Comment Re:What it means (Score 1) 222
Scientists' efforts to understand nature were subverted by the industrialists' (JP Morgan et al) vision of an electric meter on every home. The pre-established Laws of Thermodynamics (which were figured out by examining steam engines in the 1840's) guided later scientists' efforts to understand electricity and magnetism.
Nikola Tesla grokked electromagnetism, but the robber barons couldn't allow us to use these insights. Heaviside and Lorentz eventually simplified James Clerk Maxwell's 20 equations and 20 unknowns down to the 4 equations still used today, but nature is not simple. Future scientists will eventually realize their predecessors' old assumptions are not entirely accurate.