Chonosuke Okamura

{{Short description|Japanese palaeontologist}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Chonosuke Okamura

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| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1901|06|02}}

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| death_date = 1990s(?)

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| nationality = Japanese

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| occupation = Physician, Pseudoscience researcher

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| known_for = pseudopaleontology

| notable_works = presentations of claims he discovered miniature dinosaurs and humans in the fossil record

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}}

{{nihongo |Chonosuke Okamura|岡村 長之助|Okamura Chōnosuke}} was a Japanese amateur paleontologist. In his late 70s, he claimed to have discovered fossils from the Silurian geological period of miniature animals, ranging from dinosaurs to humans, accounting for more than 1000 allegedly extinct "mini-species", each less than 0.25mm in length.Okamura, C., 1980. Period of the Far Eastern minicreatures. Original Report of the Okamura Fossil Laboratory, 14: 165-346.Okamura, C., 1987. New facts: homo and all vertebrata were born simultaneously in the Former Paleozoic in Japan. Original Report of the Okamura Fossil Laboratory, 15, pp.347-573. He claimed that "There have been no changes in the bodies of mankind since the Silurian period... except for a growth in stature from 3.5 mm to 1,700 mm."{{cite journal | title = Chonosuke Okamura, Visionary | first = Earle E | last = Spamer | journal = Annals of Improbable Research | url = http://improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume6/v6i6/okamura-6-6.html | volume = 6 | number = 6 | access-date = 2011-06-21 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20151118021705/http://www.improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume6/v6i6/okamura-6-6.html | archive-date = 2015-11-18 | url-status = dead }}

In the 1970s, he visited Japan's paleontology conference several times and applied to present his findings. It was rumored that in 1978 an elderly paleontologist who walked into Okamura's lecture became so angry that he suffered from high blood pressure and died prematurely.{{Citation | last = 金子 [Kaneko] | first = 隆一 [Ryuichi] | script-title=ja:新恐竜伝説 | language = Japanese |trans-title=New dinosaur legend | publisher = 早川書房、[Hayakawa] | year = 1993 | page = 62}}. Eventually the paleontology conference changed its rules to ban amateurs and Okamura petitioned overseas colleges, finally publishing his research himself in 1983. He was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for his work in 1996.{{cite news |url= https://www.theguardian.com/education/2004/mar/16/highereducation.research |title=Tiny tall tales: Marc Abrahams uncovers the minute, but astonishing, evidence of our fossilised past | first =Marc | last = Abrahams | authorlink=Marc Abrahams | work = The Guardian | date=2004-03-16 | location= London}}