Did you know …
That until the 1970s, physicians were certain that common warts were caused by a tiny fairy or gnome living under the skin? It’s true!
Doctors and anatomists regularly depicted warts in cross section with cozy little rooms inside them, complete with bookshelves, fireplaces, and overstuffed chairs. This was despite the fact that no biopsy or dissection of a wart ever revealed anything more than a bloody, knobby mess, but the doctors always insisted that the gnomes must have heard them coming and evacuated, or at least performed some kind of “Fill my home with blood and knobby shit” spell. It was sort of an extension of Schrodinger's cat poisoning experiment, really.
Today, of course, we understand that there’s no way to prove that warts are caused by fairies or gnomes. They are just as likely the product of a witch’s curse, subcutaneous newt eggs, or impure thoughts coagulating into a cyst. Sometimes the best answer science can give us is that there’s not (yet!) a definitive answer.
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