A few years ago on an old blog of mine, I was made fun of for asserting that the price of photovoltaic solar cells would fall drastically as a similar effect to Moore’s Law would occur in that area.

The commenter wasn’t doing anything unusual; this was “common knowledge.” But like much common knowledge, it was wrong.

According to conventional wisdom at the time, the price of solar cells would never — not in a million years — be as cheap as they are right now. And they are still falling.

Yes, sometimes conventional wisdom is right. But much of the time it’s just prejudice, status quo bias, and sheer incompetence talking.