The Greatest Scientific Hoaxes?

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?

Comments

Audiophile cables

[andreyvul]

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

[PeeAitchPee]

Time again to post a link to Roger Russell's excellent site debunking "audiophile" speaker wire once and for all. The "cable elevators" about 2/3 down the page (just below the $8,900 / pair speaker cables) are a personal favorite of mine. ;-)

Does homeopathy count?

[4D6963]

The memory of water was a famous hoax, at least in France, 15-20 years ago, although I'm not sure it's exactly an hoax. Another famous hoax was when a government-appointed researcher declared in 1986 that the radioactive cloud coming from Chernobyl had stopped at the eastern French borders, and thus the official policy was to not take any of the precautions that other countries took regarding grown food or the prevention of cancer. Isn't spoon bending a hoax as well?

Goat Glands

[SatanicPuppy]

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

Re:Spaghetti tree

[Myrddin Wyllt]

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.

Re:War on Drug Users

[Hatta]

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 regarding the risks of using MDMA in human research:

Even more important for the human case is a study by Insel et al. (1989) performed in monkeys. This group found that administration of 2.5 mg/kg of MDMA twice daily for four consecutive days in rhesus monkey did not reduce the density of 5-HT uptake sites, although 5-HT and 5-HIAA were decreased by 50-70%. However, 10 mg/kg given twice daily for 4 days decreased both the number of 5-HT uptake sites and 5-HT levels.

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:

Finally, it is noteworthy that changes in the number of 5-HT uptake sites in sensu stricto do not only indicate a loss or overall damage of 5-HT terminals,but also include adaptive modulations of 5-HT reuptake sites. In fact, subchronic (less than a month)administration of 5-HT transporter ligands like antidepressants (SSRIs, TCAs and tianeptine) has also be reported to reduce 5-HT transporter mRNA and radioligand binding to 5-HT transporter (see e.g., Lesch et al.1993). Hence more research is needed to address the question how to interpret discrete reductions of 5-HT ligand binding in human brain.

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:E-Meter?

[Bogtha]

In case anybody missed it, the "Church" of Scientology successfully censored Slashdot. Using the DMCA, which is currently being praised on the front page of Slashdot right now.