Scott M Liell give us reassureance that the founding fathers had to deal with this crap too. Specifically, Ben Franklin's lightning rods were blamed by religious crackpots for causing earthquakes. No shit.

While not present at this sermon, Adams wrote that he heard idle talk of the "presumption of philosophers in erecting iron rods ... attempting to control the artillery of heaven," and dismissed it a drunken nonsense. For his part, Franklin was amused by the reaction. Why, he wryly asked, was it acceptable to build a roof to keep out the rain but blasphemy to place a rod upon the roof to keep out the lightning?

Ha!

It is interesting to note though, all the innovations that have been condemned by religious zealouts that everyone luckily ignored. Airplanes were thought to be an incursion into God's domain similar to the 8-storey tower of babel. Religious zealots have challenged even the most benign technological innovations throughout history, though seemingly seem to have ignored the invention of gunpowder, high-explosives and machine guns.