I (and I'm sure many others) feel exactly the same way. But we also need to admit the possibility of something like confirmation bias. So, you've mentioned several cases where we finally got a result which was exactly what we expected all along. Those cases stand out to use because they our brains naturally prefer them to cases where we were wrong. So then I have a couple of questions.
When were we wrong? What are some other cases which didn't turn out like we expected? It may be harder to think of them but they must exist. What would have been the consequence of acting too early on those cases based on our speculation, now that we know we had been wrong?
Do you think we should start to take a more proactive approach to these kinds of problems? I mean, should we look at a problem and assume it's caused by whatever happens to look like the culprit?
One example of where we are wrong is the commonly held belief that saccharin causes cancer. I mean, it's artificial, it's cheating to get sweetness, it has to be bad right? Turns out the initial studies looking at bladder cancer in rats were misleading (lots of confounders).
When were we wrong? What are some other cases which didn't turn out like we expected? It may be harder to think of them but they must exist. What would have been the consequence of acting too early on those cases based on our speculation, now that we know we had been wrong?
Do you think we should start to take a more proactive approach to these kinds of problems? I mean, should we look at a problem and assume it's caused by whatever happens to look like the culprit?