I mean, come on, to err is human, so has the great man ever had to eat his words?
Cecil’s human? Nah.
Well he’s given a sort of ‘I don’t know’ with regards to, ahem, ‘piss shiver’.
There are a few old columns posted online that date from the 1970s and 80s that have not yet been updated. The one on whether non-circumcised penises cause cervical cancer springs to mind.
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_068b.html
Further research has apparently disproved this.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=123490
Links repeated here.
http://www.cirp.org/library/disease/cancer/
http://www.fathermag.com/health/circ/cerv-cancer/
http://www.webhealthcentre.com/general/sm_cir.asp
However, this isn’t exactly the same thing as being “wrong”, just “out-of-date”.
Consider this:
Cecil’s “mistakes” are for a reason. Said reason being the Great Man attempts to provide something for everyone, and some people are always looking for mistakes.
He’s got a damn good track record, nonetheless.
But also notice that often his staff answers questions. Thus, you have to examine if the answers were from him or his staff first.
<< Thus, you have to examine if the answers were from him or his staff first. >>
Well, the questions that are answered by Staff are in the section called “Staff Reports” and are clearly labelled as such, with comments like, “SD Staff Songbird replies…” It’s not too confusing.
The weekly columns, with the Slug illustrations, are written by Cecil His Own Self. Staff may occasionally help with bits of research (such as trying to burst mosquitoes, or running through the hall with a quacking duck) but Cecil does the writing. On some occasions, Cecil quotes from the works of others, but that’s always very clear.
There have been very very few errors in the columns over the last 30+ years. Some of those “errors” are simply the case of scientific knowledge advancing the art, so Cecil was reflecting what was viewed as “correct” at the time. Some of the “errors” arise when Ed doesn’t do a thorough job of editing or misread Cecil’s handwriting, and at least one error arose in converting the document into print form.
And, as Cecil himself has said, the sign of greatness is not necessarily infallibility, but the ability to weasel out of being caught.
I seem to recall Cecil addressing the “Monte Hall Riddle,” wherein there is a prize behind one of three doors. After you pick a door, Monte opens another door (always without a prize) and asks if you want to switch doors. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe Cecil said it did not matter if you switched; the odds of winning would be the same. But in reality the odds of winning are 66% if you switch vs. 33% if you do not switch. I believe Cecil later owed up to his mistake after seeing the light…
I thought the weaseling in Can a cloud weigh as much as a 747? was below standard (disillusioning, even).
Personally, I thought his answer to the question “Why is a Nazi jerk like Martin Heidegger considered a great philosopher?” was, if not “wrong” per se, naive and uninformed. I gave my reasons in the Heidegger thread in the Comment on Cecil’s Columns section.
Yeah, I corrected him and he wrote about it.
As Dex says, Cecil hasn’t outright booted very many questions, but in addition to the Monty Hall question, he also blew the one about why blowing on your coffee cools it: Why do you blow on coffee to cool it, but on your hands to warm them?
One of the more notorious columns from Cecil was his rampantly error-filled one about radio stations’ call letters. A poster here wrote in detailing several mistakes (not attributable to advancing science, just a one-time incidence of sloppy research), and the following correction was issued.
I tried searching for the original column, to no avail. Has it been removed to save the Master the embarrassment?
My post with the radio call letter corrections is located at: Cecil’s Lousy Call Letter Answer – this includes the full text of the original column. At the time I posted it, they hadn’t put the columns from Triumph of the Straight Dope on-line yet. And once they did, they apparently skipped over the original column.
Interestingly, when a poorly researched Staff Report reviewing the history of the SOS distress call appeared – by the way, volunteers, rather than Cecil write these – I posted numerous corrections, and was ignored.
I’d still like to see a response for the pitch shift in stirring coffee column. (I’m trying to post a link to the appropriate thread, but can’t seem too make it work Sigh. Search on “stirring coffee” ).
I was quite disappointed by that column.
But mostly things have been excellent.
You know, this is answered in the SD Faq:
"How do we know that Cecil knows everything and is never wrong?
Because he said so, and he would never lie to us."
Cecil certainly get’s 'em right with inhuman accuracy. 
His competition is far more human. I find it entertaining to watch Marilyn flub the physics. She even attracts anti-fans:
Marilyn Vos Savant is Wrong!
http://www.wiskit.com/marilyn/marilyn.html
STIRRING COFFEE? PITCH SHIFT? This is called “The Hot Chocolate Effect” by physics teachers. A google search on those keywords probably turns up some hits.
Brief expl: a single underwater bubble can oscillate like a bell, and a crowd of underwater bubbles can behave as a “sound medium” where the speed of sound is very slow. The inside of a mug of hot chocolate is “acoustically large,” but only until all the microbubbles rise to the surface. Same goes for any liquid w/bubbles.
Coffee won’t do this unless you fill it with microbubbles by, for example, dumping in some sugar or some powdered creamer. I guess the same thing would happen if your “coffee” was made of instant coffee powder.
Yeah, but I got the same effect with just water (as described in the other thread). I performed an admittedly not-too-rigid experiment. Perhaps you’d be better equipped to make it a bit more rigid.