Have you ever heard the term “myth debunked”? It means to reveal a truth or a myth for what it actually is. That is exactly what we are going to do today: disclose all the common myth conceptions.

You all might have heard some crazy theories that your parents or grandparents have regarding your day-to day work. One of the most popular theory (myth) is when a black cat crosses a road you’re walking on, then it is compulsory for you to turn around and walk the other way. Now this particular one is really famous in the Indian culture. People really believe all this nonsense. A black cat is just an animal! What possible harm can it bring? It has a life too. It will go whichever way it likes; why should it change its path just because we consider it as a bad omen, right? In fact, I think that it couldn’t care less about what we think.

There are many stupid myths, even biology has some of the most eccentric myths. Fear not, it isn’t quite as boring as biology. I think you all know about the five-second rule. If not, I’m sure you still apply it. You know when you are eating something delicious, it falls to the ground, and you quickly pick it up. Hoping that no germs could get transferred to it. Moreover, if you pick it up in less than five seconds, than voila, your food is as good as new. Well, this five-second rule is completely false and inapplicable. The amount of bacteria transferred to the fallen food depends on how contaminated the floor is, not on how long it stays there. Another such mythconception is that humans only have five senses. We actually have twenty. Sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing are just the basic ones. Others include balance, pain, movement, hunger, thirst, etc.

Enough with the biological myths now, how about we unfold a few of good old religious myths as well. Now this would be a shocker to you all. We’ve heard that satan rules hell. Some of us may have known this since we were children. But it isn’t mentioned anywhere in the bible. In other words, it’s all made up.

Since today’s generation is all about technology and mobile phones, I would also like to clear some of the most common misconceptions. Remember the times there’s no signal, and we wave our phones all around, hoping to get a good signal (admit it, we have all done it). Well, it does not improve our phone signal. In fact, it makes it worse, and makes you look like a complete idiot. The next one is our mom’s favourite line: “watching the television too close can damage your eyes”. Well, they usually prefer  that we do not watch T.V at all, but even they know that it’s impossible. Back to the point, this myth is completely and utterly false. The truth is that it cannot cause any permanent damage to either our eyes or our brains. The most it can do is give us a headache. Another such myth is about the lie detector machine. We all know about that, don’t we? Therefore, the truth is that there is no such machine. A polygraph test detects arousal, not lies. Moreover, it can easily be faked.

One of my favourite and the most erratic myth I’ve heard is about our brains: we only use ten percent of our brains. This is a completely false acquisition. We do use hundred percent of our brain.

I’ve saved the most heart-stopping myth for the grand finale (I might’ve over exaggerated a bit). Now this myth is based on our general knowledge. What is the name of the tallest mountain of the earth? Mount Everest? WRONG! if you’d asked me the same question a couple of moments ago then I surely would’ve said the same. Mount Everest is just tallest mountain from the mean sea level. But if we are talking about base-to-summit height, then the tallest is island of Hawaii that peaks at Mauna Kea.

There are more than thousand such made up myths, all from varying origins, topics and popularity. After all, myth is a never-ending story.

NAME: Advika Agarwal

CLASS: 10^th C