dry them overnight, and then to press a hot metal template onto the sheets with an underlying layer of linen. It’s easy to get an intense scorch on the epidermis with little or no scorching of the underlying linen. It’s an approximate model of course – the onion epidermis is not a perfect model for the outermost cell layer of linen. It probably scorches primarily by Maillard reactions (sugar and protein) rather then by caramelisation of carbohydrate, which begins according to one literature reference at 154 degrees C. However, the templates I used that scorched the epidermis were sufficiently hot to scorch unprotected linen too, so I doubt if I had chosen too low a temperature.
What I don’t know, of course, is whether the image on the epidermis, with suitable choice of experimental conditions, might be be confined to the 200nm(?) thick PCW, or whether the entire cell layer is scorched (the latter being much, much thicker, say 200 or 300 microns).
What the experiment demonstrates is that scorching by thermal energy – in this instance conduction by direct contact – should not be assumed to be some catastrophic all-or-nothing process that penetrates the entire thickness of fabric – as Paolo Di Lazzaro seemed to be proposing with his hot coin experiment. It can be fine tuned, making it progressively more superficial – even if the thickness or precise location of the final limiting image cannot be defined at present. I believe he and his ENEA team were much too hasty in assuming that the Shroud discoloration could not be modelled using thermal energy, including simple conduction. As for the immediate recourse to uv energy – from an excimer uv laser no less – words fail me – especially when one reads the press reports in the UK that accompanied ENEA’s work last December ("miraculous flashes of light").
Dawkins? Forgive my saying, but I don’t see why he has to be involved in a discussion of the authenticity of the Shroud as the burial shroud of Christ, as distinct from a medieval fake, distinguished scholar though he is. Yes, I know he has expressed views on the C-14 dating, but I don’t see that being regarded as a chief spokesman (bogeyman to some ;-) on behalf of an atheistic world view should give him any privileged insights re dating technology, and in any case risks creating an unnecessary distraction, conflating scientific scepticism with atheism. It should be possible to put the Shroud under a metaphorical microscope without having one’s own religious beliefs (or lack thereof) similarly scrutinised and commented upon That’s just my opinion, which you are free to ignore…
I have been giving the Dawkins Challenge a lot of thought. I tend to agree with the last paragraph that Colin wrote above. I expect we’ll see a lot more of him in David’s neighborhood.
What baffles me about all these attempts to reverse engineer the shroud image and claim they have found how it was fabricated in the middle ages, is that only historical reference from that era asserting the shroud to be a fake is the D’Arcis Memorandum which claims the shroud was “cleverly painted.” We also know that this document was never sent to the pope and had clear economic and political motives. But the question remains…who was the artist? How did he “paint” the image when there is no visilbe trace of paint or pigment on the shroud? The critics all start with this document but then ignore the fact that it was alleged to be a painting.
Daniel Scavone has an interesting angle on the D’Arcis memorandum in a paper he presented to the Ohio conference in 2008: BESANÇON AND OTHER HYPOTHESES FOR THE MISSING YEARS: THE SHROUD FROM 1200 TO 1400. Rather than Ian Wilson’s Knights Templar theory, Scavone postulates that the Burgundian Othon de la Roche, who was Seigneur of Athens from 1204, sent the Shroud to his church St Stephens in Besancon. It so happens that Jeanne de Vergy, widow of Geoffrey de Charnay was a direct descendant of Othon. Besancon was vulnerable to both German and French forces, and at some time Jeanne is believed to have rescued the Shroud from St Stephens and substituted a copy showinig only the frontal view. It can be construed that the D’Arcis memo may actually refer to this copy. In 1389 St Stephens was destroyed by fire and all records together with the copy were lost. Even in the rebuilt church, few records survived as a result of the subsequent Terrors of the French Revolution. Scavone’s paper may be found at: http://ohioshroudconference.com/papers.htm
The problem(s) with the d’arcis memorandum are many. It was only a draft, no evidence ‘anywhere’ of it ever been sent or of a response to such letter (draft). Written in 1389 it states the ‘inquiry’ was proportedly done 34 years earlier by Bishop Henri de Poitiers, dating it too 1355. Problem is in 1356 Bishop dePoitiers presided at the consecration of the Lirey Church, at this consecration he gave his unqualified and lavish blessings, praising it’s canon and founder (Geoffrey de Charnay). I doubt he’d be praising anyone if a scandal had occurred just a year before. There is absolutely no record of any inquiry taking place either, no matter what year it may had occurred. D’ Arcis’s ‘claims’ are based on several layers of compounded hearsay, which would never pass in any court of any time. Further, D’Arcis never reveals his source, never vouches for the truthfullness of his information, meaning he may be simply relating gossip or rumor. To top it all off we have unequivocal scientific evidence that the Shroud in no sense of the word is a painting.
