In parallel, science shows how honesty underwrites durability. Robert K. Merton’s 1942 norms—communalism, universalism, disinterestedness, organized skepticism—codify the ethic that makes findings reproducible and thus timeless. Richard Feynman’s “Cargo Cult Science” (1974) warns that wishful results collapse when checked. Fraudulent constructs like the Piltdown Man (exposed in 1953) fade, while Newton’s Principia (1687) persists because its claims survive repeated tests. In short, transparent methods make knowledge weatherproof. [...]
