Independently repeatable evidence that God interacts with our world

[sjastro]

In the first three minutes of cosmic history, the whole universe was the arena of nuclear reactions. When that era came to an end, through the cooling produced by expansion, the world was left, as it is today on the large scale, a mixture of three-quarters hydrogen and one-quarter helium. A little change in the balance between the strong and weak nuclear forces could have resulted in there being no hydrogen--and so ultimately no water, that fluid that seems so essential to life. A small increase (about 2 percent) in the strong nuclear force would bind two protons to form diprotons. There would then be no hydrogen-burning main-sequence stars, but only helium burners, which are far too fierce and rapid to be energy sources capable of sustaining the coming to be of planetary life. A decrease in the strong nuclear force by a similar amount would have unbound the deuteron and played havoc with fruitful nuclear physics." (John Polkinghorne, "A Potent Universe," in Templeton pg 111

Slight variations in physical laws such as gravity or electromagnetism would make life impossible . . . the necessity to produce life lies at the center of the universe's whole machinery and design ..." (John Wheeler, Princeton University professor of physics Reader's Digest, Sept., 1986)

We have attempted to describe early stages of the expansion of the universe but the description in terms of nuclear physics and relativity is not an explanation of those conditions. Formidable questions arise and it is not clear today where the answers should be sought: indeed, even the scientific description of these queries produces the remarkable idea that there may not be a solution in the language of science. Why is the universe expanding? Furthermore, why is it expanding at so near the critical rate to prevent its collapse? The query is most important because minor differences near time zero would have made human existence impossible. When the universe was one second from the beginning of the expansion we have stated that the temperature had fallen to 1010 deg K and the density to 1 gram per cubic centimeter. It is a phase when, it is postulated, the universe had already reached the possibility of description in terms of common physical concepts. If at that moment the rate of expansion had been reduced by only one part in a thousand billion, then the universe would have collapsed after a few million years, near the end of the epoch we now recognize as the radiation era, or the primordial fireball, before matter and radiation had become decoupled. This remarkable fact was pointed out recently by one of the most distinguished contemporary cosmologists who referred to the suggestions that out of all the possible universes, the only one which can exist, in the sense that it can be known, is simply the one which satisfies the narrow conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life." (Bernard Lovell, In the Center of Immensities, pages 122-123 (New York: Harper & Row, 1978).)

If you wanted to produce carbon and oxygen in roughly equal quantities by stellar nucleosynthesis, these are the two levels you would have to fix, and your fixing would have to be just about where these levels are actually found to be ... A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question." (Hoyle F., 'The Universe: Some Past and Present Reflections," University of Cardiff, 1982, p16, in Davies P.C.W., "The Accidental Universe," [1982], Cambridge University Press: Cambridge UK, 1983, reprint, p.118)

Given a random distribution of (gravitating) matter, it is overwhelmingly more probable that it will form a black hole rather than a star or cloud of dispersed gas. These considerations give a new slant, therefore, to the question of whether the universe was created in an ordered or disordered state. If the initial state were chosen at random, it seems exceedingly probable that the big bang would have coughed out black holes rather than dispersed gases. The present arrangement of matter and energy, with matter spread thinly at relatively low density, in the form of stars and gas clouds would, apparently, only result from a very special choice of initial conditions. Roger Penrose has computed the odds against the observed universe appearing by accident, given that a black hole cosmos is so much more likely on a priori grounds. He estimates a figure of 10^300 to one." (Paul Davies, God and the New Physics, pages 178-179 (Simon & Schuster, 1984).)


