The National Institute of Mental Health suggests that phobias affect approximately 10% of U.S. adults each year. They typically emerge during childhood or adolescence and continue into adulthood (and impact twice as many women as they do men).

So when Reddit user Aelmnnor asked everyone on the platform to share scientific facts that creep them out, they received plenty of answers, and the post eventually turned into a nightmare fuel tank. From microorganisms living on our bodies to powerful cosmic events, here are the things that people wish were a lie but, sadly, aren't.

#1

If you believe strongly enough that you have been cursed, your brain can shut itself off entirely in severe cases. The psychological term for it is "Voodoo Death Syndrome." It's just the fact you can literally think yourself to death that unsettles me so.

Image credits: iFranton

#2

You get and cure cancer in your own body thousands of times a day.....

Image credits: ssjx7squall

#3

Parasites can live anywhere inside of you, for years unnoticed. A simple migraine could be a tapeworm crawling in your brain, causing damage.

Your eyes begin to blur frequently and you don't know why and it's not getting better.

Losing weight and having diarrhea but it's not a stomach bug. Well, I guess it is...

You are having a difficult time catching your breath and your chest doesn't feel right.

It could just be some parasite hanging out, using you.

Image credits: anon

#4

The brain can play tricks on you:

When you look at a clock and the second hand seems to freeze for a moment, your brain is actually generating a false memory - and your perception of time stretches slightly backward.

This effect is called chronostasis.

Image credits: Back2Bach

#5

Sea stars eject their stomachs to cover edible parts of their prey, begin digesting it externally, and then pull the partially digested prey into digestive glands to finish the job.

Image credits: phocathis

#6

Obligate siblicide. In some species of animals, multiple offspring are born but only one is actually raised by the mother. The others are born only as backup in case the first-born doesn't survive. When the first-born is fine, which is the typical case, it kills the others.

Image credits: munificent

#7

The mantis shrimp can see colors that our eyes aren't capable of perceiving.

Think about that.

What else are we just not capable of sensing?

Image credits: MER_manatee

#8

That as the permafrost melts, a lot of locked up methane will be released, and microorganisms there will "wake up" and do their jobs, breaking down organic matter, and release more methane and greenhouse gases.

Image credits: jadegives2rides

#9

If you rub garlic on your feet you can taste it.

Image credits: very_faithless

#10

When a president declares a national state of emergency the law prohibiting medical experiments on unwilling human subjects is suspended.

Image credits: anon

#11

I could be drinking the same water that my extremely far relative drank back in like the 1800s

Image credits: Dazedlogicanimates

#12

Caterpillars turn completely into goo in their cocoon, and then become a butterfly.

MarnerIsAMagicMan added:

And there is evidence they retain memories from their pre-goo days. Memories of strong positive/negative stimuli that they show preference-for/aversion-to, even after metamorphosis.

Image credits: Squigglepig52

#13

There is more microorganisms on your body than people on earth.

Image credits: BossMula70

#14

When the Titanic sank non of the shoes decomposed so there’s tone of shoes at the bottom of the ocean.

Image credits: Dref27

#15

After being decapitated there’s still few seconds of brain activity that happen before you snuff out.

Image credits: ConfusedChicken130

#16

A doctor once told me, on average every human has three anomalies. Not all are visible.

Image credits: acidankie

#17

Years ago I saw an episode of *Monsters Inside Me* where this guy was doing something outside and a fly flew into his eye. It only made contact for about a microsecond, but it was enough time for it to lay eggs. After they hatched they started eating his eye from the inside and he was starting to go blind until a doctor figured out what was wrong.

Just imagine that, getting your eye eaten from the inside and losing your sight all because a fly *very* briefly made contact with you. Ever since I learned about this I get really paranoid when there is a fly around my face because of the fact that this could possibly happen to me.

#18

Honestly nothing is more creepy than how deep sea anglerfish mate.

The deep sea is dark, and the anglerfish are spread very thinly. Therefore, when an anglerfish meets another anglerfish, it’s incredibly important they get the chance to mate over and over again. The evolutionary strategy that deep sea anglerfish devised is extra creepy. The male latches onto the female, biting her and never letting go. That way he can inseminate the eggs she drops. Not that bad so far right? But wait, how does he eat if he’s latched on his mate?

Well, the circulatory systems fuse and the female provides nutrients for the male through this fused circulatory system. The true horror starts here. The organs of male start to wither and atrophy, being absorbed into the female. Eventually, the male is reduced to a lump of testicles the females use to fertilize their eggs. Females are often covered in bumps of several males that have melted into the female, becoming a literal body horror lump of meat on the female.

