By the 1930s, two vital things were clear to all those with a even a halfway decent science education (architects and engineers for example).
(A) the observable Universe was 99.9% plasma (hot electrically and magnetically active gas).
(B) the heavier atoms that produced Humanity's familiar solid rocks and metals were a very small percentage of the .1% remaining.
The previous "Appeal to Nature" claim that 'Nature's Progress led inevitably to the domination of the big, the massive, the visible and the solid' was now shown to be totally totally wrong.