Piltdown and How Science Really Works [Evolution & Creationism]

When one debates creationists (admittedly a questionable, yet often very satisfying, habit), one is bound to run up against the infamous Piltdown forgery. This is the case of an alleged missing link between humans and so-called lower primates, that was found in England (near Piltdown, in fact) and announced to the world on December 18, 1912. The announcement was made by Arthur Smith Woodward, a paleontologist of the British Museum of Natural History, and Charles Dawson, a local amateur paleontologist, the actual discoverer of the fossils.

The problem is-as creadonists never tire to point out-that the "Dawn Man of Piltdown" (scientific name Eoanthropus dawsoni, in honor of its discoverer) turned out to be a fake. Moreover, it took scientists four decades to find out! see what happens when one takes the doctrine of evolution on faith, as one's secular religion? QED.

Many scientists are rather embarrassed by the Piltdown debacle, somehow managing to feel guilty and indirectly responsible for whatever goes wrong in their chosen profession.

And yet, as I shall endeavor to explain, Piltdown should be presented in all introductory biology textbooks as a perfect example of how science actually works! Let us briefly see how the hoax unfolded. A complete and engaging version of the story can be found in the 1955 classic, The Piltdown Forgery by J.S. Weiner (one of the scientists who eventually uncovered the truth), recently re-issued by Oxford University Press with a new introduction and afterword.

Before Piltdown, very little of the human fossil record was known. When Darwin wrote The Descent of Man, he had to rely largely on comparative data from other living species of primates, for only the clearly almost-human Neanderthals were known to paleontologists. A few years before Piltdown, however, two important discoveries were made: that of Java man in 1891 and Heidelberg man in 1907, neither of which were very ancient. When a significantly older set of prehuman remains was allegedly found at Piltdown, the scientific world was simply ready for the discovery. It was what practitioners in the field had expected, something that surely the perpetrator of the hoax knew very well.

Supposed evidence of Piltdown man was found on more than one occasion at two separate sites: fragments of skulls, of a lower jaw, and even of stone tools associated with the "culture" of these predawn men. While there were skeptics from the beginning, the hoax was simply too elaborate and cunningly put together to raise the suspicion of a significant number of paleontologists. National pride probably also played a role in a professional establishment that at the time was dominated by British scientists, with the British Museum being the epicenter of all the activities surrounding the study of the Piltdown fossils.

Yet suspicions about the authenticity of Eoanthropus dawsoni grew, until a group of researchers, including Wilfrid Le Gros Clark, Kenneth Oakley, and Joe Weiner, applied stringent chemical tests to the remains, demonstrating that the "fossils" had been planted and chemically altered to make them seem appropriately ancient: the Dawn Man was nothing but a perfectly ordinary human skull paired up with a somewhat unusually small jaw from an orangutan. What Weiner and colleagues couldn't say for sure was who carried out the hoax, although a strong case was then made by Weiner in his 1955 book that the perpetrator was none other than Dawson himself. [See also review of Miles Russell, Piltdown Man, on p. 50.]

Be that as it may, what does this story tell us about how science works? Well, on the negative side, it is painfully clear that science depends on an assumption of honesty on the part of its practitioners. Peer review is focused on uncovering methodological or reasoning errors, not possible frauds. But since science is, after all, a human activity, egos, money, and the search for glory- however brief-are still to be reckoned with. As Piltdown and other forgeries have shown, scientists are continuously open to the possibility of someone fooling them by not playing by the rules of the game.

On the other hand, science is a social activity unlike any other that human beings engage in: it is a game of discovery played against a powerful but neutral opponent, nature itself. And nature cannot be fooled, at least not for long. The reason suspicions kept mounting about the true origin of the Piltdown remains was that the more paleontologists uncovered about human evolution, the less Dawn Man seem to fit with the rest of the puzzle. In a sense, the very factor that made the acceptance of Eoanthropus dawsoni so fast in the beginning-because it seemed to be the much sought-after "missing link" in human evolution-was also the reason why, four decades later, scientists kept pursuing the possibility that it was not genuine after all.

While four decades of delay may seem an inordinate amount of time, they are but the blink of an eye when compared to the history of the human quest for knowledge. Moreover, it is important to note that it was scientists who uncovered the hoax, not creationists, which is both an immense credit to the self-correcting nature of science and yet another indication that creationism is only a religious doctrine with no power of discovery.

This is, then, why Piltdown-far from being an embarrassment - should be prominently featured in biology textbooks: it is an example of how the nature of science is not that of a steady, linear march toward the Truth but rather of a tortuous road, often characterized by dead ends and U-turns, yet ultimately progressing toward a better, if tentative, understanding of the natural world.

