The Greatest Scientific Hoaxes? 496
Ponca City, We love you writes "The New Scientist has an amusing story about the seven greatest scientific hoaxes of all time. Of course, there have been serious cases of scientific fraud, such as the stem cell researchers recently found guilty of falsifying data, and the South Korean cloning fraud, but the hoaxes selected point more to human gullibility than malevolence and include the Piltdown Man (constructed from a medieval human cranium); a ten-foot "petrified man" dug up on a small farm in Cardiff; fossils 'found' in Wurzburg, Germany depicting comets, moons and suns, Alan Sokal's paper loaded with nonsensical jargon that was accepted by the journal Social Text; the claim of the Upas tree on the island of Java so poisonous that it killed everything within a 15-mile radius; and Johann Heinrich Cohausen's claim of an elixir produced by collecting the breath of young women in bottles that produced immortality. Our favorite: BBC's broadcast in 1957 about the spaghetti tree in Switzerland that showed a family harvesting pasta that hung from the branches of the tree. After watching the program, hundreds of people phoned in asking how they could grow their own tree but, alas, the program turned out to be an April Fools' Day joke." What massive scientific hoaxes/jokes have other people witnessed?
E-Meter? (Score:5, Funny)
What massive scientific hoaxes/jokes have other people witnessed?
E-meter [wikipedia.org] comes to mind.
Re:E-Meter? (Score:5, Funny)
[This comment removed due to a copyright violation of the Church of Scientology.]
Re:E-Meter? (Score:5, Informative)
In case anybody missed it, the "Church" of Scientology successfully censored Slashdot [slashdot.org]. Using the DMCA, which is currently being praised [slashdot.org] on the front page of Slashdot right now.
you mis-spelled "polygraph" (Score:5, Insightful)
E-meter [wikipedia.org] comes to mind.
You mis-spelled Polygraph [wikipedia.org]. Slightly more important, given that, unlike E-meters, polygraphs are used in criminal investigations and employment decisions (namely, government security services) and police and prosecutors often try to get the results admitted in court as evidence.
Remember Ashley Todd, who claimed she was mugged and had a "B" cut into her face by an imaginary black dude? Cops gave her a polygraph test, but refused to release the results. Hmm, like maybe a "she's telling the truth" result, that would very publicly demonstrate what a piece of useless crap polygraphs are?
Re:you mis-spelled "polygraph" (Score:4, Insightful)
Cops gave her a polygraph test, but refused to release the results. Hmm, like maybe a "she's telling the truth" result, that would very publicly demonstrate what a piece of useless crap polygraphs are?
Since her own internal model of the B event was obviously screwed up the polygraph could only tell you whether she believed her own story.
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Nucleostop, filters nuke power out of your home! (Score:3, Funny)
The Problem: In every region of Germany, between 45% and 86.3% of the electricity that flows from the outlets is from nuclear power. Everyone has to use this electricity, regardless of whether he wants to or not. Even nature activists have no choice. Plus the energy lobby keep telling us that electricity is electricity.
The Solution: NucleoSTOP, a compact device, is th
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My Favorite Is the Tasaday Stone Age Hoax (Score:5, Interesting)
Even National Geographic [museumofhoaxes.com] fell for it hook, line and sinker. LOL.
Pride Breeds Ignorance (Score:5, Interesting)
Hilariously enough, it bit L. Ron Hubbard in the ass too [wikipedia.org]:
Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard met less fortunate timing, listing Piltdown Man as one of the ancestors of humanity in his book Scientology: A History of Man, and describing him as having "enormous" teeth and being "quite careless as to whom and what he bit." Piltdown Man would be exposed as a hoax just months after the publication of Hubbard's book.
I am not a historian but I find it hilarious that British, German and French scientists were rejecting claims of early human fossils in Indonesia or Africa on the grounds that their pride in being the origin of life. Instead they were pointing at anything and everything they could find on their own soil as the beginning of life. What made the Piltdown Man such a great hoax is that because of the mounting tension between European super powers leading up to World War I the British were grasping for anything to prove that humans originated in the UK (which, of course, is far from true). And here was this convenient find, an anomaly in the fossil record--but who cared? The British now had evidence of early humans on UK soil with large cranial regions (which they associated with intelligence). Prime minister, we must not allow an origins of our species gap!
All this stupid pride of who stood on the birthplace of humanity blinded so many intelligent people. If I recall correctly the Piltdown Man fragments were hilariously rudimentary painted lower jawbone of an orangutan combined with the skull of a fully developed, modern man. Let this be a lesson to anyone who lets emotions, national pride & religion get in the way of science.
