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List Of Hoaxes
The following is a list of hoaxes: Exposure hoaxes These types of hoaxes are semi-comical or private "sting operations" intended to expose people. They usually encourage people to act foolishly or credulously by falling for patent nonsense that the hoaxer deliberately presents as reality. * The '' Atlanta Nights'' hoax novel. * The practice of growing bonsai kittens in jars. * The British television series '' Brass Eye'', which encouraged celebrities to pledge their support to nonexistent causes to highlight their willingness to do anything for publicity. * Dihydrogen monoxide, a facetious technical term for water. * Disumbrationism, a hoax art exhibit. * Genpets, a hoax mixed-media art installation of bio-engineered pet creatures. * Grunge speak, an alleged slang of the Seattle rock underground, concocted by a Sub Pop employee and profiled in ''The New York Times.'' * The house hippo hoax briefly perpetrated by Concerned Children's Advertisers in public service announcement ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hoax
A hoax (plural: hoaxes) is a widely publicised falsehood created to deceive its audience with false and often astonishing information, with the either malicious or humorous intent of causing shock and interest in as many people as possible. Some hoaxers intend to eventually unmask their representations as having been a hoax so as to expose their victims as fools; seeking some form of profit, other hoaxers hope to maintain the hoax indefinitely, so that it is only when skeptical people willing to investigate their claims publish their findings, that the hoaxers are finally revealed as such. History Zhang Yingyu's '' The Book of Swindles'' ( 1617), published during the late Ming dynasty, is said to be China's first collection of stories about fraud, swindles, hoaxes, and other forms of deception. Although practical jokes have likely existed for thousands of years, one of the earliest recorded hoaxes in Western history was the drummer of Tedworth in 1661. The communication of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ID Sniper Rifle
The ID Sniper rifle is an art project, a fictional, hoax weapon devised by artist Jakob S. Boeskov and industrial designer Kristian von Bengtson."RFID Gun Plays Into Privacy Fears" '' RFID Journal'' (retrieved December 11, 2007) The supposedly shoots chips, and the force may tag persons with this rifle for later easy retrieval. It was produced by the fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sokal Affair
The Sokal affair, also known as the Sokal hoax, was a demonstrative scholarly hoax performed by Alan Sokal, a physics professor at New York University and University College London. In 1996, Sokal submitted an article to ''Social Text'', an academic journal of cultural studies. The submission was an experiment to test the journal's intellectual rigor, specifically to investigate whether "a leading North American journal of cultural studies—whose editorial collective includes such luminaries as Fredric Jameson and Andrew Ross— ouldpublish an article liberally salted with nonsense if (a) it sounded good and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions." The article, "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity", was published in the journal's Spring/Summer 1996 "Science Wars" issue. It proposed that quantum gravity is a social and linguistic construct. The journal did not practice academic peer review at the time, so it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alan Abel
Alan Irwin Abel (August 2, 1924 – September 14, 2018) was an American hoaxer, writer, and mockumentary filmmaker famous for several hoaxes that became media circuses. Education and early career Abel was born to a Jewish family in Zanesville, Ohio, on August 2, 1924, and grew up in nearby Coshocton, Ohio. He graduated from the Ohio State University with a Bachelor of Science in education. One of Abel's earliest pranks took place in the late 1950s; he posed as a golf professional who taught Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westinghouse executives how to use Glossary of ballet terms#Positions of the feet, ballet positions to improve their games. Beginning May 27, 1959, with a story on the ''Today (NBC program), Today Show'', the Society for Indecency to Naked Animals (SINA), was Abel's most elaborate hoax. SINA's mission was to clothe naked animals throughout the world. They are best known today for their tagline: "A nude horse is a rude horse". As a spokesman for the group, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Society For Indecency To Naked Animals
The Society for Indecency to Naked Animals, or SINA ronounced "sinna" was a satirical hoax concocted by serial prankster Alan Abel. The group used the language and rhetoric of conservative moralists for the ostensible aim of clothing "indecent" naked animals, including domestic pets, barnyard animals, and large wildlife. The society and its aims were then largely presented in the public arena on news and talk shows by comedian/improviser Buck Henry (in the guise of SINA president "G. Clifford Prout") from 1959 through 1963. History In 1959, Alan Abel wrote a satirical story about an imaginary organization for ''The Saturday Evening Post'' but the editors rejected it. Abel then transformed his story into a series of press releases from the organization that garnered media attention. Looking to expand the range and impact of the hoax, Abel persuaded the actor Buck Henry to assume the role of the group president, G. Clifford Prout, Jr., in U.S. television news and talk show appear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joey Skaggs
Joey Skaggs (born 1945) is an American multi-media artist, activist, satirist, educator and prankster. In a career spanning 60 years, he has produced paintings, sculptures, guerrilla theater, performance art, socially revealing hoaxes, media pranks, and films. Skaggs is one of the originators of the phenomenon known as culture jamming. Career and Artistic Philosophy Joey Skaggs, originally trained as a painter and sculptor, began experimenting with performance art in the 1960s, utilizing public spaces and mass media as platforms for his work. His projects often incorporate elements of guerrilla theater, satire, and hoaxes to address themes such as societal norms, media sensationalism, and institutional power dynamics. Films In 2017, the feature documentary ''Art of the Prank'', directed by Andrea Marini, about artist Joey Skaggs, was released internationally on television and streaming platforms after screening at film festivals. In 2020, production began on a series of sh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Keith Windschuttle