strong nuclear force constant:

if larger: no hydrogen would form; atomic nuclei for most life-essential elements would be unstable; thus, no life chemistry

if smaller: no elements heavier than hydrogen would form: again, no life chemistry


weak nuclear force constant:

if larger: too much hydrogen would convert to helium in big bang; hence, stars would convert too much matter into heavy elements making life chemistry impossible

if smaller: too little helium would be produced from big bang; hence, stars would convert too little matter into heavy elements making life chemistry impossible


gravitational force constant:

if larger: stars would be too hot and would burn too rapidly and too unevenly for life chemistry

if smaller: stars would be too cool to ignite nuclear fusion; thus, many of the elements needed for life chemistry would never form


electromagnetic force constant:

if greater: chemical bonding would be disrupted; elements more massive than boron would be unstable to fission

if lesser: chemical bonding would be insufficient for life chemistry


ratio of electromagnetic force constant to gravitational force constant:

if larger: all stars would be at least 40% more massive than the sun; hence, stellar burning would be too brief and too uneven for life support

if smaller: all stars would be at least 20% less massive than the sun, thus incapable of producing heavy elements


ratio of electron to proton mass:

if larger: chemical bonding would be insufficient for life chemistry

if smaller: same as above

ratio of number of protons to number of electrons

if larger: electromagnetism would dominate gravity, preventing galaxy, star, and planet formation

if smaller: same as above


expansion rate of the universe:

if larger: no galaxies would form

if smaller: universe would collapse, even before stars formed


entropy level of the universe:

if larger: stars would not form within proto-galaxies

if smaller: no proto-galaxies would form


mass density of the universe:

if larger: overabundance of deuterium from big bang would cause stars to burn rapidly, too rapidly for life to form

if smaller: insufficient helium from big bang would result in a shortage of heavy elements


velocity of light:

if faster: stars would be too luminous for life support if slower: stars would be insufficiently luminous for life support


age of the universe:

if older: no solar-type stars in a stable burning phase would exist in the right (for life) part of the galaxy

if younger: solar-type stars in a stable burning phase would not yet have formed


initial uniformity of radiation:

if more uniform: stars, star clusters, and galaxies would not have formed

if less uniform: universe by now would be mostly black holes and empty space


average distance between galaxies:

if larger: star formation late enough in the history of the universe would be hampered by lack of material

if smaller: gravitational tug-of-wars would destabilize the sun's orbit


density of galaxy cluster:

if denser: galaxy collisions and mergers would disrupt the sun's orbit

if less dense: star formation late enough in the history of the universe would be hampered by lack of material


average distance between stars:

if larger: heavy element density would be too sparse for rocky planets to form

if smaller: planetary orbits would be too unstable for life


fine structure constant (describing the fine-structure splitting of spectral lines):

if larger: all stars would be at least 30% less massive than the sun

if larger than 0.06: matter would be unstable in large magnetic fields

if smaller: all stars would be at least 80% more massive than the sun


decay rate of protons:

if greater: life would be exterminated by the release of radiation

if smaller: universe would contain insufficient matter for life


12C to 16O nuclear energy level ratio:

if larger: universe would contain insufficient oxygen for life

if smaller: universe would contain insufficient carbon for life


ground state energy level for 4He:

if larger: universe would contain insufficient carbon and oxygen for life

if smaller: same as above


decay rate of 8Be:

if slower: heavy element fusion would generate catastrophic explosions in all the stars

if faster: no element heavier than beryllium would form; thus, no life chemistry



ratio of neutron mass to proton mass:

if higher: neutron decay would yield too few neutrons for the formation of many life-essential elements

if lower: neutron decay would produce so many neutrons as to collapse all stars into neutron stars or black holes


initial excess of nucleons over anti-nucleons:

if greater: radiation would prohibit planet formation

if lesser: matter would be insufficient for galaxy or star formation


polarity of the water molecule:

if greater: heat of fusion and vaporization would be too high for life

if smaller: heat of fusion and vaporization would be too low for life; liquid water would not work as a solvent for life chemistry; ice would not float, and a runaway freeze-up would result


supernovae eruptions:

if too close, too frequent, or too late: radiation would exterminate life on the planet

if too distant, too infrequent, or too soon: heavy elements would be too sparse for rocky planets to form


white dwarf binaries:

if too few: insufficient fluorine would exist for life chemistry

if too many: planetary orbits would be too unstable for life

if formed too soon: insufficient fluorine production

if formed too late: fluorine would arrive too late for life chemistry


ratio of exotic matter mass to ordinary matter mass:

