Talk:Shroud of Turin

Gulio Fanti and dating of the shroud

Undid revision 813872329 by Erni120 (talk) Unjustified removal of sourced material + redundancy + Fanti's pseudo-science researches have nothing to do in the lede + go to talk page - Lebob

1 I did not delete anything 2 Pseudo-science? The methods of dating were described by four chemists: Pietro Baraldi - Department of Chemical and Geological Sciences, Modena and Reggio Emilia University Roberto Basso - Department of Industrial Engineering, Padua University Giulio Fanti - Department of Industrial Engineering, Padua Universit AnnaTinti - Bologna University - http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0924203113000490

And This text has been published by a science magazine ,,Vibrational Spectroscopy” - https://www.journals.elsevier.com/vibrational-spectroscopy However some criticized this dating method and I added their opinion

That's why I think you need to restore the previous version.[Erni120] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erni120 (talk • contribs) 22:25, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

This is already developed in the article and there is not need to copy/paste it in the lede where it becomes redundand. And certainly not when it is a partial copy/paste where the opinion of the archbishop of Turin, i.e. "as it is not possible to be certain that the analysed material was taken from the fabric of the shroud no serious value can be recognized to the results of such experiments" is forgotten. By the way, Fanti is not a chemist but he is known for his continuous attempts to prove that the shroud is authentic. --Lebob (talk) 08:20, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

1 So remove the mention about radiocarbon dating tests  It was already described in the text below

2 I did not add this information because Fanti described his book [He has documentation] from where he has fragments of the shroud. And exactly from Giovanni Riggi di Numana - http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/science-shines-new-light-on-shroud-of-turins-age 3 ,,But according to Giulio Fanti, professor of mechanical and thermic measurements at the University of Padua, "the technique itself seems unable to produce an image having the most critical Turin Shroud image characteristics” 4 Fanti's views do not matter. he stated that his dating is not proof that the shroud belonged to Jesus Erni120 11:40, 6 December 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erni120 (talk • contribs)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Shroud of Turin. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20141011051743/http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/inchieste-ed-interviste/dettaglio-articolo/articolo/sindone-23653/ to http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/inchieste-ed-interviste/dettaglio-articolo/articolo/sindone-23653
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130416225452/http://www.enea.it/it/produzione-scientifica/EAI/anno-2012/knowledge-diagnostics-and-preservation-of-cultural-heritage/the-conservation-of-the-shroud-of-turin-optical-studies to http://www.enea.it/it/produzione-scientifica/EAI/anno-2012/knowledge-diagnostics-and-preservation-of-cultural-heritage/the-conservation-of-the-shroud-of-turin-optical-studies

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 12:57, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Points to make about Shroud of Turin

I know we don't want to create debates about this, and that's not what I'm doing. I just want to make some points about the Shroud which should probably be mentioned in the article, if they're not already: - According to gotquestions.org, the Bible says that Jesus had "wounds in his hands". In the Shroud of Turin, the wound is in the wrist. - The same website also quotes Biblical texts stating that long hair is only for women. In the Shroud of Turin, the person had long hair. SelfieCity (talk) 02:28, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

From a bible dictionary: "The hand included the wrist, as will be seen from all passages in which bracelets are mentioned as ornaments of the hand..."

From a Jewish encyclopedia: "The most prominent outward mark of the Nazarite was long, flowing hair, which was cut at the expiration of the vow and offered as a sacrifice (Num. l.c.; Jer. vii. 29)."

See also this page: "A medieval forger would certainly have placed the hand nail wound in Jesus' palm, as he would have had to conform to traditional norms, if he wanted his false shroud to have been accepted."

Pernimius (talk) 15:47, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

Dating from 2013

At the introduction, we should add information about dating the shroud from 2013, or delete information about 1988 dating. Wikipedia should be neutral and should not favor dating — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erni120 (talk • contribs) 15:15, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

The dating from 1988 is solid scientific fact, comprising multiple tests all following a solidly developed process and conducted by multiple experts, which all arrived at a similar result. The 2013 process was a made-up test which followed an unproven and unverified process, based on samples of uncertain provenance which were already known to be damaged and thus unreliable, subject to highly arbitrary assumptions and conducted by a person with a known bias. Thus, the 1988 tests were scientifically reliable, and the 2013 tests were not. Simple. Wdford (talk) 17:46, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

First, 1988 dating was repeatedly criticized, William Meacham points to violations of researchers. Fanti's work was described in a scientific journal, where the authors were three more chemists. That's why we should add information about dating 2013. Let's add criticism, of course. However, you favor the dating from 1988. And this is unacceptable [Tor234] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tor234 (talk • contribs) 20:35, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

