Comment by ben_w

> So let's keep an open mind, our ancestors were anything but idiots.

Just not so open our brains fall out.

Our ancestors were just like us, but fewer in number and inventing things from scratch. Miasma, spontaneous generation, Newtonian gravity, these were not people being idiots, and even though they have been shown to be wrong they are still close enough to still be useful today. Phlogiston also wasn't idiotic, but lacks utility vs being correct about oxygen.

One of the shared ways we failed then and now is that what sounds true isn't the same as what is true; the modern easy example of this is how easily many of us get fooled by LLMs, and I suspect that's how a lot of ancient religions grew, with additions and copy-errors evolving them to be maximally plausible-sounding to a human mind.