The James Webb Space Telescope has been the internet’s new joke ever since it shared the clearest galaxy photos ever taken with Earth. But it seems that this is done not only on the Internet, but also among scientists. Because a scientist who recently shared on his social media account, managed to deceive the entire internet by participating in these jokes.
Etienne Klein, who is the director of the Atomic Energy Commission of France, shared the photo he said was taken by James Webb of ‘Proxima Centauri’, the closest star to our Sun, in his post on his Twitter account. But the photo in question actually contained only a slice of sausage.
Thousands of people believed the sausage photo:
Sharing the photo with the words “This level of detail.. A new world emerges every day”, Klein garnered more than 10 thousand likes and comments on Twitter. Although many people understood the joke in these comments, it also garnered comments from those who believed in the joke, since the sausage really looks like a space object if not looked carefully.
He had to apologize for the sausage photo:
Unfortunately, Klein had to explain his joke after his post was taken seriously by a considerable number of people. He made the following statements under his post:
“Considering some of the comments, I feel compelled to clarify that this tweet, which supposedly shows a snapshot of Proxima Centauri, is some kind of entertainment. Let’s learn to be wary of the plausibility of certain images as well as arguments from authority.
“I’ve come to apologize to those who may have been shocked by my inauthentic deception in no way. I asked to be wary of images that alone seem meaningful.”
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