Four Scientific Journals Accept Fake Study About "Midi-Chlorians" From Star Wars

The peer-review system is a process used to weed out weak scientific research using independent peers to check whether the study is legit, credible, and of decent quality. But recent years have seen a rise in so-called “predatory journals”, where it’s significantly easier to get past the reviewing process and have research quickly published (often for a small price, of course).

To highlight the flaws of “predatory journals”, a blogging neuroscientist writing under the alias Neuroskeptic managed to trick multiple scientific journals into publishing a nonsensical piece of research, dotted with massive factual errors, plagiarism, and Star Wars references. Neuroskeptic wrote about his “experiment” in a blog post for Discover Magazine.  

The hoax study was all about “midi-chlorians,” a fiction form of “microscopic life form that resides within all living cells” that was first mentioned in everybody’s favorite Star Wars film, The Phantom Menace.

Submitted under the names Dr Lucas McGeorge and Dr Annette Kin, the study at one point, embedded in "science" jargon, says: “Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise? I thought not. It is not a story the Jedi would tell you. It was a Sith legend. Darth Plagueis was a Dark Lord of the Sith, so powerful and so wise he could use the Force to influence the midichlorians to create life...