What is unacceptable is to try to favor the 2013 "dating" made at the initiative of Giulio Fanti, who is not a chemist, over the 1988 C14 dating. The 2013 dating in fact pretends to date the shroud using a method which is not scientifically acknowledged as a reliable dating tool. This was only the latest attempt of Fanti to give an apparence of scientific approach to his countless pseudo-scientific "experiences" in relation to the shroud. What wonders me is that has always managed to find scientific publications, although usually with poor impact factor, to get his "findings" published. If it was only me to decide none of Fanti publications relating to the shroud would be mentioned in this article. --Lebob (talk) 08:43, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

The 1988 dating certainly has been criticized, but only by people who are not C14 experts. People like Meacham made a big fuss about deviations from the "agreed protocol", but those deviations were all made for good reasons, and the process they eventually followed was perfectly valid, so the Meacham argument is void. Fanti's work is based on an unverified process, using samples of unverified provenance which were already known to be damaged and thus unreliable, subject to highly arbitrary assumptions and conducted by a person with a known bias. The fact that the "results" were published in a scientific magazine of some sort does not guarantee the process was valid or that the results were meaningful. Once again, the 1988 tests were scientifically reliable, and the 2013 tests were not. Really simple. Wdford (talk) 09:38, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

It does not favor dating from 2013, you favor those from 1988, Fanti is not a chemist, but he did research with chemists like Pietro Baraldi. And as you pointed out you do not decide. You are not a chemist or researcher to question Fanti's findings. The work is published in a scientific journal, has 4 authors and not adding it is the result of prejudices. Such a thing should not take place on wikipedia Meacham is just an expert on C14. He carried out hundreds of dating and, as he himself pointed out, there were often strange results. Once again, he indicates that we do not decide what is reliable and what is not. Let's add information about 2013 dating and criticism. For now, we remove information supporting the authenticity of the shroud, and we differentiate against it. It should not be so, it is not a wikipedia task. [Tor234]

"Fanti is not a chemist, but he did research with chemists" - Unfortunately, competence is not contagious enough for that to work as a reason to accept Fanti's expertise.

"The work is published in a scientific journal" - That is not a reason to include it. If every article in a scientific journal were mentioned in the Wikipedia article about the same subject, a lot of Wikipedia articles would be thousands of pages long. We have to make decisions what to include and what not. If the journal has a low impact, the authors are experts for something else, and the actual experts ignore or reject it, we should not. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:18, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Note this quotation from a non-religious website:

There is now plenty of scientific research that demonstrates the following about the Turin Shroud... [...]:

The cloth appears to be many centuries older than the 1988 carbon dating suggested

The famous carbon dating published in Nature in 1989 was not peer reviewed, did not follow established protocol and used samples from the most contaminated part of the cloth. The statistics even in the original paper provide evidence of significant variation in carbon 14 content even within the small strip that was tested and there is ample evidence that the sample was not representative of the rest of the cloth.

Prof. Ramsey of the Oxford Radiocarbon Unit which was involved in the original dating has publically gone on the record about the age of the shroud: "There is a lot of other evidence that suggests to many that the Shroud is older than the radiocarbon dates allow and so further research is certainly needed. It is important that we continue to test the accuracy of the original radiocarbon tests as we are already doing. It is equally important that experts assess and reinterpret some of the other evidence. Only by doing this will people be able to arrive at a coherent history of the Shroud which takes into account and explains all of the available scientific and historical information."

The article should try to be fair to the best of arguments on both sides. One side depends almost exclusively on the 95% chance given by the RC dating of one small and suspicious marginal section of a very large cloth. The other side has many different lines of argument pointing toward authenticity and singularity. Pernimius (talk) 18:55, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

The only thing that someone who writes in the homepage of his website that "the famous carbon dating published in Nature in 1989 was not peer reviewed, did not follow established protocol and used samples from the most contaminated part of the cloth" manages to do is to prove that despite 30 years of self-research on the question he has still no clue of what he is talking about. Therefore his personal opinions are of no interest for this article.