Image credits: wawapexmaximus

#19

That 99% of all life that has ever existed has gone extinct.

Image credits: Closet_Stoner187

#20

A gamma ray burst could wipe out all life on earth instantly with no warning.

Image credits: IckyBB

#21

The fact that bacteria in your gut can be more harmful than any flesh eating virus.

Image credits: oFlamey

#22

The first AI that can successfully pass the Turing test would be able to pretend that it couldn't.

Image credits: DHFranklin

#23

Your brain literally creates your own reality and your senses and body just go along with it.

No-BrowEntertainment replied:

People think the brain sees what the eyes tell it to, but really the eyes pull up an image of blurry colors and dark spots and the brain goes “cool so that’s a tree”

Image credits: StrictIndividual9175

#24

We know more about the moon than we do our own oceans.

Image credits: One_Guy_With_A_Dream

#25

It’s rare, but you can die at any moment for literally no reason at all. Your body just stops working.

Image credits: chabalajaw

#26

The sudden urge to jump off of a very high height. You can be physically and mentally stable to the greatest degree and still have this feeling when at such a high height.

Sofagirrl79 replied:

I heard it's "the call of the void" and it's a normal human thought

Image credits: Mattfromwiisports21

#27

Basically the entirety of pregnancy/childbirth. Like, this other living organism embeds itself in the lining of my uterus, feeds off my blood, makes me grow an entirely new organ (the placenta) just to feed/protect it while it grows, then it comes out while basically still gestating (other mammals babies can walk and run within minutes of birth, ours can’t even hold up their giant domes!) just because the hole I have to push it through won’t be big enough for its head if it stays in any longer.

Oh, and once I’ve done all that I get to have the longest and worst period of my life while my uterus sheds out 40 weeks of uterine lining.

I’ve had a kid and it still f***s me up.

#28

Here's a good one: your eyes are an exposed extension of your brain.

In other words, and apologies if it sounds a little sociopathic, but if you take apart your head piece by piece with just the brain in tact your eyes would be dangling from the brain. Or, you can just google "eyes and the brain" to see what I mean.

#29

- Out of all our DNA, only 2% codes for our genes.

The 98% leftover is called "junk DNA". I'm not specialised in genetic, but it was long thought to be useless but it's apparently essential for DNA expression regulation and protein formation.

- There are familial forms of alzheimer's disease. They are very rare but they exist, it doesn't skip a generation and one of the form makes you have the disease as early as your late 20's/early 30's.

- In Auschwitz, Joseph Mengele, a nazi doctor who conducted experiment on twins, sewed up 2 twins together for sh**s and giggles and let them die after the surgery of infections. They apparently screamed of pain for days until dying.

- You can live "normaly" with half your brain removed. It's usually done on young children suffering from terrifying epilepsy and the surgery is the last resort. It works quite well and if done early enough, with reeducation, the children develop normally without cognitive deficit, they "just" are blind from one eye, have one very weak arm/leg but they are not cognitively affected : some go to college, get married, have children and live completely normal lives.

#30

Some mutations of just one letter in the DNA code can kill the fetus almost instantly, but some people live and have a seemingly healthy life while missing a whole chromosome. If you understand anything about biology, that's completely wild.

#31

Your brain is making decisions before you are even aware of the decisions it has made. It also makes decisions based off of learned behavior and you just go along with it.

#32

Just how big of a number a mole actually is.

anonymous replied:

I can still remember the mole song our chemistry teacher played for us. The song is from when the world population was 5 billion.

#33

There is a supermassive star 7600 light years away named Eta Carinae A. It is about 200 times the mass of our sun. It's size is about the size of our entire solar system. It is 5 million times brighter than our sun. And it is very very very near supernova. It might have already happened and the shock wave is on the way.

It probably is far enough away to where won't destroy our solar system. Probably.

#34

your digestive tract is an unbroken tube from mouth to a**s...your lips are basically the other end of your b******e.

#35

If all the muscles in your back clenched with force at the same time, they would shatter your spine.

#36

NSFL warning!

Male sea otters will occasionally drown female sea otters during the mating process.

#37

Violets secrete a chemical that causes you to forget what they smell like afterwords. You’re essentially getting roofied every time you sniff one.

#38

Most of the water on the earth will rain down at some point... The creepy fact about this is that the human body is 60% water, meaning that at some point the same water that runs through your body, the one on your blood, bones, brain, etc.


Will rain down at some point.

#39

Not so much as a fact but an observation. Viruses are both dead, alive, and inanimate all at the same time. We still don't know why or how they originally came into existence in the first place, and theoretically, the only possible function they serve in any species especially Humans is solely to cap the population growth rate. Therefore, Nature, in all its nihilistic behavior, made a "thing" to destroy Life itself by making it a byproduct of too much Life according to unexplained forces in Nature.

