# Do Ghosts exist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 14, 2000, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475 "2000-05-14T02:05:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2000, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/41 "2000-05-16T18:38:27Z")
Summerland? I think I rented a condo there a couple of years ago. The monorail was busted so we had to walk everywhere. The drinks cost $10 apiece, and the golf course was always crowded. All the good rides need E tickets, and you only get like two of those in a book. It’s also really hot, moist and full of mosquitos. I hope I don’t hve to go back there when I die. ---
**Author:** ![HorseloverFat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8e8cbc/32.png) [@HorseloverFat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HorseloverFat)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/42 "2000-05-17T02:28:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > “Don’t you think you’re being a little naive and facetious here?” > > Facetious, yes–have I ever NOT been? But naive? No, I am being logical, sensible and skeptical. I am looking at facts, not superstition and fairy tales. I maintain–if Harry Houdini didn’t come back, ain’t NOBODY comin’ back. > \*\* Are you serious? Picking out a celebrity and noticing there aren’t any tales of his ghost is proof for anything? That is neither logical, sensible, nor skeptical. Your posts are perfect examples of things to be skeptical about. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/43 "2000-05-17T02:37:29Z")
According to Hollywood theory, you only become a ghost if you have “unfinished business.” Otherwise you just move on to your happy place. That’s how it worked for Patrick Swayze anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/44 "2000-05-17T02:42:46Z")
Anybody have any evidence, or links to evidence they can share concerning ghosts? ---
**Author:** ![David\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/51bf81/32.png) [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/45 "2000-05-17T03:02:26Z")
Not terribly helpful, I’m afraid, but here are a couple Skeptic’s Dictionary references: [http://skepdic.com/haunted.html](http://skepdic.com/haunted.html) [http://skepdic.com/ghosts.html](http://skepdic.com/ghosts.html) ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/46 "2000-05-17T03:18:04Z")
Thanks. THis on’e kind of freaky and the explanation seems thin: [http://www.parascope.com/articles/0397/ghost05.htm](http://www.parascope.com/articles/0397/ghost05.htm) ---
**Author:** ![David\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/51bf81/32.png) [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/47 "2000-05-17T03:28:33Z")
I looked around the REALL site and didn’t find much on ghosts. In fact, I just found one mention (other than the Native American “Ghost Dance” and similar things that don’t have to do with the topic at hand). Here’s a mention in my media review column from a few years ago. Page down to the part about the haunting (it deals with some of Persinger’s ideas). [http://www.reall.org/newsletter/v05/n04/reallity-check.html](http://www.reall.org/newsletter/v05/n04/reallity-check.html) ---
**Author:** ![Kricket](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f14d63/32.png) [@Kricket](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kricket)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/48 "2000-05-17T05:20:18Z")
Good old Harry said that his final act would be comming back to speak to his wife from the grave. They had a secret code word and nobody ever got it right. He and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle spent some of their time disproving ghosts and mystics. The Fairy pictures is the most known. Wouldn’t it have sucked if Harry did try to speak to his wife from the grave, and got there and fudged the code word? I am sure if I left something out it will be corrected, it is late and I am sedated. I thought that attacks on religion were in a different thread? I know that I am the one who brought the religious element into the conversation, but I wasn’t attacking. Sorry guys, I am trying not to take this personal, and I am usually a better debater. It’s been a long week for me with my son getting run over by a car and my brother-in-law blowing his brains out yesterday. I think I am going to take a break from the ghosts for a while. I am getting too touchy. When my husband gets back from the funneral I will have him scan those pics for those who want to see them. Blessed Be, Mistress Kricket ---
**Author:** ![evilbeth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/evilbeth/32/2268_2.png) [@evilbeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilbeth)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/49 "2000-05-17T06:14:39Z")
I would like the link to the site if you post your pics on a home page. P.S. Check your e-mail. ---
**Author:** ![evilbeth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/evilbeth/32/2268_2.png) [@evilbeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/evilbeth)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/50 "2000-05-17T06:15:55Z")
Sorry, I didn’t clarify that. ---
**Author:** ![David\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/51bf81/32.png) [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/51 "2000-05-17T12:13:12Z")
Kricket said: > [@](#): > > He and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle spent some of their time disproving ghosts and mystics. The Fairy pictures is the most known. Um, not quite. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle _believed_ in all that crap. Houdini and he fought about it, and it eventually ended their friendship quite nastily. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/52 "2000-05-17T13:23:57Z")
