Reading Sapiens by Yuan Noah Harari and have come across quite an interesting part about what makes us different from the rest of the animal species, among many things was for us to make up stories and believe in things that are not real.
It went on to list the things we and animals agree are real. Such as: Trees, rivers, clouds, hunger and other animals and beings.
Then there were the things we made up: The United States of America, currency, god, credit, etc.
If you stop to think about this, we have made up quite alot of things and care quite alot about them. We care about our sports teams winning, respect given to our family members or the elderly and the worth of our 401K plans. We believe in these things at least as we believe in the others. We have done this in order to exist within a higher level and it also allows us as a society to get along and form groups larger then just our families.
A great thing we have done, this telling of stories and collectively believing in things that are not right in front of us or obvious to a random observer.