Miracles still happen

[Linusthe2nd]

On Sept. 19th, the dried blood of St. Januarius, martyr during the persecution of Emperor Dioclitian, liquified again as it has been doing since 1389. It liquifies two other days each year as well. Non-believers might say that the Devil does it - but then wouldn’t that imply God exists? Or perhaps they might say it is a giant fraud maintained for over 700 years - hardly credible. cantuar.blogspot.com/2012/09/video-boiling-blood-of-st-januarius.html

 

[cornbread_r2]

On Sept. 19th, the dried blood of St. Januarius, martyr during the persecution of Emperor Dioclitian, liquified again as it has been doing since 1389. It liquifies two other days each year as well. Non-believers might say that the Devil does it - but then wouldn’t that imply God exists? Or perhaps they might say it is a giant fraud maintained for over 700 years - hardly credible. cantuar.blogspot.com/2012/09/video-boiling-blood-of-st-januarius.html

I don’t know of any non-believers who would jump to the conclusion of demonic involvement.

From what I’ve read on the subject, the substance has never been confirmed to be blood – not even by the Church – and has always remained in a sealed vial. While I agree that a conspiracy maintained for over 700 years would be difficult to accept, it isn’t nearly as difficult to accept the notion that a fraud perpetrated 700 years ago has been piously believed in ever since. This site offers a naturalistic explanation for this phenomenon.

 

[Birdmanman]

I don’t know of any non-believers who would jump to the conclusion of demonic involvement.

From what I’ve read on the subject, the substance has never been confirmed to be blood – not even by the Church – and has always remained in a sealed vial. While I agree that a conspiracy maintained for over 700 years would be difficult to accept, it isn’t nearly as difficult to accept the notion that a fraud perpetrated 700 years ago has been piously believed in ever since. This site offers a naturalistic explanation for this phenomenon.

I’ve looked into this before; I remember reading somewhere that a thixotropic substance like the one suggested in the naturalistic explanation you link to would have a shelf-life of far less than 700 years. Doesn’t such an explanation also require the use of techniques in making thixotropic substances with iron-compounds that were slightly ahead of their time (not impossible of course)?
I certainly wish more studies could be performed on the Blood of St. Januarius itself, I guess the last one performed was some sort of spectrography in which they identified what appeared to be hemoglobin, but the precision of that test (especially with how hemoglobin and iron might be confused) is being called into question.

 

[cornbread_r2]

I’ve looked into this before; I remember reading somewhere that a thixotropic substance like the one suggested in the naturalistic explanation you link to would have a shelf-life of far less than 700 years. Doesn’t such an explanation also require the use of techniques in making thixotropic substances with iron-compounds that were slightly ahead of their time (not impossible of course)?
I certainly wish more studies could be performed on the Blood of St. Januarius itself, I guess the last one performed was some sort of spectrography in which they identified what appeared to be hemoglobin, but the precision of that test (especially with how hemoglobin and iron might be confused) is being called into question.

I’m not sure how being hermetically sealed in a vial, inside a darkened vault, would affect shelf life. As the article pointed out, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that a clever 14th century alchemist stumbled upon the appropriate dialysis technique.

I agree with the article’s conclusion.

*“At present however, given that the phenomenon has been replicated, it would be rather too naive to consider it irreproducible or unexplainable.”
*

 

[cerad2]

I don’t know of any non-believers who would jump to the conclusion of demonic involvement.

Agreed. It’s obviously caused by leprechauns.

 

[Birdmanman]

Agreed. It’s obviously caused by leprechauns.

Leprechauns are what cause gravity, dummy!

I wonder, though they say they used “substances that would have also been available in the fourteenth century”, if they also used the archaic methods of dialysis they spoke about?

I’ll need to look into the length of time that an enclosed colloidal solution with thixotropic properties will keep those properties…libraries are a good thing.

 

[Tenebrae]

The belief is that if the blood of St. Januarius liquifies, then the local region will be safe from earthquakes. I remember reading a small item in the back pages of the Chicago Tribune in 1980 which reported that the blood failed to liquify. Weeks later, southern Italy was hit with a massive, destructive earthquake.

 

[cornbread_r2]

The belief is that if the blood of St. Januarius liquifies, then the local region will be safe from earthquakes. I remember reading a small item in the back pages of the Chicago Tribune in 1980 which reported that the blood failed to liquify. Weeks later, southern Italy was hit with a massive, destructive earthquake.

If one waits long enough, an earthquake is bound to hit southern Italy.

 

[Birdmanman]

From the natural-explanation article spoken about above:

Thixotropic sols will equilibrate after one or more months, and may gel incompletely. The addition of a very tiny amount of NaCl should restore their original behaviour.

Can someone translate “equilibrate” in this context (Google isn’t helping me out here)? I assume it means, to put into equilibrium, but does this affect the thixotropic properties of the substance and require correcting by addition of NaCl?