They interacted with their devotees. The devotees were gullible but not all of them were illiterate like Bahaollah and Abdul Baha. If the devotees were not gullible, they would not have believed the yarn that was spun.
Then there were Persian newspapers. Bahaollah might be reading these. Then, the newspapers of the Ottoman empire must have been available in places where Bahaollah lived in exile. Then there are two factors. One that these newspapers must be reporting science incorrectly (just like many of the newpapers do these days). And secondly that the information understood by a person depends on his prior knowledge of the subject and capacity to understand. Bahaollah who had not studied any science and did not have any prior knowledge of it.
"The first Iranian newspapers appeared in the mid-19th century during the reign of Nasir al Din Shah. More specifically, the first newspaper in Iran,
Kaghaz-e Akhbar (The Newspaper), was launched for the government by Mirza Saleh Shirazi in 1837. By 1907 (the era of the Persian Constitutional Revolution), there were 90 newspapers circulating in Iran."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_newspapers_in_Iran
"In 1828, Khedive of Egypt Muhammad Ali ordered, as part of the drastic reforms he was implementing in the province, the local establishment of the gazette
Vekayi-i Misriye (Egyptian Affairs -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takvim-i_Vekayi), written in Ottoman Turkish in one column with an Arabic translation in a second column (Ottoman Turkish text was in the right one and Arabic text in the left one). It was later edited in Arabic only, under the Arabic title "
al-Waqa'i` al-Misriyya" (The Egyptian Affairs).
The first official gazette of the Ottoman State was published in 1831, on the order of Mahmud II. It was entitled "
Moniteur ottoman" (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moniteur_ottoman), perhaps referring to the French newspaper
Le Moniteur universel. Its weekly issues were written in French and edited by Alexandre Blacque at the expense of the Porte. A few months later, a firman of the sultan ordered that a Turkish gazette be published under the named "
Takvim-i Vekayi" (Calendar of Affairs -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takvim-i_Vekayi), which would be effectively translating the
Moniteur ottoman, and issued irregularly until November 4, 1922. Laws and decrees of the sultan were published in it, as well as descriptions of court festivities.
The first non-official Turkish newspaper,
Ceride-i Havadis (Register of Events), was published by an Englishman, William Churchill, in 1840. The first private newspaper to be published by Turkish journalists,
Tercüman-ı Ahvâl (Interpreter of Events), was founded by İbrahim Şinasi and Agah Efendi and issued in October 1860; the owners stated that "freedom of expression is a part of human nature", thereby initiating an era of free press as inspired by the ideals of 18th century French Enlightenment. In the meantime, the first private newspaper written solely in Arabic,
Mir'at al-ahwal, had been founded by a Syrian poet, Rizqallah Hassun, in 1855, .. Subsequently, several newspapers flourished in the provinces."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_of_the_Ottoman_Empire