Re:Pride Breeds Ignorance (Score:5, Interesting)
Funny that you should mention Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (though I thought he was only suspected as being behind the hoax). If he was behind it, it would be quite ironic - while he made some members of the scientific community out to be fools, he was made a fool in an equally amusing spiritual hoax (he was quite a spiritualist).
The Cottingly Fairies [wikipedia.org] ranks up there as one of the longest running hoaxes (with some still claiming today that they were real), and ACD was a believer to the extent that he published a book on the subject, called, "The Coming of the Fairies".
Re:Pride Breeds Ignorance (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Pride Breeds Ignorance (Score:4, Interesting)
The British aren't alone in this. China, for instace, tries to make the case that Peking Man (Homo erectus pekinensis), a real hominid, is the direct ancestor of the modern Chinese race, while the rest of us are lower on the tree, coming from Africa.
Japanese also have an exaggerated sense of their own antiquity and separateness. Shinichi Fujimura made a career out of planting and then "discovering" Stone Age artifacts and fossils.
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China, for instace, tries to make the case that Peking Man (Homo erectus pekinensis), a real hominid, is the direct ancestor of the modern Chinese race, while the rest of us are lower on the tree, coming from Africa.
This is one of these things that I can't see how anyone can believe. Humans are all one species, given that humans of all races can interbreed. If we had more than one origin I can't see how this could be true. Different origins to me imply different species and different species mean no interbreeding.
Cold fusion (Score:3, Funny)
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While cold fusion may not work there's nothing in the Wikipedia article, at least, to indicate that it was a hoax. Perhaps Pons & Fleischmann could have been more rigorous in their methodology and waiting for other labs to reproduce their results certainly would have been a good idea. there doesn't seem to have be any malice on their part to perpetuate a hoax. Sloppy science or perhaps not accounting for all the possible ways energy could be leaking into the system certainly, but it does not appear to
Nonsense! (Score:5, Funny)
I submit that Godel solved this a long time ago.
1) Nothing is more awesome than sex with women.
2) We can imagine sex with women. And frequently do.
3) If we can imagine sex with women, the only thing that would be more awesome would be actually having sex with women. For that, women would have to exist.
4) Since point 1 says that nothing is more awesome than sex with women, they must exist, that being the most awesome thing possible.
Who says my philosophy class was a waste of time? =)
Re:Nonsense! (Score:5, Funny)
A stale piece of bread is better than nothing.
And nothing is better than a big juicy steak.
Therefore a stale piece of bread is better than a big juicy steak.
Re:Nonsense! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, you really have no clue what you're talking about, do you? You think you're so clever for nitpicking Goedel's ontological argument.
To be more precise, I did not nitpick Godel's argument. I paralleled it, substituting God with sex. You'll find I posted no counterargument to Godel in my original post. And I also used it to reach a true conclusion: Women Exist.
So yeah, I actually do have a clue what I'm talking about.
Let me ask you this: is there any role in your life for spirituality, whatsoever? I'm not talking about any one conception of God, just your spirituality. If you don't, I really feel sorry for you.
I might ask if you have any clue what a straw man argument is. There is nothing you can deduce about my spirituality from my original post. I can however deduce that you seem to be a fan of Godel, and that I've stepped on your toes by using his argument as the basis of a joke.
Which somewhat ironically, under my definition of spirituality is a blessing of sorts. Nothing tastes quite so delicious as hamburgers made from sacred cows.
If people took spirituality more seriously, we wouldn't have all these problems. People would be more moral and generally pleasant to one another. And maybe you wouldn't talk about sex so much.
Hah! *snort*
It's called a joke. Don't be such an automaton. I don't think about sex any more or less than any average human being.
And for what it's worth, I think taking spirituality seriously to be a HUGE error. It's what gets people burnt at the stake. People need to take it less seriously. Less planes will wind up embedded into skyscrapers that way. I think the world would be a more moral and happy place if they took things less seriously, and approached things with the happiness and wisdom that children have.
The Creator created all - that means humor as well. I don't think this was all made so we could sit around and make sour faces at each other, and the most dour person gets to go to the highest cloud in Heaven.
Something for you to think about. Hopefully.
Fnord.
Re:Cold fusion (Score:5, Funny)
I don't believe anything is impossible.
With the possible exception of skiing through a revolving door.
Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Insightful)
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No, it isn't science, it's philosophy and as such isn't a hoax.
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No, it's fiction attempted by some to be passed as fact. Therefore a hoax.
