Summary Of Hoagland: Cutting Edge Visionary Or Pseudoscience

English 102
Refutation Paper

Richard C. Hoagland: Cutting Edge Visionary or Pseudoscience Elvis?
How in a scientific age as ours, with legitimate data and reasoning as close as a Google search, can people believe in crazy unsubstantiated theories? Pseudoscience has been around longer than true science has, but with all we know, wouldn’t folks wise up? According to Wikkipedia, “Pseudoscience is any body of knowledge, methodology, or practice that is erroneously regarded as scientific”. (Wikkipedia) In the past, honest scientific mistakes were believed to be true. The flat earth theory, astrology and the Sun revolving around the earth were all accepted science, until proven false. Those who continued to profess those beliefs became
On his website, he engages in personal attacks on officials at NASA and Malin Space Systems.
He uses straw man arguments about data doctoring to distract you from the obvious: The modern pictures don’t show a face. Hoagland begs the question throughout his entire website: The diagrams and data he presents is not peer reviewed nor accepted by the mainstream scientific community. His “proof” requires as much proof as his face on Mars theory does! Hoagland poisons the well by decrying the secretive and deceptive practices of the space agencies, and then presses forward with his version of the truth.
The most insidious of the fallacies on Enterprise Mission though is his appeal to authority. His laundry list of credentials is impressive on the surface. But when we dig just a little deeper, most of Richard Hoagland’s qualifications are just so much hot
There seems to be no record of a specific, named museum employing Hoagland. His own website biography states only that at nineteen he was the curator of a museum in Springfield, MA. He was indeed a science advisor to CBS and Cronkite, but only for a brief period. His stint at Star and Sky also was less than a year. His involvement in the communication plaque on Pioneer was (according to Sagan and two others involved) “minimal at best”. Apparently he was there when the idea was pitched to Sagan. Nothing more.
On Hoagland’s site, he flatly claims to have originated the idea of life in the oceans of Europa in his Star and Sky article. (One should note that Star and Sky is not a scientific journal. It is a hobbyist/enthusiast magazine). This theory had been published nine years previous in the scientific journal Icarus by Dr. John Lewis. Also one year before Hoagland was published Dr. Benton Clark gave a speech at Ames Research Center about the potential for life in Europa’s waters. Hoagland has been presented with these facts, yet does not correct his claims to be the originator of the