Historical Some historical ideas that are considered to have been refuted by mainstream science are: •
Wilhelm Reich's work with
orgone, a physical energy he claimed to have discovered, contributed to his alienation from the psychiatric community. He was eventually sentenced to two years in a federal prison, where he died. At that time and continuing today, scientists disputed his claim that he had scientific evidence for the existence of orgone. Nevertheless, amateurs and a few fringe researchers continued to believe that orgone is real. •
Focal infection theory (FIT), as the primary cause of systemic disease, rapidly became accepted by mainstream dentistry and medicine after World War I. This acceptance was largely based upon what later turned out to be fundamentally flawed studies. As a result, millions of people were subjected to needless
dental extractions and surgeries. The original studies supporting FIT began falling out of favor in the 1930s. By the late 1950s, it was regarded as a
fringe theory. • The
Clovis First theory held that the Clovis culture was the first culture in North America. It was long regarded as a mainstream theory until mounting evidence of a pre-Clovis culture discredited it.
Modern Relatively recent fringe sciences include: •
Aubrey de Grey, featured in a 2006
60 Minutes special report, is studying human
longevity. He calls his work "
strategies for engineered negligible senescence" (SENS). Many mainstream scientists believe his research is fringe science (especially his view of the importance of nuclear
epimutations and his timeline for antiaging
therapeutics). In a 2005 article in
Technology Review (part of a larger series), it was stated that "SENS is highly speculative. Many of its proposals have not been reproduced, nor could they be reproduced with today's scientific knowledge and technology. Echoing
Myhrvold, we might charitably say that de Grey's proposals exist in a kind of antechamber of science, where they wait (possibly in vain) for independent verification. SENS does not compel the assent of many knowledgeable scientists; but neither is it demonstrably wrong." • A nuclear fusion reaction called
cold fusion, which occurs near room temperature and pressure, was reported by chemists
Martin Fleischmann and
Stanley Pons in March 1989. Numerous research efforts at the time were unable to replicate their results. Subsequently, several scientists have worked on cold fusion or have participated in international conferences on it. In 2004, the United States Department of Energy commissioned a panel on cold fusion to reexamine the concept. They wanted to determine whether their policies should be altered because of new evidence. • The theory of
abiogenic petroleum origin holds that
petroleum was formed from deep carbon deposits, perhaps dating to the formation of the Earth. The ubiquity of hydrocarbons in the
Solar System may be evidence that there may be more petroleum on Earth than commonly thought and that petroleum may originate from carbon-bearing fluids that migrate upward from the Earth's mantle. Abiogenic hypotheses saw a revival in the last half of the twentieth century by Russian and Ukrainian scientists. More interest was generated in the West after the 1992 publication by
Thomas Gold of the journal article, "The Deep, Hot Biosphere". Gold's version of the theory is partly based on the existence of a
biosphere composed of
thermophile bacteria in the Earth's crust, which might explain the existence of specific biomarkers in extracted petroleum. •
Young Earth creationism, asserts the Universe is under 10,000 years old, with variations, such as
Gap creationism, and
Old Earth creationism, offering similar propositions. •
Modern flat Earth advocates assert that
Samuel Rowbotham was correct, in his, 1849, pamphlet, and 1865 book,
Zetetic Astronomy: The Earth not a Globe, to reject the
Hellenistic (323 BCE–31 BCE) spherical earth model, for a flat disc world, centred on the North pole. •
Out of India theorem - asserts
Indo-European languages evolved in India, and spread to Europe through waves of pre-historic Indian immigrants.
Accepted as mainstream Some theories that were once rejected as fringe science but were eventually accepted as mainstream science include: •
Plate tectonics • The existence of
Troy •
Heliocentrism •
Norse colonization of the Americas • The
Big Bang theory •
Helicobacter pylori bacteria as the causative agent of
peptic ulcer disease • The
germ theory of disease •
Neanderthal-Homo sapiens hybridization ==Responding to fringe science==