Source: Futility Closet
In 1903, French physicist Prosper-René Blondlot decided he had discovered a new form of radiation. But the mysterious rays had some exceedingly odd properties, and scientists in other countries had trouble seeing them at all. In this week’s episode of the Futility Closet podcast we’ll tell the story of N-rays, a cautionary tale of self-deception.
We’ll also recount another appalling marathon and puzzle over a worthless package.
Intro:
Franz Bibfeldt is an invisible scholar at the University of Chicago divinity school.
Sources for our feature on Prosper-René Blondlot and the N-rays:
René Blondlot, Julien François, and William Garcin, “N” Rays: A Collection of Papers Communicated to the Academy of Sciences, With Additional Notes and Instructions for the Construction of Phosphorescent Screens, 1905.
William Seabrook, Doctor Wood, 1941.
Walter Gratzer, The Undergrowth of Science: Delusion, Self-Deception, and Human Frailty, 2001.
Terence Hines, Pseudoscience and the Paranormal, 2003.
Richard C. Brown, Are Science and Mathematics Socially Constructed?, 2009.
Robert W. Proctor and E.J. Capaldi, Psychology of Science: Implicit and Explicit Processes, 2012.
Paul Collins, Banvard’s Folly, 2015.
Roelf Bolt, The Encyclopaedia of Liars and Deceivers, 2014.
Walter Gratzer and Walter Bruno Gratzer, Eurekas and Euphorias: The Oxford Book of Scientific Anecdotes, 2004.
Robert W. Wood, How to Tell the Birds From the Flowers, 1907.
Robert W. Wood, “The n-Rays,” Nature 70:1822 (1904), 530-531.
Mary Jo Nye, “N-Rays: An Episode in the History and Psychology of Science,” Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 11:1 (1980), 125-156.
Robert T. Lagemann, “New Light on Old rays: N Rays,” American Journal of Physics 45:281 (1977), 281-284.
Irving M….
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