BewaConsensus Science

> Case in point:
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3320713.stm
>
> and the analysis:
>
> http://impearls.blogspot.com/2003_12_14_impearls_archive.html#1071671
> 24781136172

The second article seemed a bit ranty in the sense that I got no feeling
whatsoever that the BBC Article was putting the Wright Brother's flight
in doubt; actually, my feeling was that the article portrayed the
Santos-Dumont cult as a kind of exotic phenomenon of mass delusion. In
fact, the BBC article adds to the negative tone by even saying that
Santos-Dumont was "disillusioned" by the Wright Brothers flights -
something that I have never heard of and that smells of dramatization.
Santos-Dumont was an "open source" guy - the blueprints of his
inventions were published in technical magazines at the time with no
worries about patents and secrecy - and was always described as a very
reserved person a bit averse to all the prizes and celebrations in his
honor, so there seems to be little reason for personal envy or
commercial rivalry with the Wright. Anyhow, maybe I am wrong about this
last critique - I would better first read a serious biography about
Santos-Dumont, preferably something written from some "neutral"
(non-Brazilian) point of view, like "Wings of Madness"
(http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0786866594/qid71861607/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/002-5627780-7143239).

The rant in the second link proceeds when Mr. McNeils writes "even if it
took place" about the flight of the 14-Bis (Santos-Dumont's first plane
- the one in the 1906 flight) - as if he were casting doubt about this
well-documented, film-registered
(http://www.aeromania.com.br/IMAGEM/materias/dummont/filme.mov, link
extracted from the article
http://www.aeromania.com.br/ART_SantosDumont.aspx) fact.

More to the point, what would BBC gain by supposedly "casting shadows"
over the Wright Brothers? Mr. McNeil should provide a reason, like in
any "good" conspiracy theory ("Aliens mutilate cattle because they want
beef" or "Elvis simulated his own death because he did not want to be
remembered as a fat middle-age guy", and so on).

Lucio Coelho