- Begin by giving a brief synopsis of the Piltdown hoax, including when and where it was found, by whom, its scientific significance (what would it have taught us) and varying effects this had on the scientific community. Also include how the hoax was discovered and the varying responses it received from the scientist(s) involved and in the related fields of human evolution. (10 its)
The Piltdown Hoax was in 1912 in a southern English town of Luis in a small village called Piltdown. An amateur Charles Dawson stated he found remains of an ancient human skull, and invited Arthur Woodward, a well known Geologist of England, and French Paleontologist, Father Pierre. Until this moment, fossils of primitive humans had only been found in France, Germany and Asia, and never in England, making this a big moment for these scientists to have discovered the first primitive human fossils in England. They believed the fossils found in England to be the oldest of them all and called it the "Piltdown Man", with a suggested large brain and ape like jaw and human like teeth. However, around the 1930's other early human remains were found that didn't quite match up with this "Piltdown Man", as these new discoveries suggested that the jaw and teeth became more human-like before the evolution of a larger brain. After more investigation and more extensive testing, carbon-dating technology showed the skull was actually no more than 600 years old. More investigation found it was in fact a human skull and an ape skull manually altered to appear to be from the same skull, and the teeth had been filed down to look more human. The reason this happened is most likely from someone trying to get revenge on either the scientists or science itself, and there are many speculations on who it could have been, however it was most likely someone out for revenge or perhaps one of the three scientists involved who wanted respect as the founder of this "rare" fossil. This teaches us to always further investigate fossils and not look at just what was fond, but to compare it to other things that have been found. Evolution is part of a tree and everything is connected by "branches", and it's important to see where those branches start and connect rather than looking at them individually. This Piltdown man hoax was a huge discovery for the scientific community as it shows how much testing one must do before declaring something to be true, as doing so without proper tests and evidence can lead one to look foolish and make false claims to gain praise, which is not science. - Scientists are curious, creative and persistent by nature, but being human, they also have faults. What human faults come into play here in this scenario and how did these faults negatively impact the scientific process? (5 its)
The human faults of this situation is the want for praise and status. As humans, it is in our nature to want to be "adored" and have a high status in society. This hoax happened because it was an amazing discovery to find the oldest and first ever primitive human fossil in England, and it was just too easy to lie and make up a story to make it look real and say it's true. This negatively affected the scientific process as tests were not made and no one was trying to falsify it, it was simply said to be true and so people believed it to be true without further evidence, which is not how science works. - What positive aspects of the scientific process were responsible for revealing the skull to be a fraud? Be specific about scientific tools, processes or methodologies that were involved in providing accurate information about the Piltdown skull. (5 its)
Falsifiability was a big aspect of revealing what this skull truly was, as scientists thought to check if the skull had possibly been altered when they realized it didn't match up with other discoveries that were supposed to be similar to it. Comparing the skull to others rather than looking at it individually was very important. Scientists used fluorine testing, carbon-dating technology, and a microscope to reveal that this Piltdown man was a fraud.This showed that the skull was in fact much younger than was stated (only 600 years), and close examination showed that the teeth had been grinded down to look human like, with stating to match the mismatched pieces. - Is it possible to remove the “human” factor from science to reduce the chance of errors like thishappening again? Would you want to remove the human factor from science? (5 its)
I believe that human's can and will always end up making errors at some point, but it's humans that do the searching and digging and want to discover. I'm sure robots could one day travel and forage all the land of the earth for fossils and make scientific discoveries that may perhaps be quicker to authenticate, however I don't think taking humans out completely is necessary for accurate answers. I do think that humans must do all testing available and continue testing as new technologies arise to find true "answers" before stating something is true, but I know humans can curate these facts and evidence and continue to discover amazing things (with backed up testing and evidence). - Life Lesson: What lesson can you take from this historical event regarding taking information at face value from unverified sources? (5 its)
I've learned to never believe something to be true until there is correct scientific steps shown to prove it. Deep analysis of every possible part to something is extremely important, and just because something looks real, and important scientists are saying it's real, doesn't mean it is real. Only facts and evidence can prove something to be real, and it's important to not be naive (especially with science) when people of a higher status say something is true, and not go in further investigation.
Tuesday, November 12, 2019
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Overall, very good synposis, but I just want to make a correction here:
ReplyDelete"with a suggested large brain and ape like jaw and human like teeth."
Yes, suggested a large brain, but recognize that since humans ARE apes, saying that the jaw was "ape-like" doesn't tell us much. You mean (I think) that the jaw was more like non-human apes, correct? Additionally, so how does that explain the significance of this discovery (had it been valid)? This suggested that the larger brains evolved relatively early in hominid evolutionary process. We now know this to be incorrect, that bipedalism evolved much earlier with larger brains evolving later, but Piltdown suggested that the "larger brains" theory, supported by Arthur Keith (one of the Piltdown scientists) was accurate.
Good discussion on the faults that led the perpetrators to create those hoax. Other than the culprits, can you find fault with anyone else? How about the scientific community? Why did they accept this find so readily without proper scrutiny? What might have inspired them (particularly the British scientists) to not do their jobs properly when it came to this particular fossil?
"Comparing the skull to others rather than looking at it individually was very important."
This is a key point and I would have liked you to expand and explain further. Are you referencing the other fossils discovered after Piltdown that contradicted its conclusions? The fact that these discoveries drove scientists to return and re-examine Piltdown was crucial to uncovering the hoax.
Good discussion on the issue of the "human factor". I agree with your conclusions.
Good life lesson.
"It was simply said to be true and so people believed it to be true without further evidence, which is not how science works. ...and just because something looks real, and important scientists are saying it's real, doesn't mean it is real."
ReplyDeleteI really like these two statements. I think they really summarize very concisely what we've learned from the history of the Piltdown Man. I do somewhat disagree regarding the necessity of *human* factor, mostly because advances in AI are taking us down a very interesting path; computers are learning to be curious, to dream, to play games, to solve problems, to have conversations... we're getting close to an AI passing the Turing test. Not soon, but probably within our lifetimes, a computer will express genuine curiosity and pursue science of its own volition. Heck, even chimpanzees and some corvids construct tools, they engineer things which is a sort of applied science. Scientific endeavour in its most basic form isn't something exclusive to humans. Human exceptionalism is a half-truth, we are not and never have been alone as intelligent life, we're just much better equipped than the competition: elephants can't manipulate much with their trunks; chimpanzees and gorilla are still too quadrupedal to use their hands enough to get anywhere; orangutans are solitary and therefore lack the advantage of cooperation which is crucial to advancement; oceanic dolphins are even further impaired in terms of manipulator appendages, i.e. they have only their snouts, side note: oceanic dolphins have been observed doing incredibly cruel things to live prey in order to teach their young hunting techniques; corvids and other intelligent avians similarly lack the means to conduct complex manipulations of objects, limiting their ability to interact with the environment in any sort of engineering capacity; and finally, cats just don't seem to care about progress, they just want food and scritches, and let's be honest they've got their priorities down pat.