The Theatre of the Blind: Starring a Promethean Prankster,a Phoney Phenomenon,a Prism,a Pocket,and a Piece of Wood

Abstract

One of the most notorious cases of full-blown scientific error is the `non-existent' form of radiation known as `N-rays', discovered in the spring of 1903 by the French physicist Blondlot. After a short but full and interesting life, N-rays were killed off (so the story goes) in the autumn of 1904 by the American physicist Wood, who, after visiting Blondlot's laboratory in Nancy, published in Nature a damning report of what he found (or didn't find). In this paper, I look at the way in which these events have been represented in subsequent commentaries (including a later one of Wood's), concentrating particularly on `the tale of the removal of the prism'. I also examine the source of the effectiveness of Wood's `rhetoric of undiscovery' which I claim lies in his construction and operation of a `theatre of the blind', in which only we who were not there can see the nothing that is there. Throughout the text, Wood's credibility as a reporter is questioned in the interest of providing a symmetrically sceptical account of Wood's scientific claims and status, as a counter to the standard story.