About this episode
January 28, 1986, at 11:39am, the Space Shuttle exploded during liftoff, killing all seven crew members. It was a big deal. As soon as it happened, everyone stopped what they were doing to watch the TV updates.
Because it was a school day in America, a psychology professor handed out a questionnaire to his freshman students, asking what they had been doing moments earlier when they had first heard the news. Where were you? Who were you with? What were you doing?
Then, he saved their answers for three years, for the sake of what came next.
Three years later, he gave those same students the same questionnaire, asking what they had been doing when the Space Shuttle exploded. After they answered, he asked how confident they were in their answers. Almost all of them said 100%.
Then he showed them their original answers from the day it happened. Nobody remembered correctly. Their answers were all different. Everybody had misremembered their own facts.
Memories feel like facts, but they’re not. People don’t doubt their memory, but you should.
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