The Disappearing Spoon: Chapter 15: An Element of Madness Summary & Analysis

The archetype of the “mad scientist” shows how closely scientific brilliance can border on insanity. William Crookes was an English chemist who earned a place in the elite Royal Society at only 31. However, not long after, Crookes’s brother died at sea, and Crookes was consumed by grief. This was a moment in which spiritualism had taken hold of England. Crookes fell under its spell and started attending séances in order to communicate with his brother. This horrified the scientists at the Royal Society—even more so when Crookes published a scientific paper attempting to justify the spirit world as plausible and real. Before all this happened, Crookes had devoted himself to selenium, a mineral the human body needs in small amounts but which can be toxic in large ones.

Selenium causes insanity in animals, and thus some might be tempted to believe that this is what happened to Crookes. However, this is unlikely. Crookes eventually turned away from spiritualism, yet pushed forward with his scientific research. He was awarded a knighthood in 1897 and three years later he discovered the element protactinium (although he didn’t actually realize this at the time). Crookes had fallen victim to “pathological science,” a term that describes highly detailed and internally coherent belief system that uses actual scientific ideas and methods to try and prove that it is true. Believers in pathological science “use the ambiguity about evidence as evidence.”

In 1873, a research ship called the HMS Challenger scooped up samples from the ocean floor to study. They found what look like “fat, solid, mineralized ice cream cones” that had giant shark teeth inside. Looking at these surprising skeletons, paleontologists guessed that this was a type of enormous shark that could grow to 50 feet long. They called it the “megalodon.” Such speculation is normal in the realm of paleontology. Things took at pathological turn when researchers began studying the shark teeth, which they had dated to about 1.5 million years ago, giving a rough estimate of the point when the megalodon died out. However, the researchers then noticed that the manganese plaque on the teeth was only about 11,000 years old.

Suddenly, people began to speculate that the megalodon may have never gone extinct after all. Although there is no evidence to support this, it is a persistent myth. This is partly because, with a certain mindset, a lack of evidence can be treated as proof of one’s existing belief. Far more intense than the pathological science surrounding the megalodon was that fixated on cold fusion. B. Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann were once believed to be one of the great pairs of scientists in history; however, now they are remembered only as “imposters, swindlers, and cheats.” The two scientists ran an experiment that produced very erratic results, but one of these results encouraged them to “convince them[selves]” that they had discovered cold fusion.

Abandoning all patience and precaution, Pons and Fleischmann immediately announced their supposed discovery to the world. They became “instant celebrities” and won the Nobel Prize within a record one year. Scientists were not just excited about the cold fusion revelation but also the fact that Pons and Fleischmann’s experiment seemed to have proven that superconductors (matter that can conduct charge with no resistance) could work at temperatures above 400ºF—something many thought was simply impossible. Some scientists remained skeptical, pointing out that Pons and Fleischmann had skipped the peer-review process. Indeed, a group of scientists from around the world ended up teaming up to collate arguments that Pons and Fleischmann had faked their results. A fierce argument ensued, with many rallying to defend Pons and Fleischmann. Tired of fighting, the dissenters gave up.

Looking back, it is obvious that Pons and Fleischmann knew their trick would be discovered. They must have decided that it was worth the humiliation that followed to feel the exhilaration of scientific glory, even if it was temporary and fake. There are, however, a rare few cases when pathological science has turned out to be right. This includes Wilhelm Röntgen’s discovery of invisible rays. In Germany in 1895, Röntgen was repeating an experiment performed by his colleague when he noticed an unexpected beam while shining light through a barium-coated screen. To Röntgen’s astonishment, he realized that combining the light with the barium screen mean he could “somehow see through things.”

Röntgen briefly thought he was hallucinating. He spent seven weeks in his lab trying to figure out what happened, which he refused to believe could have been “revolutionary.” Eventually, he brought his wife into the lab and, self-effacingly claiming that everyone would think he’d gone mad, took the world’s first X-ray photograph, of her hand wearing a ring. Bertha was terrified, but the incident confirmed that Röntgen was not mad. Eventually, his terror of anything resembling pathological science relented, and he was able to realize the true nature of his discovery. In 1901, he won the first ever Nobel Prize in Physics.