There are those believing things based on distant rumours. Trouble is such rumours corrupt the essential in the context. When events are retold the one retelling can misremember. Details missing can be filled in with the result of someone’s imagination. Misunderstandings can arise too. A strong emotional reaction can make people over-interpret. Single events attracting attention can be mistaken for the normal out of lack of other knowledge. Such happen time after time when more people retell. Errors are accumulated over time making information unreliable.
Let me take a theoretical example which is relatively harmless. I have a piece of the Belin Wall in a box at home. My mum saved it when this wall was demolished in 1990. A rumour could corrupt this to myself being there when the Belin Wall fell. Something being impossible since I was in Stockholm then. I had no reason whatsoever to be anywhere else.
Unfortunately, real examples can be considerably more harmful. In Britain it is illegal to advertise for cancer treatments. At least unless it is about radiation therapy. Rumouring has corrupted this into an American federal ban on curing cancer. Which would be complete madness. I think about 2/3 of all cancer can be cured. Why would a country forbid well-documented methods from being used? To make loads in the population suffer and die from a disease? People don’t do things just for the hell of it. Neither would the decision makers automatically earn from it. Also that idea has arisen precisely trough rumouring.
What is it then making people believe in distant rumours? I don’t think they ask themselves how they can know something. Maybe they don’t know what they heard was a rumour. In both cases they don’t realise they need to check out things. Written first and second hand sources are in such a case not used. Or they can have an overconfidence in oral traditions. Add an unawareness of scientific results improving. Then certain individuals can believe that a distant rumour is currently official standpoint. Something it does not at all need to be.
Uploaded on the 15th of September 2026.
https://blog.ifraagasaetterskan.se/The-limits-of-human-memory#wbb1
Commercial rights reserved by Lena Synnerholm if nothing else is stated.
This site was last changed on the 15th of September 2026.