R
Ron, I know all of that and appreciate all those arguments. Read what I said again. Scavone hints in his paper that it may have been a copy that Jeanne de Vergy substituted and returned to the Besancon church that really prompted the d’arcy memo, possibly resulting from some kind of garbled misunderstanding. Seen in this light, we could understand that he felt action was required, even if he did not fully understand what had happened, and had to rely on hearsay. It’s merely another angle on what may have prompted his memo, and consequently dilutes inferences and criticisms made on the true Shroud’s authenticity resulting from his memo. It seems he was probably aiming at the wrong target, instead of aiming his criticism at the actual copy at Besancon. LOL
Dave, I understand the Scavone hypothesis, I’ve read his papers. But I’m saying it doesn’t really matter as the d’Arcis memorandom was strictly ‘heresay’, nothing more. d’Arcis never saw the Shroud, he wasn’t there in Lirey and he’s talking about something that had ‘supposedly’ occurred before his time. Therefore strictly on those grounds, it can and should be found useless with no merit. Opponents to Shroud authenticity ‘ignore’ these fundemental shortcomings of the memorandom blindly, same as they blindly ignore all the evidence for the Shroud. Thats all I’m saying.
Sorry I also wanted to add that the Shroud opponents, at the same time regarding this ‘heresay’ memorandom as fact will totally ignore or disptute evidence such as the Hungarian Pray Manuscript or the writings of Robert d’Clari on absolutely no grounds….hypocricy at it’s best. ;-)
R
What does not seem to be appreciated, here or elsewhere, is that a 12.8 billion pixel digital image of the Shroud was taken as long ago as 2008 – one that was supposed to provide an invaluable resource to researchers.
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/02/28/shroud-of-turin.html
Yet as far as I can establish, no image files on the internet have this image or sections thereof, and there have been no scholarly papers based on that new resource (why not?) I only discovered this by enquiring from David Rolfe whence he had acquired the banner he uses on his Enigma site.
I am presently negotiating with him to gain access to additional image files from the same high-defintion scan. There are copyright issues, and a degree of protectiveness on the part of the Turin custodians, perhaps understandable, but we seem to be making progress.
I personally believe that a lot of ‘received wisdom’ re the Shroud image will need to be re-evaluated once the full 12,8 billion pixel image file becomes generally avaialble.
I now refer to David’s banner as “Rolfe Panel A”. It’s worth a post or two in its own right, but I shall hold off for a while, with a view to cross-checking conclusions against a larger section of that amazingly high-definition Shroud image.
I don’t normally contribute to sites that hold up my comments for vetting (“pre-moderation”) but I shall make an exception in this instance.
Colinsbery, I too have wondered why these HD images (taken in 2008!) have not been circulated or no studies have come from them, but again it comes down to the Vatican again, in their childish sense of holding back everything that can shed some or more light on the Shroud. I on the other hand believe these HD images may just bring out even more tantalizing evidences to the Shroud authenticity and maybe raise more questions. But we’ll never know unless the Vatican gets their heads out of their hole.
R