if larger: universe would collapse before solar-type stars could form

if smaller: no galaxies would form


number of effective dimensions in the early universe:

if larger: quantum mechanics, gravity, and relativity could not coexist; thus, life would be impossible

if smaller: same result


number of effective dimensions in the present universe:

if smaller: electron, planet, and star orbits would become unstable

if larger: same result


mass of the neutrino:

if smaller: galaxy clusters, galaxies, and stars would not form

if larger: galaxy clusters and galaxies would be too dense


big bang ripples:

if smaller: galaxies would not form; universe would expand too rapidly

if larger: galaxies/galaxy clusters would be too dense for life; black holes would dominate; universe would collapse before life-site could form


size of the relativistic dilation factor:

if smaller: certain life-essential chemical reactions will not function properly

if larger: same result


uncertainty magnitude in the Heisenberg uncertainty principle:

if smaller: oxygen transport to body cells would be too small and certain life-essential elements would be unstable

if larger: oxygen transport to body cells would be too great and certain life-essential elements would be unstable


cosmological constant:

if larger: universe would expand too quickly to form solar-type stars

This is all very confusing.
You are now arguing on the premise expansion does cause cooling but create a different set of problems such as fine tuning, yet in a previous post you referred to a link which stated expansion violated thermodynamics.
You can’t have it both ways.

Given a random distribution of (gravitating) matter, it is overwhelmingly more probable that it will form a black hole rather than a star or cloud of dispersed gas. These considerations give a new slant, therefore, to the question of whether the universe was created in an ordered or disordered state. If the initial state were chosen at random, it seems exceedingly probable that the big bang would have coughed out black holes rather than dispersed gases. The present arrangement of matter and energy, with matter spread thinly at relatively low density, in the form of stars and gas clouds would, apparently, only result from a very special choice of initial conditions. Roger Penrose has computed the odds against the observed universe appearing by accident, given that a black hole cosmos is so much more likely on a priori grounds. He estimates a figure of 10^300 to one." (Paul Davies, God and the New Physics, pages 178-179 (Simon & Schuster, 1984).)

One of the dangers in quoting a source that is nearly 40 years old in a field that has progressed rapidly in the same period is the criticisms are less valid today in particular the likelihood of the universe evolving into a black hole cosmos.

These theoretical primordial black holes as opposed to black holes created due to the gravitational collapse of stars are believed to be the result of initial homogeneities and phase transitions formed very early in the radiation era, or the decay of topological defects such as cosmic strings created during the GUT epoch.

Primordial black holes having formed very early in the universe are effectively diluted by inflation as in the case of magnetic monopoles discussed in a previous post.
In 1984 inflation theory was still not widely accepted by cosmologists and a black hole cosmos was more plausible then.
There is very little evidence of primordial black holes of even existing in our universe.

Also what is the point of quoting Penrose?
Penrose is an atheist not a creationist his model (CCC) is also an expansion model and does not support creationism; you are engaging in a quote mining fallacy.

 

[Kyrani]

Have you studied human physiology? I ask because although there is a grain of truth in what you say, i.e. the emotions do have physiological effects, what you describe is distorted and inaccurate.

Yes, please show me the relevant science.

I'll watch the video if you have some appropriate qualification for what you talk about in it - do you?

First there is the early chemotherapy that was given as they thought that cancer was rapidly dividing cells. It is not rapidly dividing cells so the drugs had no pharmacological effects on the cancer. I discuss this in this answer on Quora.
https://www.quora.com/If-a-cure-for...isn-t-it-talked-about-more/answer/Kyrani-Eade
Instead of admitting that they were wrong, they changed the way they talked about cancer. So now they are saying uncontrolled cell growth owing to "cancer genes", either through damage or miscopied DNA. And that the immune system normally destroys such cells.
Now, without the full participation of the immune system, there is no cancer. They are influential in the microenvironment.

Roles of the immune system in cancer: from tumor initiation to metastatic progression

Roles of the immune system in cancer: from tumor initiation to metastatic progression (nih.gov)

Next, if there ain't no cancer stem cells , there is no cancer. That was shown back in the early 2000s by Dr. Max Wicha M.D and his then PhD student Dr. Michael Clarke.