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Insightful)
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The ones making the arguments know that ID is unfalsifiable. So by asking for it to be put in science class (unfalsifiable means not science), they'd have to be liars.
The everyday people who repeat the arguments (but usually unfashionably old ones, there's a very Emerald City vibe to the whole thing) are perhaps sincere and misguided.
I hope.
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For example, if you can't understand the difference between "wrong" and "lying", and because of that you say "Neocons are all liars," that doesn't make you a liar. It just makes you wrong.
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Well, we do know that the Intelligent Design people do have intent to deceive. They pretend it's not Christian Fundamentalism in their books and lesson plans, but it is. They know it and we know it. When they think we're not around they openly acknowledge the fact that it's Christian Fundamentalism with the names changed. It's one of their selling points, even.
However, I think Intelligent Design is more fraud than hoax.
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There's a difference between fact and belief, although the less intellectually honest people will try to say that their beliefs are equivalent to fact.
It's easy to distinguish them. If it comes from a book, then it's a fact.
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No, it isn't science, it's philosophy and as such isn't a hoax.
It pretends to be science, so it pretends to be a hoax, which means it isn't really one, so it is true.
Don't dare to dispute me, I remember my Mathematical Logic classes!
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:4, Insightful)
Philosophy is a form of science, so no, ID definitely is *not* philosophy. More like idiocy.
I hate to be seeming to defend ID, but a philosophical stance need not be provable, so ID can be a valid philosophy.
Of course a philosophical idea can also be a load of rancid donkey bollocks too...
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My answer is at the end of the sentence you were quoting. It is not about purity or approximation - the notion of "proof" in science and math is the same: proof is a demonstration that some statement you are making is correct. In math, which is axiomatic like you said, truths can be derived from other, absolute truths. Statements about the world are very different, esp broad statements that comprise fundamental models, and that is why you only disprove science. What is offered as proof are observations made
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Insightful)
How the hell did that get modded "troll"?
"Intelligent design" is the biggest "scientific hoax" ever devised. These people have literally taken creationist ideas and literature, and re-packaged them to look like a scientific theory.
Now, if we were talking about creationism, then ok, it's not a scientific hoax because it doesn't pretend to be scientific. But ID? It should be at the TOP of this list!
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Insightful)
A few points.
1) Darwinism doesn't purport to explain the start of the universe.
2) Few things are considered proven in science. The general test to determine if a theory is scientific is whether or not a test can be devised which would disprove the theory. Evolution could be disproven. Intelligent design can never be disproven. Ergo, its status as a scientific theory is highly questionable.
3) Intelligent design goes way farther than the beginning of life on Earth or of the universe. One of the classic examples of an ID argument is that the eye is too complex to have evolved "randomly". That's pretty far removed from the issue of the beginning of life.
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Intelligent Design relies on that pseudoscience nonsense of "irreducable complexity" and their text book Pandas and People shows almost a word for word
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Insightful)
Science is neither right nor left. Intelligent design is, by it's very design (pardon the pun) aimed at people who are very religious; people who also happen to lean right on the political spectrum.
The science behind global warming is pretty simple - increased CO2 levels cause increased heat absorption. That's a fact. Where you stand on the political spectrum won't change it, any more than your political position will change the force of gravity. Whether human CO2 emissions are drastically affecting the earths climate is a different question, and one which has not been settled with any degree of certainty.
There is no question that we are having SOME effect. The real question is how much, and whether it's a good thing or a bad thing.
So to correct your earlier statement, it would be safe to say that the Cult of Al Gore is to the left what ID is to the right; global warming as a scientific field of study, though, has nothing in common with either. The fact that some political groups have hijacked the name, doesn't invalidate the science.
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so "intelligent design" is to the right what "global climate change" is to the left
Not at all. Both issues involve the Right denying established science.
You know I'm old enough to remember when it was the Left, that did loony stuff like that. Remember when plate tectonics was judged to be inconsistent with historical materialism? Funny how times change.
Re:Intelligent Design? (Score:5, Interesting)
He *does* give real science in the movie, that's my point. While you call it "political grandstanding", it does show that what has happened since the industrial revolution FAR outweighs the natural temperature cycles.
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No, ID says "life was designed in it's current form". It makes no allowance for anything except what they call "micro-evolution". If you don't understand that, then you haven't actually read any ID "literature".
