The experts talk. What is the difference between the wisdom of experience and the babbling of an old fool - so deep in their paradigm rut, they can't see over the brim? You decide. Sometimes only hindsight can tell.
What does this say about the "experts" of today.
"I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled..."
"There is no such thing as consensus science. If it's consensus, it isn't science. If it's science, it isn't consensus. Period." A lecture by Michael Crichton at California Institute of Technology (2003) [Link]
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977.
"I believe this Government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free." Abraham Lincoln (1865).
"We, the German Führer and Chancellor, and the British Prime Minister, have had a further meeting today ... We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again... My good friends ... I believe it is peace in our time." Neville Chamberlain, British Prime Minister, 30 September, 1938.
"Sensible and responsible women do not want to vote." Grover Cleveland, U.S. President, 1905.
"The Americans are good about making fancy cars and refrigerators, but that doesn't mean they are any good at making aircraft. They are bluffing. They are excellent at bluffing." Hermann Goering, Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, 1942.
"We will bury you." Nikita Krushchev, Soviet Premier, predicting Soviet communism will win over U.S. capitalism, 1958.
"We will not bother to denounce it [communism], we'll dismiss it as a sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages are even now being written." Ronald Reagan
"The energy produced by the breaking down of the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine." Ernest Rutherford, shortly after splitting the atom for the first time. He won Nobel Prize in 1908 for Chemistry.
"There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom." Robert Millikan, American physicist and Nobel Prize winner, 1923.
"There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will." Albert Einstein, 1932. He later changed his mind.
"That is the biggest fool thing we have ever done [research on]... The bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives." Admiral William D. Leahy, U.S. Admiral working in the U.S. Atomic Bomb Project, advising President Truman on atomic weaponry, 1944.
"Transmission of documents via telephone wires is possible in principle, but the apparatus required is so expensive that it will never become a practical proposition." Dennis Gabor, British physicist. He received a Nobel Prize for inventing the hologram.
"X-rays will prove to be a hoax." Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1882.
"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.
"The monopoly of science in the realm of knowledge explains why evolutionary biologists do not find it meaningful to address the question whether the Darwinian theory is true." Phillip E. Johnson, Professor, UC Berkeley
"Today the theory of evolution is about as much open to doubt as the theory that the earth goes round the sun." Richard Dawkins, Professor, Oxford University.
