The Piltdown hoax was when I fossil was found in the place called Sussex, near the village of Piltdown in England, was claimed to be a missing link between apes and humans. It was found by a laborer digging at Barkham Manor and he later reported it to Charles Dawson, an archaeologist. The scientific community was in an uproar. They were eager to see one of the most closest human ancestors. People at the time didn’t know much about early human fossils, therefore it was a really crucial find to them. When Kenneth Oakley did a chemical test to date the fossil, he found that it wasn’t as old as they thought. Further observations and tests showed that the fossil was just a regular ape skull. This impacted the scientific community by creating a diminished image of science. This made the public believe that science was less credible.
The faults that come into play are curiosity and the desperation to find a link to human ancestors. These faults prevented the scientists from thinking logically and doing several examinations before claiming that the fossil was a link to our human ancestors. Scientists mistakenly concluded ideas about the fossil before actual evidence was looked into.
The positive aspect of the scientific process that helped prove the skull was a hoax was the idea of trying to falsify the discovery. With another observation, Oakley observed that the teeth of the skull had been filed and it had been skillfully stained and boiled. The chemical test to date and authenticate the fossils helped immensely.
Removing the human factor in science is very unlikely because it’s natural for humans to be curious and determined to discover and claim things without proper evidence. Removing the human factor would be ideal for science, because the error margin would be greatly reduced.
An important lesson with this hoax is that scientific discoveries can be proven false and its essential to provide sufficient evident before any claims are made. This historical event shows how jumping to conclusion could devalue a science or argument.
You write really well and I agree with you in that desperation is definitely a fault that played a factor in this hoax being believed for so long. The British were so desperate in wanting to upstage the Germans, they accepted the Piltdown Man without question, which was a huge mistake. However, I am not so sure that curiosity is necessarily at fault as well because it is curiosity that gives humans the need to find out who we are and where we came from.
ReplyDeleteGood job, especially on the discussion of the positive aspects of the scientific process that contributed to uncovering the hoax.
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