"As long as people believe in absurdities, they will continue to commit atrocities." --Voltaire "Nothing is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also believes to be true." --Demosthenes A long, long, long time ago, many people believed the Earth was flat, but for more than the last 2,000 years few educated people have subscribed to this delusion. The story (included in some textbooks used in American schools) that Christopher Columbus' 1492 voyage was the first proof that the Earth is round and not flat is deceitful historical revisionism, nothing more. For (literally) thousands of years, people...