Well, this is an astronomy and science BB.

A key component of science is to entertain all speculations, consider hypotheses that have supporting evidence, and then analyze these propositions in order to determine which are predictive enough to qualify as theories.

Without the speculation that is different from current thinking, this process would never get started.

Of course almost all ATM material gets bogged down in the hypothesis stage, but not all. That 1/1000 of one percent (or so) that makes it through that part of process is so valuable that it more than compensates for the balance which is correctly discarded.

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