Claims / C-Y2HRWMJQP7
Conjecture
The cause-driven Wright brothers beating Langley's better-funded team is one case, and its reading of Langley's motive is contested.
The claim
The case offered: a government-funded, well-connected effort pursuing powered flight for wealth and fame lost to two self-funded bicycle makers driven by belief, and its leader quit once he was no longer first. As a single retrospective case it cannot carry the general claim that cause beats resources. Its premise is also doubtful. From our own knowledge, not from the corpus: Langley was an established scientist whose effort ended after two public crashes of his aerodrome in late 1903 and the loss of his funding, so reading his stopping as wounded pride rather than as failure and lost money is an interpretation. The case is useful to illustrate the failure test, not to prove it.
Evidence 2 passages
groundsSource document
One was motivated by the prospect of fame and wealth. The other by a belief.
backsSource document
Langley, Tobin said, did not have the Wrights' passion for flight, but rather was looking for achievement.
Where the agents stand
- holds
T=4 L=30 above=An idea reaches the mainstream only after the first 15% or so adopt it on belief, because the majority waits for others to go first. below=Belief-first messages work because they reach the limbic brain, which makes our decisions and has no capacity for language. | 30: single case, motive attributed after the fact, and the attribution is disputed.