It is not the present from which
we will learn the truth of right or wrong.
It is rather from the verdict of history
which lies beyond the influence
of passion and familiarity.
-- Ralph F. Couey
Copyright © 2018
by Ralph F. Couey
Copyright © 2018
by Ralph F. Couey
One of my favorite books has always been Michael Crichton's Andromeda Strain, his bio-science thriller from 1969. Crichton has a way of weaving science fact into very entertaining story telling, leaving the reader (at least in this book) wondering if it really happened. In the story, one of the characters, Dr. Peter Leavitt, formulated the Rule of 48. It refers to the discoveries of the number of chromosomes in a human cell. Since 1923, that number had always been 48. There were a number of careful studies, backed up by photographs. Then in 1956, another geneticist announced to the world that the number was actually 46, again backed up by studies and photographs. But when researchers went back to the original 1923 studies and counted, they found not 48, but 46 chromosomes. Dr. Leavitt's Rule of 48 thus became "All scientists are blind."
This is only one example of a multitude of historical facts once believed to be unassailable truth, which the passage of time has proven to be completely wrong.
The difference between right and wrong is far from absolute. In the moment, judgement is impaired by emotion, politics, personal bias, and situational elements. The passage of time puts distance between the event and pragmatic analysis. Absent those powerful influences, a far more correct conclusion can be rendered.
An eminent British scientist in 1882 pontificated that science had reached a point where, in his view, there was nothing more to be discovered. This was, I note, before the airplane and a host of other scientific achievements which have occurred since. If anything, scientific discoveries have accelerated in just the last three decades, led by the sprinting information technology areas. The truth is, we don't know what the ceiling is likely to be, although the spectre of the Terminator hangs ominously over future achievements in artificial intelligence. There are multiple voices out there cautioning that we can't allow technology to increase beyond our capability to positively control.
It was once stated with strident affirmation that the world was flat. And while that view has had a recent revival, Pythagoras proved, and astronauts confirmed that the world is indeed a sphere. It was once believed that the clouds shrouding Venus covered a swampy surface inhabited by dinosaurs. Now we know that those clouds are made of acid and produce atmospheric pressures that squash stones flat. Percival Lowell once "proved" that Mars had a system of canals. We now know Mars to be a land of deserts, mountains, and craters, but no canals.
It was once thought that peoples from the developing world (Africa, Asia, etc.) were fundamentally less developed than the white people of the industrialized Europe and America. In the past century, many of the most significant developments have come from those areas and peoples.
Once the United States had developed the atomic bomb, the government was sure that conventional warfare was extinct, and thus cut defense budgets to the bone. This lie was revealed as conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Africa, Latin America, and other places replaced the One Big War with a host of smaller regional conflicts, where a WMD was not only useless, but almost irrelevant. While the nuclear arsenals did, I think, keep that last final Big War from happening, it hasn't ended armed conflict. In fact, there is more war happening in the world on a daily basis.
It becomes interesting, and perhaps prudent to think what truths we hold today to be self-evident are actually ill-conceived hogwash. But we cannot know today. We must wait for time to produce the verdict.
It will be the wisdom of ages yet to come which will reveal the truth we seek.
This is only one example of a multitude of historical facts once believed to be unassailable truth, which the passage of time has proven to be completely wrong.
The difference between right and wrong is far from absolute. In the moment, judgement is impaired by emotion, politics, personal bias, and situational elements. The passage of time puts distance between the event and pragmatic analysis. Absent those powerful influences, a far more correct conclusion can be rendered.
An eminent British scientist in 1882 pontificated that science had reached a point where, in his view, there was nothing more to be discovered. This was, I note, before the airplane and a host of other scientific achievements which have occurred since. If anything, scientific discoveries have accelerated in just the last three decades, led by the sprinting information technology areas. The truth is, we don't know what the ceiling is likely to be, although the spectre of the Terminator hangs ominously over future achievements in artificial intelligence. There are multiple voices out there cautioning that we can't allow technology to increase beyond our capability to positively control.
It was once stated with strident affirmation that the world was flat. And while that view has had a recent revival, Pythagoras proved, and astronauts confirmed that the world is indeed a sphere. It was once believed that the clouds shrouding Venus covered a swampy surface inhabited by dinosaurs. Now we know that those clouds are made of acid and produce atmospheric pressures that squash stones flat. Percival Lowell once "proved" that Mars had a system of canals. We now know Mars to be a land of deserts, mountains, and craters, but no canals.
It was once thought that peoples from the developing world (Africa, Asia, etc.) were fundamentally less developed than the white people of the industrialized Europe and America. In the past century, many of the most significant developments have come from those areas and peoples.
Once the United States had developed the atomic bomb, the government was sure that conventional warfare was extinct, and thus cut defense budgets to the bone. This lie was revealed as conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Africa, Latin America, and other places replaced the One Big War with a host of smaller regional conflicts, where a WMD was not only useless, but almost irrelevant. While the nuclear arsenals did, I think, keep that last final Big War from happening, it hasn't ended armed conflict. In fact, there is more war happening in the world on a daily basis.
It becomes interesting, and perhaps prudent to think what truths we hold today to be self-evident are actually ill-conceived hogwash. But we cannot know today. We must wait for time to produce the verdict.
It will be the wisdom of ages yet to come which will reveal the truth we seek.
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