In 1912, a famous doctor who was also an amateur paleoanthropologist, Charles
Dawson, claims to have discovered the jawbone and fragment of the skull inside a
hole in Piltdown, England. Although the teeth and skulls appear to come from humans,
but the jawbone is more like an ape. The specimen is then called "Man
Piltdown. "The 500,000-year-old fossil is on display at several museums
strong evidence of human evolution.
In 1949, Kenneth Oakley of
Department of Paleontology British Museum tried
do a "fluorine test", a new method that
used to determine the age of ancient fossils.
After fluorine testing is done on fossils
Piltdown man, the result is surprising It turns out that the human jawbone of Piltdown does not contain fluorine. This means jawbone
it was buried less than a few years ago. While the skull is just
containing low levels of fluorine indicates that it is only a few thousand
year.
In 1953, J.S.Weiner, K.P.Oakley along with other British scientists
published his thesis, and declared that Piltdown Man was a lie
Science.
After this scandal was uncovered, the fossil of "Piltdown Man" was immediately removed from
British Museum after more than 40 years on display.
