In this case irrelevant.
You presume a sample that has explicable characteristics in which only the provenance is necessary to state it is extraordinary. Provenance is everything then.
If the sample characteristics are themselves inexplicable. The sample cannot exist in its present state, regardless of origin. In that case provenance is not important to declare it inexplicable..
A comparison. A Lego brick alleged to be found on the moon.
A Lego brick is ordinary. Only the audit trail from the moon - the provenance - would make it inexplicable. The provenance is everything.
On the other hand a Lego brick that hovers an inch over the desk is inexplicable. It doesn’t need provenance to state it is inexplicable. It’s existence in its present state is inexplicable.
In these cases the samples themselves are inexplicable in multiple ways,
regardless of provenance. They share the same characteristics.
Leucocytes in vitro or long after death. Many nucleus of tissue that is positive tested human and heart that won’t yield nuclear sequence. Electron micrograph channels in bread shown to be the source of blood. Tissue that doesn’t decay without preservatives. Tissue intermingled with bread at periphery,
these are forensic pathologists whose job is to detect manipulation. They found inexplicable , no sign of manipulation. The micro graphs ( like the ct scan at Cochabamba we’re done precisely to rule out fraud.)
Moreover those characteristics are repeated with some or all the above in multiple unconnected locations tested by multiple labs in multiple continents.
These are hovering Lego bricks, not Lego bricks purported to be found on the moon.
As regards the sampling , there is no serious reason to doubt the veracity of it - but if you want to introduce that doubt you have three problems to solve not one.
- first how was the provenance manipulated?
- second how were inexplicable samples created in order to swap them?
A cadaver has a dna profile! Nobody knows how to create them!
- third , who was ever in any position to manipulate all of the samples? - which to include lanciano would Need to be someone 1000 years old?
The idea of one of the samples being a substitution , might have a possibility if you can also explain 2
Occam’s razor defies the idea that all the samplers were duped. They were all different unconnected people. And it leads back to one issue - how can any of them be faked, let alone all?
By way of comparison let’s examine an ACTUAL potential provenance fraud,
It was Committed by the radio carbon daters of the shroud!!
They took a sample weighed and measured ( in front of camera) into a back room where Michael tite and others chopped it into pieces ( out of camera) . But the combination of the pieces then documented didn’t match the totals of either weight or size, There was clearly opportunity for substitution by the daters! Why the idiots did it off camera is hard to fathom!
It was then compounded: The daters then refused to release untested parts of the samples, and didn’t characterise them chemically. The sizes they report don’t add up to the first total. So there is no provenance for what they tested. So the shroud RC dates lack provenance !! RC dates are ordinary.
So provenance Is everything in RC - and in RC dating speak , the daughter of provenance is called “association” . That Is the sample same age as what you are trying to test. In this case it wasn’t.
Giving benefit of the doubt, I actually think the RC daters were simply incompetent scientists not cheats. Which echos through the transcripts of their inter communications. The fiddling of dates for publishing was reprehensible , but minor not major.
History shows they tested a mediaeval selvedge. But as you say provenance matters if the material itself is not inexplicable. They could have swapped it too. So The shroud date lacked true provenance.
I’ll wager you never contested that date though because you liked the answer!
in the EM case the samples are floating Lego bricks.
There’s no reason to doubt provenance , but it’s not needed to say inexplicable.
Not least because it is inconceivable that a multiple sample fraud occurred.
How could they be sure it was the same?
You see, from a sceptical approach, it is necessary to show beyond reasonable doubt that there is no possibility of fraud, so it is necessary to eliminate all possible ways the sample could have been different from the original relic, e.g. by substitution prior to sampling, or substitution after sampling. In general, this is not possible to do, outside a well-controlled environment. Even CCTV monitoring can be hacked, and there are plenty of examples of switching being done under the eyes of people looking out for it - by simple misdirection, the involvement of 'plants' - people prepared concur with a harmless false claim in what they feel is a good cause (which may involve their remuneration), and so-on. As I said, the ol'switcheroo is the oldest trick in the book, and makes all subsequent events irrelevant.
That's what I mean by provenance.
I tend to agree with Hume when he said that to accept a miracle by evidence given for it, the likelihood of that evidence being false must be more unlikely (more miraculous) than the miracle it is claimed to demonstrate. Given the history of fraudulent and mistaken miracle claims, it's a justifiably high bar.
