Durant, John. +quot;It's a Fake! It's Genuine!You Decide+quot; [Review of] The Feathers Fl

Durant,  John.   "It's a Fake!   It's Genuine!--You 
Decide"   [Review   of]  The  Feathers   Fly:    Is 
Archaeopteryx   a  Fake?    A   special   temporary 
exhibition in the British Museum (Natural History), 
London,   UK.    Opened  August  18,   1987.    The 
Scientist, November 2, 1987.

[John   Durant  is  a  staff  tutor  in  biological 
sciences  in the Department for  External  Studies, 
University of Oxford,  Wellington Square,  OX1 2JA, 
UK.]

In  1985,  the  astronomers Fred Hoyle and  Chandra 
Wickramasinghe  wrote  an article  in  the  British 
Journal  of Photography claiming that Archaeopteryx 
is  a  fake.   An ordinary  dinosaur  fossil,  they 
suggested,   had  been  treated  with  a  paste  of 
powdered  limestone,  into which bird feathers  had 
been pressed in order to create the illusion of  an 
extraordinary, dinosaur-like bird.  Despite a swift 
rebuttal   by  British  Museum  staff  in   Science 
magazine (Charig et al,  vol. 232, May 2, 1986, pp. 
622-626),  Hoyle  and Wickramasinghe have  repeated 
their claim in a popular book (Archaeopeteryx,  The 
Primordial Bird,  Christopher Davis, 1987), and now 
the  museum  has put on an exhibition  setting  out 
both sides of the dispute.

This  exhibition bends over backwards in an  effort 
to  be seen as fair to its critics.   Its  entrance 
looks  rather  like a polling station,  with a  red 
rosette  on one side labelled "It's a fake!" and  a 
blue  one  on the other  labelled  "It's  genuine!"  
Thereafter, arguments are color-coded and presented 
in parallel.   Throughout the exhibition,  visitors 
are  encouraged  to make up their own minds on  the 
balance of the evidence presented.  I decided to do 
just that.

The  exhibition begins with a 4-5 minute  videotape 
of a recent television news item.  Fred Hoyle comes 
across  as very self-assured and trenchantly  anti-
establishment--no real suprises there.   The museum 
representative,  in  contrast,  is altogether  more 
reserved--quietly confident, perhaps, but certainly 
indignant  at Hoyle's suggestion that the  museum's 
first  superintendent  of  natural   history,   Sir 
Richard  Owen,  knowingly bought a fake in order to 
discredit Charles Darwin and his early  supporters.  
I scored this exhibit 50:50.

After  the  video,  there is a collage of  relevant 
newspaper and journal articles.  This gives a sense 
of  the  public  ocntroversy,   but  most  of   the 
headlines  appear  to  be  of  the  museum's  side.  
Either  this  reflects a real lack of  support  for 
Hoyle  and Wickramasinghe in the media,  of else it 
is  a  slip in the museum's  posture  of  political 
balance.  I found this exhibit impossible to score.

The   next  exhibit  deals  with  the  five   known 
Archaeopteryx fossils,  represented by casts (exact 
copies) and photographs.   The first two specimens, 
found at the same site in 1861 and 1877,  both have 
feathers; the red label says they were faked by the 
same  people.   The  third specimen (1950)  has  no 
feathers,  but  the  blue label claims you can  see 
where they were.   The fourth has feathers, but the 
red  label says the specimen is too poor to  count.  
The   fifth  specimen  (1970)  produces  the   most 
straightfoward disagreement: the blue label says it 
has feathers and the red label said it does not.  I 
looked  hard  and  thought  I  saw  feathers,   but 
couldn't be sure.   I ignored specimens one and two 
pending  further  evidence about faking  and  three 
pending further evidence about feathers;  I awarded 
number  four to the museum,  and five was  a  draw.  
All in all, 60:40 to the museum.

This  left  just  the star of the  show,  the  1861 
specimen  itself,  on display again for  the  first 
time  in 20 years.   The fossil is in two  halves--
slab and counter-slab.   Red labels claim that: (1) 
the  two  halves  don't  match  properly;  (2)  the 
feather  impressions are too good to be  true;  and 
(3)  sticky  deposits on the exposed  surfaces  are 
remnants  of  glue  used by fakers  to  doctor  the 
surface.   Blue  labels  reply that:  (1)  the  two 
halves  do match properly,  but the surface of  the 
slab  has been excavated to reveal more details  of 
Archaeopteryx's  tail;  (2) the feather impressions 
are no better than many other fossils obtained from 
the  same rock;  and (3) the sticky  deposits  come 
from  legitimate scientific work on the fossil.   I 
scored points 1 and 2 to the museum,  and point 3 a 
draw (how do I know what the sticky deposits are?).  
Overall, 60:40 to the museum again.

By  the  end  of the exhibition  I  had  come  down 
clearly in favor of the museum.  But what does this 
really  mean?   After  all,  the British Museum  is 
itself one of the protagonists in the dispute,  and 
presumably it wanted the balance of the evidence in 
its  favor.   The  real question  for  me  (and,  I 
suspect,   for  most  visitors)  is  this:    whose 
judgment do I trust more:   the British Museum's or 
Fred  Hoyle's?   As  it  happens,  I  came  to  the 
exhibition  with  some prior knowledge  of  Hoyle's 
biological  and  geological  writings  (though  not 
those   on  Archaeopteryx),   and  this   certainly 
prejudiced  me  in  favor  of  the  museum.    Most 
visitors  will  not have this background,  and  for 
them the judgment will be trickier.

I  spoke to a man who had just finished taking  his 
family around the exhibition.  Like most visitors I 
saw,  he appeared to be trying hard to weigh up the 
arguments.  His reaction?

"Well,  I think it's helpful.   I mean,  it  brings 
home  to the man in the street the problems they're 
got in sorting out a famous thing like that.  Maybe 
they've got it wrong; but then again, maybe the guy 
just  wants to make a name for himself.   I  really 
don't know."

Science  in  public  really is  quite  a  bit  like 
politics.