Stem cells, cancer, and cancer stem cells - PubMed (nih.gov) this is published in 2001 and still behind a paywall but the abstract is clear enough.

And as you can see they are careful in what they say and all directions are towards treatments. How can we target cancer stem cells. Publications | Wicha Lab (umich.edu)

No one is asking why is the body developing cancer stem cells?

The carcinogen story is what most of the research is about and for that they use transgenic mice. That means that some of their genes have been altered to create so called oncogenes, ie., genes involved in cell proliferation as seen in wound healing and tissue regeneration and so-called tumor suppressor genes again seen in wound healing etc. So the experiments are all about see if we do X, then Y happens, when the experiments are manufactured to produce Y happens.
And again they are careful how they write things otherwise funding can be lost.
Use of rodents as models of human diseases (nih.gov)
The argument that they had to wait two years to see the effects of carcinogens in wild type mice is not true. The way they justify this is by saying that transformed cells are cancer cells, which they are not.

You can find the video I made on my findings of why the body develops cancer in this answer (second video )
https://www.quora.com/Does-the-dist...ess-pejorative-terminology/answer/Kyrani-Eade
The first video in that answer explains the underhanded foul game play by related inhumane people that leads to disease generally. A concealed threat is used and that is why they see a fight or flight response right across the board in all diseases, but they put it down to a dysregulated fight or flight response. The meat robot, in other words, has just malfunctioned! If you want to see the series I made you need to go into my YouTube channel and find the playlist on The Underlying Conditions of Disease. And there are others that are relevant too.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

But have you read the forensic reports?

The forensic reports are meaningless if the sample was not obtained as claimed - that was my point.

I don’t know what you are reading.

I read the link you provided, then googled around.

Which is typical in sceptic world of trying to debunk phenomena with unsupportable alternative non explanations. Some earn a good living out of such pseudoscience.

It's generally the believers (or pretenders to believe) in the supernatural that make a good living out of pseudoscience.

I notice You haven’t commented on the actual tissue sections which are identified by multiple pathologists as striated heart muscle ( which looks nothing like fungus or bacteria and never will) preferring to note there are other things can look red!
It really is human tissue.

Just as not all things that look red are blood, but then red mould doesn’t pass any of the tests for human blood and tissue which these ( indeed the statue of Cochabamba does)

Irrelevant without indisputable provenance. See above.

There is no doubt there are pious frauds. But no amount of painting fakes render the original artwork fake.

The art world is full of fakes of paintings by famous artists that they never painted. I have no doubt that if the Jesus the myths & legends were built around was real, he had a heart and blood, but extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, that this story isn't it.

One of the other oft repeated red herrings is the idea that the church wants phenomena to be real or has any incentive to do so. The church is incredibly sceptical ,it hates the publicity, it analyses them for years and even at the end stops short of saying they are true!
They simply claim worthy of belief because all reasonable sources of fraud are discounted. Indeed they are often ( take Fatima ) the most hostile of the sceptics!

Who said anything about 'the church'? It's usually individuals or independent groups that make such frauds, either for personal attention or for the attention it will bring to things that are important to them. And miracles are great for tourism...

It was a lawyer who took sealed samples at Buenos airies which were analysed across the world,so chain of custody intact.

As above - it sounds more and more like the classic illusionist misdirection - do the switch before the punter even hands over what he believes to be his item, then go through a charade of carefully pretending to ensure it can't be tampered with, etc...

This is the real deal in my view.
I’ve looked for the holes and I can’t see them.
I’m sceptical too , until I see the forensics.

So where are these forensics? link? reference? citation? at what point after the 'discovery' do they begin?

I’ve already pointed out that on the statue of Cochabamba , the pathologist Lawrence was unable to discount the samples on the basis of pathology. They really were traumatised epithelium and human blood, ( and vegetative cells assumed thorn) but wanted to be sure so he returned and took his own samples, and examined the statue and came to the same conclusion , that it couldn’t be faked. That’s the point. On magic tricks, illusiinists don’t let you behind the curtain. In these cases scientists were welcomed. Several did in each case.