Ahhhh! No, ID does not say "life was designed in it's [sic] current form". It says "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." In other words, the current state of biological complexity could not have about without some direction from an outside force beyond randomness and evolutionary pressure. Some IDers combine this with creationism, others do not. Creationism says "life was designed in its
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Well, no, you'd have to take out the phrase "best explained", since ID basically hinges on the idea that design is the ONLY possible explanation for certain phenomena. That's their entire case - "such and such is too complex to have evolved, ergo DESIGNER!".
P.T. Barnum and the Cardiff Giant. (Score:5, Interesting)
Barnum tried to buy the Cardiff Giant off its owners, but they wouldn't sell. So he had one of his own carved, and traveled around exhibiting it. Barnum was showing a fake fake.
Thiotimoline (Score:5, Interesting)
Odd that NS didn't mention the hoax that started the story, the Great Moon Hoax of 1835 [wikipedia.org] where it was revealed (incorrectly of course) that Sir Walter Herschel had found evidence of life on the moon.
My favorite wasn't really a hoax; it was a humorous science fiction story by Isaac Asimov who was a grad student studying biology when he wrote about thiotimoline [wikipedia.org], a substance that, when added to water, dissolves before it reaches the water.
Definitely... (Score:4, Funny)
Why...this is no poll? Dammit.
What about the Lemming's film (Score:5, Interesting)
This from Wikipedia -
"The myth of lemming mass suicide is long-standing and has been popularized by a number of factors. In 1955, Carl Barks drew an Uncle Scrooge adventure comic with the title "The Lemming with the Locket". This comic, which was inspired by a 1954 National Geographic article, showed massive numbers of lemmings jumping over Norwegian cliffs. Even more influential was the 1958 Disney film White Wilderness in which footage was shown that seems to show the mass suicide of lemmings. The film won an Academy Award for Documentary Feature."
I think this one deserves honorable mention at least!
Re:What about the Lemming's film (Score:5, Funny)
That's so sad. Why didn't somebody put little parachutes on them or have a couple of them stand at the edge of the cliff and redirect them backwards? Unfeeling Norwegian bastards.....
Re:What about the Lemming's film (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What about the Lemming's film (Score:5, Funny)
Don't worry, they were stunt lemmings.
Re:What about the Lemming's film (Score:5, Funny)
Why do you hate Norway so much? I for one will not tolerate this anti-Norwegian propaganda. Another remark like that and I'll report you to the House Committee on Un-Norwegian Activities. If you are found guilty, you will be beaten to death with a large fish.
Audiophile cables (Score:5, Informative)
Denon's $500 ethernet cables, those $9000 "vacuum chamber" cables, etc.
Oh, this is science, not technology.
Still, they use edge cases of science to make $$$$$$$$$$$$$$ off of rich fanboys.
In practice, the cable I mentioned are hoaxes.
Re:Audiophile cables (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Audiophile cables (Score:5, Funny)
The "cable elevators" about 2/3 down the page are a personal favorite of mine. ;-)
Good Lord, I had to read that three times before I realized my mind was inverting those two words. I expecting to scroll down that page and see a story about audiophiles who had been duped into using elevator cables for low loss speaker wire.
Re:Audiophile cables (Score:5, Interesting)
A while back, my roommate at the time and I considered making an audiophile cable company ourselves, on the theory that if you can't convince audiophiles that they're wrong (and I've certainly done my part to try), you can at least make money off of them. Setup is simple enough; make a little box to put a sine wave through a cable for 72 hours as a "break-in" procedure, or cryo-treat cables by pouring liquid N2 (easier to get then you'd think) over them and letting the N2 boil off. (Care has to be taken that the cables don't shatter from heating up too fast, though I never got far enough into the plan to try it.)
I eventually dropped the plan after deciding that I wasn't quite that evil, but before that, my roommate had a discussion with one of his coworkers at the retail shop he worked at (don't remember the exact exchange, but it went like this):
Roommate: I'm setting up a cryo-treatment and burn-in service. Should make lots of money off stupid people.
Coworker: What does cryo-treatment do?
R: Absolutely nothing, but people pay for it thinking it does.
C: Sounds interesting. I might buy a few cables from you to try it out.
So my roommate had flatly stated that it's just a big ripoff, and the guy still wanted it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Technically speaking, the coworker was being a good scientist: he could have taken your word that the cryo-treatment did nothing to the cables (based entirely on your say-so with no evidence), but instead he was skeptical, and wanted to prove it for himself. Good for him.
BTW, FryBaby manual gets the "no shit" award (Score:3, Funny)
The most dangerous one ... (Score:2)
CC.
