Minimalist

True believers will dispute any test that shows their beliefs are wrong.


It goes with the territory.

Saramago

Can you point to any references about blood degrading to AB? I couldn't find anything, and if that does happen it means that something on the cells degrades into an antigen which cross-reacts with antibodies against the A antigen and with antibodies against the B antigen. Given the description of the antigens at Wikipedia's page on ABO blood group system, I'd guess that degradation of A & B antigens could occur that would make a sample appear to have type O blood instead of A, B, or AB - but I don't see how degradation could occur such that "any type" of blood could appear to have AB blood.

Does anyone know whether blood typing can even be done on a very small, very old, very dry sample?

And, why would finding type AB blood be seen as a point in favor of authenticity that SoT was the burial shroud of a guy who, it is claimed, only had one earthly parent? I'd think that AB blood would be the LEAST suggestive that the shroud ever touched Jesus's body.

When I tried searching for answers to these questions, multiple sites turned up gushing about how SoT has bloodstains which were PROVEN to be male Jewish (or Palestinian) blood. I am highly skeptical of the claim that any stains on SoT have demonstrated "male" blood, since that would be determined by karyotyping, which requires nucleated cells. Mature red blood cells have no nuclei. (Though perhaps a believer could readily convince himself that Jesus would be an exception.)

Besides which, even if one had nucleated cells to study, and believes the SoT was wrapped around the divine Jesus, where did that Y chromosome come from? Both AB blood, and XY karyotype, strongly suggest that 2 parents, both human unless proven otherwise, donated actual genetic material.

steve_bnk

My paranormal sixth sense tells me you tend to be skeptical about religious claims....

Out of all the people crucifed in history by the Romans, of course this was the one.

semiopen

Without a response from Ramoss, This is difficult.

I also looked for awhile and was unable to find anything clear but the field is highly technical.

This quote from Shroud_of_Turin

suggests that there is quite possibly blood on the shroud. I'm not clear if the quote says that if this is blood it is likely to be human.

Minimalist

Let's see about this shroud crap.

As the story goes it was in 1898 that an Italian photographer took a photo of the shroud and confessed to be shocked to see an "image" appear.

One supposes that when he took the picture that there was nothing visible, otherwise why would he have been surprised. Hold that thought.

The actual 'history' of the shroud begins in 1389, almost 500 years earlier and recounts an exhibition of the shroud in 1355 in Lirey, France. At that time the shroud is called a forgery by the Bishop of Troyes who said it was a "cunning painting." OK, that's his opinion and not everyone is an art critic.

However, we must assume that there was, in fact, some sort of image present in 1355 which the Bishop could call "a cunning painting." Certainly, whoever was viewing this thing in 1355 was not using a camera to see it.

What we have here is a medieval piece of art work ( we don't know if the original artist intended it as a forgery or not...he may have simply been trying out a new technique and some other damn fool decided the thing was real!). However, it appears that the image had faded over 500+ years to the point where it is only visible via camera.

One would think that if 'god' created this thing in the early first century AD by some sort of 'miracle' that it would have had a lot more staying power?

Petergdi

I think you have misunderstood. The two obvious reasons why the photographer might very well be surprised at seeing the photographic negative are:

1) An ordinary (blue-sensitive) plate will increase contrast between the pigments and the shroud. The old plates had the same effect as using a blue filter. While the effect of filtration is somewhat predictable, unless you know the spectral characteristics of the pigments present, it is easily possible for an experienced photographer to be surprised.

2) A negative of the shroud has more realistic looking shading than a positive image. This is a very odd thing for a work of art. I can easily see a photographer being astonished when he first saw the negative.

Peter.

Minimalist

I don't know about that. Here are the words of the photographer:

http://www.shroud.com/vanhels4.htm


The implication is that whatever was there in 1898 was not sufficiently pronounced to be apparent to the eye...otherwise he wouldn't be seeing the image "for the first time."

And, if that is the case, what on earth was the Bishop of Troyes seeing that he called "a cunning painting?" 500 years will do a lot of fading.

Petergdi

You have seen the difference between regular images of the shroud and negative images, haven't you? Haven't you been impressed with how much more the face in the negative image looks like a human face? I think it is a work of art from the late middle ages, but it does seem striking that the negative image looks better than the positive.

The image is faint, but I can't see how it is possible that it would have been less visible in the late 19th century than it is today, so I take the photographer's comments to be about the striking appearance of the negative.

Peter.

Minimalist

I'm trying to make the contrast to what Pio saw in 1898 and what the Bishop of Troyes reacted to in 1355. However faint it may have been (and I don't want to put words into Pio's mouth - his statement speaks for itself) the Bishop unhesitatingly called it a "painting."

It doesn't look like a painting anymore.

Again, though, we do not know that it is a forgery. We do not know the intention of the artist. He may have merely been trying to depict what he thought the shroud might have looked like and then someone else made the claim that his was the "real" shroud.

Toto

Ian Wilson's Turin Shroud theories are the worst kind of junk history