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10. The Nacirema Tribe - The Nacirema were supposedly a tribe of people living in North America, as described by Horace Miner in his anthropological paper, published in 1956. It was actually a satire of everyday American life. ("Nacirema" is "American" spelled backward.) 9. The Disappearing Blonde Gene - Every generation or so, an alarm is sounded over the belief that natural blondes will soon go the way of the dodo. 8. "Say No to Cake" - In 1995, British faux news show Brass Eye conducted an "investigative report" on a street drug they invented called "cake," claiming it affected an area of the brain called "Shatner's Bassoon." Members of the media lashed out against cake, and the British government even took the matter to Parliament. 7. Alien Autopsy - English cameraman Ray Santilli claimed to own footage of an alien autopsy performed after the 1947 Roswell Incident. FOX aired a portion of it, but in 2006, Santilli 'fessed up to the hoax. 6. The Turk - It was nearly impossible to beat this chess-playing automaton of 1770, heralded as the next great venture into technology. It was even toured across Europe. Unfortunately, the Turk was discovered to be a chess whiz in a robotic-type suit. 5. The Fiji Mermaid (aka "Feejee Mermaid") - This artifact in P.T. Barnum's museum was advertised as a gorgeous topless siren, but was actually the mummified corpse of an ape sewn to a fish. 4. Rabbit Mother - In 18th-century England, Mary Toft convinced doctors she had given birth to 16 rabbits. A Short Narrative of an Extraordinary Delivery of Rabbets [sic] was written by King George's surgeon about her case. People stopped serving rabbit stew. Once the hoax was discovered, the medical community suffered great embarrassment. 3. El Chupacabra - This savage chicken-eater was actually a hairless wolf. 2. Archaeoraptor - This creature was the supposed "missing link" between dinosaurs and birds. 1. Piltdown Man - The supposed "missing link" between humans and apes, the Piltdown man proved to be a deliberate attempt at paleontological fraud. |
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