In 1912, archaeologist Charles Dawson claimed to have found a piece of an ancient human skull. His discovery occurred near the English town Louis, in the Piltdown village. He claimed that he had found a jawbone, which was apparently part of the same skull.The shape of the bone was like the jawbone of an ape, but the teeth were flat like a human's. Dawson invited the geologist Arthur Woodward and French paleontologist father Pierre Tay to his investigation. With their support, the discovery was thought to be the first remains of primitive humans to be found in England. It was believed that the species that directly connected apes and humans had been found. Another supporter of the conclusion was English anatomist, Arthur Keith. The newspapers called this discovery the Piltdown Man.
However, after World War II scientists ha learned to roughly date fossils through fluorine testing. In 1949 a fluorine test was done on the Piltdown fossils and the results showed that they were pretty young, far younger than what they were presented as. Then, in 1953 scientist launched the first full-scale analysis on the fossils with better dating methods. This led to the discovery that the bones had been stained by hand and the fossils had probably been cut using a steel knife. Under a microscope the teeth showed evidence that they had been filed down. It was also discovered that the jawbone was less than 100 years old, and was from a female orangutan. The pieces that did not match to a human skull were completely removed so the reality was not discovered earlier. Dawson was the main suspect of planning the hoax, and it was later found that he also forged at least half a dozen of other archaeological finds. Only a few people thought Woodward was the co-conspirator because he kept searching for more fossils even after Dawson had died. Father Tay stayed quiet after the reveal of the hoax so he is believed to have been a co-conspirator. Keith did have a big motive to go along with the lie because it supported his personal theory on human evolution. Martin Hinton, a volunteer at the Natural History Museum, became another suspect. There was evidence against him, because carved bones with the same stain that was on the Piltdown Man were found in his trunk.
There were various human faults that came into play for this hoax. One of them was jealousy from some scientists who did not like that primitive remains had been found in other countries, but not in England. Another factor was ego/pride, because England felt proud that their human ancestors might be the oldest of all the ones found. In addition, I think the human fault of following people according to prestige/fame played a role. People were afraid to question the findings of these recognized people. Questioning and re-testing is a large part of the scientific process, and all of these faults created a barrier that did not allow for questioning. Therefore, they negatively impacted the scientific process.
The positive aspects of the scientific process that helped to reveal the hoax, were better lab tests and dating methods. The new technique of fluorine testing that developed after WWII helped to obtain dating results. Also, a wide study by different scientists allowed new information to be discovered. The use of microscopes also helped to gain the detailed information that served as evidence for the hoax reveal.
I do not think that it is possible to remove the human factor from science, because it is humans who are conducting the experiments and making the discoveries. I think there will always be an element of human nature that is faulty and that will get mixed into the process. I do not think that I would remove the human factor from science, because it is what makes it a process. The scientific process occurs through the re-testing of existing experiments and material, so without the doubt of human error this process would not occur.
The lesson I have learned is to question the information that I am given, especially from unverified sources. I learned that as humans, we will usually include self interest in the information we give out, so questioning information is a good idea. The possibility of having false information, even from known sources, is still there so it is a good habit to question information.
I think the best thing we can do is question everything, especially in this case since the information was given about a "crazy discovery" that had the potential to change Our ways of thinking in terms of early human species' development. Your description is pretty good and your descriptions of how the hoax was uncovered were even better. Good job.
ReplyDeleteHello @TRU I found the fluorine analysis very intrestng method of dating the fossils ,with this discovery science has taken many steps forward into the right direction and made a huge factor in discovering the Piltdown hoax. I also agree with you and believe as you stated that its not possible to remove human factor from science as its part of our human nature and scientists are humans like us ,who are vulnerable to make errors. Life in general is a trail and error everyday process.
ReplyDeleteYou offer good detail in your synopsis, better in the second half than the first, but a few points need to be clarified:
ReplyDelete" It was believed that the species that directly connected apes and humans had been found."
No. This is essentially using the "missing link" argument. It isn't the words that are the problem. It's the concept. Piltdown, had it been valid, would NOT have demonstrated a link between humans and apes. First of all, humans ARE apes, but beyond that, Piltdown would have been a branch on the hominid family tree. It would have had nothing to say about the connection between humans and non-human apes. It didn't go back that far in evolutionary time.
So the issue of significance remains. Yes, this was significant because it was the first hominid found on English soil, but there was also *scientific* significance. Piltdown was characterized by large cranium combined with other more primitive, non-human traits, suggesting 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. You mention Arthur Keith at the end of the first paragraph but you don't make this important connection.
"I think the human fault of following people according to prestige/fame played a role. People were afraid to question the findings of these recognized people."
Actually, not in the scientific community. Scientists can gain prestige by shooting down the claims of another scientist, so there is no incentive to accept a conclusion without question... in fact, it is the JOB of a scientist to question, so beyond incentive, scientists actually failed to do their job properly when they accepted Piltdown with so little skepticism. This needs to be explored. So why did the scientists fail to do their jobs? Remember that Germany and France had already found their own hominid fossils. This would have been England's first. Would you like to be the British scientist that killed England's chance to be on the hominid map? Could national pride have played a role here?
And what about the perpetrators of this hoax? What faults may have been involved there? Greed? Ambition?
Good discussion of the technology used to uncover the hoax, but what made scientists come back and retest Piltdown? What was happening in paleoanthropology in those 40 years that pushed them to re-examine this find? What aspect of science does that represent?
I agree with your conclusions, but your reasoning seems to assume that all factors are negative. Is that the case? Do humans bring nothing positive to the scientific process? Could we even do science without the curiosity in humans that push them to ask those initial questions? Or their ingenuity to create tests of their hypotheses? Or the intuition that helps them draw connections and conclusions from disparate pieces of information?
Good life lesson.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI think you touch on an interesting point in your human factors section. I do believe that progress is always made through struggle. That things grow out of conflict. Why is science any different? Human error can lead to so many lessons that can help the science community. I believe the Piltdown Hoax exemplified how human error bettered such community and outside of it.