As I said, scientists have been fooled many times by tricksters, even in 'well controlled' lab conditions. What you need is an experienced illusionist who knows how those sorts of tricks are done.

If you have a fraud hypothesis it would be interesting to ask how.
This is simply not explainable by fraudulent insertion of cadaver flesh.
Not least cadavers have nuclear dna. This has only mitochondrial.

I'm frankly sceptical - without seeing the actual report, I would suspect that it's been misreported. Are you seriously suggesting that Jesus had no DNA? He was supposed to be a human, not a zombie - wasn't that the whole point?

humour me. Take a good hard look at one.
Castarnon book is downloadable on tixtla ( Spanish), sadly at a price, but it is half forensic reports. All credible labs.

Lanciano sections are all there on the web ( but was pre dna testing)

I'm not going to pay to validate your claims. If you have the relevant material, scan it and post it. But as I already said, without indisputable provenance, it's just a waste of time, lawyers and all.

 

[chad kincham]

I know what this "fine tuning" stuff is. I've argued against it in dozens of posts. The "expansion fine tuning" is not relevant in modern cosmological theory. And I *really* don't care what some philosopher wrote 30+ years ago. A real cosmologist would have at least acknowledged inflationary cosmology as a solution to this problem even in 1989, but noted that more evidence was required. We'll that evidence exists now. This "problem" is no longer so.

Your claim ignores the fact that not just a few things are finely tuned for life, but an overwhelming preponderance of them are.

Thus claiming one of them was solved, does not negate that fact.

Add to the universe fine tuning, the existence of life in earth is dependent on dozens of conditions being exactly right - thus the universe PLUS life on earth PLUS even the vital universal solvent called water, shows evidence of being designed.

 

[chad kincham]

Another issue is this. Lets say I have 100, 6 sided dice and roll them. The probability of any one combination coming up is 1 in 6.5 x 10^77 (someone can check my math). But the probability of one of those combinations coming up is 1 in 1. So if you roll the dice it is a 100% probability that and extremely low probability will happen. Same with the universe. If a universe comes into existence the probabilities of a universe with certain characteristics is very low but one of those would have to happen, it just happens to be our universe.

Scientific American:

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

 

[NxNW]

Cognitive dissonance, eh?

No, just an understanding that "knife edge" is nowhere near the truth.

 

[NxNW]

the existence of life in earth is dependent on dozens of conditions being exactly right

Discover magazine refuted this nonsense years ago. You could make wholesale changes to conditions on Earth and still be compatible with life.

the vital universal solvent called water, shows evidence of being designed.

You haven't shown any evidence of design. Questions are not evidence, and mysteries are not miracles, as Dame Vaako widely observed.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Your claim ignores the fact that not just a few things are finely tuned for life, but an overwhelming preponderance of them are.

Thus claiming one of them was solved, does not negate that fact.

Add to the universe fine tuning, the existence of life in earth is dependent on dozens of conditions being exactly right - thus the universe PLUS life on earth PLUS even the vital universal solvent called water, shows evidence of being designed.

Can you actually discuss one of these, or are you just a cut-and-paste man?

Your copied list doesn't impress me and is too boring to read all the way through.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Scientific American:

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

More philosophers. Meh.

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

Scientific American:

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

Our Improbable Existence Is No Evidence for a Multiverse

I never said anything about a multiverse.

If you think I did then you didn’t understand the point of the dice illustration.

it shows that low probability events have to happen and do happen regularly.

Also, we have no way to know what the probability of our universe happening over another version was. It could be 100% or 0.000000000005%. Unless we know all possibilities we can’t calculate the probability of one universe forming over another.

 

[Hans Blaster]

How 'bout one more chance at this. Let's try another...

velocity of light:

if faster: stars would be too luminous for life support if slower: stars would be insufficiently luminous for life support

So how would changing the speed of light change the luminosity of stars? And, how would such a change (if it happened) in stellar luminosity reduce the possibility of life that couldn't be corrected by changing the planetary orbits? (ie., if stars were more luminous, the "habital zone" would be further out.)