Massimo Pigliucci is a professor of evolutionary biology at SUNY- Stony Brook, and the author of Denying Evolution: Creationism, Scientism and the Nature of Science. His essays can be found at www.rationallyspeaking.org.

This hoax and others are brought up in all basic anthropology classes as warnings to students to be critical in their thinking. I don't know if it really contributes much to the evolution verses creation debate, but it is a wonderful example of how people accept anything that supports what they expect. My favorite hoax was the one about the Tasaday tribe in the Philippines where they claimed to of found a primitive stone age people untouched by the modern world. The government set aside a huge area for them which prevented encroachment into the region. it was later shown that they were local modern tribesmen pretending to be cavemen. This was instigated by a local official who later ran off with thirty-five million set up as a trust fund for the Tasaday. The locals liked it because it kept others out of their area. Now that was a grand hoax that had the scientific community swallowing it hook line and sinker for fifteen years. You have to love a good hoax, whether it's drunken farm boys cutting crop circles or whatever tickles you, they make life entertaining.

Every letter to an editor, every newspaper column, and every broadcast commentary I have seen or heard since the Kansas Board of Education announced it’s decision regarding the teaching of evolution in science classes has referred to some huge amount of evidence supporting Darwin’s unproved and unprovable theory of evolution, one of the leftists most sacred of cows. They seem to believe that making a statement regarding the existence of evidence is the same as presenting evidence since they never bother to get specific. There’s a good reason for that: There is NO EVIDENCE, not one bit, that they can present.

Many supporters of this sham science make reference to the fossil record to add weight to their arguments, insinuating that assertion is as good as evidence. The actual fact is the heralded fossil record has failed to produce even one genuine transitional creature which is a pretty good indication that people relying on the fossil record to support their belief in the theory of evolution don’t know what they talking about.

Genuine is a key word here. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that those promoting the theory of macro evolution, when they can find no evidence to support their faith, which they have tried for over a century to masquerade as science, simply manufacture it. Here are a few examples taken from a well-documented book entitled Five Lies of the Century, a book by David Moore you really should read:

Piltdown man -- When subjected to a test developed in 1950 that dated fossils, Piltdown turned out to be 1,000 years old rather than 500,000 years old as claimed by evolutionists. The bones had been treated with iron salts to make them look older and the teeth appeared to have been filed to enhance the "authenticity." Even thought proved to be a fraud, Piltdown is still included in the lore or evolution.

Nebraska man -- A myth was concocted when someone fond a tooth in Nebraska in 1922. Examinations later proved the tooth came from an extinct pig.

Peking man -- Based on the discovery of 30 skull fragments, four lower jaws and 147 teeth in a cave near Peking during the early 1900’s, Peking man was conjured up. Somehow, all the "evidence" mysteriously disappeared, yet Peking man is included in evolutionary "history."

Neanderthal man -- Once touted as the missing link after being discovered in the Neander Valley, Germany, Neanderthal man has now been reclassified as a Homo Sapien (modern man). X-rays proved that arthritis caused him to walk in a stooped position. Many encyclopedias still refer to him as prehuman.

Ramapithecus -- Based on the discovery of a jaw and a couple of teeth in 1932, Ramapithecus was established and presented as the missing link. Many highly-respected experts now say Ramapithecus is an orangutan.

Australopithecus -- Current number one contender for missing link, Australopithecus, constructed from a few bone fragments and someone’s huge imagination, also is regarded by many experts as most likely being an orangutan.

According to an article in World magazine a couple of years ago, drawings of Ernst Haeckel, a German biologist whose artwork has been used in high school and college science textbooks for more than a hundred years, have been demonstrated to be fake. According to the magazine article, an embryologist at St. George’s Hospital Medical School in London has proven that the drawings "were purposely faked to bolster the evolutionary argument." Michael Richardson said that "not only did Haeckel add or omit critical features to increase the appearance of similarity between species, he also obscured differences in scale to enhance the effect he wished to create."

Self-proclaimed intellectuals, none of whom want to be confused by facts, continue to make monkeys of themselves by repeating the mantra of the Darwinists and ignoring the readily available evidence proving the bankruptcy of the theory of macro evolution. Anyone who disagrees with the self-anointed intellectual elite, those who prefer to think of themselves as cool, sophisticated and intellectually superior, is accused of believing the earth is flat and that babies are delivered by a stork. They would rather be cutesy than correct; acerbic rather than accurate; silly rather than sincere; humorous rather than honest. I don’t think that fits the definition of intellectual.

You might enjoy reading "The Myth of the Flat Earth," By Jeffrey Burton Russell, Ph.D. Hyper-skeptics routinely label Christians flat-earthers. It might surprise you to know who created the label. http://id-www.ucsb.edu/fscf/library/RUSSELL/FlatEarth.html

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