In an 1899 address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, the physicist J. H. Poynting wrote:

While the building of nature is growing spontaneously from within, the model of it we seek to construct in our descriptive science, can only be constructed by means of scaffolding from without, a scaffolding of hypotheses. While in the real building all is continuous, in our model there are detached parts, which must be connected with the rest by temporary ladders and passages, or which must be supported till we can see how to fill in the understructure. To give the hypotheses equal validity with the facts is to confuse the temporary scaffolding with the building itself.

Similar concerns were expressed by other prominent scientists of this era. How should the Second Philosopher respond to these concerns?