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

Your claim ignores the fact that not just a few things are finely tuned for life, but an overwhelming preponderance of them are

A lot of bad evidence does not equal good evidence.

 

[chad kincham]

A lot of bad evidence does not equal good evidence.

Tell that to the many physicists, astronomers, mathematicians, etc, who say the evidence of design is overwhelming.

 

[chad kincham]

Can you actually discuss one of these, or are you just a cut-and-paste man?

Your copied list doesn't impress me and is too boring to read all the way through.

Did you ever write a college level paper?

If you did, you filled it with citations and quotes from authoritarian sources, complete with footnotes if you wanted a passing grade - so why should I make an unsupported assertion when there’s scientists and researchers with advanced graduate degrees who said it?

What I do puts me one jump ahead of you, since with everything I say you demand documentation and proof, so I am pre-proving and documenting my statements by signing and quoting authoritarian figures up front.

 

[chad kincham]

How 'bout one more chance at this. Let's try another...



So how would changing the speed of light change the luminosity of stars? And, how would such a change (if it happened) in stellar luminosity reduce the possibility of life that couldn't be corrected by changing the planetary orbits? (ie., if stars were more luminous, the "habital zone" would be further out.)

I never said anything about a multiverse.

If you think I did then you didn’t understand the point of the dice illustration.

it shows that low probability events have to happen and do happen regularly.

Also, we have no way to know what the probability of our universe happening over another version was. It could be 100% or 0.000000000005%. Unless we know all possibilities we can’t calculate the probability of one universe forming over another.

Had you read it you would have noted they discuss fallacies of using mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning,, a direct correlation to your post, especially given that it was on the topic of the formation of our universe, and in point of fact, those who use mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning, generally do so in conjunction with the multiverse hypothesis, that posits a universe generating mechanism that pukes out universes with different laws of physics in each one, so that the astronomical odds against a random BB event producing just the right laws of physics, is negated by randomly generating an astronomical number of universes, with ours being the one lucky universe that allows life to exist in it.

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

Tell that to the many physicists, astronomers, mathematicians, etc, who say the evidence of design is overwhelming.

This is a problem with your epistemology. Why do you believe the scientists etc. that believe in fine tuning over the ones that don't?

I don't believe fine tuning by a god is true because the evidence does not support that conclusion and I am not convinced. I have tried to tell you my reasons that I am not convinced and those have been ignored and responses like this have been thrown out.

 

[Mountainmike]

It is hard to see how we ever make progress.

Science Books and papers are not free.
Even feynmann's and hawkings publishers have the ethos "we never knowingly undercharge"
Even less monographic summary books like "through two doors at once" cost a fiver.

So "cronica de un milagro de eucharistico" (castarnon on tixtla) is on the way to 300 pages - the last half of which is actual forensic lab reports (several different labs , countries) and explanations around them, all histological studies, analysis etc. I cannot in reality copy more than a small fraction of it. I would be breaking copyright to do it. Just as I would copying feynmann!

The compilation of books like this costs money. So even the books on the lanciano, full of chemical analysis and tissue sections costs a tenner. The original paper I got from scientific archives via british lending library. It cost at least 15

Its true across the spectrum. The best books on the shroud - eg " a chemical perspective of the shroud" , meachams "rape of the shroud " which is the ONLY archeologist as part of the team with substantial experience of dating textiles - debunks the RC test. The forensics of the sudarium. They all cost 15-30. Books on cochambamba a 10.

They are not making money. The volume is low. It is just covering the cost of complex books/

All I can do is point at the conclusions that make the books worth reading.
The impossible parts even without seeing the event.
- How can tissue recognised as heart myocardium , tissue and blood shown human AB - pass all the tests for human origin, but fail to yeild a DNA profile? And if that experiment was a hoax in one place (which would be impossible to see how to do) - how did it repeat in places with no connection to each other? Different labs doing tests.
- How do these samples still have leucocytes. A pathologist will tell you it cant happen, but all admit it has.
- It would take a skilled surgeon to cut such a thin piece of myocardium (and the patient would die!) - how was that done 1000 years ago. Coming to which - how does lanciano survive as a viable sample wihout preservatives? And even if that is managed , how do they have bread intimately intermingled with flesh (eg buenos airies).


