"It is sometimes desirable to have experimental data which is not completely precise. Had Berthollet been successful in convincing the chemical world that compounds do not have fixed proportions, the development of the atomic theory would have been greatly hindered. The fact that the Proust position became the accepted one in view of the work of Dalton, meant that the trials and errors toward a successful formulation of chemical compounds would ultimately succeed on the basis of an atomic philosophy. Once the atomic philosophy was clearly developed, the existence of the Berthollides could still be incorporated into chemical philosophy on the basis of studies of solid state physics. This illustrates clearly... the fact that science progresses from one state of approximation to another, and that progress may well be hindered when so much precise information is available that broad and useful concepts are overlooked."