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Don't Be Fooled: Strange Hoaxes
That Endure
愚人节：别再被谎言欺骗 有人捡到了外星人的飞碟碎片，还秘密解剖了他们的尸体；有人具有通灵的本事，可以施展招魂术让生死相隔的两个人再次对话；还有一位神奇的医师可以进入病人的体内，不用手术刀和麻醉药就能摘除肿瘤……这些消息听上去真是太"带劲儿"了，难怪世人宁愿相信它们是真的。 April Fool! That gleeful pronouncement greets victims one day each year.1 The celebration of April Fool's Day is of obscure origin but became common in eighteenth-century England. Among the memorable pranks launched on April 1 was one perpetrated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1980.2 They announced that the landmark London clock, Big Ben3, was going digital and that the famous clock hands would therefore be given away! Such pranks are examples of hoaxes4, and April Fool's Day is an appropriate opportunity to look at them. A hoax is an intentional deception. Distinguished from a fraud, which is perpetrated primarily for gain, a hoax is characterized by the nature of the deception.5 It may involve money or not, but essentially a hoax is an imposition on the victim's credulity.6 It may range from harmless mischief, such as that associated with April Fool's Day, or it may have a more cruel or sinister aspect. Typical of the range of hoaxes is the following "top-six list", and these paranormal claims beyond the range of nature and normal human experience frequently involve hoaxes, and some are outright frauds.7 Roswell Incident8 In 1947 a "flying disc" crashed near Roswell, New Mexico. Rancher Mac Brazel described the debris as foiled paper, sticks, string, and tape consistent with a radar reflector, once thought part of a weather balloon but now identified as a Project Mogul spy balloon.9 Over time the story has prompted many other kinds of hoaxes. Despite well-documented evidence exposing the Roswell hoax, the tale persists as part of the American consciousness. A 1997 Gallup poll10 revealed that over 80% of Americans have heard of the Roswell incident, and 31% believe that a spacecraft from another planet did indeed crash at Roswell in 1947. In addition, the incident has inspired major plot themes in the very popular X-Files television series and films like Independence Day and Men in Black.11 Spiritualism12 Belief in communicating with the dead is ancient, but modern spiritualism began in 1848 when two girls, Margaret and Katherine Fox, apparently received messages from the ghost of a murdered peddler13. He responded to their questions by knocking a certain number of times to signal yes, no, or other simple answers. Soon the girls traveled all over the United States to promote their "Spiritualist" society. Four decades later, however, the sisters revealed to a theater audience how they had tricked the world. Margaret Fox demonstrated how she had slipped her foot from her shoe and snapped her toes to make the rapping sounds. In the meantime, as well as later, spiritualists were caught producing fake phenomena from bogus spirit writing on slates to ghostly entities that proved to be mediums or their assistants in disguise.14 The most recent incarnation15 of spiritualism arrives in the form of psychic-medium James Van Praagh, whose book Talking to Heaven is currently atop the best-seller lists. Crop Circles16 Since the late 1970's, mysterious swirled patterns have been appearing in southern English grain fields invariably during nighttime. Some thought the depressions were caused by "wind vortexes17," while others, plying their dowsing rods, believed they had a mystical origin, and still others opted for an extraterrestrial explanation: perhaps the designs were communications from alien beings. However, in 1991 two elderly men, Doug Bower and Dave Chorley, demonstrated how they had made the first circles, which others copied and elaborated to produce the stylized "pictograms"18 that became known around the world. Amityville Horror19 America's most famous haunted house is located in Amityville, New York, where in 1974 a man murdered his parents and siblings20. A year later the house was bought by George and Kathy Lutz who soon claimed they were driven out by weird events, including demon tracks in the snow and damage to doors and windows. Investigation showed the events never transpired, and the murderer's lawyers confessed how, for money, he and the Lutzes had "created this horror story over many bottles of wine." Despite the admission, the story spawned the best-selling book Amityville Horror and a franchise21 of successful horror films that continue to be released on video today. Psychic Surgery Among the most outrageous and dangerous hoaxes is a phony22 healing procedure in which a practitioner appears to reach into a patient's body, without benefit of scalpel or anesthesia, to remove "tumors" and other diseased tissue.23 Common to Brazil and the Philippines, psychic surgery is actually produced by sleight of hand. Animal tissue and blood are used to give a realistic appearance, while a patient's fleshy midriff24 helps create the illusion that the surgeon's fingers have actually penetrated the body. Tragically, many of the patients, or victims, of the psychic surgeons have died within a year or so of the trick procedure. King Tut's Curse25 The "boy king" Tutankhamun ruled Egypt from the age of nine until his death at eighteen, during the twelfth century B.C. His tomb was discovered in 1922 by Howard Carter, but a curse written over the entrance began to take its toll, resulting in the death over the years of many associated with the excavation. Or so it was claimed. In 1980 the tomb's former security officer admitted the story of the curse had been circulated to frighten away thieves. In fact, ten years after the tomb was opened, all but one of the five who first entered it were still living, and Carter himself lived until 1939. There are numerous paranormal hoaxes all over the world. Even the six examples, however, are sufficient to illustrate that the will to believe is part of human nature, and that hoaxes are not limited to April Fool's Day but are, in fact, a year-round occurrence. Unfortunately, people worldwide continue
to be fooled by the hoaxes and even in some cases, the numbers continue
to grow. Too often the explanations or criticisms of these fabricated
claims go unheard in the media, while movie makers, television producers
and book publishers draw on26 these hoaxes to weave top-grossing fiction
that is often treated as real. Until the media provide more critical
presentations of the paranormal, a word of warning is the only known
antidote27. |