“It's estimated that the average human has 60,000 thoughts a day. This is not surprising. What is disconcerting is that 90% of the thoughts you have today are the ones you had yesterday.” The Basics of Quantum Healing by Deepak Chopra, M.D.  

“Our brains produce as many as 50,000 thoughts per day (National Science Foundation). Ninety-five percent of these thoughts are repeated daily and reflect the mindset or beliefs we hold that lead to those 50,000 thoughts.” Thoughts by Steven K. Cload/Mind Sets

“Experts estimate that the mind thinks between 60,000 – 80,000 thoughts a day. That’s an average of 2500 – 3,300 thoughts per hour. That’s incredible. Other experts estimate a smaller number, of 50,000 thoughts per day, which means about 2100 thoughts per hour.” How Many Thoughts Does Your Mind Think in One Hour? by Remez Sasson

“In 2005, the National Science Foundation published an article regarding research about human thoughts per day. The average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those, 80% are negative and 95% are exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before.”  80 % of Thoughts Are Negative…95 % are repetitive by Faith Hope & Psychology 

“The popular 50,000 thoughts per day claim is apparently based on research performed by the National Science Foundation. Except that the research doesn’t exist. (The NSF are a funding organisation and don’t do research themselves.) Put simply, we don’t know how many thoughts we have per day.” How many thoughts does the ‘average’ person have per day? by Dr Stu

Ok, now that we've settled that, and before I get into the thorny problem of how to even count “thoughts”, please attend to the signs of pseudoscience in the above quotes:  “It’s estimated…” “Experts estimate...” and all those references to the National Science Foundation. In none of these articles were there specific references or links to academic papers. Rather, the authors use markers of scientific authority to present their claims as “facts”.

Rule of Thumb: when you see the word “experts” in a piece, 9 out of 10 times it’s a bunch of hogwash. Or so experts say….

Coming up: Are thoughts countable? Are thoughts mostly negative? Are thoughts mostly repetitive?