# Your private, off the wall theories **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 5, 2012, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963 "2012-05-05T06:39:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![scratch\_llll](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9fc348/32.png) [@scratch\_llll](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scratch_llll)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/61 "2012-05-08T05:27:07Z")
That every one of us has godlike powers that control reality and the only thing holding each reality in check is the perception of others with the majority opinion prevailing. It’s scary. Then I accidentally hit my thumb with a hammer and realize I’m full of crap. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/62 "2012-05-08T05:55:14Z")
> [@scratch\_llll](#): > > That every one of us has godlike powers that control reality and the only thing holding each reality in check is the perception of others with the majority opinion prevailing. It’s scary. You think that’s \*air \*you’re breathing now? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![KellyCriterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b3f665/32.png) [@KellyCriterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KellyCriterion)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/63 "2012-05-08T07:25:02Z")
I believe that what we now perceive to be “spooky” or “weird” quantum behaviour will actually turn out to be logical, sensible and intuitive behaviour - we’re just hostage to the big gaping holes in our understanding of energy/motion/matter… Eg, there’ll be a physics lecture given one day where the professor says to his class something like “… so that’s why results of things like the ‘double slit experiment’ seemed so awfully strange to the early quantum physicists…” with the class all nodding along in an ‘oh yeah, makes sense’ kind of way. ---
**Author:** ![wheresmymind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/91b2a8/32.png) [@wheresmymind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wheresmymind)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/64 "2012-05-08T17:31:14Z")
That _Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer_, the old stop-motion TV Christmas special, is full of barely-concealed anti-Semitic propaganda. Seriously, I swear it could have been produced by Goebbels. ---
**Author:** ![StusBlues](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@StusBlues](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StusBlues)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/65 "2012-05-08T18:12:20Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > This may of be interest: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New\_Chronology\_%28Fomenko%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Chronology_%28Fomenko%29) I knew a professor at Murray State who bought into that. I doubt that we’re talking about such a broad conspiracy as that, though. What I am saying is that any time I hear someone opine about the character of someone like Pompey or critique the military tactics of Alexander or Julius Caesar, I roll my eyes a little. To the extent that all of the generally-accepted classical personages existed at all, we see them through a glass darkly, at best. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/66 "2012-05-08T18:12:35Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > This is my SEGO theory: String Theory is bunk. Inflation is bunk. There are no such things as Dark Matter or Dark Energy. These will all be revealed to be convenient assumptions on the class of phlogiston or the interstellar ether. > > There is **Something Else Going On ™** in physics and cosmology that we don’t yet, or possibly can’t, understand. I agree. I’ll add that I don’t think we can know yet if the Earth’s core is really a ball of molten iron, or a plutonium reactor, or something we’ve never imagined as it is so far from our experience on the crust. The Earth is opaque to most wavelengths. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/67 "2012-05-08T19:02:22Z")
You guys don’t think Mormons tend to be good looking? In a bland sort of soft American Norman Rockwell way? I’m surprised. In my experience, they all look alike but they’re a pretty handsome lot. They do all look like Rick Steves, though. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/68 "2012-05-08T20:47:30Z")
> [@wheresmymind](#): > > That _Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer_, the old stop-motion TV Christmas special, is full of barely-concealed anti-Semitic propaganda. Seriously, I swear it could have been produced by Goebbels. Naw, it’s a parable of being gay. Seriously, Rudolph gets in trouble in gym class for displaying his big red… nose? Herbie doesn’t want to [del]date girls[/del] make toys, he wants to be a [del]interior decorator[/del] dentist. And they sing a song about being misfits. They run away together, make the acquaintance of burly bear Yukon Cornelius, find a [del]gay bar[/del] Island of Misfits, and finally earn respect in the eyes of the Patriarch of the North Pole. More off the wall theories of mine: IQ scores keep going up because cesarian section now allows children whose heads would have been too big to be born survive. Quantum physics makes sense if you allow that small-scale time reversals are creating Grandfather paradoxes at the particle level. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2012, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/69 "2012-05-08T22:20:02Z")
