With Halloween just around the corner, it’s fun to consider the interesting and somewhat creepy occurrences that happen in our world. These three very different conspiracy theories that will blow your mind, make you question everything, and send you down a rabbit hole of conspiracy theory investigation.
1. The Mandela Effect
When people find out that I’m into conspiracy theories, they usually ask to hear about one. The Mandela Effect is my go-to. This one specifically interests me because it’s fairly simple to understand and it affects everyone’s daily life. Simply put, the Mandela Effect is when many people have a similar memory that ends up being false. It’s named after Nelson Mandela, who many people believed died in prison in 1993, when in reality he didn’t actually die then. This conspiracy theory gained popularity when people started to realize that the name of the popular children’s novels was spelled “The Berenstain Bears” instead of the widely believed spelling “The Berenstein Bears”. Since then, countless examples have popped up on the internet. Do you remember it being spelled Sex AND the City or Sex IN the City? Do you remember Darth Vader saying “Luke, I am your father” or “No, I am your father”? Do you remember the evil queen in Snow White saying “Mirror mirror on the wall” or “Magic mirror on the wall”? You can definitely spend hours researching this conspiracy theory, so I’ll tell you that this conspiracy theory proposes the idea of alternative realities and parallel universes. Why do so many people share the same false memories? Some believe that in some point in time, there was a shift to an alternate reality where The Berenstein Bears was spelled like The Berenstain Bears. After researching this theory, you can definitely start to look at other theories involving parallel universes and time traveling.
2. Solipsism
This theory once took up a better part of my week. It fascinated me so much that I had to discuss it with everyone and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. This theory is more of a philosophical theory than anything, but I thought I would include one that can cause you to have an existential crisis – just for fun. Solipsism is a theory that says that nothing exists but the individual’s consciousness. It basically implies that everything that happens in the universe is actually just made up in your mind. At first, this sounds crazy, but when you really get to thinking about it, there’s no way to really disprove this theory. You might think, “Well, other people hear and see the same things I do, so they must be real.” But, what if those people are just fragments of your imagination as well? What if everything is a dream? Alright, I’ll stop stressing you out with this theory, but I do urge you to do more research about dreams and reality.
3. Shakespeare Didn’t Actually Write His Plays
Honestly, I think this theory is plausible. The theory says that William Shakespeare wasn’t the one writing the famous plays. This theory explains that William Shakespeare was just an actor and figurehead, and that the actual author of his plays was someone named Sir Francis Bacon, a prominent philosopher, writer, and supposed member of the Free Masons. Sir Francis Bacon realized that England was falling behind in terms of intelligence, as a lot of people were illiterate and there wasn’t an official spelling of a many words in the English language. He decided that in order to get everyone on the same page, he would have to spread language through entertainment. The theory goes that he was visited in his sleep by a divine power that told him to spread education through a different identity. He chose to use the local theater actor, William Shakespeare, as the “author” of these plays because he could convincingly play the part. There are a couple pieces of evidence in support of this theory. One, there are a lot of accounts that the actual William Shakespeare was borderline illiterate and did not have an education. The first biography for him was written 100 years after his death, too far past his death to be accurate. In William Shakespeare’s will, there is no mention of his plays at all. On top of that, all of the legal and court proceedings mentioned in his plays are historically accurate for that time period and are highly in depth. Only someone working in that field and with extensive knowledge of the court would have been able to write that. William Shakespeare could not have had that knowledge, but Sir Francis Bacon could have. The last piece of evidence I will leave you with is that apparently Sir Francis Bacon left secret ciphers throughout the plays that proved he was the rightful author. In the end, if Sir Francis Bacon truly did write these plays, he definitely succeeded in educating England. There are a lot of great historical conspiracy theories like this one that actually make a lot of sense if you want to do further research.
Whether it be mainstream theories about parallel universes, philosophical theories, or historical theories, there are a lot of interesting conspiracy theories just begging to be explored. If you’d like to learn about theories similar to the Mandela Effect, there’s a subreddit on Reddit.com called “FanTheories”, where people share theories about tv shows, books, and movies. If you’d like to learn more about theories involving the universe, one of my favorites is the Fermi paradox, which talks about the lack of evidence but high probability of there being extraterrestrial life. And lastly, if you want to research more theories about celebrities in history, two of my favorites are the theory that Elvis Presley faked his own death and the theory that Paul McCartney actually died. Overall, there’s definitely a lot to explore and keep you guessing!