The
Piltdown Hoax started in 1912 in the village of Piltdown in England. A
geologist, Charles Dawson came out with a discovery of a piece of an ancient
skull he had found when digging in a gravel pit. This skull was said to be
about 1 million yeas old. It was a human jawbone. This was significant because
it would have been the oldest human remain discovered. It would have also shown
that the oldest people might have been in Europe rather then Asia or Africa. It
wasn't until around 1953 that the Piltdown bones were reanalyzed using new
dating technology. It was discovered that the bones dated back about 100 years
and belonged to a female orangutan. There was also evidence the bones were
filed down and stained to look much older then they actually were. The
scientists involved really had nothing to say. A few were no longer living,
while the others just kept their mouths shut on the issue. This was devastating
news in the field of human evolution.
Even though scientists devote their lives to
finding out the hard facts, they are still only human. As humans our fault is
that we tend to think selfishly sometimes. In this case, the scientists working
on the Piltdown project had motive to fake their findings in order to advance
their careers. Even though it is unknown who was actually in on the hoax, each
one is a likely suspect. Unfortunately whoever was involved let their need for
personal gain effect findings that could have changed our theories of human
evolution tremendously.
About 40 years after the Piltdown discovery, new scientific dating processes were starting to become a popular tool when examining fossils. At the Natural History Museum, fluorine tests were performed on the bones. This tested how much fluorine had accumulated in the bones and teeth which allowed for scientists to get an accurate age of the bones. Scientists also used a microscope in order to further examine the teeth. They were able to see they had been filed down to make the perfect shape of a humans.
I do not think it is possible to remove the human factor from science. We need scientists to make new discoveries. We can't rely solely on technology. Even that can have its own flaws. This hoax has given insight to scientists to further analyze findings to make sure this kind of thing does not happen again. Removing the human factor from science would not allow for certain advances in certain scientific fields. For example, we cant just rely on technology to go out and dig up fossils. Technology could help analyze it, but we need the human factor to find it in the first place.
After learning about this hoax, information cannot always be trusted at face value, no matter how reputable the source is. It is important to get a second opinion, especially from one who is objective to the finding. Seeing how easy it was for the scientists to fake their findings at Piltdown shows that it is just as easy for others to repeat the process but in different aspects of science.
In general, good summary, with some corrections on this significance of the find. Piltdown, had it been valid, would have been the first fossil hominid found on British soil (other countries had found hominids already) and it would also have supported the theory that humans developed larger brains earlier in the evolutionary process. We know this last point to be false now, with bipedalism evolving earlier.
ReplyDeleteI agree those faults were likely involved in the creation of this hoax. But there is another side of the story here, namely the scientists who accepted this find and its conclusion with so little analysis and skepticism, which is their responsibility as part of the scientific community. What faults might explain their response to the find?
Good description of the technology used to uncover the hoax. But why were scientists still testing this find some 40 years after it was uncovered? Does this represent a positive methodological aspect of science that helped to uncover the hoax?
Good discussion on the issue of the human factor and good life lesson as well.
I think you could have elaborated on the fact that the scientific community did not thoroughly apply the scientific method in validating the findings at Piltdown. Hypotheses are brought forward for scrutiny all the time in scientific circles, and it is the responsibility of peers in the specific field to vet the information that is presented. Conversely, the fact that it was still being examined and tested 40 years later, shows the scientific method and the principle of skepticism at work.
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