In earlier chapters, I noted that the acceptance of new scientific views was usually determined by a loosely defined leadership, which Ludwik Fleck had called the community's thought collective. A clearer picture of how this acceptance comes about has gradually emerged through an improved understanding of the ebb and flow of influence within the scientific community. When the weight of mounting influence triggers a cascade, widespread acceptance becomes inevitable. Once set in motion, however, cascades are almost impossible to control; misinformation can spread as readily as more reliably documented data. High priority thus needs to be assigned to containing the spread of error.

Transforming Belief

The inflationary theory of cosmology envisioned by Alan Guth, and extended most persistently by Andrei Linde, proposed that at the birth of time the Universe comprised a high-density vacuum permeated by chaotic fluctuations on all scales. Almost at once, the vacuum explosively expanded at a rate that exponentially increased. During this inflationary phase, which may have lasted no more than 10-33 seconds, distances across the Universe separating individual fluctuations dramatically increased by factors of order ˜3 × 1027 or more. This left the fluctuations isolated, able to seed the formation of clumps of radiation and matter as the inflationary phase subsided.

This astonishing theory was widely adopted almost as soon as it was proposed. It accounted for the homogeneous and isotropic appearance of the Universe; explained why space is seemingly flat, meaning that light propagates along straight lines rather than curved paths as it traverses the Universe; and also suggested why the Cosmos appeared to be devoid of magnetic monopoles.