1. The Piltdown hoax was in the early 1900's. In 1912 in a small town called Piltdown, Charles Dawson found what seemed to be a ancient human skull. Dawson invited Arthur Smith Woodward, and Father Pierre to come help excavate the site further. The jaw bone that was found didn't look human at all, but more like a primate. Although the teeth seemed like they were that of human because they were a flatter surface. This finding dominated research on human evolution even though nothing else was found at the site. A turning point was made after WWII; a new technology was made up by measuring the fluorine content of fossils scientists could ultimately date them. In 1949 scientists conducted this test on the Piltdown fossils, it showed that the fossils were very young closer to 100'000 years old not what was thought originally which was closer to a million years old. It baffled the scientists, so finally in 1953 they performed the first full scale scientific analysis. They found during the tests that the fossils was superficially stained and was cut when it was already fossil and that the teeth had been filed down. And it further showed that the fossil actually only dated back 100 hundred years!
2. The human faults that came into play here was that when a man wants something bad enough he will make it happen no matter what he has to do. Whether it be lie, cheat, or steal. In this case lying and cheating. This affected things in the long run because more tests had to be invented to assure that this would never happen again. So that had to start testing to make sure the credibility of fossils and scientists was held up. It was clear that there would always be someone out there that wanted to get a head and cheat the system. But now they would know better.
3. The testing of fluorine content helped in dating the fossils to their correct time. There also was the first full scale analysis that would further reveal the how far off there were on dating the fossils, and show they were stained by someone and that the fossils were cut and teeth filed. Clearly someone faked the fossils. They found out the jaw bone was from a female orangutan.
4. You can't really take the "Human" factor out of science when you are looking for human life. I suppose you could make that your last resort when finding things. Rule out all other odds before considering human. This example was based of the deceit of one man though, it was a easy error to make in those times when people were looking for ancient man and someone had tried to forge their own ancient man fossils. When he knew there weren't any proper tools at that time.
5. The life lesson I take away from this, is to pay close attention to detail and to not take the word of human just because they try to place evidence in front of your face. You have to always take a step back and look at the big picture and do things add up.
Double-check on your first section: Nothing was found in addition to this? No evidence of flora and fauna fossils that helped provide a date to this find? What did this find (if it had been true) contribute to our understanding of human evolution? What was the big deal with this fossil?
ReplyDeleteI agree in general with your second section, but can you apply it a bit more to the Piltdown event? Who is at fault here? Dawson? His supporters? Scientists in general? Who wanted to gain what?
Who completed the fluorine analysis on the Piltdown fossils?
Yes! The scientific process seeks to take out the human error factor in the process of analysis and research, leaving only the facts behind. But is there any positive of the human factor that you wouldn't want to take out of science?
Good life lesson.
Emily Carson,
ReplyDeleteFirst, I do agree with your life lesson. It isn't wise to base information solely on the word of another. In order for it to be considered valid, it must be validated.
Yes, as stated by a scientist in the video, scientists are generally reluctant to believe that another scientist would use "cheating" as their means of accomplising their tasks. They were once believed to be "gentlemen". So indeed, the science community has learned better than to accept data at face value.
In regard to your section on the florine testing, I have a question. Why were the tests and full scale analysis conducted in the first place? You response just gives a brief and vague background of what happened next, but not the reasons why.
I agree with your answer to number four, you cant take out the Human factor when it comes to science, part of it is the reason why humans are interested in science. Most of all its the curiosity of finding something because we are here with nothing of our original species to take from, in a sense some ancients left behind markings but what happened before that, and before that and so on and so forth.
ReplyDelete