Most inventions lead to prototypes and then to pre-production examples, so they (Huygens telescopes etc) definitely would have had to go through a "nerd" phase.

So I think that Huygens would forgive you. Besides, his place in the history of optics and physics is firmly set in concrete - so nothing we can say will change that.

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It may he that Huygens wouldn't have appreciated being put in the "What the Nerds Do" section and if so, I'm sorry.