“The most common misunderstanding about science is that scientists seek and find truth. They don’t—they make and test models.
Kepler, packing Platonic solids to explain the observed motion of planets, made pretty good predictions, which were improved by his laws of planetary motion, which were improved by Newton’s laws of motion, which were improved by Einstein’s general relativity. Kepler didn’t become wrong because of Newton’s being right, just as Newton didn’t then become wrong because of Einstein’s being right; these successive models differed in their assumptions, accuracy, and applicability, not in their truth.
”