In 1995, 44-year-old McArthur Wheeler became the unintentional face of a major psychological breakthrough after attempting one of history’s most bizarre bank robberies.
On January 6, 1995, Wheeler and an accomplice robbed two banks in Pittsburgh. What made the crime legendary wasn’t the loot, but Wheeler’s “disguise.” He walked into the banks without a mask, looking directly into the security cameras and even smiling. When police arrested him later that night after his face appeared on the local news, he was reportedly stunned, muttering: “But I wore the juice.”
Wheeler’s “brilliant” plan was based on a fundamental misunderstanding of chemistry. He knew that lemon juice can be used as invisible ink (which becomes visible when heated). He concluded that if he smeared lemon juice all over his face, he would become invisible to security cameras. To “test” his theory, he reportedly took a selfie with a Polaroid camera. Because he was likely sweating and the juice stung his eyes, he aimed the camera poorly and captured a shot of the ceiling. In his mind, the blank photo was proof: the juice worked.
While the police had a good laugh, the story the attention of Cornell University psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger. They were fascinated by how someone could be so incompetent yet so confident. This led to their 1999 study and the naming of the Dunning–Kruger Effect, which describes a cognitive bias where people with limited knowledge of a task vastly overestimate their own ability.
