April Fools' Special: History's Hoaxes Happy April Fools' Day. To mark the occasion, National Geographic News has compiled a list of some of the more memorable hoaxes in recent history. They are the lies, darned (可恨的) lies, and whoppers () that have been perpetrated on the gullible(易受骗的) and unsuspecting to fulfill that age-old desire held by some to put the joke on others. Internet Hoaxes The Internet has given birth to a proliferation (增殖) of hoaxes. E-mail inboxes are bombarded on an almost daily basis with messages warning of terrible computer viruses that cause users to delete benign (良性) chunks of data from their hard drives, or of credit card seams that entice the to give all their personal information, including passwords and bank account details, to identity thieves. Other e-mails give rise to wry(歪曲的) chuckles, which is where this list begins. Ban Dihydrogen Monoxide (一氧化二氢) City officials in Aliso Viejo, California, were so concerned about the ers of dihydrogen monoxide that they scheduled a vote last month on whether to ban foam (泡沫) cups from city-sponsored s after they learned the chemical was used in foam-cup production. Officials called off the vote after learning that dihydrogen monoxide is the scientific term for water. 'It's embarrassing,' city manager David J. Norman told the Associated Press. 'We had a paralegal(律师助手) who did bad research.' Indeed, the paralegal had fallen victim to an official-looking Web site touting the ers of dihydrogen monoxide. An e-mail originally authored in 1990 by Eric Lechner, then a graduate student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, claimed that dihydrogen monoxide 'is used as an industrial solvent and coolant, and is used in the production of Styrofoam(聚苯乙烯泡沫塑料).' Other ers pranksters (爱开玩笑的人) associated with the chemical included accelerated corrosion and rusting, severe burns, and death from inhalation. Versions of the e-mail continue to circulate today, and several Web sites, including that of the Coalition to Ban DHMO, warn, tongue-in-cheek, of water's ers. Alabama Changes Value of Pi The April 1998 newsletter put out by New Mexicans for Science and Reason contains an article titled 'Alabama Legislature Lays Siege to Pi'. It was penned by April Holiday of the Associmated Press (sic) and told the story of how the Alabama state legislature voted to change the Value of the mathematical constant Pi from 3.14159 to the round number of 3. The ersatz(假的) news story was written by Los Alamos National Laboratory physicist Mark Boslough to parody(滑稽地模仿) legislative and school board attacks on the teaching of evolution in New Mexico. At Boslough's suggestion, Dave Thomas, the president of New Mexicans for Science and Reason, posted the article in its entirety to the Internet newsgroup Talk. Origins on April 1. (The newsgroup hosts a lively debate on creation vs. evolution. ) Later that evening Thomas posted a full confession to the hoax. He thought he had put all rumors to bed. But to Thomas's surprise, however, several newsgroup readers forwarded the article to friends and posted it on other newsgroups. When Thomas checked in on the story a few weeks later, he was surprised to learn that it had spread like wildfire. The telltale signs of the article's satirical intent, such as the April 1 date and misspelled 'Associmated Press'. dateline, had been replaced or deleted. Alabama legislators were bombarded with calls protesting the law. The legislators explained that the news was a hoax. There was not and never had been such a law. TV and Newspaper Hoaxes Before the advent of the Internet, and even today, traditional media outlets such as newspapers, radio, and television, have sometimes hoaxed thei