Shroud of Turin

[Mallz]

RickD: The supernatural is defined as events or things that cannot be explained by nature or science and that are assumed to come from beyond or to originate from otherworldly forces.

How can anyone reject this? Could someone please explain what I'm missing? Seems simply obvious

For myself (and I suspect Hugh), it's just.. silly?
Something we can't explain with current natural/scientific knowledge is miraculous? Man.. guess we all had miraculous healing abilities that went away when we figured out how the body heals itself..
And the underlined is silly, too, and presumptuous. Guess at one time light from the sun was a miracle that made things grow, too. There isn't a separation between physical and spiritual. There is spiritual without physical, though. Anyways, I see YHWH using Himself from 'thought to form' to work in our existence. No magic. There's a way He does things, we just don't know most of it. And that gets attributed to miraculous 'magic'.

I'm not sure why y'all are debating over the mechanics, either.

Hi, Mallz, good of you to drop in. The mechanics of what, precisely? We are not debating the mechanics because:

a) I don't know what the mechanics of the Resurrection are, and don't think it matters very much. There's not enough evidence to pursue anyway. I'm interested in the mechanics of how the Turin Shroud image was made, but we seem to have drifted away from that...
b) My interlocutors think the EXACT (their capitals) nature of the Resurrection is VITAL (their capitals), but they don't seem to want to investigate it. They think the word 'miracle' or 'divine' covers it.

..the mechanics of how the image came onto the shroud which went into natural vs supernatural and the importance of the resurrection. Wasn't everything related to each other..?
For a) I see you are saying you don't believe the Turin Shroud to be evidence of the resurrection, right?
b) I just see too much confusion and equation, talking past each other. Different understandings of reality butting heads even though they are all on the same wavelength

Have you in fact read anything from the scientists involved? I recommend my own modest offering, at http://www.shroud.com/pdfs/n78part9.pdf, The Mystery of the Invisible Patch, which gives all the 'scientists involved' paper in the references at the end, or even http://shroud.com/pdfs/n82part4.pdf, Invisible Weaving, which is illustrated by actual examples.

Of course I've read much from 'the scientists involved'. I'm many things but I'm not a liar (and if you prove me one, I'll thank you). Didn't know you did anything on the shroud (obviously because I don't know you). Were you just compiling information or were you actually involved in anything? I'll give them a good read!

[PaulSacramento]

The argument is really simple:
Either one accepts the possibility of the supernatural being an option or one doesn't.

Hugh obviously doesn't and that is why he holds fast to the view that it must be a 14th century "whateveritis" ( since he hasn't actually told us what he thinks it may be).

Either there are only two possibilities, or else there are more.

Either there is a natural explanation ( and of course if that is the case it can be replicated).
Or there isn't a natural explanation.

I want us to remember here that the closest anyone has come to being able to replicate the image has been with radiation.

[RickD]

The argument is really simple:
Either one accepts the possibility of the supernatural being an option or one doesn't.

Hugh obviously doesn't and that is why he holds fast to the view that it must be a 14th century "whateveritis" ( since he hasn't actually told us what he thinks it may be).

Either there are only two possibilities, or else there are more.

Audie,

There can't be another possibility.

[RickD]

RickD: The supernatural is defined as events or things that cannot be explained by nature or science and that are assumed to come from beyond or to originate from otherworldly forces.

How can anyone reject this? Could someone please explain what I'm missing? Seems simply obvious

Mallz wrote:

For myself (and I suspect Hugh), it's just.. silly?
Something we can't explain with current natural/scientific knowledge is miraculous? Man.. guess we all had miraculous healing abilities that went away when we figured out how the body heals itself..
And the underlined is silly, too, and presumptuous. Guess at one time light from the sun was a miracle that made things grow, too. There isn't a separation between physical and spiritual. There is spiritual without physical, though. Anyways, I see YHWH using Himself from 'thought to form' to work in our existence. No magic. There's a way He does things, we just don't know most of it. And that gets attributed to miraculous 'magic

Mallz,

The sun is part of the natural world. The light that comes from the sun is natural.

You guys are changing the meaning of supernatural, and you're overthinking it.

[hughfarey]

If God is outside nature, then you agree that the supernatural does exist?