Thats what this thread is about. The evidence stands or falls on inspection.
I think science is empirical not fundamental. "is an electron". Its clearly a model that matches some behaviour. It is only representative of a part of what might actually be there.
I don't need an explanation why tixtla doesnt yield DNA. The fact it doesnt, does not invalidate the existence of an inexplicable phenomena, it enhances the evidence. God may have a sense of humour in confusing scientists.

Ive already acknowledged there are pious frauds. But pious frauds dont stand scientific scrutiny, and there never was a serious illusion that allowed scientists behind the curtain at the time the illusion was performed.

Ive given a a website where the basic precis is provided. More than that you have to go back to the forensic reports. I cannot possibly copy hundreds of pages.

We reach an impass:
I question who is being more objective in attitude to phenomena!
I am convinced because I have read the forensic eveidence importing obscure books from all round the world.
You are unconvinced without looking at any of it! To be scientific you should reserve judgement.

It is a problem with all of this, and the reason it does not get more coverage. Take the dean of Bialystock university so hated the conclusion of his pathologists on Sokolka ( who declared it cardiac tissue) - he declared it red bread mould, having never looked at it once. An australian and a german university have refused to even test them BECAUSE of what they were told they were testing. The australian one said "we are founded on Darwins theories, so we cant do it" (ie consider evidence they are wrong) Pretty much the attitude of academia to all of this. I do not get it.
They were given a dream shot of ridiculing a supposed miracle, but turned it down in case it was real...

It is no issue to me if any are proved fraudulent.
The ones that defy explanation are fascinating.

As for provenance. I can ony say the scientists at cochamamba were alowed to take their own samples, see all the film footage, scan the statue. If their own chain of custody carrying a sample to their own labs is a problem. What science could survive that scepticism?

Lastly "extraordinary claims" etc is anti science.
It is a threshold used to raise a bar against thinks the establishment does not like. All claims need the same standard of evidence. Most would accept what a forensic lab says as reliable.

It lasts all the way till a forensic lab says something people do not like.

Like the massive forensic correspondence and pre and post mortem pathology of the shroud and ( the much longer chain of custody ) sudarium have so many points of correspondence, they covered the same victim :end of.
RC flat earthers still try to stand by a hopelessly flawed test. It was known it was flawed before the result was announced. But the sceptics "liked" that test.

The forensic reports are meaningless if the sample was not obtained as claimed - that was my point.

I read the link you provided, then googled around.

It's generally the believers (or pretenders to believe) in the supernatural that make a good living out of pseudoscience.

Irrelevant without indisputable provenance. See above.

The art world is full of fakes of paintings by famous artists that they never painted. I have no doubt that if the Jesus the myths & legends were built around was real, he had a heart and blood, but extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, that this story isn't it.

Who said anything about 'the church'? It's usually individuals or independent groups that make such frauds, either for personal attention or for the attention it will bring to things that are important to them. And miracles are great for tourism...

As above - it sounds more and more like the classic illusionist misdirection - do the switch before the punter even hands over what he believes to be his item, then go through a charade of carefully pretending to ensure it can't be tampered with, etc...

So where are these forensics? link? reference? citation? at what point after the 'discovery' do they begin?

As I said, scientists have been fooled many times by tricksters, even in 'well controlled' lab conditions. What you need is an experienced illusionist who knows how those sorts of tricks are done.

I'm frankly sceptical - without seeing the actual report, I would suspect that it's been misreported. Are you seriously suggesting that Jesus had no DNA? He was supposed to be a human, not a zombie - wasn't that the whole point?

I'm not going to pay to validate your claims. If you have the relevant material, scan it and post it. But as I already said, without indisputable provenance, it's just a waste of time, lawyers and all.