Furthermore, and to respond to Tor234, William Meacham is not a C14 specialist but an archeologist and has never carried out one single C14 dating himself because, as every archeologist, he needs to rely on specialized laboratories to make the C14 tests when he needs them for his work. --Lebob (talk) 08:01, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Your POV is duly noted, Lebob, as is your lack of proof for your judgment. Many informed people disagree with the C14 zealots who think C14 results from a questionable edge of the cloth is "all ye know and all ye need to know." An encyclopedia article should neutrally report the scope of the problems and major positions, all that speaks for authenticity, and alternative paths that scientists have taken (and published in peer reviewed journals). I support the tenor of Tor234's remarks. Pernimius (talk) 15:17, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Only a handful of people and very few scientist think that this particular edge of the shroud was "questionnable". It has been stated countless times that it took two hours to specialists to choose this part of the shroud. Furthermore, Mrs. Mechthild Flury-Lemberg who was responsible for the restauration of the shroud in 2002 has clearly stated that there is not such things as "invisible mending" and that she didn't found any evidence that could back the theory that this particular edge of the shroud would have be different in texture and/or age than the other part of the cloth. I really wonder who are the "zealots" here: those who push a faith based agenda without sustainable evidences or those who stick to a test carried out on a piece of the shroud made with a well-know and widely acknowledge as accurate technique? As explained by Jimbo Wales, What we won't do is pretend that the work of lunatic charlatans is the equivalent of "true scientific discourse". It isn't. Maybe you should read this essay with great attention before pushing forward things which are noting else than crank theories. --Lebob (talk) 10:44, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

You are calling some renowned scientists "lunatic charlatans" without cause, people like Dr. Ray Rogers who did so much work on the Shroud and was as objective as anyone could hope a scientist would be. Also it is typical of your side to quote a textile expert saying there is no such thing as invisible mending without mentioning the opposite argument:

[Citation:] When in 2005 textile expert M. Flury-Lemberg continued to insist that such reweaving did not exist and that the patch would be recognizable on the reverse side, Benford and Marino produced a fourth paper. In it they quoted the owner of a textile repair business, Mr. Michael Ehrlich, stating that “French Weaving [a textile repair practiced in Late Medieval and Renaissance periods] involves a tedious thread-by-thread restoration that is undetectable” and therefore invisible from both sides (Benford and Marino, 2005:2). The paper then went on to discuss the Shroud’s historical circumstances in the early 16th century that may have led to repairs at the cloth’s corner that was later to be radiocarbon dated. Taken from here.

(Addendum: See French Weaving. No such thing as invisible mending, eh?? Think again.])

How revealing these tactics of yours are! Let's have some fairness, please!! And keep away from anti-religious bigotry and scientism. Empiricist rationalism does not have the only or last word...not by a long shot. Pernimius (talk) 20:37, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

"Light of the Shroud" is not a scientific website, nor is it an objective website. It reports the work of Dr. Andrew Silverman, who believes that reality is not what we perceive it to be. Interesting, but not scientific.

Wikipedia is not based on biased websites, it is based on balanced scientific evidence. There is strong scientific evidence which proves that the shroud is made of cloth which is only medieval in age, and there is ZERO scientific evidence which proves that the shroud is authentic. "Nature" is one of the most prestigious scientific journals in the English-speaking world. The SUGGESTION that the dating may have been conducted on repair material was investigated and has since been PROVEN to be false. The SUGGESTION that contamination could have swung the dating was investigated and has since been PROVEN to be false. However some people refuse to accept this, and they continue to publish biased and incomplete assessments of discredited suggestions, in the attempt to keep their own hopes alive. That is their right, but that is not scientific, and that is not how Wikipedia works.

Meachem was correct that very early C14 results were inconsistent, but that was in the 1970's. By 1988 these issues had been ironed out, the fresh atmospheric radioactivity from atom bomb testing had been calibrated and the technology was much more reliable. Meachem of course doesn’t bother to acknowledge these inconvenient truths, because they mess up his POV.

Every piece of evidence which purportedly supports authenticity can be explained away, if you are objective. I challenge you to present me with a list of the "pro-authenticity" evidence, and I will give you all the refutations – one by one.

Fanti's latest "tests" involved the following:

1. Obtain some fragments of fibers which somebody else apparently vacuumed off the shroud decades earlier – with no chain of evidence to prove that these fragments were actual shroud material;
2. Glue these tiny crumbling fragments onto an apparatus he invented for the purpose, and stretch them until they snap, to measure their "remaining strength" – ignoring that they seemingly had crumbled off their original fabric for some reason, and so were obviously much weaker than the original fibers;
3. Create a "control" to compare this against, by obtaining modern linen and baking it to simulate aging – ignoring possible differences in original fiber quality, bleaching techniques, spinning techniques and quality of storage conditions over 600 years, as well as the true heat and duration of the fires that baked the shroud;
4. Compare the "strength" results of the unverified and crumbling fragments against the results of the arbitrary modern linen which had been "aged" by an arbitrary process, and discover that the crumbling "shroud" fragments STILL don't reach as far back as the 1st Century, being about 400 years too recent;
5. Incorporate a huge "margin for error" of 400 years which he totally sucked out of his thumb, but which (only just) permits the crumbling "shroud" fragments to potential have a 1st Century origin;
6. Back this up by testing crumbling "shroud" fibers using lasers etc to measure "degradation", and compare them against the measured degradations of other old linens from around the world – although the true ages of the control linens is only approximately known, and ignoring the vastly different manufacturing and storage techniques involved, and the shroud's history of being boiled and baked in fires;
7. Discover that the laser tests indicate that the crumbling "shroud" fragments are much too old to belong to Jesus of Nazareth, so add on a different huge "margin for error" of hundreds of years which he also totally sucked out of his thumb to make the crumbling "shroud" fragments seem newer;
8. Average out all the above nonsense, to achieve a mean date of 33AD;
9. Declare that the shroud is the true burial cloth of Christ.