Windows (Score:2, Funny)
har har
Obviously (Score:2, Insightful)
My favorite (or least favorite) (Score:5, Interesting)
The fraudulent research showing that high dose chemo followed by marrow transplants was an effective treatment for breast cancer. It was an experimental procedure, so insurance companies wouldn't cover it. But this study showed it worked, and it got some play in the media, and Congress actually passed a law requiring that insurance companies cover it.
Then it turns out that the researchers left out negative results which, when compiled with the rest of the data, showed a slightly WORSE outcome for this procedure. It seems that the researchers believed that the procedure SHOULD work, and since it was so important to get insurance companies to cover it, they simply modified the data to get the results they wanted.
Of course, insurance companies stopped paying for it, and the procedure isn't used, and Congress has moved onto other things. But I still need to ask: how many women had months or years removed from their life because 2 "scientists" thought they knew better than the data?
Re:My favorite (or least favorite) (Score:4, Insightful)
What!? (Score:5, Funny)
This list is incomplete. I would provide a proof but this comment box is too small to hold it.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Fermat's last theorem was proved by Wiles [wikipedia.org] in 1994.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Fermat's last theorem was proven true by Andrew Wiles in 1993/1994. But Fermat probably didn't have a proof for it, so the "theorem" portion really was a misnomer, maintained that way by mathematicians, I suspect, for romantic reasons. So it's not a hoax per se.
Re:What!? (Score:4, Informative)
Not a theory, a theorem. In mathematics, a theorem is a statement that has been rigorously been proven to be true. A theory is the body of work associated with a particular mathematical subject e.g. number theory, group theory, set theory. Thanks to Andrew Wiles, Fermat's Last Theorem is a theorem of number theory.
Before Andrew Wiles proved it, it was technically a conjecture. However, it became known as Fermat's Last Theorem because of the way Fermat worked. It wasn't unusual for Fermat to write down mathematical statements and then claim to have a proof without actually stating the proof. In fact, at the time of Fermat, it was quite common for mathematicians generally to keep their discoveries secret.
Over the years since his death, proofs were discovered for all of the other statements that Fermat made. Therefore, they turned out to all be theorems. It was thus natural to assume that he wasn't lying when he wrote the infamous marginal note and Fermat's Last Theorem was so-called because it was the last one left without a proof.
By the time it became clear that a proof was not going to be easily forthcoming, the tradition of calling FLT FLT had already set in. Wiles' proof is certainly not the proof that Fermat said he had - it builds on far too much maths that was discovered after Fermat's death. I think the consensus is that Fermat thought he had a proof but there was an error in it.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Whenever I go beyond the comment box bounds, I lose the first few lines I typed. When I go back to retrieve them, I lose the last few lines. The comment box cannot be trusted.
Stem Cell Research (Score:3, Informative)
Of course, there have been serious cases of scientific fraud, such as the stem cell researchers recently found guilty of falsifying data
Unless I'm mistaken, the fraud committed in this instance was that the photos taken were adjusted in photoshop to make them clearer (i'm not sure if they were brightened or darkened), which had no affect on the actual data or conclusions of the study. Please point me in the right direction if I'm wrong.
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Spaghetti tree (Score:2)
Re:Spaghetti tree (Score:5, Informative)
Back in 1957, even the word 'pasta' wasn't widely used in the UK. There was only 'spaghetti' and that came in tins with tomato sauce (generally served on toast or with fry-ups as an alternative to Baked Beans). This was decades before full ingredients had to be displayed on packaged food, so all the tins used to say was 'Ingredients - Spaghetti, Tomato Sauce'. Widespread use of dried pasta (popularised by the ubiquitous Spaghetti Bolognaise beloved by students) didn't occur until the '70s, and fresh pasta was uncommon until the '90s.
The unfamiliarity with anything remotely resembling 'real' spaghetti, and the fact that the story was broadcast by the BBC on it's flagship documentary programme in it's normal time-slot years before television April Fools pieces were common makes the fact that it was widely believed much less surprising than it would appear to 21st century pasta-eaters with a healthy skepticism towards TV news.
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I remember watching a 'documentary' some years ago that showed that Man had received communications from Extra Terrestrial lifeforms. It turned out that the aliens were communicating in binary and in response to the images of humans and the genome that we sent out on a probe, they returned circuit diagrams. It was concluded that they were in fact artificially intelligent beings that had become estranged from their creators.
The show was very professionally and convincingly presented and I was completely suck
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The best one was "Ghostwatch" by the BBC [bbc.co.uk], which was broadcast as a reality TV show, but in fact was a fiction horror movie. Using presenters (Michael Parkinson) from serious shows such as "Crimewatch", they convinced a good percentage of the British population that this was a reality TV show. Only in the last 15 minutes, did they have children speaking in tongues, the female presenter disappear, and the studio presenter become possessed.