 

[Clizby WampusCat]

Had you read it you would have noted they discuss fallacies of using mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning,, a direct correlation to your post, especially given that it was on the topic of the formation of our universe, and in point of fact, those who use mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning, generally do so in conjunction with the multiverse hypothesis, that posits a universe generating mechanism that pukes out universes with different laws of physics in each one, so that the astronomical odds against a random BB event producing just the right laws of physics, is negated by randomly generating an astronomical number of universes, with ours being the one lucky universe that allows life to exist in it.

This is a strawman. I never mentioned a multiverse. You don't need a multiverse to counter the fine tuning argument. I have no confidence that you are going to respond to any of my objections at this point.

One more try. What is wrong with this?

Another issue is this. Lets say I have 100, 6 sided dice and roll them. The probability of any one combination coming up is 1 in 6.5 x 10^77 (someone can check my math). But the probability of one of those combinations coming up is 1 in 1. So if you roll the dice it is a 100% probability that and extremely low probability will happen. Same with the universe. If a universe comes into existence the probabilities of a universe with certain characteristics is very low but one of those would have to happen, it just happens to be our universe.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Did you ever write a college level paper?

Only a couple, because I was doing a B.S.

If you did, you filled it with citations and quotes from authoritarian sources, complete with footnotes if you wanted a passing grade - so why should I make an unsupported assertion when there’s scientists and researchers with advanced graduate degrees who said it?

When I wrote papers about science (I think it happened twice), I used scientific references because that was the topic. When I wrote a history paper, I used (secondary) historical sources. For my English term paper -- oh boy -- I got annoyed after several weeks of the professor extracting "hidden lesbian themes" from readings that left my head scratching, so I wrote my essay on how some other theme was dominant about the most obvious of the readings:

Carmilla - Wikipedia

Since my theme was a real theme of the work, the TA grading my paper was probably fine with it. (The paper was probably due the last day of class, so I definitely never saw the graded version, but I was OK with the grade I got in the class, given the subject matter, that was based on that essay and two hand-written essay exams.) He may have rolled his eyes when I contorted my writing to avoid mentioning the romantic elements, when I could have written something like "Beneath the girls romantic attraction, ...", but I'm pretty sure they are used to dealing with 18-year-olds from rural, conservative backgrounds.

What I do puts me one jump ahead of you, since with everything I say you demand documentation and proof, so I am pre-proving and documenting my statements by signing and quoting authoritarian figures up front.

Proof would have been nice, but what I wanted most was a focused discussion of *one* of your claims, rather than the wall of text that was your collection of out-of-date pull quotes. (And it would be "proper authorities". "Authoritarian figures" would be people like Stalin, Mussolini, Pol Pot, Orban, and Thiel.)

 

[Hans Blaster]

Had you read it you would have noted they discuss fallacies of using mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning,, a direct correlation to your post, especially given that it was on the topic of the formation of our universe, and in point of fact, those who use mathematical odds to disprove fine tuning, generally do so in conjunction with the multiverse hypothesis, that posits a universe generating mechanism that pukes out universes with different laws of physics in each one, so that the astronomical odds against a random BB event producing just the right laws of physics, is negated by randomly generating an astronomical number of universes, with ours being the one lucky universe that allows life to exist in it.

I'm not sure why you replied to my post with the other post. None of what you write has anything to do with how a different speed of light would impact the luminosities of stars. So let's try again...

By what mechanism would a different speed of light alter the luminosity of a star, and why could this not be compensated for by having life closer or further from the star?

For example, changing the gravitational constant would certainly change the compactness of stars of a particular mass. What would the speed of light do?

Most places where the speed of light enters into the physics underlying stellar evolution it is in combination with other constants. (In nuclear physics, in atomic physics, thermodynamics, etc.) This is why such variation is often measured in unitless combinations like the fine structure constant.

How would the propagation speed of light impact the luminous output of a star? Those other impacts are in areas of physics whose fundamentals have not changed since your list was compiled. Surely there is a reference in it to *why* the speed of light would change stellar output. Please provide.