Why groups of people can remember something that didn't happen

[robvalue]

It seems people can very easily be convinced to believe what they want to believe, including memories of events.

I've come to the conclusion that this is what faith is: believing what you want to be true, or what you feel must be true, regardless of the availability of reliable evidence.

Memories are terrible evidence. So many times I've been utterly convinced I've remembered something right, to the point where I'd have put lots of money on it, then turned out to have totally misremembered.