This is called "junk science". It does not compare equally in scientific quality with the C14 testing, so it is not accorded the same respect as a reliable source.

If you read carefully what Prof. Ramsey said, you will see that he is actually saying that some other evidence "suggests" that the shroud may be older than the carbon dating, but that actual experts need to "assess and reinterpret some of the other evidence" to achieve a consistency with the "available scientific and historical information" – in other words, the "other evidence" is not reliable, and needs to be reviewed. He said this when he was about to test a hypothesis put forward by Jackson that the cloth may have absorbed fresh carbon from the fire – a test which soon thereafter proved that Jackson's new hypothesis was wrong.

This article (together with its daughter article Radiocarbon dating of the Shroud of Turin) does neutrally report the scope of the problems and major positions, including those that claim to support authenticity. However it then presents also the FACTS which show that those pro-authenticity arguments have been debunked. This is what objectivity means – present ALL the relevant evidence, and don’t try to manufacture an even balance where no such balance actually exists in reality.

When you use phrases like "C14 zealots" and "a questionable edge of the cloth", in the face of solid scientific evidence to the contrary, then you are demonstrating your own non-neutral POV. Wdford (talk) 15:51, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

You want science? Okay:

[Citation:] Microchemical tests also reveal vanillin (C8H8O3 or 4-hydroxy-3-methoxybenzaldehyde) in an area of the cloth from which the carbon 14 sample were cut. But the rest of the cloth does not test positive for vanillin. Vanillin is produced by the thermal decomposition of lignin, a complex polymer, a non-carbohydrate constituent of plant material including flax. Found in medieval materials but not in much older cloths, it diminishes and disappears with time. For instance, the wrappings of the Dead Sea scrolls do not test positive for vanillin. See: [PDF] Scientific Method Applied to the Shroud of Turin: A Review by Raymond N. Rogers and Anna Arnoldi This is an important find. It suggests that the tested samples were possibly much newer and it underscores that the chemical nature of the carbon 14 samples and the main part of the cloth are outstandingly different.

Cited from here. Doesn't sound like religious zealotry to me. Of course I wonder if you will simply take every indication of authenticity as junk science and look for some spurious way to discredit this. Then there is this:

[Citation:] Italian scientist Paolo DiLazzaro tried for five years to replicate the image and concluded that it was produced by ultraviolet light, but the ultraviolet light necessary to reproduce the image “exceeds the maximum power released by all ultraviolet light sources available today.” The time for such a burst “would be shorter than one forty-billionth of a second, and the intensity of the ultra violet light would have to be around several billion watts.”

Cited from here. The fact that the blood was first and then the super-extremely thin non-directional image followed also speaks strongly against any kind of fabrication. Refute away...I'm sure you'll think of something, though your scientific credentials are wanting...those very credentials that you are so imperiously demanding of others. You'll probably say that if a religious website quotes a scientist, it thereby renders the science invalid for purposes of this argumentation. That is indeed a spurious and illegitimate response.

Note: I have never argued for a Wikipedian declaration of TS authenticity, merely for fair and adequate coverage of the pro-authenticity arguments. It is no trouble to say "Many scientists think X, but there are others who insist on another conclusion for these reasons...The former group rejects those reasons with these explanations..." Now why should it be so hard for an objective encyclopedia to do that? Pernimius (talk) 18:19, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Addendum: Proof of the invalidation of the RC14 testing is available at this page. Multiple scientists so confirm. Pernimius (talk) 07:36, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

@Pernimius: Flury-Lemberg is a textile expert, who specialises in restoring old fabrics. She examined the actual shroud specifically looking for evidence of repairs, and found none. This supports the conclusions of the textile experts who supported the C14 team in 1988, who also specifically checked the sample area for evidence of repairs, and found none. Against all these experts, you offer a website from a commercial clothing repair business. Can you see the difference in the quality of the sources? The commercial repairs are intended to be "undetectable" to the naked eye, but not to magnifiers. Modern magnifiers are much better than Renaissance magnifiers, if they even had magnifiers back then. There is no possible way that they could have repaired a cloth 600 years ago without it being detectable today with modern instruments – as Flury-Lemberg makes clear. Benford and Marino are grasping at straws, and the shroudie community is delighted to grasp along with them.