Err.. yes and no. There is indeed a sense in which, since all around us was created by God, and he is external to it, that a state of supernaturalness does exist. However, since God created nature as a reflection of himself, God's supernaturalness has a very natural quality about it. However, in extremis, I grant - as I always have done - that God could act, in nature, in a wholly supernatural way. I just don't think he does.

What I mean is that God can most certainly temporarily interrupt or suspend the laws of physics.

I think he can too. But I don't think he does.

Newton discovered gravity but he formulated/created the law of gravity.

I think this is muddled. Mankind has from time immemorial known that things fall to the ground. Gravity had been discovered eons before Newton was born. What's more, the fact that the gravitational force between two masses was proportional to the product of the masses and, inversely, to the square of the distance between them was an operational part of the universe long before the first living things appeared on earth, let alone Newton. The laws of physics, in all their exquisite detail, were working the universe from the beginning. Newton, Einstein were simply the first people to recognise some of the less obvious factors, and, yes, to put them into words.

Aaaaand then you lost me.

Sorry. It goes like this. For me "I think that the difficulties of producing the image 'naturally' from a dead body are, according to current experiment, greater than the difficulties of producing it by artificial means" and, for the sake of simplicity, I'm opting for the easiest version. That being so, I think it more likely that the Shroud was produced artificially than not, and since there is more or less a dichotomy between 1st century authentic and 14th century artificial, that leads me to the latter as my preferred opinion. I have read a few other options (5th century Gnostic, for example), but the evidence for them is weak indeed.

if God can't/won't break the Laws of Physics that the universe seems to have to "obey", then where did the universe come from?

There weren't any laws to follow/break before the Universe was created, so there was nothing for God to follow/break. The Universe sprang from his divine will, and could most certainly have come from nothing except his divine will.

Either one accepts the possibility of the supernatural being an option or one doesn't. Hugh obviously doesn't and that is why he holds fast to the view that it must be a 14th century "whateveritis" ...

Eh?? You really don't read anything I write, do you? Hugh most clearly, consistently and frequently says he does accept the possibility of the supernatural, and most clearly, consistently and frequently says he does not hold fast to the 14th century option. What part of: I ACCEPT THE POSSIBILITY THAT THE SUPERNATURAL IS AN OPTION do you find difficult to understand? What part of I DO NOT THINK THAT A 14TH CENTURY ORIGIN FOR THE SHROUD IS AN ESTABLISHED FACT have I not made clear? Please, let's have no more of this unjustified misrepresentation.

[quote=""PaulSacramento"]He hasn't actually told us what he thinks it may be.[/quote]No? Well, beginning with the fact that I DON'T KNOW (please read that last bit in capitals carefully) I'm inclined to think it was one of the many shrouds produced as 'props' for the medieval liturgy of Quem Quaeritis, in which clerics dressed as Saints Peter and John, (or nuns representing the holy women) made their way from the high altar to a side chapel containing a representation of the empty tomb, where another cleric dressed as an angel gave them the shroud as a memento. This was then brought back and displayed to the congregation. That there were hundreds of these shrouds is beyond question, although this Shroud is of an unusually fine cloth, and bears, uniquely as far as I know, a double image of the dead Christ.

Either there are only two possibilities, or else there are more.

“Either it brings tears to their eyes, or else -"
"Or else what?" said Alice, for the Knight had made a sudden pause.
"Or else it doesn't, you know.”

Of course I've read much from 'the scientists involved'.

My humblest apologies. That would principally be "Discrepancies in the Radiocarbon Dating Area of the Turin Shroud", by Sue Benford and Joe Marino, Chemistry Today, 2008, and "Studies on the Radiocarbon Sample from the Shroud of Turin", Ray Rogers, Thermochimica Acta, 2005, with a nod to "The presence of dye in the 1988 radiocarbon date samples of the Shroud of Turin", Pam Mood, 2015, and similar studies. Apart from the responses I gave links to above, the recent correspondence between Marco Bella and Mario Latendresse in Thermochimica Acta regarding Ray Rogers' conclusions is also worth reading.

The closest anyone has come to being able to replicate the image has been with radiation.

Are you joking? Have you actually seen what Paolo di Lazzaro produced? Half a square centimetre of discoloured linen is not 'replicating the image'.

