physics

I used to believe that because jet airplanes went so fast, that if you held a large sheet of paper in front of them, they would go right through the paper without making a hole or tearing the paper.

Dave

I used to lay on the ground looking up at the sky, watching the clouds go by. I thought that was evidence that the world was turning, as if the clouds were stationary, and the world moved beneath them.

Zen_Sorcere

It doesn't fit the vehicle categories, but I think this one's pretty good:
When we were kids a friend of mine thought a ten centimeter long propeller driven ship I had in my bathtub was exactly as fast as the ferrys from Norway to Denmark, because it was a copy of one of them. I disagreed even though I was two years younger. We got into a really long and tiresome argument about it, and I don't think we ever managed to agree. It's been years since I saw him, but if I run into him maybe I should ask if he still thinks it could be the case. He's 34 now.

Christer

After spinning around in a chair or just self-propelled, I thought the spinning environment was the earth rotating. I used to do it a lot cuz i thought it was the only way i could see the earth spinning.

tree

People said that the earth spinned but I never felt this "spin". I then swiftly came to the conclusion that the only way to feel the earth move was to spin around in circles and that your dizzyness was actually the enlightenment of feeling the earth move.

My science teacher told me I was wise for my age.

Anon

I used to believe that each people has their own perception of color, for example: I see color red as red, but when I was a kid I used to think that others may perceive different. I see red but they see other color, and we describe the same color because we are used to it since birth.

Anon

My sister convinced me that if I tied each corner of a sheet around my hands and feet, that I could fly like Super Man. I jumped head first out of a two-story window. Luckliy the sheet did slow me down, but it still hurt.

Anon

When I was embarrassingly old--9 or so, I think--I used to believe that if you had half a glass of water and stuffed a washcloth into it, and the water rose to the top of the glass, you now had a full glass of water. My mother was unable to explain displacement in a way that satisfied me, so I held on to my belief persistently.

Ward Webber

I knew that the earth was spherical for as long as I can remember... but I do remember a time (until I was 4 or 5) that I believed that people on the other side had to hold on to these rungs when they moved from building to building to keep from falling out into space. I thought the houses were made so that the people walked on what we think of as the ceiling... with their feet facing the sky.

Rose

When I was six, I was obsessed with turning out the light and racing it to my bed as I ran and dove on to it.

I thought the after-image in my eyes was the light fading away because it wasn't powered any more by the light bulb.

Andrew

I used to think that lbs. stood for a form of measurement called labs. I felt like an idiot when I realized it meant pounds.

D

I used to believe that if you had this really big sheet of paper, and if a jet airplane flew through it fast enough, it wouldn't hurt the paper.

David E.

I beleived as a child that everything that moved had a wind up key and that it was just a matter of finding it. Some years later I began to think that they were only visible when you had your eyes closed and that if you looked for them really quick you might see them before they disappeared

Anon

As a child, I always wondered why the moon changed color as it rose higher in the sky. So in my mind I formulated a solution: it got hotter as it went up, so that (like metal, I thought) it was RED hot when it first appeared on the horizon, then rose higher and heated up to YELLOW, then when it was up the highest it was WHITE hot.

Polly

My parents are religious fanatics, so of course they did not properly explain the "big bang" to me. I am now an atheist, but back then (when I was 7 or so) I thought the "big bang" theory was idiotic. Why? Well, because I thought that the BIG BANG meant that something went *kaboom* and *poof* there was the earth as I knew it! My parents also told me that the theory of evolution meant that humans evolved from monkeys! But then, many uninformed people make that mistake...

Rose

I used to believe that the front of our green family van was the direction north. Whichever way the van was facing was how direction was determined.

Troy

When I was little I remember being taught that light was the fastest thing in the universe, however to my little mind I wondered that if light was so fast why was the darkness always there first, surely that was quicker?! Seemed logical at the time.

Adr

I remember making myself a pair of Icarus wings out of cardbord. I drew wing shapes and cut them out and made arm straps too. I was really convinced that I would be able to run down the street flapping my arms and take off.
Needless to say, I was heartbroken when it didn't work. :(

Johnny Kayoss

When I was younger, I had a firm belief that if I ever fell from a high place (i.e. a cliff, skyscraper, etc.) I could simply grab on to something during my fall, or jump off of something right before I hit the ground.

Dave

When i was like 6 or 7 i was on a family vacation in cape cod and we decided to go on a whale watch. I was on the top deck with a good number of other people. When a whale came into view all the people of course would go to one side. the waves where making the boat dip back and forth. I thought this was caused by all the whale watchers standing on one side. So to avoid capsizing the boat i would run to the other side and try to balance us out. Needles to say i didn't see very many whales on that tour.

Ghotzy