The internet is filled with the strangest of conspiracy theories, almost always accompanied by clips from The Matrix.

We’ve covered some of the various conspiracy theories sucking the wind out of real conspiracies here before. Jets don’t actually use fuel, the German Chancellor is part of a fight club, Helen Keller was a fraud — if it’s a conspiracy theory that makes you groan, we’ve heard of it. Now, we’ve got a new one. Posting on r/Conspiracy (where else?), Redditor SgtBrutalisk proposes a bold theory: half of the world’s population doesn’t exist.

“At least 50 percent of the world’s population exists only in a spreadsheet. They are ghosts, fake people created by evil governments to grab power, mess with our heads and hide the human genocide agenda,” he writes.

This post was positively received on r/Conspiracy, accruing over 700 upvotes and more than 200 comments. In it, SgtBrutalisk identifies this idea as the “Global Population Conspiracy (GPC)” and says that compiling all of this information took three years.

So, what’s the theory? According to SgtBrutalisk, while governments may report population numbers, they’re just estimates. These estimates don’t make sense to him, and the data *he* shares indicates that there may be fewer people than we know.

Second, if one drives through urban areas, they’re not likely to see people, and some places like St. Louis, Missouri (though he links to a video of the wrong St. Louis) appear to be ghost towns.

There’s also some other stuff about emigration and far, far, far too many paragraphs defining what it means to be a psychopath. Governments, he says, can be psychopathic, which in turn leads them to lie about their population numbers.

Got it? Good. Well, I read this whole post (and the included PDF), and I have to say, I wasn’t sold. That’s why I contacted Mr. Brutalisk to get a better idea of what he was talking about. My first question? “How many people do you think there are on Earth, total?”

“I’d say 2 billion or less,” he responded. For context, the U.N. estimates that the global population is 8 billion people. Sensing my disbelief, SgtBrutalisk stated, “Before you ask me why that number, it’s my estimate that I got the same way census bureaus get their numbers — I thought of a number and wrote it.”

Hey, at least he’s honest. As we continued chatting, SgtBrutalisk said that this secret is so closely kept that even heads of state don’t know what’s going on. “I think the shadow government (think Kissinger types) are definitely in the know,” he explained. “Official heads of governments are clueless.”

Certain countries, SgtBrutalisk added, are fibbing more than others — which he attributes to the nation’s “psychopathy.”

“China, obviously,” he responsed when I asked about which countries are lying about their population the most. “All the signs of psychopathy are present in China to the extreme. I think African countries are faking their numbers too to get more charity. Think of all the tours Bill Gates did with his vaccines in Africa. It's another scheme that ties into GPC (donate to countries with many ghosts and then funnel the money to you).”

I still remained unconvinced, however. If every country is lying about their population, why would any international bank trust population numbers? Do they not know? How could they not know? I thought the whole conspiracy thing was that these global banks knew everything!

But hey, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe India is really just four guys and tandoori oven. And to hear SgtBrutalisk tell it, there’s a chance that people will eventually discover this population deception, even within our lifetimes. “My post is a crucial step toward discovering a healthy culture of governments counting and engaging with the population,” he explained to me. “It’s absurd that a government can claim that it works for the people when it doesn’t even want to count them regularly but makes estimates to avoid any semblance of culpability.”

Moreover, to close, SgtBrutalisk left me with this surprisingly heartfelt advice: “Surround yourself with art and beauty and do the kind of work that inspires you. You matter and your voice matters. Make tours around your neighborhood and estimate the number of people there. Get together and discuss things, ideas, plans and anything else.”

Thanks for the chat, man — and if you ever want to talk about your other theory that MrBeast is the Antichrist, I’m all ears.