The main problem with Rogers' work is that he failed to properly verify that the threads he was working on were actual shroud material to begin with. Since the presumed source was not authorised to possess valid shroud material, this failure by Rogers is very significant. When Rogers' conclusions directly contradict the conclusions of ALL the specialists who DID have access to the ACTUAL shroud, one is forced to conclude that Rogers' sample threads are not valid shroud material. In a nice bit of irony, Rogers actually accuses the C14 team of failing to first ensure that their sample is valid shroud material.

The THEORY by Di Lazzaro is very interesting, and he may well be on to something. Of course the Sun puts out a lot more ultraviolet light than any other source. There is actually no need to run ultra-high intensities for ultra-short durations – the same fading effect is achieved a million times a year by accident, simply by exposing fabrics to direct sunlight for a few weeks or months. Perhaps that might be a less-exotic explanation? Also interesting to note that the image on the shroud has been fading away progressively over the centuries, as the rest of the cloth dries out and discolours as well.

The "fact" that the image does not exist underneath the blood was determined by examining one single fiber, which had been ripped off the shroud with adhesive tape, and this conclusion may not be correct for the rest of the shroud. It can also have many other possible explanations, some of which I have cited on this talk page previously. On its own this "fact" does not overturn the huge weight of scientific evidence from the C14 testing.

The cotton thread issue means nothing. First, this applies to the Raes sample, not to the C14 sample. Second, when the C14 sample was made, a strip along the edge was trimmed off and discarded SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE foreign threads were detected – those foreign threads were thus EXCLUDED from the C14 tests. The actual sample material was studied under magnification, and any other extraneous threads present in the samples were removed. Please note also that to swing a dating from 1st C to 14th C would require an amount of foreign threads equal to more than the weight of the original material, so random foreign cotton threads have been discounted as a possible explanation. Note also that you are once again citing an internet blog rather than a quality scientific source.

You ask for a sentence that says: "Many scientists think X, but there are others who insist on another conclusion for these reasons...The former group rejects those reasons with these explanations." The article already says: "Certain shroud researchers have challenged the dating, arguing the results were skewed by the introduction of material from the Middle Ages to the portion of the shroud used for radiocarbon dating. However, none of the hypotheses challenging the radiocarbon dating have been scientifically proven." Seriously, what are you still complaining about? Wdford (talk) 08:15, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

Well this section debates how much Fanti's work should be noticed. I have veered off that topic to counter what I see as argumentation deriving from a biased and all too dismissive attitude (roughly something like "This scientific quote comes from a believer's website therefore it is not scientific reality we need to take seriously). The article is not bad at all, but consider the implications of a lede-sentence like "The cloth itself is believed by some to be the burial shroud he was wrapped in when he was buried after crucifixion although three radiocarbon dating tests in 1988 dated a sample of the cloth to the Middle Ages." That might have been expressed this way: "Although three radiocarbon dating tests in 1988 dated a sample of the cloth to the Middle Ages, other factors lead many to believe that this is actually the burial shroud that wrapped Jesus's body after the crucifixion." (And if it is such, it is an astounding relic. Even if not, it is an amazing object in itself.) See the difference? You can debate provenance, but that is not probative of the science involved. That requires non-scientific, procedural and historical considerations: what is the likelihood the material came from the right source? Pernimius (talk) 12:50, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

A further consideration: we just archived the Talk-page section in which it was mentioned that the article made it seem that only a fringe group was promoting the authenticity of the Shroud. Whatever your position on the Shroud, this is an impression that should not be given. There is robust research, conferencing, and argumentation favoring authenticity. There are scientists on both sides. Many people who were originally skeptical have changed their position on consideration of the total range of evidence and aspects (e.g., from art history, coinage, geology, etc.)

You criticize me for citing a commercial site on invisible weaving. The point to be made was that it does indeed exist pace Flury-Lemburg who seems to outright deny even the possibility of its existence. The page I gave also provided an actual photograph of such reweaving for the skeptical. A blanket denial of existence is overturned by a single counter-example such as that. It is called evidence. Whether it could have be done in the middle ages / Renaissance period is another question requiring original research. Pernimius (talk) 14:16, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

I am not opposed to rewording the sentence to read something like "Although three radiocarbon dating tests in 1988 dated a sample of the cloth to the Middle Ages, other factors nonetheless lead some people to believe that this is the actual burial shroud that wrapped Jesus's body after the crucifixion."

The argument in favor of authenticity is very much fringe, because there is solid scientific evidence of a medieval origin, and nothing yet presented has threatened that dating. The "other evidence" is all highly speculative, and is capable of multiple interpretations. The issue of the hypothetical coins is probably the most fringe of everything.

