Scientific Serendipity
Published by When you look at how much science has been discovered by chance or accident you may think that instead of the phrase “Eureka! I have found it!” maybe science should be denoted by the phrase, “Yeah, I meant to do that’.
There is such a thing as Scientific Serendipity. In general, serendipity means that you discovered something unexpected and good. For instance, you are looking in your pants pockets for that traffic ticket you just got and you find twenty dollars that you didn’t know you had.
Who was the first guy who thought that drinking sour milk was a good idea? How did he get past the smell? For that matter who first thought animal intestines which are used as food all over this planet would be good to eat even after you washed out our cut off the stinky parts?
Let me stick these leaves in your mouth. Hold still whilst I light the leaves with this burning wood. Most of us now agree that smoking is not a good idea but it used to be that all the “cool” people did it. When you think about the first guy who took up smoking you wonder if he had a death wish.
Tell you what we will kill animals of various types and strap them to your feet. If the animals prove to be too big for your feet we will tie the animal skins to your back and call it clothes. One of the strangest things about the objects we have used for clothing down through the ages is all the processes used to get rid of the stinky parts. Who knew, the first time that it was going to be worth all that effort to skin the hides and soak them in lye? I suppose you could reason that if the bear’s fur kept the bear warm it might keep you warm too.
Chemistry must be an exceedingly deadly profession because those guys are forever putting unknown substances into their mouths. Once in a while, when the chemist doesn’t choke and die, something interesting is discovered by this trial and error. For instance, the artificial sweeteners saccharin and aspartame were discovered by serendipity.
The sex lives of countless Americans were revolutionized by several accidental discoveries. For instance the drug Minoxidil which was being investigated as a hypertension drug when it was accidently found to grow hair. Those who don’t know what male patterned baldness has to do with sex life may be too young for this article. Viagra was being studied for its effect on hypertension when it was noted to have beneficial side effects.
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