National Geographic has the details on the hoax behind the picture above. It was first created for a Photoshop contest, and then quickly became the subject of various rumours. Here’s one:
An often cited March 2007 article in India’s Hindu Voice monthly, for example, claimed that a National Geographic Society team, in collaboration with the Indian Army, had dug up a giant human skeleton in India.
“Recent exploration activity in the northern region of India uncovered a skeletal remains of a human of phenomenal size,” the report read.
The story went on to say the discovery was made by a “National Geographic Team (India Division) with support from the Indian Army since the area comes under jurisdiction of the Army.”
The account added that the team also found tablets with inscriptions that suggest the giant belonged to a race of superhumans that are mentioned in the Mahabharata, a Hindu epic poem from about 200 BC.
“They were very tall, big and very powerful, such that they could put their arms around a tree trunk and uproot it,” the report said, repeating claims that initially appeared in 2004.
If such giants actually existed, and were alive today, I have absolutely no doubt about the industry in which they’d be most gainfully employed: Porn. So instead of shuddering at the sight of nine-inch thingies, we average males would be fighting despair at the sight of nine-foot thingies. Horrors.
(Link via email from Sanjeev.)