In the July/August 1998 issue of the Skeptical Inquirer, Joe Nickell has yet another time addressed the controversial subject of the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin. And yet again the old way of looking at the subject is still there with the same tendencies, biases and errors.

It starts badly with a criticism of the negativity of the image of the Shroud. In his own words:

Actually the image is only a quasi-negative, the hair and beard being the opposite of the features and giving the effect, when a positive is made, that Jesus was a white-bearded old man.

This is clearly wrong: with such argument we would have to conclude that the nose is also white! A simple observation makes it clear: all over the Shroud, the white intensity is in direct relation to the distance of the body to the Shroud. In other words, the beard was nearer to the Shroud then, let say, the cheeks. This is why the beard and moustache appear whiter then the cheeks. Actually, the hair are not so white, showing that they were farther. This is also how we can readily observed that one of the legs is bended. This is this 3-D information that Nickell don't seems to understand. Once again, such details demonstrate the great accuracy of the intensity of the image of the Shroud. Something that seems to have completly escaped Nickell.

We are then shown what is real science, according to the author.

Whereas the scientific approach is to let the evidence lead to a solution, "shroud science" (or "sindology") begins with the desired answer and then works backward, dismissing or rationalizing whatever arguments or evidence may be incompatible with it.