To answer your call for sources: In my readings of literature, I've noted occurrences of the insanity motif; WWI-era politicians said something along those lines, it recurred periodically throughout the 20th century and especially after Sept. 11, 2001, and even Graham Hancock et al. noted a similar idea in "Mars Mystery."

As for the idea that rapid change causes stress, the historian Jacques Barzun ("From Dawn to Decadence," Harper Collins, 2000) noted that much of Western Civilization's "decadence" was a reaction to the jarring disclocation caused by industrialization. Based on articles in the Skeptical Inquirer that have linked belief in pseudoscience to a desire to escape the change inherent in science, it is not much of a leap to connect the dots and see belief in fixed ideas as a reaction to societal change and the perceived "insanity" of society related to the disconnect between fixed beliefs of individuals with teh changing beliefs of general society.

I hope that answers your question.

Jason