Article September 12, 2016 Issue

Fact or fable, you can find out

Hannah Carlson

How is it possible to know if something is a fact or fable?

We know that if something is a fact, it can be proved, such as the aerodynamics of airplane flight. If something is a fable, it’s a story not founded on facts, such as that man will never fly because flying machines are heavier than air. People believed this fable for centuries until the Wright brothers flew their homemade Flyer in 1903. Even then, in 1906, Scientific American published an article, “The Wright Aeroplane and Its Fabled Performances.”

The public and press eventually took the Wright brothers seriously, and a major change in thinking occurred. Once a fable is proved false, the fact is then learned and can be demonstrated widely and in expanded ways, as man’s flight proved with landing on the moon a little more than 65 years after the law of aerodynamics was proved to be fact.

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