Piltdown Hoax

Piltdown was an archaeological site in England where in 1908 and 1912 human, ape and other mammal fossils were found together and given to a local archeologist and lawyer by the name of Charles Dawson. In 1913 at a nearby site was found an ape's jaw with a canine tooth worn down like a human's. This discovery was huge, and the general community of British paleoanthropologists came to accept the idea that the fossil remains belonged to a single creature that had had a human cranium and an ape's jaw. In those times scientist believed they have found the "Missing Link" in human evolution. In 1953, Piltdown 'man' was exposed as a forgery by the use of modern technology that can calculate the age of bones and fossils. The skull was modern and the teeth on the ape's jaw had been filed down This "Piltdown Man" was believed by many to be "the earliest Englishman," and in fact, the missing link between apes and humans. But in 1953, the jawbone was found to be that of a modern ape orangutan, most likely that had been treated with chemicals to make it look as though it had been lying in the ground for hundreds of centuriesMicroscopic study revealed file marks and the teeth were modified to look more human. The perpetrator of the hoax has never been found, though there are theories. Charles Dawson would seem to be the prime suspect, but there is little evidence he did it, and he died in 1916 without leaving a confession. Other suspects over the years have included various acquaintances of Dawson, museum curators, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the guy in charge of the digging.


The Human fault the came into play was the desire to discover an early englishmen. Human desires led to the acceptance of a hoax that negatively impacted the scientific process down a dead end of false information for about 40 years. The hoax was caused by human rivalry, jealousy, and ambition. Also no one questioned the hoax, many didn't bother to challenge the hoax, they accepted and believed the findings, which allowed the hoax to last for so long.

The positive scientific process that were responsible for revealing the skull to be a fraud was by a fluorine absorption test. The test determines the duration of time an object found in the soil has been there. When the test was done in 1949 on the Piltdown man, Scientist were shocked when they discovered that the fossils were very modern. This was a lessoned learned by the scientific community, and a chance to move on from false discoveries. 

I don’t think it’s possible to remove the “human” factor from science because humans discover and propose new theories. Even though the theory might be false at first but its natural for humans to go through trial and error.There will be someone who revisits the theory that can prove, disprove, or improve a theory.

I Learned that its important to question everything, especially large discoveries such as the "piltdown man". Discoveries should be carefully analyzed by many scientist that will help conclude a reliable theory.