Why an Atheist Thinks the Shroud of Turin is the Real Deal

Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Protista, Archaea and Bacteria

Carbon 14, or radiocarbon as it is frequently called, is the big exception. The carbon 14 we find on earth is not from distant stars. It is made right here on earth; well not exactly on the earth but in the upper atmosphere above 30,000 feet, up where jetliners fly.

In living things—Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Protista, Archaea and Bacteria—there is one carbon 14 atom for every trillion or so other carbon atoms. To put that in perspective, if every carbon atom was the size of a ping pong ball and we lined up one trillion of them end-to-end, it would form a line long enough to reach from the earth to the moon. Only one of those ping-pong-ball-sized atoms would likely be carbon 14 isotope. If we could walk along that line, twenty-four hours per day, seven days per week, examining those atoms at the rate of one per second, it would take us nearly 32,000 years. In other words one in a trillion is a very small number. So how do those carbon 14 atoms get made? How do they get to be in living matter? And why is that important to a study of the shroud?