One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.
Robert A. HeinleinDemocracy can't work. Mathematicians, peasants, and animals, that's all there is - so democracy, a theory based on the assumption that mathematicians and peasants are equal, can never work. Wisdom is not additive; its maximum is that of the wisest man in a given group.
Robert A. Heinlein