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The Craziest Beliefs Shared By 'One-In-Five' Americans

post #1 of 18
8/26/10 at 2:41pm
Thread Starter 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/0...3.html#s130111


Believe The Sun Revolves Around The Earth
Despite only a few (thousand) years of evidence supporting otherwise, one in five Americans still believe that the the sun revolves around the earth. Because apparently the orbits of millions-of-years-old heavenly bodies is up for debate. (from Northwestern University)

Believe In Alien Abductions
On one hand, one out of five Americans believe in alien abductions. On the other, aliens who plan on enslaving the human race have four out of five Americans exactly where they want them. (from NewsofAP.com)

Can't identify the US on a MAP
In 2007, a Miss Teen America judge asked Miss South Carolina how to remedy the distressing fact that 20% of the population cannot locate America on a map. Apparently he had no idea he was talking to their spokeswoman. (via MTV)

Think George W. Bush Was A Great President
During his last few months in office, the second President Bush's approval numbers hovered around 20%, the lowest in modern history. At that point, staying in the double digits seemed like a real mission accomplished.

Are Unaware Who The U.S. Declared Independence From
The year was 1776. A small band of scraggly yet uncompromising rebels in 13 American colonies were struggling in the noble fight for sovereignty after having been subjected to unfair taxation by tyrants across the ocean in... Russia? China? Mexico? Sigh. (from Gallup)
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post #2 of 18
8/30/10 at 5:37am
omg, thank you for posting this! a morning radio show was talking about it, but i didn't hear where the article was from, and I was trying to tell my dad about it, but could only remember the sun revolving around the earth one
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post #3 of 18
8/30/10 at 6:40am
Calling a belief (which in this case more likely means, the belief in the possibility of) in aliens or alien abductions 'crazy', is a bit arrogant, don't you think?
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post #4 of 18
8/30/10 at 7:46am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keycube View Post
Calling a belief (which in this case more likely means, the belief in the possibility of) in aliens or alien abductions 'crazy', is a bit arrogant, don't you think?
I believe there's other life in the universe... but why the heck would they be interested if a fairly primitive (compared to anything that could build a ship that could traverse solar systems) self destructive race? And if it was, why would they need to repeatedly abduct humans and mutilate livestock?

Nope, the only aliens you're going to see are the illegal ones.
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post #5 of 18
8/30/10 at 8:06am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keycube View Post
Calling a belief (which in this case more likely means, the belief in the possibility of) in aliens or alien abductions 'crazy', is a bit arrogant, don't you think?
I totally agree! Why should we think we're the only life out there?
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post #6 of 18
8/30/10 at 9:18am
If I were a technologically advanced alien species I know I wouldn't waste my time with a primitive self destructive species like humans.

Not being able to identify the United States on a map, and not knowing who we declared independence from is embarrassing.

The ancient Greek astronomer Aristarchus first proposed the heliocentric model during the 3d Century BC.
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post #7 of 18
8/30/10 at 1:17pm
I wonder how many Americans believe in Heaven or Hell?

When you come down to it, it's the rare person (perhaps the non-existent person) who doesn't have a few irrational beliefs.
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post #8 of 18
8/30/10 at 9:38pm
This came from Huffington Post? Surprise, surprise!
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post #9 of 18
8/31/10 at 4:22am
I wonder if you could find 20% who think Jimmy Carter was a good President. That was about the level of Harry Truman, too, when he left office. In fact, going out the door is probably not a good time to be taking a popularity contest. By the time they leave, virtually every President has done enough things to annoy people that they are at their lowest popularity. I'd guess a couple of exceptions would be Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan.

But to put it all in context, several of those are not "beliefs." Whether you can find the U.S. on a globe is ignorance, not belief.

And, in that context, I wonder how many Americans could pass a basic written English test.

And, further, something like 10% of all Americans think Elvis Presley is still alive. Somewhere between 10 and 20% of all Americans think we never landed on the moon.
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post #10 of 18
8/31/10 at 5:49am
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrblanche View Post
I wonder how many Americans believe in Heaven or Hell?

When you come down to it, it's the rare person (perhaps the non-existent person) who doesn't have a few irrational beliefs.
I agree with you, everybody's beliefs are not the same and some of our beliefs might be considered irrational by others. My belief in Heaven and Hell, I am sure is very irrational to some who will read this. To me, however, it is a very real part of what I base my life on.
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post #11 of 18
8/31/10 at 12:49pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by katiemae1277 View Post
omg, thank you for posting this! a morning radio show was talking about it, but i didn't hear where the article was from, and I was trying to tell my dad about it, but could only remember the sun revolving around the earth one
That's my favorite too.
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post #12 of 18
8/31/10 at 12:54pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by threecatowner View Post
This came from Huffington Post? Surprise, surprise!

Its' an aggregation of Polls and the article links to the sources. Unlike things you find on Faux.
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post #13 of 18
9/5/10 at 5:51pm
I wonder if the sun-revolving-around-the-earth thing is just a case of the people not learning the proper info in the first place.
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post #14 of 18
9/5/10 at 10:44pm
You can't believe everything like this to be true.

Statistics are manipulated, mismanaged, misrepresented and massaged by officials and other powerful groups to promote their agendas.

You'd have to dig deep examining these "studies" to see how accurate they are. What demographics were interviewed? Were the questions biased towards/against certain individuals?

Google how to lie with statistics for more...
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post #15 of 18
9/6/10 at 1:01am
Quote:
Originally Posted by SwampWitch View Post
You can't believe everything like this to be true.

Statistics are manipulated, mismanaged, misrepresented and massaged by officials and other powerful groups to promote their agendas.

You'd have to dig deep examining these "studies" to see how accurate they are. What demographics were interviewed? Were the questions biased towards/against certain individuals?

Google how to lie with statistics for more...
I couldn't agree more. This is why I challenge some of the "statistics" thrown out during debates here.
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post #16 of 18
9/6/10 at 3:46am
^I would certainly believe the geography and history related ones, though. The people I went to HS with really were that dumb. How in the heck does one make an F in geography when the teacher never gave us home work? It was usually multiple choice and lifted verbatim from the text book. He taught some history classes, too.
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post #17 of 18
9/6/10 at 5:11am
Here is one for you. There are a lot of people who believe AR groups such as PETA and HSUS do a lot of good. Talk about a crazy and insane belief!!
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post #18 of 18
9/6/10 at 10:28am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Willowy View Post
I wonder if the sun-revolving-around-the-earth thing is just a case of the people not learning the proper info in the first place.
Most likely. Also the things about history could be misinformation from the parents or a misunderstanding in school, or laziness in school to simply not know.

When you are young you are simply a sponge. You believe what your parents tell you. Still though, I've run across people who didn't know who we were fighting against in the American Revolution. It made me cringe in disbelief. How could you not know the history of your own country? It doesn't tend to be misrepresented in the media... I don't know other countries history so I don't blame them if they are not from here.
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