landscape

that the mountains that i could see in the distance from my house were the barrier of everything. every other state or country had to be somewhere between the ocean on one side and the mountains on the other.

Anon

I used to believe that craters were old dinosaur nests.

dumb one

I used to believe when I was young that little rocks grew into bigger rocks. Now I know its actually the other way around.

Anon

After playing halo, i began to think that the world was actually a huge megastructure, which explained iron deposits deep in the earth's crust. When i learned that things like iron and coal were made from compression of dead organisms, that thought collapsed on itself.

Stevensonbak

When I was little, I used to believe that the world moved under my feet as I walked, I didn't travel over the world, it spun under me.

Mat

When I was a kid I believed that dark places were pieces of the night that didn't go away when the sun came up, because they were caught behind doors and in closets, etc. I thought that the darkness grew up out of the world when the sun started going down. I was very scared of it.

Shotsi

I thought the Earth was something you had to "get back into" or inside of. Example - when astronauts were re-entering from outerspace, my question was "how do they get back inside?" I thought we all lived inside the earth and the green and blue was just the color of the outside ball. I was so embarassed in Science class when the LIGHTBULB went off. Now I'm going to read "most comomn beliefs" to see if anyone else believed that. ha.

Courtney

I used to think those giant wind turbines were really just big fans because it was so hot where they were, and it needed some cooling.

anastacia beeverhousen

When I was little, I used to believe that instead of people moving when they walked, the earth moved in the direction they wanted to go, and the people were stationary. I never did figure out how so many people could walk in separate directions if the earth was moving. I never really though of it - I just knew that when I walked, the earth moved, and when I stopped, it stopped, and it must be the same for everybody else!

Ella Wonderwinkle

From years of watching Gilligan's Island, I knew that quicksand (which frightened me) was common on islands. When I learned that Manhattan was an island, I was terrified by the thought of an upcoming trip there. I comforted myself by planning to stay only on pavement or in buildings AT ALL TIMES, fortunately pretty easy in Manhattan. I survived.

Anon

well when I was little, I thought we lived inside the earth, like in the core. one day I asked my mother how astronauts broke through the earth to get to outer-space. A also wondered how they could fix the holes that must be there. I was horrified when i found out we don't actually live inside...

Anon

When I was a kid, I believed islands floated on the ocean like a boat. The first time my family ever drove to Statin Island in our car, I sat in the back seat terrified that we would sink at any moment or drift away from the mainland.

Anon

Until I was about 15 I honestly believed that the atmosphere was a tactile layer that held us inside the earth. I believed that if we walked on the outside of the earth that we would just float away. It took my step father telling me the truth to make me understand that I was very mistaken :-)

Dawn

When I was very little, my Dad took me to his friends church where they said something along the lines of our being surrounded by God's presence. In my imagination, I pictured the world as being inside God's belly, and much like a snow globe, the sky was the top of His belly (from the inside), and the ground was along His back. When He drank something, it rained; when He coughed, there were earthquakes; when He moved around, the tides rolled in (like when you move in a full bathtub) and when He had gas, the winds would blow. You get the idea. It changed the way I looked at the sky and made me feel just a little claustrophobic.

Silverchild

When I was young, about 5, my mom told me that a bog was a place where when you go in and come out you turn into a mummy. The visualization I got from this was a hole 3x3 feet big, with green fog coming out of it, and mummys coming out of it.

John

I used to think that volcanoes and geysers was the earth vomiting or taking a shit (especially because a lot of geysers i saw when i went to yellowstone for vacation smelled horrible. I didn't know it was because of sulfur)

Shawn

i used to think that hills and mountains were dried updead giants that used to live a long time ago

jammin

When I was little, I believed the hills were giant dinosaurs, waiting to awaken. This scared me to no end on trips to the local snow fields. I still don't know if this is true or not

James