I don't think these particular fringe beliefs are directly useful, and they have a real cost in terms of confusion. I also don't expect them to last since they

I don't think these particular fringe beliefs are directly useful, and they have a real cost in terms of confusion. I also don't expect them to last since they are easy to disprove. But they belong to a bigger trend which questions the value of experts and institutional knowledge. This could either send us into a dark age, or challenge a better class of experts and institutional knowledge. My money is on the latter. Few things improve without some kind of challenge.