As I mentioned yesterday I spent last weekend fighting off nicotine cravings and asking people the following question obsessively:

What is the strangest thing you believe to be true?

As an experiment I asked a lot of people within the Stumbleupon community this question and collated their responses into a series of articles (I asked *alot* of people). This is something of an experiment and I’d like some feedback from our readers wether or not I should do this again in the future. So if you want me doing an article like this on a weekly basis please email me or if you’re a stumbler you can give us the () to show your support and we’ll get the hint.

This is the first installment of a series of articles so if you don’t see your answer here don’t despair, as I’ll be printing all of them eventually.

One last thing, a lot of people bare some very personal and unconventional beliefs here. I’m blogging out of genuine curiousity not to expose these people to ridicule so please be mindful of other people’s feelings when leaving comments.

To go to someone’s Stumble page just click on their handle.

Here we go:

Stewart McCauley
I suffer from debilitating OCD and occasional delusions, so on any
given day my answer might involve suspicions of a friend or imaginary enemy’s attempts to drug me. But today, it would be quantum theory which, oddly, so many everyday people still consider ’strange’ and esoteric. In much the same way as relativity once did, quantum mechanics will change the way we view the universe and redefine our place in it.

Stewart McCauley is a writer and student of Precolumbian archaeology at the University of Texas.

Ashadow:
That instincts are hardwired….not strange when you consider survival of the fittest etc but that rational thinking and logic can be subjugated by reflex and on the other end (learning) conditioning can be so strong that monkeys will not eat banannas etc if paired with the appropriate stimulus.

mindseye:
Existance
‘I think therefore I am !’
neither mathematics, philosophy, religion or science are able to explain how we as material,sentient beings can exist in a material cosmos that came from absolute nothingness. Big-bang cosmology, God, multiverses and string theory never answer the the question, ” And what was before them ”

vizikahn:
When I was young, I had this idea that if I could keep my mind under very strict control, and have long and clear lucid dreams (where I know that I am dreaming while in dream), I could somehow “jump out” of my meat brains. I didn’t believed in soul or anything supernatural, it was just an abstract idea that there could be some other way to keep my mind running in some other form, even if my meat brains stops running it - a kind of “natural mind uploading” scenario. Years later I found out that I had been thinking along the lines of Greg Egan’s dust theory (in the book Permutation City). Now, I *don’t* believe in dust theory, but I still have this habit of whenever I’m having a lucid dream to keep my mind under very strict control, because I think it somehow helps my meat brains to live longer, and maybe, if I some day have an accident and fall into a coma, I can fight my way out of it more easily.

- Marko.

Khemau:
The strangest thing that I believe to be true is the idea of multiple realities. This thought was prevalent in ancient animistic cultures that utilized trance states to facilitate an expansion in consciousness to allow one to experience realities beyond the present physical reality. When results of certain trance states offer information that is qualified by modern science it cautions one to not be so deterministic about what is reality. For example, the Dogon, a West African people skilled in ritual trance work have known for thousands of years about the Sirius star systems where modern science only discovered it a few decades ago. The Dogon claim to communicate with beings from these star systems, in fact, they claim they are from it and for thousands of years they have performed ritual work while in trance that helps maintain a balance between earth and these star systems.

Usually, information like this falls in the category of science fiction or fantasy and even new age thought, however if we look at what is going on in the scientific fields, scientists are now formulating theories that would explain much of what lies in these categories such as multiple realities which falls under the Everett relative-state, many worlds or many universes interpretation of quantum theory. I’ve also looked into the science of super string theory and although I lack a firm understanding, it seems to add more information that would theoretically validate the multiple realities theory. My only question is how may we live the alternate reality of our choosing?

Asaiah

compuveg:
I would have to say that I believe that there’s more to the world than meets the eye. It can also be said that things are not as they appear. I know that’s very vague generalization, but it is probably about all I’ve got time for before I go on to bed for another day at the salt mine.

solidcube:
I’d have to go with Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem, because it’s at the root of many of those other things.

It IS true, and it’s extremely strange because it means that math itself is broken to the core and unfixable.

Godel’s Theorem goes something like this: in any proof of sufficient complexity, there exist undecidable propositions. Paradoxes.

The barber of seville shaves all men of seville who do not shave themselves. Who shaves the barber?

Anomynous:
That people have been swallowed by snakes in the past.

Digitalnova:
The strangest thing that i believe to be true is the coming ’singularity’. You can learn about it at singinst.org. There is strong substantiation for this belief, although it certainly remains on the fringe of mainstream beliefs. If you would like an elaboration on why I believe it to be true, let me know and I’ll be happy to provide support for my belief that the kind of singularity described at singinst.org is coming.

mixed-use:
That the entire manmade world is false.Thoughts are not real
what is is.

Kaylacey:
The strangest thing that is true, is that I think, therefore I am alive/conscious. But if I’m asleep I’m not thinking yet, still I am alive not dead. GO figure.

quillow:
I don’t consider anything I ‘believe’ to be true as ’strange’. I am an advocate of facts and have so far not found myself believing in something that is not likely and or possible. I do sometimes wish though that I was not so closed to such ideas but invariably find my self reverting to what I term ‘rational perspective’.

Funkycaucasian:
George W. Bush is president of the most powerful nation on earth. I believe it’s true and I believe it’s strange. Either that or a giant pink bunny controls everything. I’m kinda hoping the latter is more accurate.

Funkycaucasian is a self-described second-rate attention whore with nothing worthwhile to say.