[PaulSacramento]

What part of: I ACCEPT THE POSSIBILITY THAT THE SUPERNATURAL IS AN OPTION do you find difficult to understand? What part of I DO NOT THINK THAT A 14TH CENTURY ORIGIN FOR THE SHROUD IS AN ESTABLISHED FACT have I not made clear? Please, let's have no more of this unjustified misrepresentation.

I am sorry but where did you state this?
I truly must have missed it...

Sorry Hugh, I confused the Paolo reference to Luigi.

[RickD]

RickD wrote:
If God is outside nature, then you agree that the supernatural does exist?

Hugh wrote:
Err.. yes and no. There is indeed a sense in which, since all around us was created by God, and he is external to it, that a state of supernaturalness does exist. However, since God created nature as a reflection of himself, God's supernaturalness has a very natural quality about it.However, in extremis, I grant - as I always have done - that God could act, in nature, in a wholly supernatural way. I just don't think he does.

I suppose God's supernaturalness has a very natural quality about it, in the same way water has a dry quality about it.

But seriously, you're taking a different meaning of natural, and you're applying that meaning to the natural vs supernatural debate.

You are taking this meaning of natural:

of or in agreement with the character or makeup of, or circumstances surrounding, someone or something.

And you're applying it to the natural vs supernatural debate. That meaning is irrelevant when discussing natural vs supernatural.

in this context, supernatural doesn't mean above or against God's nature. We're talking about "nature" or natural, as pertaining to the physical realm.

You and Mallz are changing the meaning of natural, in this context, and then you're arguing against some made-up kind of supernatural.

[PaulSacramento]

This is the Paolo Di Lazzaro you are referring to?
http://www.sci-news.com/physics/scienti ... entic.html

Excerpt:

“For sure, none of the hundreds attempts to obtain a shroud-like image by using chemical contact techniques – i.e. adding chemical substances like colors, powders, etc. – has achieved good results. Usually, the chemical approach gives similar macroscopic results, but it fails when analyzing the coloration with a microscope. At the microscopic level, the contact chemical approach does not give Shroud-like results. On the contrary, attempts using various radiations (vacuum ultraviolet photons, electrons from a corona discharge) give a coloration that looks shroud-like even at the microscopic level,” concludes Dr. Di Lazzaro.

[PaulSacramento]

The radiation I was referring to was this one:
https://www.shroud.com/pdfs/accett2.pdf

[Mallz]

RickD: The supernatural is defined as events or things that cannot be explained by nature or science and that are assumed to come from beyond or to originate from otherworldly forces.

How can anyone reject this? Could someone please explain what I'm missing? Seems simply obvious

Mallz wrote:

For myself (and I suspect Hugh), it's just.. silly?
Something we can't explain with current natural/scientific knowledge is miraculous? Man.. guess we all had miraculous healing abilities that went away when we figured out how the body heals itself..
And the underlined is silly, too, and presumptuous. Guess at one time light from the sun was a miracle that made things grow, too. There isn't a separation between physical and spiritual. There is spiritual without physical, though. Anyways, I see YHWH using Himself from 'thought to form' to work in our existence. No magic. There's a way He does things, we just don't know most of it. And that gets attributed to miraculous 'magic

Mallz,

The sun is part of the natural world. The light that comes from the sun is natural.

You guys are changing the meaning of supernatural, and you're overthinking it.

My point is that a miracle made plants grow. 'We' didn't find out it was the sun until much later. Supernatural became natural. If you want to get into spiritual vs physical and their interrelations, then, well, I think that would be more accurate than supernatural vs natural. And, sorry, I was taking 'otherworldy' forces to mean 'outside earth'. Aren't ufo stuff considered 'supernatural'? Anyways, I reject supernatural as I reject random. The only thing accurate I see about the term is '..things that cannot be explained by nature or science'. What does it mean to be naturally explained? The only way to make it work is to equate natural with material or physical. And you know I don't believe in purely the physical (..except maybe a rock...? Nice, just got a new topic to dwell on)

[Philip]

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The point is, as to whether something is supernatural or not - from God's point of view, everything has it's origins and sustaining support from the supernatural/non-physical realm. What I call miraculous and supernatural, is when the natural order and function of things is instantly interrupted in a way that no MAN can replicate it. Again, ALL of the physical flows from the spiritual/supernatural Source which is God. But instant, non-replicateable, otherwise inexplicable (that is, other than the supernatural) interruptions in that usual physical flow are what I consider to be miraculous. When Jesus multiplied the loaves and fish to feed the thousands, when He suddenly appeared in the room with the disciples, post-Resurrection, when He made a man blind from birth see, a man born lame run down the street jumping for joy - THESE are miracles. They are instant, un-replicateable interruptions in the way things otherwise work.