The issue of "invisible weaving" hangs around the definition of the word "invisible". If you use the word to mean it is undetectable to a casual glance with a naked eye, then I would agree that it does exist. If you mean it is undetectable to a group of scientists with modern magnifiers who are specifically looking for evidence of a repair, then no there is no such thing as invisible weaving. Wdford (talk) 21:52, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

I should have said "iconography" instead of coins, as in this paper, which comes with a convenient one-paragraph abstract at the start. But the paper does mention how coins may show the influence of the Shroud image as well, and that is what I was thinking of, even more than the icons. (That said, how interesting that some people claim to find the markings of a Pontius Pilate coin. I fully agree that this is difficult to prove. But even here we do have more than one scientist claiming to see the same markings.)

Thank you for your openness on the rewording. I think we must agree to disagree on the dating, not on the validity of the testing as such or on the result, but on the nature of the area from which the sample was drawn. I think it is time for me to sign off again, until there's new evidence or a compelling re-interpretation. Pernimius (talk) 23:43, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

Deleted sentence "However, none of the hypotheses challenging ..." as not sourced

The sentence I deleted as unsourced was: "However, none of the hypotheses challenging the radiocarbon dating have been scientifically proven.[12][sources 1]" N.B. [sources 1] expands to [13][14][15][16][17][18][19].

The seemingly unassailable list of 8 sources supporting this statement are:

[12] Chivers, Tom (20 December 2011). "The Turin Shroud is fake. Get over it". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 1 August 2016. Behind paywall, here's an alternative link: https://www.sott.net/article/239118-The-Turin-Shroud-is-fake-Get-over-it

[13] "Debate of Roger Sparks and William Meacham on alt.turin-shroud". Shroud.com. Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association. Retrieved 12 April 2009. http://www.shroud.com/c14debat.htm

[14] Radiocarbon Dating, Second Edition: An Archaeological Perspective, By R.E. Taylor, Ofer Bar-Yosef, Routledge 2016; pg 167-168

[15] Jackson, John P. (5 May 2008). "A New Radiocarbon Hypothesis" (PDF). Turin Shroud Center of Colorado. Retrieved 18 February 2014 – via Shroud.com. http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/jackson.pdf

[16] "The Invisible Mending of the Shroud, the Theory and the Reality" (PDF). Shroud.com. Shroud of Turin Education and Research Association. Retrieved 10 February 2014. http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/n65part5.pdf

[17] Gove, H. E. (1990). "Dating the Turin Shroud: An Assessment". Radiocarbon. 32 (1): 87–92. https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/radiocarbon/article/viewFile/1254/1259

[18] R.A. Freer-Waters, A.J.T. Jull, Investigating a Dated piece of the Shroud of Turin, Radiocarbon, 52, 2010, pp. 1521–1527.

[19] Schafersman, Steven D. (14 March 2005). "A Skeptical Response to Studies on the Radiocarbon Sample from the Shroud of Turin by Raymond N. Rogers". llanoestacado.org. Retrieved 2 January 2016. http://llanoestacado.org/freeinquiry/skeptic/shroud/articles/rogers-ta-response.htm

Technically the original sentence is nonsense as no scientific hypothesis can be proven, only falsified. So as a working hypothesis I assume the sentence actually means "the radiocarbon dating has not been seriously challenged by alternative hypotheses".

So I looked at as many of those 8 sources I could. I found NONE of the sources available to an average reader seriously and/or scientifically challenged the idea that the alternative hypotheses were wrong and I even found that some of them actually challenged the radiocarbon dating - not the opposing hypotheses! Hence I deleted the statement.

Detailed criticism of sources:

[12] As flagged by the title "The Turin Shroud is fake. Get over it", this article doesn't support the thesis that the shroud is genuine. However, it doesn't actually directly attack the idea either, instead it quotes arguments by various people. In the article it quotes one of the scientists who did the testing: "It's also been hypothesised that the patch we tested was a modern repair, but most of us agree that's implausible, because the weave is very unusual and matches the rest of the shroud perfectly." As stated, this is only a hypothesis, and also as stated it's not a universal view, so is not appropriate as a source for such a strong statement. And an obvious riposte is if someone was going to try and do a good job of repairing the shroud they would try to match the unusual weave. So it is not even a good hypothesis and this source cannot be used to support the statement.