Project Alpha (Score:4, Informative)
Well, some of these hoaxes, like the hilarious Sokal hoax, weren't really scientific hoaxes moreso than exposing the idiocy of certain groups.
So, if you want to go down that route (and I see no reason not too!) then you MUST bring up the venerable James Randi.
Project Alpha humiliated a bunch of paranormal researchers and parapsychologists because of how easily fooled they were.
Banachek has a good article on his website:
http://www.banachek.org/nonflash/project_alpha.htm [banachek.org]
The most interesting thing is that some people were such True Believers in the supposed "powers" of Banachek and Edwards that they continued to believe in them even after revealing it was all just an exposé. The most important thing was that it reveals that while many scientists in this area just didn't properly account for outright fraud; I would guess it is because most experiments do not have to worry about participants purposefully trying to mess with the results.
Re:Project Alpha (Score:4, Interesting)
Not really - the big problem with "researchers" in those fields is that they go in expecting to see certain results. Even if we could expect 100% of participants to be totally honest (a silly expectation), the bias of the scientists themselves can easily (and often does) influence the results of the experiment.
The biggest point that Randi makes is that proper scientific controls and double-blind experiments are ESSENTIAL in determining the validity of a theory. There are countless examples of scientists (even well-established ones) conducting experiments which seemed to yield a certain result, only to be completely demolished once the experiment was repeated with proper controls. Perhaps the most famous was Jacques Benveniste's study of "homeopathy", which yielded positive results and was published in Nature - but under the condition that he repeat the experiment and allow a select team to observe and guide his experiment. Now, since the experiment already included control-samples of plain water, the only change that the team made was to re-label the test-tubes using a random code in order to remove any selection-bias on the part of the people performing the experiment. That simple procedure was all that was needed to show that Benveniste's earlier results were invalid - the new experiment showed the homeopathic "cure" being tested to have no effect whatsoever.
We see the same thing with all the other hoaxes - whether intentional or unintentional. The theory is initially accepted by those who WANT to believe it, only to be later disproven by properly controlled analysis or experimentation. As an example, the piltdown man "fossil" was only accepted by a small number of scientists - those who had pre-existing biases (about the supremacy of caucasians) which made them less critical of that fossil than they would be of others.
That's why the scientific process is so important - it forces all theories to undergo examination by other qualified individuals, and ensures that all supporting experiments are fully documented so that they can be repeated by anyone. This allows us to minimize the effect that personal credulity and bias have on the acceptance of theories, which is the only way we can ever really make any discoveries about our world. It's also why I think critical thinking and rational skepticism should be a major part of early-childhood education, but that's a topic for another time ...
Re:Project Alpha (Score:4, Interesting)
That's true of most of the things that Randi "debunks" (for lack of a better word), but not really in Project Alpha. Project Alpha involved deliberately deceiving the researchers to show that their scientific controls were not strong enough.
For example:
During one type of telepathy test, a subject would be given a sealed envelope containing a picture drawn from a target pool. Left alone with the envelope, the subject would subsequently surrender the envelope to the experimenter, who would examine it for signs of tampering. The subject would then announce his selection for the target pool. This series of tests was quite successful â" though not overly so, because the boys realized that 100 percent might be suggestive of trickery. They purposely minimized their success. The method was easy. Since the envelope was âoesealedâ only with a few staples, they removed them, peeked, and then replaced the staples through the original holes! In one case, Michael lost two staples, and to cover this he opted to open the envelope himself upon confronting the experimenter. The breach of protocol was accepted. The subject had been allowed to shape the experiment.
Project Alpha was more about finding weaknesses in the testing protocols of the researchers. In fact, if you read the link, Project Alpha largely began because the researchers in question did not take Randi's advice on how to properly control for fraud and deception in such experiments. It is true that experimenter bias is a factor, but the spotlight here was on the shoddy test designs and poor protocols.
idle.slashdot.com (Score:5, Funny)
Please someone tell me it's a hoax.
Evolution (Score:5, Funny)
computer-generated journal article (Score:3, Interesting)
My personal favorite is the gibberish computer-generated journal article [theregister.co.uk] that actually got accepted and published...
The James Ossuary... (Score:4, Insightful)
There are still people who wish it weren't a hoax. It's an interesting tale in the ways people will ignore evidence of the contrary when it comes to something they want to believe. The signs were obvious - found in a shop with stone cutting tools, yet ignored for years afterward...