I too think that the Gulf of Mexico is a huge impact crater. I also think today’s polarized politics is solely among the electorate and that the politicians secretly share the same goals and are playing good cop/bad cop with us. ---
**Author:** ![wheresmymind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/91b2a8/32.png) [@wheresmymind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wheresmymind)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/70 "2012-05-09T04:11:26Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > Naw, it’s a parable of being gay. Seriously, Rudolph gets in trouble in gym class for displaying his big red… nose? Herbie doesn’t want to [del]date girls[/del] make toys, he wants to be a [del]interior decorator[/del] dentist. And they sing a song about being misfits. They run away together, make the acquaintance of burly bear Yukon Cornelius, find a [del]gay bar[/del] Island of Misfits, and finally earn respect in the eyes of the Patriarch of the North Pole. […] Ha, can sort of see that. But I think Rudolph’s large, strange nose is reminiscent of the [grotesque noses found on Nazi propaganda posters.](https://www.google.com/search?q=nazi+jewish+propaganda&hl=en&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&ei=MOypT73fAYOi9QTh-rDXAw&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&sqi=2&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1102&bih=569) Herbie doesn’t want to slave away in a [del]work camp[/del] toy factory, and wants to become a dentist, a fairly stereotypical occupation for a Jew. Santa wants to get rid of/banish Rudolph until he finds a use for him, etc. It makes more sense when I’m sitting down watching it. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/71 "2012-05-09T04:33:42Z")
In the Warner Brothers cartoons, The Coyote (who doesn’t speak), Wile E. Coyote (who does), and Ralph Wolf (with a bit of makeup on his nose) are three distinct characters portrayed by the same actor. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/72 "2012-05-09T12:07:52Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > In the Warner Brothers cartoons, The Coyote (who doesn’t speak), Wile E. Coyote (who does), and Ralph Wolf (with a bit of makeup on his nose) are three distinct characters portrayed by the same actor. Of course these days you couldn’t get away with having a coyote in makeup play a wolf. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Oly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oly/32/8255_2.png) [@Oly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oly)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/73 "2012-05-09T13:06:15Z")
Dogs that fetch incessantly hate doing it, but are compelled by Poochy-type OCD. Their heart sinks when the tennis ball comes out. They know what’s comming. Behind their panting faces they beg you to stop. You don’t. They hate you. They hate themselves. Global warming is the most recent messianic Northern European campaign to be foisted by them onto the rest of the world - like Christianity, scientific materialism, industrialism, capitalism, nihlism, communism, fascism. This one, like some of the others, is tinged with some good old fashioned Teutonic/Götterdämmerung conniption. I’m woking with some people who have discovered a number after 2. We call it 3. We think there may be another number after that. But don’t tell anyone. We haven’t published it yet. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/74 "2012-05-09T14:48:38Z")
> [@Shakes](#): > > The Boson Higgs particle: I think the weight is on some other plane of existence unobservable to us. > > Dark energy: I think these are two planes of existence that are colliding into each other. The laws of physics that govern them only have about 0.000000001% in common. (Just made that number up.). Which would explain why we don’t don’t see dark energy all around us. But you can if you look out into the vastness of space. Yeah, I think something similar. Or, at least, I think that quantum physics has led to so many strange conclusions that I suspect physicists have the model way wrong. I think we’re in a similar state to when astronomers had to have crazy arcane formulae to explain the motion of planets and stars because they thought the earth was stationary, and the center of the universe. Or when physicists axiomatically accepted the aether and had dozens of little exceptions to explain to make it match to observable reality. I suspect maybe matter and energy are just a mapping, or something, of some more inner reality that doesn’t have things like probabilities of things in the past still being uncertain. Or, just