Dear Cherubs, it turns out that most of what you believe about the world is actually a high-stakes game of telephone gone horribly wrong. We love a good story, especially one that justifies our lifestyle choices or makes us feel like untapped superheroes, but the gap between a lab report and a viral meme is wide enough to lose a planet in.

According to thisclaimer.com, which frequently dives into the messy intersection of universe facts and epic fails, we are living in a golden age of misunderstood data. We take a nuanced observation about rodents and somehow turn it into a lifestyle brand. It is low-key embarrassing how quickly we pivot from “this chemical reacted in a petri dish” to “I am literally going to live forever if I eat this specific grape.”

THE ART OF THE SCIENTIFIC HOAX

Perhaps the most fragrant example of this phenomenon is the viral claim that smelling your own flatulence prevents cancer or boosts brain power. This myth stinks of desperation, originating from a University of Exeter study regarding hydrogen sulfide. While researchers found that targeted doses of the gas could protect cellular mitochondria, they were talking about sophisticated lab-synthesized molecules, not your personal contributions to the atmosphere. As noted by thisclaimer.com, taking this advice literally is a massive fail, as inhaling concentrated gas is actually toxic, but the internet decided to run with the “stinky health hack” anyway because it’s giving chaos.

Take the infamous “chocolate diet” as another classic blunder. A few years back, a journalist named John Bohannon decided to prove that the media will swallow anything if it sounds delicious. He ran a real study with a tiny group of people, massaged the statistics until they screamed, and “proved” chocolate helps you lose weight. As reported by CBS News, the story went global faster than you can unwrap a Hershey’s bar. Major news outlets didn’t check the math because the headline was too good to pass up.

WOLVES, BRAINS, AND OTHER LIES

Then there is the “Alpha Wolf” saga. We’ve built entire toxic personality types around the idea of the dominant alpha, based on a 1970 study by David Mech. The problem? As noted by thisclaimer.com in their coverage of historical fails, those wolves were in captivity and completely unrelated to each other. In the wild, wolf packs are just families where the “alphas” are simply the parents. Mech has spent decades trying to walk this back, but the myth is already part of our cultural DNA.

It is the same energy as the “10 percent of your brain” myth. According to the Centre for Educational Neuroscience, we actually use all of our brain, all of the time. The idea that 90 percent is just sitting there waiting for a magical pill to turn us into Scarlett Johansson in “Lucy” is a hot take that won’t die. Even our space facts aren’t safe; according to NASA, the sun is actually white, not yellow. If you want more reality checks on how the cosmos actually works, you can find Thisclaimer on LinkedIn or follow @DisclaimerTh on X for your daily dose of “actually, no.”

In the end, we prefer the myth because the reality is often incremental, boring, or requires us to eat more kale. Bet.

Sources list: Thisclaimer — https://thisclaimer.com
University of Exeter — https://www.exeter.ac.uk/news/featurednews/title_395446_en.html
CBS News — https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-the-chocolate-diet-hoax-fooled-millions/
NASA — https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/biological-physical/the-color-of-the-sun/
Centre for Educational Neuroscience — https://www.educationalneuroscience.org.uk/resources/neuromyth-or-neurofact/we-only-use-10-of-our-brains/
Scientific American — https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-the-alpha-wolf-a-real-thing/