[13] Actually strongly supports the case that the experiment was flawed and challenges the radiocarbon dating! Quote from debate: "When I attended the 1986 conference in Turin for planning the C14 dating of the Shroud, at the invitation of the Vatican Academy of Sciences, I argued strongly for an extensive testing program (including various staining and microscopic studies) that would have examined the Shroud samples in detail for contamination. This was met with arrogant dismissal by 5 of the 7 radiocarbon lab heads in attendance. They ridiculed the notion that contamination could account for more than 1 or 2% of the C14 after standard pretreatment. Their stance was decidedly haughty then, and now shown to be dead wrong. The truth is that there are many possible sources of error which are not fully understood, and it simply behooves us to at least look for all the possibilities that we can."

[14] Not online so haven't looked.

[15] Is a preliminary report on a possible method to account for the contamination needed to throw the date off. There are no references to this work. This reference, as a preliminary note with no references should be ignored, but why was it used as a source to support the accuracy of the radio-carbon dating when the research hypothesis is the experiment was flawed?

[16] By Mechthild Flury-Lembergs is an interesting but non-academic piece by someone who appears to know about textiles. They are critical of the idea that the test piece was mended, but they are also highly critical of the radio-carbon dating: "... would be sufficient to demonstrate the uselessness of the carbon-14 method, without having to construct an untenable "mending theory"." So how can this article be used to support the carbon 14 date? N.B. they make certain assumptions about the mending e.g. that the corners would not need to be repaired (when possibly someone had snipped an inconspicuous bit as a relic from the corner, just as the scientists did 500 years later), and that if it had been repaired it would have been done in the same way as the other repairs and thus be more noticeable (why do they have to do it the same way?).

[17] The date of this reference is 1990, well before the 2005 publishing date of Ray Rogers' paper or 2000 when Sue Benford began her investigation which challenged the radiocarbon date, so an irrelevant source in this context.

[18] Not online so haven't looked.

[19] This piece is by, quoting from the heading of the article, "Consulting Scientist and Administrator of the The Skeptical Shroud of Turin Website". It's not going to be a neutral balanced article and it isn't. In the article it says: "Ray Rogers, ... recently published a pro-authenticity Shroud of Turin paper in a legitimate and peer-reviewed chemistry journal, Thermochimica Acta ... The real story in this controversy is not the mistaken age of the Shroud of Turin, but the misjudgment of a science journal editor and the breakdown of its peer review process." So the author here is proposing censorship of articles which conflict with their views. This is scientism, not science, and this article should not be used as a source for anything except evidence of scientism.

N.B. Ray Rogers' 2005 article is available here: http://www.shroud.it/ROGERS-3.PDF Aarghdvaark (talk) 07:44, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

"Not proven" is indeed not a good way of saying it. I suggest we reinstate it but change the wording to something like "none of the hypotheses challenging the radiocarbon dating have any factual basis".

Your item 12 is silly. You think that it is "not appropriate as a source for such a strong statement", but that strong statement is the result of looking at the preponderance of evidence. "Matches the rest of the shroud exactly" is the part you are overlooking. If that silly "hypothesis" is right, some exceedingly clever fraud has managed not just to fake the "unusual weave", but make it indistinguishable from the genuine part - except for that fact that the radiocarbon dating caught him. But this just an ad-hoc excuse for the fact of the radiocarbon dating saying "middle age". The smart money is on the rest of the shroud having the same age.

Your item 13 comes from a Dunning-Kruger effect victim. The idea that contamination can make a 2000-year old object appear 600 years old can only come from an innumerate who deserves to be dismissed in that way. They probably tried to explain but he didn't get it. Learn how to do the math involved, then do it. You will see that this is only possible if there is more contamination than original material, which is not called "contamination" but "switcheroo".

Your item 16: This source is indeed irrelevant and should be removed.

Your item 19 is bullshit. The author is proposing nothing of the sort. Your "censorship of articles" is a strawman. You are beefing about his honesty in posing as a skeptic, but this is a field where everybody has an opinion. One party (scientists) has one because of the evidence, the second party (believers) has one in spite of the evidence, and the third party (postmodernists) has no idea what evidence is, therefore cannot decide and insists that both other parties are hasty in choosing a side. It can be plainly seen from your writing that you belong to one of the two ignorant parties. So, by your own reasoning, nobody should listen to you either. This line of reasoning (X belongs to Party Y! Do not use him as a source!) leads nowhere. In serious discussions, contributors are not chastised for their standpoints but for their reasoning. And your reasoning is crap. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:06, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

(item 12) Hi :) I've just deleted the preponderance of evidence as presented by these sources, so at the moment there is no preponderence of evidence. N.B. an argument based on the preponderence of evidence is a circular argument. About the possible fraud, possibly it has or possibly it hasn't been forged, but the scientist's quoted defense of the experiment was so weak it is actually an admission that the experiment was flawed.

(item 13) Actually that was another part of the debate, but OK, I think you're agreeing the source is no good?