Keith Windschuttle (1942 – 8 April 2025) was an Australian historian. He was appointed to the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation from 2006 to 2011. He was editor of '' Quadrant'' from 2007 to 2015 when he became chair of the board and editor-in-chief. He was the publisher of Macleay Press, which operated from 1994 to 2010. Major published items include ''Unemployment'' (1979), which analysed the economic causes and social consequences of unemployment in Australia and advocated a socialist response; ''The Media: a New Analysis of the Press, Television, Radio and Advertising in Australia'' (1984), on the political economy and content of the news and entertainment media; ''The Killing of History'' (1994), a critique of postmodernism in the study of history; ''The Fabrication of Aboriginal History: Volume One: Van Diemen's Land 1803–1847'' (2002), which accuses a number of Australian historians of falsifying and inventing the degree of violence in the past; ''Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quadrant (magazine)
''Quadrant'' is a conservatism in Australia, conservative Australian Literary magazine, literary, cultural, and political journal, which publishes both online and printed editions. , ''Quadrant'' mainly publishes commentary, essays and opinion pieces on culture, cultural, politics, political, and historical issues, although it also reviews literature and publishes poetry and fiction in the print edition. Its editorial line is self-described "bias towards cultural freedom, anti-totalitarianism and classical liberalism". History The magazine was founded in Sydney in 1956 by Richard Krygier, a History of the Jews in Poland, Polish-Jewish refugee who had been active in social-democrat politics in Europe, and James McAuley, a Catholic poet known for Ern Malley, an anti-literary modernism, modernist hoax. It was originally an initiative of the Australian Committee for Cultural Freedom, the Australian arm of the Association for Cultural Freedom, Congress for Cultural Freedom, an anti-co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychic Phenomena
A psychic is a person who claims to use powers rooted in parapsychology, such as extrasensory perception (ESP), to identify information hidden from the normal senses, particularly involving telepathy or clairvoyance; or who performs acts that are apparently inexplicable by natural laws, such as psychokinesis or teleportation. Although many people believe in psychic abilities, the scientific consensus is that there is no proof of the existence of such powers, and describes the practice as pseudoscience. Psychics encompass people in a variety of roles. Some are theatrical performers, such as stage magicians, who use various techniques, e.g. prestidigitation, cold reading, and hot reading, to produce the appearance of such abilities for entertainment purposes. A large industry and network exist whereby people advertised as psychics provide advice and counsel to clients. Some famous psychics include Edgar Cayce, Ingo Swann, Peter Hurkos, Janet Lee, Miss Cleo, John Edward, Sylvia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Randi
James Randi (born Randall James Hamilton Zwinge; August 7, 1928 – October 20, 2020) was a Canadian-American stage magician, author, and scientific skeptic who extensively challenged paranormal and pseudoscientific claims.#Rodrigues, Rodrigues 2010p. 271 He was the co-founder of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), and founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF). Randi began his career as a magician under the stage name The Amazing Randi and later chose to devote most of his time to investigating paranormal, occult, and supernatural claims. Randi retired from practicing magic at age 60, and from his foundation at 87. Although often referred to as a "debunker", Randi said he disliked the term's connotations and preferred to describe himself as an "investigator". He wrote about paranormal phenomena, skepticism, and the history of magic. He was a frequent guest on ''The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson'', famously exposing fraudulent faith healer Peter Pop ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Project Alpha (hoax)
Project Alpha was an effort by magician James Randi to test the quality of scientific rigor of a well-known test of paranormal phenomena. In the late 1970s, Randi contacted the newly established McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research ("MacLab") with suggestions on how to conduct tests for paranormal phenomena. At the same time, two teenage boys (Steve Shaw, later known as Banachek, and Mike Edwards) independently contacted the McDonnell Laboratory and volunteered as subjects for such tests from 1979 to 1982. They quickly proved to exhibit a range of paranormal abilities far and away better than the other subjects of the experiment. The lab began leaking reports of the pair's capabilities, which were in fact simple magic tricks. When rumors of the test subjects' connection to Randi reached Peter Phillips, head of the MacLab, he instituted tighter protocols for the experiments; the two subjects' results declined sharply. In 1983, Randi held a press conference to expose the dec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Octopus
An octopus (: octopuses or octopodes) is a soft-bodied, eight-limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (, ). The order consists of some 300 species and is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttlefish, and nautiloids. Like other cephalopods, an octopus is bilaterally symmetric with two eyes and a beaked mouth at the centre point of the eight limbs. An octopus can radically deform its shape, enabling it to squeeze through small gaps. They trail their appendages behind them as they swim. The siphon is used for respiration and locomotion (by water jet propulsion). Octopuses have a complex nervous system and excellent sight, and are among the most intelligent and behaviourally diverse invertebrates. Octopuses inhabit various ocean habitats, including coral reefs, pelagic waters, and the seabed; some live in the intertidal zone and others at abyssal depths. Most species grow quickly, mature early, and are short-lived. In most species, the male uses a speciall ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
