Have you ever heard about the Mandela Effect? Don’t you loathe that feeling you get when you KNOW you remember the progression of a conversation and the conclusion reached by whomever you were talking to, but they remember it completely differently?

It can definitely change the tone of a discussion from frustration to, “Wait… should I be institutionalized?” Or maybe a better example is how frustrating it is when you, say, remember buying bread last time you went to the store – to the extent that you even recall being confused at how expensive it was – yet, there’s no bread anywhere in the house?

With examples such as these, it’s easy to say that maybe you misread their communication because they were giving mixed signals or you just weren’t paying enough attention.

Maybe you left the bread in the cart, or, equally likely, are actually recalling accidentally crushing the loaf a little as you put it in your trunk from the time before when you went shopping, and your memory cortex is just a bit flipped over.

But what about similar circumstances on a significantly larger, maybe even global, scale? This occurrence is actually common enough that it has been given a name.

The Mandela Effect

The Mandela Effect, named after Nelson Mandela as a prime example of the phenomena, is like candy to conspiracy theorists. Especially since there are so many examples that the mass populace has likely experienced some of this effect at some point, and the stockpile of recorded evidence makes it very hard to dispute the effect.

In fact, there’s even a full archive of a wide variety of examples that fit this model. The namesake example of these phenomena is an interesting one to look at. Personally, I don’t know much about Nelson Mandela.

But a lot of people who do claim they are very aware that he died in prison in the 1980s. They even remember seeing documentaries pertaining to his death during school.

These people are very shocked to hear that history has it recorded as Mandela dying in his home in Johannesburg in 2013

While the effect is not easily disputable, the cause is definitely susceptible to interpretation.

When a large group of separate individuals (that are not in any way associated, directly or indirectly, with one another) all have a shared memory that conflicts with the known or documented reality, could it be a possible indication of alternate universes? Possibly our strongest argument toward the notion that our history is rewritten as key, well-funded, people decide it should be?

Others speculate that this effect can be explained simply by the misunderstandings common with mass media, the “telephone game”, mis-publications in newspapers and magazines, etc.

Personally, I feel that a lot of the examples I’ve encountered while researching this topic, and a lot of the recounting from massive multi-lingual groups, that there is something more to these phenomena than simple misunderstandings or translation confusion.

While a lot of the examples which are often brought up very well could be due to language barriers and cognitive dissonance, I do believe that a few of the key examples of the Mandela Effect have a high probability for giving us a hint that there is more to our world, and our minds, than we understand.

As always, I urge you to do some research into this fascinating topic and draw your own conclusions.

Please share in the comments any experiences you may have which help to prove or disprove the cause of the Mandela Effect.

Featured image: Darren Glanville from Acle, Norfolk, UK, CC BY-SA 2.0 


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This Post Has 6 Comments

  1. Kddomingue

    I see the Mandela Effect played out in my own family. It is actually funny when it’s not frustrating. The mind is a very malleable thing.

  2. Brenda Byrd

    Yes..I do know about this effect that is affecting Bibles as well movies and others things….the one that caught my attention was the Bible…..I couldnt believe my eyes…my bible at home ..not a new one but a old one..Isaiah 11:6 was very alarming to me because I knew I knew that verse…It had change…It suppose to say” lion instead of wolf….do the research for yourself…there are many many others….be blessed😇😇😇😇😇😇

  3. Kate Gladstone

    Brenda Byrd, I’ve been reading the Bible since I was six (cover-to-cover every year), and Isaiah 11:6 has always said “wolf”: also in the original Hebrew (yes, I’ve checked)

  4. John

    That’s why the subject is quite undebatable.
    You and many others will swear blind it said wolf, people in massive numbers swear it was lion. There is no proof that lion was ever the verse in the bible so you think you’re right. People who know for sure it was lion have no evidence because it’s now different. I think it was lion and some government agencies have upset the past by travelling back. You really think the lhc is for research?? God particle is rubbish. I believe that so much has changed. I remember vw logo well because I sold some old van signs, and ford! I’m not missremembering. They have changed.

  5. Francine

    I love conspiracy theories but this is one rabbit hole I went down which I think is untrue. When you explore various youtube videos you will find them giving the same examples over and over – I’d say about 12-15 so that gets boring in a hurry. If it was true there should be many more examples (and much more significant than mostly just changes to labels)… along with some closer to home like realizing a relative or friend is not quite the same as before or worse, they weren’t even born lol. I haven’t come across one instance of that (thank God).

    Rodin did more than one version of The Thinker. No one ever mentions this one, but I seem to remember that when Mandala was in prison that there was rumor that he died, that was started by his enemies. Or maybe he was just ill at the time and someone speculated that he was dying and that turned into a brief rumor.

    1. Frank Wilson

      Francine, my guess as to why people think Mandela died in prison is due to movies showed in school. Two movies, frequently showed during the same year in the same class. One was “Cry Freedom”, the other “Cry, the beloved country”. One was about Steven Biko, an anti apartheid activist that was indeed thrown in prison, and died of “hunger strike”. The other was about apartheid in general and touched on Mandela briefly. My belief is people forget Mr Biko’s name, then throw out one they do remember. Pretty much most of the other examples I’ve seen aren’t really cut and dried like this one. Thus, in my opinion, we’ve misnamed the Biko effect as Mandela.

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