What does Scripture say?

"Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know."

Now, to WHOM are such things miraculous? To God, they are just "another day at the office!" But to MAN, they are MIRACULOUS!

[Mallz]

I agree, Phillip. What happens when you inject a more pure fuel into an engine over regular grade? Or what happens to a body when pumped with fluids and antibiotics and other medicines to enhance the bodies ability to heal and go back to homeostasis (as naturally intended)? You call miraculous what I see as Him directly interacting with us. How He does? Again, mechanics. I know thought is involved. What He does to exist that thought, is mechanics. Of course we can't duplicate it in our current state, and if ever (in our glorified state) we know as you say, it's still Him. Which should just be a natural dwelling state for us.

[RickD]

I agree, Phillip. What happens when you inject a more pure fuel into an engine over regular grade? Or what happens to a body when pumped with fluids and antibiotics and other medicines to enhance the bodies ability to heal and go back to homeostasis (as naturally intended)? You call miraculous what I see as Him directly interacting with us. How He does? Again, mechanics. I know thought is involved. What He does to exist that thought, is mechanics. Of course we can't duplicate it in our current state, and if ever (in our glorified state) we know as you say, it's still Him. Which should just be a natural dwelling state for us.

Mallz,

None of what you mentioned is miraculous. Christ touching a blind man, and making him see, is a miracle. You do understand the difference, don't you?

[hughfarey]

I suppose God's supernaturalness has a very natural quality about it, in the same way water has a dry quality about it. But seriously, you're taking a different meaning of natural, and you're applying that meaning to the natural vs supernatural debate.

I don't think so. Let's start with God 'before' (if that means anything) or perhaps 'in the absence of' any creation at all. All powerful, all knowing, all everything, capable of creating any sort of Universe, or none at all. I'll call his ability super-natural, if you like, or extra-natural, although in the absence of anything natural, there is nothing to be 'super-' to. Of all the Universes he might have created, the one he chose seems to be following rigorous, coherent, eternal, ubiquitous laws, which can mostly be understood in strictly mathematical terms. Sure, he could have created random living things out of the ground or the air, he could have made the DNA of gorillas completely different from that of humans, he could have buried fossils with the first dinosaurs lower than the first jellyfish, he could have made the moon out of cheese. But he didn't. The more we research, and the more we understand, creation, the more coherent, logical and rational things seem to be. The search for the Theory Of Everything, linking quantum physics and gravitational theory, is being carried out not on the offchance that it might actually describe the universe, but in the confident expectation that it will. This being so, it is not absurd to speculate that God might have arranged everything in harmony with this overall structure, and does not care to use the 'override' switch which could cause 'sudden interruptions in the physical flow.' Note: that is not to deny the possibility of 'supernatural' miracles, merely to suggest that God can, and on the basis of almost everything we observe actually appears to, work within a universe that doesn't need them.

[Audie]

I agree, Phillip. What happens when you inject a more pure fuel into an engine over regular grade? Or what happens to a body when pumped with fluids and antibiotics and other medicines to enhance the bodies ability to heal and go back to homeostasis (as naturally intended)? You call miraculous what I see as Him directly interacting with us. How He does? Again, mechanics. I know thought is involved. What He does to exist that thought, is mechanics. Of course we can't duplicate it in our current state, and if ever (in our glorified state) we know as you say, it's still Him. Which should just be a natural dwelling state for us.

Mallz,

None of what you mentioned is miraculous. Christ touching a blind man, and making him see, is a miracle. You do understand the difference, don't you?

Twain..


The difference between a Miracle and a Fact is exactly the difference between a mermaid and seal. It could not be expressed better.
- "Official Report to the I.I.A.S," Letters From the Earth

There is nothing more awe-inspiring than a miracle except the credulity that can take it at par.
- Notebook, 1904