Red-Man-Red-Man:
I believe that we are at war with a group of states. They are waging war through many unorthodox strategies. I believe that the attacks are economic, political and direct. I believe that countries as large as China may be the ultimate winners of the global conflict and that is very long term. The theories first surfaced in a document called Unrestricted warfare which is said to have been written by generals in the Red Army. Included in the coordinated attacks are Foot and Mouth incident in the UK, and the Egypt Air accident where the pilot is claimed to have piloted the aircraft into the surface. I also believe that the Attempt by China to influence the US politically in the 90’s is part of the strategy… How’s that, probably not that strange

SteveCake:
When I was a kid I used to say that I was from Mars. It was the best way I could think of putting things.

You hear a lot about life after death but you don’t hear so much about life before life. The major faiths will permit you the luxury of an immortal soul but it has the same birthday as your body. Even the reincarnationists skimp a little on the bardos. Kierkegaard moaned that he was just “thrown” into the world without his permission and demanded to see the manager. Literally. In his book Repetition he asks “Is there no manager? To whom shall I make my complaint?” as if the universe was a bad call centre.

Heidegger called this concept “throwness”, this idea that we have no thoughts or ideas or essence before we come into existence. Then Sartre came along and gave a wedgie to the soul and that was it and nobody dared to say otherwise.

The only problem is: I can remember things that happened before I was born; I always have.

I remember being “sent down” to Earth rather than “thrown”. I was a little reluctant to go because I would miss the friends I had up there but they reassured me that it was all fine, that everything would be OK and that I would see them again when it was all over, like a ride. My actual recollection of the place is a little (unsurprisingly) vague but as a child I expressed it in terms of another planet, Mars being the only other planet I had heard of.

I have no real explanation for the meaning of this memory. Perhaps it goes back to my difficult birth. I came out feet first and bright blue with the umbilical coiled around my throat like a noose. In that time maybe I died a little and went back to the terminus we all depart from, snatching a few rare human memories of it before the midwife cut me loose. Maybe I just got brain damage. I don’t know. But I am ready to admit that being Martian is somewhat of a strange belief.

Heralias:
When I was a kid I went to a very strict church. We didn’t have a lot of thinking room about creation, evolution, etc.

There was only one man in the congregation that would sometimes make comments that weren’t straight out of the bible and one day he came up with this…

We don’t believe in evolution, per se, but what if all the bones and animal remains being found my paleontologists were really brought here and buried when the earth was created? What if God knew that he was going to have to have SOMETHING to decompose and enrich the Earth??

Goofy as it sounds…I have always really been partial to that explanation.

Where did the things come from? Other worlds? Other galaxies??

If you believe in God, believe he could create THIS world…why couldn’t everything have happened just like that oh so cool elder from that church supposed?

Not sure whether it was the rebellious feeling of a bit of sci-fi interjected in such a strict culture or if it was just credible to me at the time…but I still feel it’s a very viable option.

nicky187:
I believe that observation of things or events affects “reality.” This is coming out of quantum physics. I’m amazed that there are enough people who agree on what constitutes “reality,” so that there’s enough common ground, that everything doesn’t just “fall apart.”

I suppose I’m looking for Schrodinger’s Cat, but I think he’s somewhere with Godot.

wisefools:
I believe that every mind is connected and the brain is a sophisticated electrochemical sending and receiving apparatus that moves thoughts in and out of our conscious mind. Any separation you observe between minds is an illusion.

Tord:
“The past” - speeking therapeutically as well as philosophically.

aalonso99:
While there are things in the world that are kind of difficult to explain without direct observation or without understanding their origins, most of them can be explained & understood once the originating cause is observed and scientifically demonstrated. Personally, I can’t name one that stands out as the strangest one, mainly because doing that will indicate a knowledge I don’t have. But I can tell you this: we humans are at the same time an irresponsible/ ignorant race, but also a very curious one, always trying to know what’s behind something or who’s pulling which strings and why.

clowntoe:
Well, that’s an interesting question, and a good one to ask me. My belief system is based mostly upon using data available and coming to a conclusion, so most of my beliefs are not considered “strange”. For instance, I don’t believe in a god or supernatural being. However, I don’t think that’s strange. That’s just believing only what I have proof to show.

In answer to your question, I think the strangest thing I believe is that human beings’ brains are not developed to see what is quite possibly relatively simple. I can imagine an advanced alien species looking at us and thinking “I can’t believe they haven’t figured out how to get energy out of simple matter. We learn that in our first few days alive!” I think of it similarly to how one might think of learning math. Perhaps algebra was difficult for you when you first learned it, but then a few years later you look back and wonder why it was so hard, since it seems so logical now. I do think the human brain is in its infancy as far as evolutionary understanding goes.

EccentricGenius:
‘Strange’ is a damned contextual term. I find it *mind bogglingly* strange that Diebold voting machines are in use in the U.S., yet I know that it is a fact. In context of the American sociopolitical climate however, it’s just ‘business as usual’.
I don’t think that this is your context of ’strange’ however.

If you’re looking for a personal belief which is neither commonplace nor in any way verifiable, here’s one that I’ve considered ‘a basic truth’ for years, and which gets me no end of odd looks at cocktail parties:

Time travel is real in some variation of the future, is currently happening, and the changes which occur as a result of extemporal influence have caused, and continue to cause multiple divergences in the timeline, with each subtly different variation existing in parallel with the others.

Yeah, it’s temporal mechanics from a bad sci fi movie, but it’s the only conceivable way of explaining some of the radical *fundamental* changes in reality that seem to be occuring with increasing frequency.

Wiggy, innit?

(To be continued..)

A big hearty shout out to all the Stumblers who bared all. I had a great time corresponding with you guys. And I found the whole experiment oddly theraupatic. It kept me sane while I was quitting smoking. You’re a very welcoming and open bunch of people. Cheers.

Elsewhere in the Blogosphere:

Sya at She Dreams in Digital posted this response on her blog.

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