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copo233 | 4 years ago

You can't call dibs on any future progress in a field.

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kordlessagain|4 years ago

That's a thing nowadays. Trevor Noah talked about this type of biased thinking recently. While it is true there may be a machine in the future that can do what Holmes claimed, there are still people who worked at the company who claimed it was impossible due to our current understanding of the laws of physics.

hn_throwaway_99|4 years ago

> While it is true there may be a machine in the future that can do what Holmes claimed

No, there won't. I feel the need to keep repeating this because for some reason many people seem to conflate "it is not possible with current technology" with "it is a physical impossibility". Doing accurate quantitative blood tests with a finger prick is a physical impossibility.

All that said, one thing that made me especially mad about Theranos is that a lot of their ideas, e.g. one small, portable machine that can run tons of tests; simplified, consumer-accessible pricing; access at neighborhood pharmacies, etc., had a ton of value even if accomplished with venous blood draws. But instead Holmes' delusions of grandeur forced her to hang everything on the fraudulent, and impossible, "must be done with a finger prick" idea.