(January 8, 2016 at 2:34 pm)Stimbo Wrote:(January 8, 2016 at 2:22 pm)athrock Wrote: So, were all those who argued in favor of a Big Bang routinely mocked in Internet forums by the "establishment cosmologists" at one point?
Maybe Mahoney is just another insignificant patent clerk waiting for his big break.
Maybe, but were I him I would cringe at the quality of champion defending me, if this thread is anything to go by. Comparing him to Einstein just on the offchance that he may be the next one is a backhanded argument from authority; it's up to you and similar proponents to etablish the fact, not simply surmise it. Posturing from a position of ridicule doesn't exactly help.
And yes, BBT was and continues to be thoroughly peer-reviewed. The major difference is that the BB supporters separated their personalities from the work they presented for scrutiny. They didn't just say "you must believe this because we're clever", nor did they try to sell their work on the back of deriding their opponents as idiotic.
My point is simply that the crackpot ideas of today often turn out to be the bedrock of mainstream thought tomorrow.