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They used to pose as alchemists. "Fund me and I will produce an endless supply of gold."

Two years later.

"How it's going?" "Making progress, not quite there yet. I'm going to need more funding."

And so on.

The sophists in ancient Athens maybe? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophist#Democracy

So you just moved the goalposts from "this is new and unique to the recent wave of Silicon Valley bullshitters" to "well, this started in the industrial era"?