Skeptical Inquirer magazine is published by the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal; founded by the likes of Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, Paul Kurtz, Ray Hyman and Philip Klass. While they deny that they are critical of Christianity or any religion they mean only so long as it is completely secular. They make people like John Dominic Crossan and John Shelby Spong seem like pious saints.
As for Joe Nickell, a magician by trade, he is a crusading iconoclast who deals only in selective facts and fantastic made up garbage. For instance he keeps claiming it is tempera paint even though the chemical analysis disproves that. Nickell has never examined the Shroud or any of the thousands of particles collected from its surface. He wouldn't understand spectral analysis anyways. Spectrophotometry, fluorescence photography, x-ray fluorescence spectrometry, microscopy, microchemistry, laser microprobe Raman spectrometry, and pyrolysis mass spectrometry all prove that he doesn't know what he is talking about. This is a picture of some imaging from the tip of the nose. Those little straw-colored fibers are about 15% as thick as a human hair. The image is superficial. There is no image below the topmost fibers. In some case one fiber is colored, the next one not, and the one next to it colored. No liquids have been applied (unless it was done with a very tiny one-hair brush under a microscope).
The actual chemistry of the image is a carbohydrate layer that coats the individual fibers. In some places the layer has been chemically altered to create double-double carbon bonds with chromophores needed for us to see the yellow.
What Joe Nickell is throwing out is absolute garbage.
Oh yes, as for the mystery artist. You are referring of course to the claims of an inquest by Bishop Henri de Poitiers of Troyes conducted in the 14th century. It is funny that Henri never recorded anything about that inquest although he seems to have recorded everything else. It appears, from the clear historical record, that another bishop made the claim in an attempt to discredit a relic in another competing diocese. That sort of stuff went on.
Historians of any attitude towards the Shroud don't take Nickell seriously.
Shroudie
The results of the microanalysis and carbon dating tests Nickell describes have been challenged by those who accept the Shroud's authenticity on faith, but have yet to be scientifically invalidated. Sorry. This is wrong on both counts. Both McCrone's "microanalysis," which bears more relationship to Percival Lowell's canals on Mars than to objective science, and the Carbon 14 test, which threw out the agreed sampling protocols and as a result invalidated the findings (Garbage In, Garbage Out), have been scientifically (complete with peer reviewed publication) invalidated.
McCrone's microanalysis is worthless. Walter C. McCrone is the ONLY scientist who sees what he claims to see in his optical microscope. McCrone's claims were released to the general press and were not published in any peer reviewed publication. In fact, after McCrone's papers were rejected by peer reviewed publications, he published them in The Microscope which is published by McCrone Associates, Inc., and edited by Walter C. McCrone. He claimed his magazine is "peer reviewed" because his associates (employees) "reviewed" his articles.
Other scientists have been unable to duplicate McCrone's findings. McCrone is not even consistent in what he claims to have found:
"McCrone . . . has alleged at various times that the ‘blood’ images are 1) simply iron oxide particles, 2) simply post-1800s iron oxide particles, 3) iron oxide particles of a form derived from the earth and available for tens of thousands of years, all in a proteinaceous medium, i.e. liquid earthy iron-oxide paint, and 4) liquid earthy iron-oxide and liquid mercury-sulfide (HgS) paint. . . .. . . McCrone’s devotion to the microscope prevented him from taking into account peer-reviewed data from physics-based instruments and wet-chemistry testing contrary to his painting conclusions. McCrone’s failure to respond in print to contrary peer-reviewed data and conclusions, and his allegation that H&A and STURP fabricated data, were presaged by the fact that both before and after resigning from STURP, McCrone exhibited marked reluctance to defend his claims before other STURP scientists.
McCrone appealed to microscope appearance when making the conflicting statements that the ‘blood’ had the appearance of post-1800s iron oxide, and the appearance of a form of iron oxide existing for tens of thousands of years, and still later, the appearance of iron-oxide and mercury-sulfide.
Researchers using MUCH MORE SOPHISTICATED instruments than a visible light microscope have published articles in peer reviewed scientific publications showing that the image IS NOT A PAINTING OF ANY KIND. While Iron Oxide is present on the shroud, it is not in sufficient quantities to be seen, much less present an image. Studies using electron microscopes of various types have magnified image fibrils down to the molecular level and have found NO PIGMENTS that could be responsible for the image, Pyrolysis/Mass spectrometry analysis also shows no pigments.
McCrone was wrong.
McCrone also claimed that there is no blood on the Shroud. He claimed that he saw Iron Oxide and Vermillion (Mercuric Sulfide) in the blood stains... and that, according to McCrone proves the blood is paint. Unfortunately for McCrone, numerous other scientists more qualified in the identification of blood and blood products have conclusively proven that the stains on the Shroud ARE BLOOD. Again, no one can find the amounts of Iron Oxide and Mercuric Sulfide that McCrone claims. Again the other scientists published THEIR articles in peer reviewed journals AND defended their findings in symposia.
Biophysicist Dr. John Heller and Biochemist Alan Adler performed numerous tests identifying the stains in the blood area. A paper written by historian David Ford gives an excellent overview of their efforts AND of Walter McCrone's effort to sabotage their research by deliberately withholding samples and sending them samples that had little or no blood stains. The source is another PDF file (requires Adobe Acrobat Reader).
