Our Aim

There is plenty of excellent empirical work which has been done by many esteemed researchers concerning the provenance of the shroud and the formation of the image. On these subjects the reader will be pointed towards this research much of it published in peer reviewed scientific journals.

Much scientific evidence suggests that the shroud image occurred when a corpse shone momentarily brighter than the Sun.

An attempt will be made to understand rationally how this could occur without resort to terms like miracle or mystery.

The postulation is that this can all be explained by natural science but that we have to recognise as Schrödinger (one of the founders of quantum theory) did, that we need a unified understanding of mind and matter to look beyond the merely sensory, empirical view of the world and understand that which "looks out at the world from behind our eyes"

Home   |   Definitions   |   Presentations   |   Dr. Andrew Silverman
There is now plenty of
 

The image is not the work of an artist

If an image is painted onto a cloth the paint soaks through the fibres and mats them together. However the image on the Turin shroud has not been painted on but consists of a surface only phenomenon affecting only the outermost fibrils. Rather than anything being added to the cloth there is a change in the structure of the cellulose akin to accelerated ageing and similar to the yellowing of books that are exposed to sunlight.

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The famous carbon dating published in Nature in 1989 was not peer reviewed, did not follow established protocol and used samples from the most contaminated part of the cloth.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 image seems to have been formed by a short intense burst of radiant energy brighter than the Sun

Dr. Paolo Di Lazzaro is an eminent researcher at the ENEA centre in Rome. This is a world leading research centre in nuclear fusion and laser technology. Dr. Di Lazzaro has demonstrated that the surface properties of the image with the specific changes in chemical structure which are found can be replicated by an extremely high intensity and short duration burst of coherent ultraviolet light. This also explains the 'photographic negative' properties of the image.

The 'light' that seems to have caused the image, shone from the body of the man that the shroud wrapped

The image on the shroud is unique in that it has 'distance-coded' properties such that the image contains three dimensional information. This suggests that unlike an ordinary photograph in which light is reflected from the subject, the light which formed this 'photograph' actually originated from within the subject.

The man was dead when the blood stains were left on the shroud and before the image was formed

Forensic pathologists who have studied the shroud attest to the wealth of information contained on it. In particular the bloodstains can be shown to have been from fresh post-mortem blood suggesting that the crucified man had been wrapped in the shroud very soon after death. The image can be shown to have formed after this as there is no image underneath the blood stains.

The shroud can be found by pollen evidence to have been in the very close vicinity of Jerusalem in March or April

Forensic botanists have found pollen on the shroud of plants which are found only around Jerusalem and which produce pollen in March and April.

The image is so detailed that forensic pathologists have studied it to gain an insight into how the man died

The pathologists found:

bullet point 1He was tortured and whipped with a roman flagrum
bullet point 2He had a cap of thorns placed on his head,
bullet point 3He was crucified through the wrists and feet and pierced through the side.

All of this is consistent with the Turin Shroud being the burial cloth of the historical Jesus (Yeshua Ben Yosef) and as time goes on the aim of this website is to consider rationally and scientifically what questions the Turin Shroud raises about the nature of what we are as human beings and what we are all capable of. The connection between mind (sentience) and matter will be discussed as will the ramifications for scientific thought if what humans believe to be free will is what it seems.