Do you have a quasi-scientific theory of some kind, completely unresearched and unsupported, that you secretly like to believe even though you know the facts would probably disprove it?

Not folk wisdom, superstitions, and old wives’ tales here, but some notion you formulated to explain a phenomenon, without benefit of any actual knowledge on the subject.

For example: I have a persistent notion that dreams are caused by the way cerebral fluid trickles around in the brain, pooling in places according to gravity and stimulating or connecting various electrical circuits depending on the position of your head. From this follow the ideas (a) that you can stimulate different kinds of dreams depending on the position in which you rest your head when you sleep and (b) that you can go back into a dream after you wake up only if you don’t move your head.

I have not read anything about the brain and cerebral fluid in relation to dreams. This is just my own idiosyncratic notion. I don’t want to learn that it’s wrong. It pleases me to imagine that it’s true. But I would never dream of trying to tell anyone that it really works this way.

Do you have any similar theories about any branch of scientific knowledge, from anatomy to astronomy, that you like to entertain (but don’t confuse with the results of systematic observation and logical conclusions)?

Please don’t answer by telling me how dreams really work. That is not the question. The question is: Do you have any similar “scientific” theories that you like to pretend are true?