Kricket—thanks for explaining my Harry Houdini mention. As I said, Houdini promised that if it were at all possible to return, he would. P.S. he didn’t. I would LOVE to see a ghost, I really wish they did exist. So I’m not one of those who would pooh-pooh any ghost-like entity I saw. But I’ve never seen one, and I doubt I ever will, because THEY DON’T EXIST. How’s this: when I die, I’ll come back and h’ant the SDMB? Not that I’m not doing so now . . . Boooooo . . . ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/53 "2000-05-17T13:25:23Z")
Oh, yeah—why do ghosts all say “boo?” Did they die while watching really bad plays? ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/54 "2000-05-17T16:16:59Z")
WAG: I think “Boo” is a Casperism. Ghosts are known for groaning and moaning, more “oooooooooooooo” than “boo.” People shout “Boo!” in order to make other people jump. The good people at Harvey Comics just merged the two ideas. And hey, I see ghosts all the time. I was born between midnight and dawn, so I have that power, according to Southern folklore. And I live in a 120-year-old house, which is just jam-packed with ectoplasm. – Uke, who’s the one, who’s the one, the one they call the seventh son ---
**Author:** ![Holly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/48db29/32.png) [@Holly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Holly)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/55 "2000-05-17T17:12:06Z")
I would _love_ to believe that ghosts exist. Unfortunately, I can’t make myself believe it, despite a few encounters with what many people would take as proof of ghosts. I love a scary story. Is anyone here familiar with the railroad ghost just north of Watersmeet, Michigan? My sister lived for several years in an old Victorian house that had been divided into three apartments. Weird things happened all the time there. 1.The downstairs neighbor had a jar of pennies weighing maybe 20 pounds or so; she kept it on a shelf. Every day when she came home from work, the jar was sitting upright in the middle of the floor. 2.The upstairs tenants were laying in bed on their waterbed one night when the bed swooshed exactly as if someone had lain down between them. They left, still in their pajamas, and never came back. They sent someone else to recover their possessions. My sister’s apartment was the busiest. 1.Her kitchen was always very, very cold, even in the summer. You could feel the hot air coming up through the registers, but the room was cold. She kept a quilt tacked across the doorway to keep the cold drafts from freezing the rest of the house. 2.You could always distinctively hear a clock ticking in her bedroom, though she didn’t have a ticking clock. There were no pipes or anything else in the walls that could account for the sound. 3.My sister’s apartment included the original front porch, which had an exterior door (with a deadbolt) and an interior porch door (also with a deadbolt). Every evening when she came home from work, the interior porch door was unlocked and ajar, though she was fastidious about checking the locks before she left the house. 4.The apartment contained many windows: about six on the exterior porch, about six between the living room and the porch, four in the kitchen and four in the living room. Each one had a roller shade. As my sister sat on the couch one evening reading, every shade snapped up at once. Later, my sister discovered from the landlord that the original owners of the house were a man and his wife; one evening he’d come home and found his wife in bed with another man (in what was then my sister’s bedroom). He shot them both; the bullet hole in the living room ceiling seemed to confirm the story. Despite all this, my sister _still_ does not believe in ghosts. Neither do I, and I’d love to believe the ghost of a jilted husband still haunts that house, but I can think of a thousand other explanations. ---
**Author:** ![vanilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f19dbf/32.png) [@vanilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vanilla)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/56 "2000-05-17T17:40:43Z")
I once had my son’s pretend vacuum toy make the sound on its own. Twice in 2 days. My church friend came over and said it wasn’t a “ghost” but a demon. So she prayed and it “apparently” left… Nope, I can’t prove anything, but i know what I heard. SnarK; Oh great! This is where(your grandma’s) we’re going to be staying! And what if _I_ get the bedroom with the ghost?! Of course, if she serves us KFC, maybe it’ll be okay… ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/57 "2000-05-17T18:01:22Z")
“I live in a 120-year-old house, which is just jam-packed with ectoplasm.” —Well, I live in a 170-year-old house, and the only thing floating eerily around my apartment is cat fur. ---
**Author:** ![Gaudere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e495f1/32.png) [@Gaudere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gaudere)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/58 "2000-05-17T18:58:49Z")
> [@](#): > > 2.You could always distinctively hear a clock ticking in her bedroom, though she didn’t have a ticking clock. There were no pipes or anything else in the walls that could account for the sound. I remember hearing a story like this once. They even called in a watch specialist, who identified the mysterious ticking as a 1870 Something-or-other watch. Very eerie. Then they found out their books were infested with silverfish, and it was their rhythmic munching that was making the ticking sound. Not so eerie after all. ---
**Author:** ![PeeQueue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8797f3/32.png) [@PeeQueue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PeeQueue)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/59 "2000-05-17T19:11:24Z")
Gaudere: Yuck. PeeQueue ---
**Author:** ![Snark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Snark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snark)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2000, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475/60 "2000-05-17T22:31:39Z")
Peaches8, you’ve got the wrong Grandma. It’s the one who lives in my town who has apparently “seen” the ghosts, not the other one. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/19475.md?page=4)