Remember when they wanted to close the patent office in the late 1800’s because they had the steam engine, so everything that could be invented had been invented...
That was funny.
The science was ‘settled’
Even Michaelsen (of Michaelsen-Morley classical physics fame) in a speech in 1888 said that all major findings in physics had been identified and it was now just a matter of fine-tuning physical science …. A clear demonstration that even brilliant minds can be breathtakingly naive, if not ego-centric.