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Many of us have vague knowledge of the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, perhaps from Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible. Twenty accused witches died before the frenzy ran its course. A tragedy to be sure but historically, Salem was a brief, one-time hysteria in colonial America.
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Humanity has produced a delightful array of good ideas, like representative democracy, internal plumbing, and rocky road ice cream. In a healthy marketplace of ideas, wisdom rises and spreads; bad ideas are quickly discarded. So, it’s unsettling and disappointing when dumb ideas gain traction and linger, like a smelly couch left on the front lawn.
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Tease: Maybe the princess shouldn’t marry her uncle.
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Barry Marshall, an Australian medical student, claimed that bacteria caused gastritis, peptic ulcers, and stomach cancer. He believed that cheap antibiotics could cure the syndrome, but his research was met with ridicule and disbelief.
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Drug lag, a complaint that occurs when the FDA is too slow to approve a life-changing drug, is a common issue. For example, thalidomide, prescribed to alleviate morning sickness, faced resistance from the FDA. Dr. Frances Kelsey, was the FDA reviewer who insisted on clinical safety trials before granting approval. She had her suspicions about thalidomide and her "dumb" idea changed the world.
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Anarchy, a worldwide social movement in the 1870s, was sparked by the economic collapse and the Gilded Age, where wealth concentrated among the rich.
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The scientific method has made significant progress in the past 500 years, but one long-respected theory, the static universe, was deemed a dud by scientists like Albert Einstein.
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Christopher Columbus sailed the Atlantic in 1492, believing he had found a new route to India.