Piltdown

1. In 1908 a worker in the English town of Piltdown allegedly presented a skull fragment to Charles Dawson. In 1912, four years after the initial find, Dawson told the Geological Society of London that the skull was very similar to that of modern day humans. He believed that the skull belonged to a        so called "missing link", our ancient ancestor that allegedly connected apes and humans. If the findings were accurate the Piltdown man would have shown that our brains developed faster than our omnivorous diet, which would be a significant finding if it were accurate.

Because the Piltdown man was the believed "missing link", other remains found in other parts of the world were mostly ignored. These remains would have pointed scientists in the right direction about our earliest ancestors, instead they were sidetracked on how to discover how the Piltdown man fits into what was known. Over time the validity of the Piltdown man was eventually questioned.

In the decades after the finding there became better methods to more accurately date remains and fossils. One of these methods was the fluorine absorption test, which would eventually discover the truth about the Piltdown man. It was found that the part of the bone fragments was actually a jaw from an orangutan that was combined with a piece of skull from a modern day man. Teeth that were discovered were also found to be filed down. Dawson died before the hoax was revealed so it is unlikely that we will know that Dawson was behind the hoax. Arthur Woodward, who worked at the British Museum, assisted Dawson in his findings. It is believed that Woodward had nothing to do with the hoax because he was still working the site after Dawson died, hoping to find more remains. To this day we only have ideas on who committed the hoax but no solid proof on who did it.

2. The main fault here is that the scientists who analyzed the remains didn't verify the findings. Arthur Woodward was highly respected at the time and people believed what he had to say They chose to believe in the Piltdown man because it fit into what they wanted to find. This lack of scientific verification was a major setback in evolutionary science when other findings were dismissed in favor of the Piltdown man.

3. After doubt about the validity of the Piltdown man began to rise, more research into the discovery done. One of the main tools they used was the fluorine absorption test which was how they discovered the true age of the remains. The amount of fluorine that is absorbed by the bone can approximately determine how long the bone was in the soil.

4. I say you could remove the human element from science to verify all findings. I wouldn't want to remove the human element though. Humans have a natural need for curiosity and discovery that machines and computers don't have.While humans can be prone to hoaxes, it is humans who find out the truth to these hoaxes.

5. Verifying your sources is a very important aspect of the scientific community, especially at the time of this discovery.  In this day and age verifying your sources is still very important. Taking everything you read online at face value could leave you easily misinformed on a variety of different issues. As could be seen in this instance not verifying your sources could potentially setback the scientific community for decades. Always make sure you have verify your sources is a very important lesson to learn!