Aim higher, reach further.

Kim Kardashian Fails the P.T. Barnum Test

In 1835, the New York Sun published a remarkable scoop. It reported on the extraordinary findings of Sir John Herschel, a celebrated English astronomer, who had devised a revolutionary telescope with a lens "twenty-four feet in diameter," and weighing "14,826 lbs. or nearly seven tons after being polished." The paper described in detail the mathematical and technical specifications of the telescope, eventually explaining that understanding "its principles and powers" was indispensable in appreciating "the sublime expansion of human knowledge which it has achieved." Most notably: the discovery of life on the moon.

Kris Humphries and his then-wife, Kim Kardashian, appearing Oct. 4 on 'The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. ENLARGE
Kris Humphries and his then-wife, Kim Kardashian, appearing Oct. 4 on 'The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. NBCUniversal/Getty Images

And not just any life, but an astonishing menagerie of lunar creatures, all of which were said to have been directly observed by the famous scientist. He had witnessed diminutive bison with semicircular horns; animals "of a bluish lead color, about the size of a goat, with a head and beard like him, and a single horn, slightly inclined forward from the perpendicular"; and "a strange amphibious creature, of a spherical form, which rolled with great velocity across the pebbly beach" of a lunar island.

Perhaps the most extraordinary discovery was the existence of flying humanoids: "Four feet high, covered, except in the face, with short, glossy, copper-colored hair," they had batlike "wings composed of a thin membrane, without hair, lying snugly upon their backs from the top of their shoulders to the calves of their legs." These creatures appeared to be polite, sociable fruitarians.

The discovery of life on the moon caused a sensation and—told as it was in a series of articles—sold a lot of newspapers. It wasn't until some time later that news of bat-men on the moon reached Mr. Herschel himself, who laughed it off as a spectacular prank. (Though a year later he was growing tired of having to write letters disclaiming "all knowledge of or participation in the incoherent ravings under the name of discoveries which have been attributed to me.")

Easy as it may be to laugh at the credulous 19th-century New Yorkers who fell for the great moon hoax, it would be a mistake to think that we are any less susceptible to swindles and flimflam. It's just that our hoaxes aren't nearly so inventive.

Take the news, this week, that a highly regarded researcher in the field of social psychology achieved his standing by manufacturing a steady stream of fake data. Graduate students working under Dutch psychologist Diederik Stapel discovered he was cooking the experimental books and blew the whistle on him. "I have failed as a scientist and researcher," he admitted in an online apology Monday. "I feel ashamed and I am deeply sorry."

If not ashamed, the many scientists who fell for Prof. Stapel's bunk are feeling embarrassed. And not a little worried about the reputation of their field. The past few years have been a boom time for social psychology and "behavioral economics," with discoveries regularly plumped by the popular press. Much of Prof. Stapel's work made it into newspapers in no small part because he delivered scientific evidence for contentions journalists wanted to believe, as with "studies" purporting to show how unconscious sexism and racism skew people's judgments.

The great impresario P.T. Barnum was a big admirer of the moon hoax. I doubt he would have thought much of the pedestrian deceits perpetrated by Prof. Stapel. Mr. Barnum would have had a higher regard, I suspect, for the other humbug in the news this week, Kim Kardashian. But he would have been a little perplexed at the general reaction to the news that she wants a divorce: Mr. Barnum always maintained that the public doesn't mind being swindled as long as it is entertained. Why then all the outrage?

The conceit has been that Ms. Kardashian's television show captures something approximating the reality of her ludicrous life. The tube pretends to be a telescope even more powerful than the one attributed to Herschel, a lens that lets us spy, from a distance, exotic life forms. Here the humanoid on display was a rapaciously acquisitive creature engaged in elaborate and expensive mating rituals. Now it turns out that, though rapacious acquisition was an honest enough expression of the creature's nature, the mating ritual may not have been in earnest.

People seem to be upset by this revelation. Does it mean they were bamboozled in the first place? Now that's hard to believe.

No, I think people are annoyed because the burlesque wasn't nearly entertaining enough—they were cheated out of the spectacle that had been promised. The divorce was a given. But jumping right to it showed a disregard for the craft of reality TV. Where were the nightclub screaming matches? Where were the inevitable infidelities that would have pushed the tawdry plotline along to its natural conclusion?

We hope for a better standard of hooey from our reality performers. We expect their hoaxes to be more competently executed. In these plastic times of ours, even the fakes are phony. Is it too much to ask for artistes of con who can come up with bat-men on the moon?

Show More Archives

Popular on WSJ

Editors’ Picks