The Shroud of Turin's 'Blood' Images: Blood, or Paint? History of Science Inquiry
Some of the tests they applied and reported as positive for blood are reported in this excerpt:
. . . Regarding the ‘blood,’ Heller and Adler concluded that it was actual blood material on the basis of physics-based and chemistrybased testing, most tests of which will be discussed, specifically the following: detection of higher-than elsewhere levels of iron in ‘blood’ areas via X-ray fluorescence, indicative spectra obtained by microspectrophotometry, generation with chemicals and ultraviolet light of characteristic porphyrin fluorescence, positive tests for hemochromagen using hydrazine, positive tests for cyanmethemoglobin using a neutralized cyanide solution, positive tests for the bile pigment bilirubin, positive tests for protein, and use of proteolytic enzymes on ‘blood’ material, leaving no residues. The tests and data not discussed 3 are the reflection spectra indicative of bilirubin’s32 and blood’s presence,33 chemical detection of the specific protein albumin,34 the presence of serum halos around various ‘blood’ marks when viewed under ultraviolet light,35 the immunological determination that the ‘blood’ is of primate origin,36 and the forensic judgment that the various blood and wound marks appear extremely realistic.37
Heller and Adler checked their results with other scientists even more expert than they:
After the (microspectrophotometer results) coordinates had been plotted on graph paper, Adler observed, “John, this is hemoglobin. It’s the acid methemoglobin form, and it’s denatured and very old.” Heller “beamed” before noting, “But Al. We don’t have the requisite fine structure,” to which Adler replied, “Fine structure, my foot! Do you think this is the spectrum of sauteed artichoke hearts? Don’t be ridiculous.” Suggested Heller, “Let’s check with at least two other top hemoglobin hotshots and see if they are as sure as we are. Pick anyone you want.” Adler’s choice gave the answer of old acid methemoglobin. They then spoke via speakerphone to Bruce Cameron, “whose double -doctorate is dedicated to hemoglobin in all its many forms,” and upon receiving and plotting the numbers, Cameron said, “You both should know what it is. It’s old acid methemoglobin. I don’t know why you wanted to bother me with something you know as well as I do... Hey, wait a minute. Are you two idiots working on the Shroud of Turin?”
Needless to say (since I already did) Heller's and Adler's research has been published in peer reviewed journals and has been duplicated by other scientists. To reiterate, McCrone's has not.
McCrone is also famous for his findings (again by microscopic examination) that the controversial Vinland Map is a modern forgery... except that finding has also been found to be false. Again, other scientists were unable to duplicate McCrone's findings and, in some instances, found either sloppy errors (or deliberate falsifications) in chemical data from McCrone Associates that seemed to support McCrone's findings.
Is this sufficient to impeach Walter C. McCrone as qualified to have ANY valid opinion on the authenticity of the Shroud?
The Carbon 14 test
In addition to the exhaustive data I and Shroudie provided earlier on the horrendously flawed sample taking for the C14 tests, there is even more conclusive data proving that what was tested was an adulterated sample and combined more modern material with original shroud material, skewing the results. At worst, the results are useless; at best, they give us an opportunity to calculate an age for the percentage of the sample that are genuine shroud compared to the observable patched percentage.
The Pyrolysis/Mass Spectrometry analysis that found no visible quantity pigments provides more proof that the C14 dating was fatally flawed by the sample taken contrary to the agreed protocol. The following link to a PDF file (you'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader) by Dr. Ray Rogers detailing the research provides more information:
Pyrolysis/Mass Spectrometry Applied to the Shroud of Turin
Synopsis of the article:
A technical paper from Ray Rogers that explains how Pyrolysis/Mass Spectrometry was used to detect impurities (like painting mediums) on samples of the Shroud of Turin. Interestingly, a gum coating was found on the fibers of the Raes Sample, a section cut from the Shroud in 1973 from an area directly adjoining the 1988 c14 sample. However, this gum coating was not found on any fibers from anywhere else on the Shroud. The tests provided quantitative evidence that the Raes sample and consequently, the adjoining 1988 c14 sample, were both anomalous and different from the rest of the Shroud. With this, and a significant amount of other corroborative scientific evidence, the validity of the 1988 c14 dating of the Shroud is even further in doubt.
The Carbon 14 tests are too flawed to be used to claim the Shroud is a forgery.
Joe Nikkell
Joe Nikkell has a book to sell and an agenda to support. Joe Nickell's expertise in science is nonexistent. His degrees are in Art and English. His claim to have "duplicated" the shroud using art techniques is a laughable failure, meeting none of the criteria established for a successful duplication example. The Skeptical Inquirer's article (1996) on the Shroud is outdated (8 years and counting) and quite biased, ignoring any VALID research that does not agree with their position. They dismiss the peer reviewed research without giving an explanation except to fall back on already discredited findings.
Joe Nikkell's fake vs. the Shroud
The Catholic Encyclopedia
You also cited The Catholic Encyclopedia as a source. The on-line version of The Catholic Encyclopedia is copyrighted 1912. There has been a lot of research done in the intervening 92 years. The The Catholic Encyclopedia revised the article in 1968... and even that article is completely outdated.
You denigrate the challengers to Nickell's position by claiming they do so because of "faith", but that is not true either. The scientists involved in these studies include Christians (both Catholic and Protestant), Agnostics, Atheists, and Jews. THEY are following the science.