Editorial: The Johor Hominid Controversy: One Year Later

Nearly 1 year ago, a series of photos was promised to be unveiled on the public, allegedly of the Johor Hominid or Orang Mawas. The photo you see on the right was the "teaser photo" which promised something extraordinary from johorhominid.org. This photo was up at the website for several weeks, until a sharp-eyed French scientist, remembering that these eyes looked quite familiar, like something he had seen before. It turned out he had; it was actually a photo of an actor in costume for a television program on the Australopthecines from a book. Now, there was speculation that the photo was a deliberate hoax from Vincent Chow, but let us examine this a bit closer; supposing Chow and Ang were taken in by this photo and were not aware that it was actually from a book? It is always possible. I am reticent to accuse them of hoaxing, because Rick Noll, who worked with the two gentlemen last Summer, attested to their honesty on the "Sasquatch Experience" the other night. I think that Chow and Ang were deceived by someone who claimed this photo was the real thing. It isn't the first time researchers have been fooled by what they thought was evidence and turned out to be a hoax, and it won't be the last either. I think it is a lesson to those who count something as evidence without examining all parameters more thoroughly, so let's just be careful and more discerning.