Not too hard... (Score:3, Informative)
Judging from this recent /. article [slashdot.org], perhaps one shouldn't be surprised that we are this gullible.
Does homeopathy count? (Score:5, Informative)
Madison Priest and his magic box (Score:5, Interesting)
Anthropogenic Global Warming (Score:4, Insightful)
Global warming is a fact, not a theory or hoax. (Score:4, Insightful)
Its cause is not fully understood, but that hardly matters; we have to live with it no matter what causes it.
Ever notice how it's the same deluded people (political conservatives, for some reason) who claim that evolution doesn't happen (hello? antibiotic-resistant bugs?) as claim that global warming doesn't happen?
Read the subject line again (Score:5, Insightful)
Color TV! (Score:4, Interesting)
Goat Glands (Score:5, Informative)
Nothing beats the perpetual search for...ahem...male enhancement.
The scientific pioneer was a guy around the Great Depression who made a mint selling an operation in which he would implant goat testicles into his patients, many of whom claimed dramatic improvement.
In the process he managed to revolutionize modern radio and advertising.
Linky linky: John Brinkley [wikipedia.org]
How about (Score:3, Interesting)
Anything mentioned on the new Fox show Fringe. [fox.com]
HeadOn (Score:4, Funny)
HeadOn [wikipedia.org]
I almost died laughing when I woman I work with bought some at lunch.
I stopped laughing when she put in charge of operations during our busiest time of year.
I find it hard to believe (Score:4, Informative)
That nobody has mentioned the Museum of Hoaxes [museumofhoaxes.com], which documents all these and more. Much, much more.
The Turk? (Score:4, Interesting)
While perhaps it was more of a parlor trick than a scientific hoax, The Turk [wikipedia.org] was still peddled as a thinking machine that could play chess. Not only did its creator succeed, but subsequent owners did, as well.
Really interesting stuff, well before any modern computer (even beating Charles Babbage's [wikipedia.org] work by almost half a decade). In fact, Babbage was another opponent [thefreelibrary.com] of the turk, and was reportedly inspired by it.
(If you're a CS major and don't know who Babbage is, you really should read up.)
Fairly obvious... (Score:3, Insightful)
How about "hoaxes" later found to be authentic (Score:3, Interesting)
I know of at least two documents, the Vinland Map and the Paraiba Inscription, that were declared "hoaxes" by experts but were later found to be authentic.
In both cases the documents contained messages encyphered in a manner common for many years. Cyrus Gordon discussed both in his book Riddles in History. Gordon was an expert in ancient languages who also had worked at Bletchley Park during World War II, giving him a knowledge of encryption.
The encypherment was what Gordon called "acrostic/telestic". The first and last letters of a line are treated as a count into the line and the appropriate letters marked. Then the pairs of letters are rearranged according to a pattern. The usual message was the name of the author (by the rearranged front count letters) and a religious message (by the back count letters). An example of this encypherment was found in a scribe's practice attempts in Turkey.
One item of hoax "evidence" was a spelling error in the Vinland Map. It turned out that the author had forced a letter into place, which resulted in the apparent error.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Or if i'm wrong, please provide source material that proves your claim.
Cyrus Gordon's analysis of both the Vinland Map and the Paraiba Inscription are in his book Riddles in History. I don't have my own copy, so I am working from memory on this.
Part of the evidence he presents is that the encypherment scheme was not known until it was archaeologically found in Turkey a few years before he wrote the book.
The Paraiba Inscription translation he presents in the book is not exactly the same as the one provided at your link. He states the encyphered message in the Paraiba Inscript
Inadvertent Hoax? (Score:5, Interesting)
Not fraud, because they truly believed what they saw and their publications supported it. And then it went far beyond the source.
Binaural Beat, or EEG "beat frequency" brain stimulation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beat_frequency [wikipedia.org] (see Binaural Beat section), as originated at The Monroe Institute http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monroe_institute [wikipedia.org] (TMI).
In acoustics, two beats of nearly the same frequency interfere to produce a change in summed volume of a period equal to the difference between the two frequencies. At TMI, they found that if they played sine waves into each ear of a slightly different frequency, they could detect an increase in EEG power at the beat frequency. I was so taken with an article in OMNI on TMI that I saved it for over a decade until I started studying EEG research under Karl Pribram.
