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It took 50 years for plate tectonics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics#History_of_the_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics#History_

• mannykannot 4y ago
  Are you not conflating continental drift with plate tectonics? The former was, for several decades, not widely accepted on account of the lack of a plausible mechanism. The latter is not the theory that the continents drift, but it provided the missing mechanism for how they do. Acceptance of both was swift once the distinctive paleomagnetic patterning of the oceanic crust was discovered. This scientific revolution was data-driven.