Neatorama has an excerpt of "10 scientific frauds that rocked the world," from a book called Condensed Knowledge, by Mental Floss.
The Quadro Corporation of Harleyville, South Carolina, had an impressive client list: public schools, police agencies, the U.S. Customs office, and Inspector General's offices to name a few. The product they sold, the top of the line Quadro QRS 250G (also known as the Quadro Tracker, available for $1,000), boasted the ability to find drugs, weapons, or virtually anything worth looking for. The small plastic box supposedly contained frequency chips of an advanced sort not known to regular science. Driven by static electricity, the Quadro would resonate at exactly the same frequency as the searched-for item. When the FBI opened the box, however, they found nothing inside. Quadro threatened to sue Sandia Laboratories when Sandia suggested that the device was fraudulent, but eventually Quadro became the bigger company, and just closed shop.
Reader comment:
David says:
#4 – the peppered moth experiment is not a hoax. The idea that it is has been widely promoted only by creationists. The moths were glued to trees for the sake of photographs, not during the actual experiment/observation, the experiment took into account different places where moths rest, and birds will pretty much eat whatever they can get their beaks on. Link
That rather calls the validity of the list into question…