recently, physicists claiming to have merged particles that _didn’t exist_ anymore. I think Einstein’s relativity was right in a very fundamental way, and quantum physics is a hack job that predicts “well” (if saying that at subatomic scales probability _is reality_ can be considered “predicting well”), but that misses some huge core fact that makes everything ‘make sense,’ if you will. I hope I’m alive when the breakthrough that I think is coming comes. Also, I think American wars go popular/unpopular each generation, because each generation’s wars are started by those who were in formative years when the last year was fought. I think an unpopular war keeps the US masses from succumbing to the stupid drumbeats of war by chickenhawks…for a generation. Then the next generation is susceptible again. The Civil War was unpopular. The Spanish American War was popular. WWI was unpopular. WWII was popular. (The Korean War is an aberration in the data). Viet Nam was unpopular. Gulf War I was popular. Gulf War II was unpopular. Also, _ **Frosty the Snowman** _ is an allegory of the Christ. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/75 "2012-05-09T14:59:33Z")
Miyazaki’s _Spirited Away_ is one huge allegory for a young girl overcoming the fears of puberty. To me, the Freudian symbolism is so blatant as to be almost embarrassing, but of course my wife doesn’t see it and thinks I’m nuts. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/76 "2012-05-09T15:23:48Z")
Electricity is like snake venom – you build up a tolerance for it with repeated exposures. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bcef8e/32.png) [@The\_Man\_In\_Black](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_In_Black)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/77 "2012-05-09T15:29:48Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > This may of be interest: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New\_Chronology\_%28Fomenko%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Chronology_%28Fomenko%29) I just read that wiki. Holy shit. Does the author really believe what he wrights? ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/78 "2012-05-09T15:33:58Z")
> [@bup](#): > > Yeah, I think something similar. Or, at least, I think that quantum physics has led to so many strange conclusions that I suspect physicists have the model way wrong. I think we’re in a similar state to when astronomers had to have crazy arcane formulae to explain the motion of planets and stars because they thought the earth was stationary, and the center of the universe. Or when physicists axiomatically accepted the aether and had dozens of little exceptions to explain to make it match to observable reality. > > … > > I hope I’m alive when the breakthrough that I think is coming comes. I think this, too. I hope to be alive when the new model of physics comes. I’m enough of a physics geek to think that would be a really exciting thing. I would _really_ like it if someone I know were involved in making this new model. Mr. Neville and I know a lot of astronomers, so that’s not out of the question. > [@Reepicheep](#): > > That humans in the developed countries are having more health problems (allergies, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, depression, autism etc) due to two major reasons. First we keep infants and small children much too sanitize (see the master’s statements on allergies). We should have them out in dirt (and yes putting it in their mouths). I believe this, too. I’m not planning to sanitize the house when our new baby comes, because of this. Get rid of things like lead paint that we know are dangerous, yes. Freak out if the baby swallows some cat hair or if there is dust in the nursery, no. I think making things too sanitary is likely to do more harm than good. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/79 "2012-05-09T16:58:13Z")
Do you remember those old merged/averaged pictures that went around? If this guy and that girl had a baby it would like “X” type things? I always used to look at those and wonder: If you put a [bonobo](http://wkprc.eva.mpg.de/images/bonobo/B_Yasa_08_03.jpg) on one side and one of those[big-eyed alien heads](http://www.everwonder.com/david/aliens/alien00.jpg) in the other; wouldn’t you get [Celine Dion](http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ9K23s1xYyHkl0WnPF_OaM88G_Q-)? Seriously though, I think humans are a hybrid of the known primates and _something_ else which is now gone. My old crazy theory that my family had more than the average Neanderthal DNA has not entirely been proven. But the base point that there does in fact exist an average level of Neaderthal DNA has been accepted. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963/80 "2012-05-09T17:26:06Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > This may of be interest: [New chronology (Fomenko) - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Chronology_%28Fomenko%29) It’s in Wikipedia, so it must be true. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-private-off-the-wall-theories/620963.md?page=5)