I guess it's a sign I'm old. When I was a wee tot, growing up and obsessed with planetary science (as one is), everyone "knew' that the Moon (Luna) formed the same way other Solar System moons formed, bits of the planetary accretion disks left over and drawing together into a body. Only crazy people thought that it might have been caused by a collision [1].
Then moon rocks brought back from the 1960s NASA landings on the Moon suddenly made the collision theory seem much more likely — so much so that it's been the accepted theory for nearly forty years, no matter what explanation I grew up with.
Well, okay, I can go along with changing theories.
Except … now new studies of those rocks are beginning to cause problems with that theory, and spawn new ones.
Which, of course, is the way science is supposed to go. It's just a bit daunting when such big ticket things get reworked multiple times in one's lifetime.
——
[1] Or even a "Crack in the World"! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGXVBW82GnY]
The Moon’s Origin Story Is in Crisis – The Atlantic
After decades of what seemed to be settled science, there’s new, conflicting evidence for how the moon might have formed.
I feel like what you allude to in the last line is a large part of why many people distrust science: because we're learning so much, so quickly, that at least some knowledge we accept as fact gets overturned well within a person's lifetime.
+John Bump Absolutely, which is why I included the comment, to show that while my (semi-tongue-in-cheek) sentiment about How Things Keep Changing is real, I also understand that's how science works and need to learn to stop worrying and love the method. 🙂
I've started talking about this as "everything science says is wrong, but it's the least wrong stuff we know, and it's constantly improving."
People are bad at risk assessment. They want certainty. Science promised them that certainty (well, scientists promised them that certainty) for centuries, and its hard to realize we were sold a bill of goods by scientists who had an emotional need for certainty, too: it's really uncertainty all the way down.
But … it's rational uncertainty. It's being probably wrong in the long run, but wrong for the right reason (what evidence we currently have and how it's been correlated), and usually it's right enough to work under given circumstances.
Too many people want to certainty, and don't know how to balance the black and white opposites of "THIS IS ABSOLUTELY TRUE" with "THIS IS UTTER RUBBISH" … and so assume anything that isn't the first must be the second.
I mean, yeah, it was neat when I thought I had all the moons in the Solar System memorized. But I was wrong, not because there are no moons or because planetology is bunk, but because we just didn't know then all we know now.
+Dave Hill the last thing I remember seeing was collision/synthesis.
+Dave Hill When I first got into planetary science as a kid, Jupiter had 12 moons. Not 12 known moons, but 12 moons. Period. 'Certainty' assured in subtle ways.
+Andrew Westman Yup. 12 for Jupiter. 9 for Saturn. Even if presented for kids, it was still of a "this is the Truth" that shows an unscientific hubris. The "unknown" was still acknowledged, but the implication was that the known was Known.
And then it's wrong, and Pluto isn't a planet, and folk wonder why people mistrust science and scientists. (Which is completely the wrong reason to mistrust science and scientists, but an understandable one.)