Once I started studying it, a glaring error came to mind. We had to put subjects in a Gaussian cage to shield them from stray signals from the heaters and pumps for the swimming pool elsewhere in the building our lab was at. These caused induced currents in the EEG. If that was necessary, how could they justify putting electromagenticially driven headphones on top an EEG cap?
To first pull things apart, I tested a single subject -- a styrofoam head (a wig stand) with EEG cap and headphones on it. I was able to show power increases at precisely the same frequencies as the beat signal. (I'd first suggested using a bowl of Jell-O. Karl suggested not to, since he'd found increases in alpha waves in a bowl of Jell-O when shaken. No, I don't know why. Neither did Karl. We just thought it was extremely cool.)
To make it more official, I helped teach some students at University of Virginia at Wise to run EEG research. Their EEG system could produce sound remotely in a closed box and transmit it via air conduction up long plastic tubes into the ears -- no electromagnets anywhere near the head. They ran it this was as well as the traditional Monroe way (headphones on top of EEG cap). In the each of the same subjects, the traditional method produced power increases at the beat frequency. With air conduction stimuli, no changes were observed.
My two greatest joys in science are having undergrads produce results presented at international conferences, and in bursting the bubbles of old farts in the field. This particular project resulted in both. Not only did TMI present several pieces of research as valid, but many other people used the same set up and got stuff published elsewhere. Go to PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez [nih.gov] and put in "binaural beat" to get the relevant results (and some not relevant, but they're easy to tell apart).
Now, you'd think that once results are presented that show it's bogus, people would quit. Not so. We did the work on 2002. Check the dates on the PubMed results. Now, that's kind of fraudulent, but more a sign that there's way too many people publishing way too many things in way too many places to be able to keep track of everything. OTOH, our work isn't in PubMed because it was a conference presentation.
What is fraudulent is the many places that produce all sorts of new agey junk based on binaural beat, claiming there's scientific evidence, but not ever quoting any, whether the original well done but slightly fatally flawed TMI work, or any subsequent. Also fairly fraudulent by TMI and all the others is claims that specific frequency differences can be used to produce specific changes such as, oh hell, here's just a sampling from TMI: http://monroeinstitute.com/store/home.php [monroeinstitute.com]
I try to go easy on the scientific community when it comes to possible fraud claims in this area. To their credit, there used to be many more people producing work in this field, including some at U. Va. itself. In fact some from U/
Kensington Runestone (Score:3, Interesting)
The Kensington Runestone [wikipedia.org] is an intriguing item in my neck of the woods. It's largely considered a hoax these days, but there will always be believers. It's pretty elaborate for a hoax if it is one, causing a century of controversy.
I would include another classic: (Score:3, Informative)
In it, he described a substance that would actually dissolve just before it touched the solvent. This is a great one, well worth the read if you can find it.
This prank was not actually "pulled" on anyone, but when the professors who were to judge his real thesis caught wind of it, he was strongly reprimanded and apparently there was some question about whether he would be given his doctorate.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
As far as the question "is marijuana addictive" is concerned, the answer is clearly that it is. There are a lot of types of addiction, and if you have ever seen the results of significant marijuana use, you see addiction.
Now, what most people think of as "addiction" is the sort of withdrawal that occurs with heroin or alcohol. Obviously, marijuana is not physically addictive in that manner. It has different physical effects and the method of addiction is different.
In my experience, addiction to marijuana
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure, if you want to dilute the word "addictive" until it's meaningless, than everything is addictive. I have never seen a marijuana user do things that are self-destructive to the end of getting more marijuana. Nobody goes out and steals to get pot.
Hate to tell you, but it's not exactly unknown.
Re:War on Drug Users (Score:5, Informative)
The evidence I've seen suggests that excessive MDMA use decreases the density of serotonin receptors/transporters but not cell bodies. I don't think the effect is visible at doses relevant to most recreational users. Consider this letter to Nature [nature.com] regarding the risks of using MDMA in human research:
That's 2-3 times a normal recreational dose of MDMA, twice a day, for 4 days straight. That's a lot of MDMA, and no damage as measured by serotonin reuptake sites could be observed. So it's not as simple as causing "brain damage, which increases with every dose." This is what I mean by scientific fraud. People taking extreme results, and applying them to real world situations that don't even come close to real world situations. And then they make public policy based on those unrealistic results. Here's more:
Translation:Uptake sites may be downregulated, instead of destroyed. The same kind of downregulation has been seen with SSRIs, and we have no problem giving them to humans. Trying to pass off receptor downregulation as "brain damage" is still more fraud.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
The global warming of ducks is known as roasting and isn't a hoax. I have seen it happen with my very own eyes.