By Samuel Strait, Reporter at Large – January 6, 2020 It has become an increasingly familiar event when modern"scientists" utter words of such complete foolishness that one wonders what exactly has happened in the world of science. As long as humans have inhabited the earth the tiny lights that move across the night time sky have elicited a strong sense of curiosity and the need for explanation. From the time of the Greek, Aristotle, then Ptolemy, a theory of planetary movement was developed to account for those tiny specks of light we now know as the other planets that occupy the solar system. This system known as the Aristotelian/Ptolemaic theory of planetary motion was for almost two millennium considered by academics, theologians, and philosophers, the scientists of the day, as the consensus theory. So great was the pressure to conform that the church and academics condemned non believers as uninformed lunatics and heretics, to be imprisoned in some cases and cast out of the church in others. While the notion of consensus did not end in 1543 with the publication of Nicolaus Copernicus's "Six Books Concerning the Revolutions of the Heavenly Orbs", in less than a century it completely shattered the notion held for more than two thousands years that the earth was the center of the planetary system and replaced it with the sun. As so often history reminds us that a great deal can be learned from the lessons of the past, it should be shocking that even in this day and age, humans continue to repeat the mistakes of the past. It is often said when going down the path of failure repetitively, that if only I'd been in charge it will work this time. Yet in nearly all occasions those arrogant enough to utter those famous words, clearly do not account for the most fundamental flaws that presage another failure. The Aristotelian/Ptolomeic theory was not the first consensus theory to have crashed and burned in the scientific universe and it is unlikely to be the last. As we have entered into the 21st century, many scientists seemingly have forgotten the lessons of the past and some arrogantly proclaim we have all the knowledge necessary to say that it is all there is to know. No one can offer anything further to advance the science because we the "experts" have figured it all out. The question becomes, if that is so, does science stop advancing? Of course that is absurd because we haven't figured it all out and should continue to build on what we do know. Before Nicolaus Copernicus's new theory had even been accepted by the "consensus" scientists of the age, barely one hundred years would past before new refinements were added to his system of planetary motion. This evolution continues to this day. It should be a stark reminder to those that shout "consensus we know all there is to know" for there are many hotly contested areas of scientific discovery where we do not know all there is to know. Scientists of this modern world where technology abounds, a health reminder of the past is important to those in any scientific discipline that the science of consensus can flounder on the rocks at any moment. Scientists should take to heart the lessons of the past and open their collective minds to listen, for your consensus may soon follow others into the dust bin of historical failure.