(item 19) You are contrasting scientists with believers, but this guy is a believer, although he poses as a scientist. This is what scientism is. He is trying to use non-scientific methods to undermine Ray Rogers' argument. The straw man argument is also unscientific, but I disagree that I've made a straw man argument - I think in fact you've just made one :). I think an unbiased person reading [19] would agree the author is actually proposing that the article should not have been accepted and the editor is criticised for accepting it. A scientist would not criticise the editor, but address the arguments. Cheers! Aarghdvaark (talk) 10:46, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Do NOT insert comments into other people's contributions. That way, if there is more discussion after your contributions, nobody who reads this will know who wrote what. I corrected that.

(item 12) "I deleted the preponderance of evidence"? Who are you, the Ministry of Truth? You cannot delete things like that. You can only delete text that mentions them. So you think if you delete information here, it is gone? What you give us here is just meaningless words. That "maybe, maybe not" of your is just your opinion.

(item 13) Yes, bad source, because of the site (a newsgroup). But your spin on it is completely wrong. You quoted only those parts which agreed with your position and concluded that the whole text is like that and cannot be used to support another position. That's naive.

(item 19) Again, bullshit. When I say "believer", I obviously do not mean it in the postmodern sense of "someone who does not sit on the fence". The word "scientism" is mainly used by people who do not understand science. For example, people who get their ideas about science from TV shows and mistakenly think that scientists should be "unbiased" like Spock instead of normal humans with expertise. Of course you do not know how to recognize "non-scientific methods".

For instance: "proposing that the article should not have been accepted" is perfectly acceptable. It is also not the same as "proposing that the article should not have been accepted because it conflicts with one's views". Schafersman wrote in his introduction "it contained plenty of legitimate and reliable scientific information and had the veneer of scientific respectability, but it also contained subtly illogical arguments, speciously misused data, and omitted the vital scientific information that completely refuted its pseudoscientific conclusions." That was the reason given for his suggestion that the article should not have been published. Did you miss that? Did you also miss all the more detailed reasoning given below, starting with "Ray Rogers relies on papers that were neither peer-reviewed nor published in legitimate scientific journals"? You did not need to invent that reason for him. He actually gave a reason. You inventing a reason for him is that strawman I was talking about. --Hob Gadling (talk) 12:53, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

The lead contains the sentence: "However, none of the hypotheses challenging the radiocarbon dating have been scientifically proven." This sentence is true – all challenges have been scientifically refuted. This sentence is paraphrasing the statement by C14 expert Professor Christopher Ramsey, whose actual words were "There are various hypotheses as to why the dates might not be correct, but none of them stack up." He goes on to refute the contamination theory, the repair theory and the carbon monoxide theory. This is as per reference [12]. We can argue about pedantic wording here, but the underlying fact is that these challenges have all been refuted by actual scientists using actual evidence.

1. Reference [13] is Rodger Sparks, a carbon dating expert, shooting down the contamination theory, while Meecham (a non-C14 expert) clutches at straws.
2. Reference [14] is a scholarly work by C14 expert Taylor and archaeologist Bar-Yosef. They support the C14 dating. You can access it at [1]
3. Reference [15] is included here because Jackson shoots down the repair theory and the bio-contamination theory comprehensively. He goes on to propose a carbon-monoxide theory, which was duly tested at Oxford and refuted in turn.
4. Reference [16] reports an examination by Mechthild Flury-Lemberg, who is a leading textile restoration expert and who has actually examined the actual shroud. She clarifies that invisible mending can never elude a microscope, and states that: "The theory that repairs had been done to the corner areas in the Middle Ages, unfortunately is based on a false presupposition." She notes that contamination COULD cause a distortion, but does not debate the fact that the C14 experts are well aware of this risk and that they therefore carefully cleaned the samples first. You are seriously cherry-picking here.
5. Reference [17] cites Gove, who basically invented C14 dating. He is confirming that the contamination theory is untenable, as the samples were properly cleaned, and that modern threads were detected under microscopes and removed. He also refutes the radiation theory. It predates the nonsense-theories of Benford et al, but it is still highly relevant to the point. If Benford had read Gove before she started her crusade, this might have worked out differently.
6. Reference [18] is a paper by Jull, who did the Arizona testing, confirming that the remaining fragment shows no signs of any of the dyes or contaminants which Rogers found on the threads he examined – the threads whose provenance he never bothered to first establish.
7. Reference [19] points out that Rogers' methodology was bad, in that he failed to first establish the provenance of those threads. He also refutes Rogers' vanillin test on the basis that the process has never been verified as reliable, and that Rogers disregards all the factors that would skew his results. It is nothing to do with censorship.

These references are all credible people who point out that the challenges to the C14 results are unfounded. Wdford (talk) 10:12, 2 March 2018 (UTC)