N rays
The N-rays were one of the great discoveries in physics at the beginning of the 20th century, which turned out to be scientific error and self-delusion ( pathological science ).
Alleged discovery
The French physicist René Blondlot at the University of Nancy 1901 derived from the name N (ancy) rays believed to provide a novel radiation , similar in 1895 discovered X-radiation (X-rays), to have observed by a hot platinum wire emits becomes.
The detection of the rays should be possible through their influence on the brightness of a gas flame. Many French research colleagues greedily rushed to the novel discovery and so numerous scientific articles on the topic were published in the following years. Even a spectral decomposition of the N-rays by means of a prism made of aluminum appeared to be possible.
Exposure
The end of the supposed discovery began when the German Kaiser Wilhelm II , who was always interested in science, wanted to see these novel rays. But Professor Heinrich Rubens , who was supposed to demonstrate them, could not understand the experiments with N-rays. At a scientific conference, he advocated a precise examination of the radiation in question by visiting Blondlot's laboratory, which the American Robert Wood should take over, as a German would encounter reservations in nationalist research.
Wood visited the laboratory in 1904, but could not recognize the detection of the N rays with a gas flame, nor did the other experiments convince him. Finally Blondlot demonstrated the spectrum to him using the aluminum prism and described spectral lines. Since Wood could not see anything, he asked Blondlot to measure the spectrum again, but first secretly removed the prism in the darkness of the laboratory. Nevertheless, Blondlot was able to recognize spectral lines again. His indignant assistant had watched Wood and asked to measure the spectrum again himself. He realized that nothing could be measured. Wood had secretly reinserted the prism beforehand. The N-rays were thus exposed as a deception. In France , many viewed the scandal as a national disgrace.
This classic example of scientific mistakes is often told to new students in physics to illustrate typical mistakes in scientific work. Similar fame gained the polywater (in the 1960s and 1970s) and a process of cold fusion in the 1989th
literature
- Alexander K. Dewdney: Everything rotten magic? IQ tests, psychoanalysis, and other controversial theories . Birkhäuser Verlag, 1998, ISBN 3-7643-5761-4 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ René Blondlot: N Rays . Longmans, Green and Co., London 1905 (translated by J. Garcin).
- ↑ Pathological Science: The "N-rays" of René Blondlot - derStandard.de. Retrieved April 20, 2019 (Austrian German).