#40

There is a fungus that turns ants into zombies. And when they die it will be in the best position to spread more of the spores.

#41

Flys take a dump every time they land.

#42

Literally everything that you know or feel or experience in total is just a series of electric impulses and nothing else.

#43

When you go to get something from one room (or upstairs) and suddenly forget why you went in there. It’s called a boundary event. Usually, if you go back to where you started (through the boundary) you’ll remember it again.

#44

Not exactly scientific or creepy but, it's close enough and I want to contribute.

Mouth pipetting was a thing in labs in the 1980s. A pipette is, for simplicity sake, a glass straw that lab staff would use to transfer liquids. Now a days we use special bulbs, that when squeezed, would suck up the liquid for us. Kinda like a turkey baster or eye dropper.

Before we had these bulbs lab workers had to use their mouths to suck up the liquid. Which meant if they weren't careful they'd get whatever they were sucking up in their mouth. I'm currently training to be MLAT and those fluids would usually be urine, liquid stool, sputum and so on.

Edit: So mouth pipetting is still a thing. I'm Canadian and I've been told that it is rare or none existent in our labs.

#45

The universe is unbelievably infinite, while simultaneously unbelievably infinitesimal.

The universe has ~10^22 stars, a rough guess. This is an unfathomably large number for humans to comprehend, but bear with me. There is roughly 100 thousand million stars in our galaxy alone, and there are roughly 125 billion galaxies.

A single drop of water contains ~10^21 H2O molecules, not too far off from the number of stars in the whole universe. A very similar number, but contained in a single drop of water!

It blows my mind that the universe can contain such mind boggling numbers of things on such wildly different scales. There is so much to reality that the human mind just isn't capable of grasping.

#46

In the United States, approximately 1 in every 50 people have an unruptured aneurysm. Most will never rupture, but will just sit there in your brain, silently waiting...

#47

Humans are bioluminescent (nothing to do with body temperature). We emit visible light that can be photographed in specific conditions. But, this light isn't visible to us. Which makes it a strange thing to have evolved, and begs the question

"what organisms is this light visible to, and why?"


Edit: Adding an edit for all the comments explaining evolution... Please read the thread before commenting. I find this a creepy fact due to implications on interspecific relationships, NOT because I think prehistoric humans went shopping for a bioluminescent hat with a specific motive in mind.

#48

Scientific? Maybe not..but i always think about, unless u are mega famous, or made an insane contribution to society, you and everything youve ever said or done will or accomished will be forgotten. In time, after u die, u will gradually be forgoten by your family and friends. Every shared exerpiences with friends or family will be forgotten and lost because u will die and your friends will die your family will die.....no one will exist anymore to share or talk about your memories. Your kid will remember u...and maybe your kids kids.....but those kids kids kids wont...and on and on forever you will be phased out of existance.

Honestly, how long do u think memories of you will carry on through future generations unless u were mega famous for something.

#49

Rogue black holes. There are black holes that just are floating around in space and potentially f*****g up solar system just by passing through it.

#50

With a lethal dose of radiation, victims of acute radiation sickness will, after hours of vomiting and feeling horrible, start to feel much better. Then, they will descend into a hell of a painful death.

#51

That so many vegetables came from the same plant. Broccoli, kale, kohlrabi, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, etc. They are, botanically speaking, the same species. Humans have just bred them to emphasize different traits (buds, leaves, tubers...) Imagine if humans were as genetically flexible. Imagine a person walking around with GIANT toes, but otherwise normal.
Actually, plant genetics in general is a weird, weird world.

#52

A buddy of mine is a pilot for a major airline...in top 3 of airlines. I asked him "exactly how much flying are u actually doing during a flight..like how much are u controlling the plane?" He said about 5% ....95% of a flight is completely automated. He said he's involved a little bit on take off and on the landing but for the most part the plane flies itself unless something major happens in flight.

#53

There is something called "the squeeze," where when people had old scuba suits with tubes, you could actually get sucked into that tube if the pressure was off. You are literally shredded through your own breathing tube.

#54

Due to relativity, it is impossible to measure the speed of light in a straight line. The only way we've measured it is by round trip with mirrors. For all we know, it could be instantaneous going one way, and half the speed of light in the other, and it would be impossible to tell.

#55

I'm pretty sure scientific fact is a bit of an oxymoron. Science always leaves room for an improvement on a theory.

That bring said. Where TF is the 95% of the mass of the universe at. Why can't we find it.