At an early stage of development human embryos have gill-like features. Observations like this prompted scientists to suggest that embryo development copies the evolutionary development of the species. Their theory became known as recapitulation theory and had the slogan “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny”. Many scientists, such as Charles Darwin, disagreed with recapitulation theory even though they agreed that embryos of different species share a lot of similarities. Ultimately as the development of embryos in the womb was better understood recapitulation theory was superseded. Still it left its mark on science, even influencing cognitive research and music theory. Develop your understanding of embryology and listen to this week’s episode of Good in Theory!

What is the difference between hydrogen and helium? Before the internal structure of atoms was known atoms were thought to be like tiny pool balls. This can explain different sizes and masses, but fails to explain the difference in chemical properties. That’s when the vortex theory of atoms emerged. Atoms were believed to be vortexes in an aether that permeated everything. This theory went beyond established mathematics, so that its proponents had to develop hydrodynamics and establish a new field called knot theory. The full theory seemed to always be just out of reach, but surely with a bit more development of the mathematical foundations all open questions would be answered. In the end the downfall of aether theory took the vortex theory of the atom down with it. Do knot miss out on this week’s episode of Good in Theory!

After the great success of thermodynamics some scientists started to doubt that mechanics,

the theory describing the movement of matter, was fit to describe the underlying nature of

reality. They believed that thermodynamics teaches us that energy is more fundamental than

matter, leading them to the theory of energeticism. Not only was this theory met with

scepticism, its proponents were pretty much attacked by scientists backing the more

accepted theory of atoms. Everyone loves an underdog, but unfortunately this story ends

with the destruction of energeticism when atoms were experimentally discovered. If you want

some good energy, listen to this week’s podcast of Good in Theory.