Why People Believe Weird Things Book Summary - Why People Believe Weird Things Book explained in key points

Why People Believe Weird Things summary

Name: Why People Believe Weird Things
Rating: 3.7 (36 reviews)
Author: Michael Shermer

Michael Shermer

Pseudoscience, Superstition and Other Confusions of Our Time

3.7 (36 ratings)

16 mins

Topics

Atheism

Table of Contents

Why People Believe Weird Things
Summary of 9 key ideas

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Key idea 1 of 9

What’s in it for me? Learn about the strange things people believe in, and why.

Superstition and belief in supernatural phenomena are by no means left in the past. Even today, people believe in a wide range of absurd things, such as divination, creationism or alien abductions. Some of these things may induce nothing worse than weary head shakes, and some can actually be dangerous. Why do these pseudosciences persist? Why do people believe in them?

Why People Believe Weird Things attempts to answer these puzzling questions. In these blinks, you’ll learn about some of the most commonly held pseudoscientific “theories,” and the irrational arguments their proponents use to back them up. You’ll learn what makes pseudosciences so different from actual sciences, and how to tell the difference between them. You’ll also learn

how you can become a psychic in just a few minutes;
why the human wish for immortality will likely remain just a dream;
why the “tunnel” seen by people who have near death experiences is biological.

Science is based on facts – pseudoscience is based on belief.

What separates real science from pseudoscience? Pseudosciences like astrology or creationism claim to be “scientific,” but they actually reject scientific laws and methods.

Science is based on laws that can be measured. A scientific law describes an action in nature that can be proved by tests. Once we’ve determined a certain law, we can use it as a basis for further theories and research.

Consider the law of gravity. We can test it again and again, and confirm that it’s always true. Scientists can research the physical world further, knowing that the law of gravity will always be a part of it.

A scientific theory can also be tested, but it’s different from a law, because it’s possible to prove a theory wrong. The fact that theories don’t have to be correct is actually one of science’s greatest strengths. Anyone can research a theory, and correct and improve it if necessary.

Pseudoscientific theories, however, aren’t based on facts. They’re based on belief, which also means they can’t be proven wrong, because you can’t disprove someone’s subjective belief.

Unlike science, pseudosciences don’t involve any sort of laws or evidence. Instead, they’re based on intangible ideas or assumptions.

Divination, for instance, is based on the assumption that certain people have innate psychic powers. Yet throughout human history, no one has ever been able to prove that psychic powers exist. Because divination isn’t based on evidence, it can’t be tested.

Ultimately, pseudosciences can never be proven wrong – or right – which is where they differ from science. A scientist would say, “x is true because I can prove that x is true,” whereas a pseudoscientist would say, “x is true because you can’t prove that x is wrong.”

Scientific knowledge always grows and improves, whereas pseudosciences are static.

Since the dawn of humanity, scientific knowledge has been growing – and growing rapidly. Over the millennia, people have researched, tested and improved scientific ideas, so that our understanding of science is always increasing.

Each new scientific theory is based on the current body of knowledge. If a theory gets replaced by a newer one, we can still retain the useful information from it.

Divination isn’t magical – it’s simply guess work, close observation and research.

If you watch a mind reader or psychic at work you might be surprised at the accuracy of their information. Accurate readings, however, don’t mean that divination is real. Psychics use tricks to fool their audience into believing them, just like magicians.

There are two methods that psychics or other mystical people use to fool people into believing them.

Near death experiences are purely biological, and can be explained.

It’s a marvel of modern medicine that many people survive severe accidents or life-threatening comas where they technically “die,” but there’s still some mystery: many of these survivors report the same experience. They say they felt they were leaving their body, and moving through a tunnel toward a light.

The similarities between these testimonies are one of the driving forces behind religions, mysticism and spiritualism. But while believers view the accounts as proof of life after death, scientists have found rational explanations for them.

“Alien abductions” are really the result of psychological and physical stress.

Stories of alien abductions are very widespread. How can so many witnesses be lying? Actually, they aren’t, it’s just that certain experiences can cause hallucinations that are so real that the affected person confuses reality and fantasy.

Many alien encounters are actually caused by not getting enough sleep. “White-line fever” is a sleep disorder that’s often experienced by truck drivers. Lack of sleep combined with the monotony of driving (and seeing the endless white lines on the road) leads to hallucinations, which can be quite extreme.

Modern witch hunts and cults are just like those in the Dark Ages.

In the Dark Ages, “witches” were hunted down and various cults were founded in the name of religion. We don’t call people witches any more, but people still go on witch hunts today for no rational reason.

In fact, medieval witch hunts have the same characteristics as certain modern crazes. From time to time, some kind of mass hysteria is triggered. People get falsely accused of a crime, the media goes wild and people become convinced that an innocent person is guilty.

Immortality is scientifically unlikely.

In 1994, Frank J. Tipler released a book called The Physics of Immortality, which initially received a lot of attention. It might be tempting to believe we have proof that immortality is real, but Tipler’s pseudoscientific theory is untenable.

Tipler believed that by the far distant time when the universe collapsed on itself, humans would have invented a computer that could use the energy thrown up by that catastrophe to virtually recreate every human being from data stored in their memories. Mankind would be saved in a new virtual universe by a godlike computer.

Creationism goes against the very concept of science.

Creationists believe that the Earth and all its living creatures were created by God. They reject Darwin, and view his theory of evolution as an attack on religion.

In reality, creationism is an attack on science. If creationists wanted to prove that God created everything, they’d have to first disprove much of our knowledge about biology, geology or paleontology. Needless to say, they haven’t had any success with this.

Holocaust deniers pretend to be sincerely interested in history, but they actually ignore historical records.

Holocaust deniers acknowledge there was anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany, but insist that there was no planned extermination of Jews in Europe during World War II. They’re emphatic: they just want to know “the truth.”

According to them, Hitler’s final solution for the Jews was actually deportation out of the Reich, not extermination. They believe the main causes of death at the time were disease and starvation. Moreover, they assert that between 300,000 and two million Jews died, rather than five or six million as most historians believe.

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What is Why People Believe Weird Things about?

Why People Believe Weird Things provides an overview of the most common pseudoscientific and supernatural theories. It’ll teach you why so many people believe in them, why they’re wrong, and what methods proponents of pseudosciences use to assert their incorrect theories. It also offers both rational arguments for science, and rational arguments against pseudoscience.

Who should read Why People Believe Weird Things?

Anyone interested in science or psychology
Anyone who wants to learn about incorrect but widely held beliefs
Anyone interested in the difference between science and faith

About the Author

Michael Shermer is a science journalist, historian and founder of The Skeptics Society – a non-profit organization of over 55,000 members that promotes scientific skepticism and fights pseudoscience. He’s the editor in chief of Skeptic, and writes monthly for Scientific American. He’s also published many other books, such as Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design and The Science of Good and Evil: Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share and Follow the Golden Rule.

Categories with Why People Believe Weird Things

Psychology Religion & Spirituality

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