# Do Ghosts Exist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 6, 2004, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542 "2004-08-06T00:18:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![SnakeSpirit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snakespirit/32/7271_2.png) [@SnakeSpirit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakeSpirit)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 10:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/61 "2004-08-09T10:49:14Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I don’t think this definition takes us anywhere. > > Are you saying that any time something inexplicably moves, or emits a sound or light repetitively, we have experienced a ghost? > > When it comes down to it, aren’t you just saying “ghosts” aren’t really a thing at all, they are just a category, a basket into which we put things we can’t explain? That might be just it. A category for, at least, some types of the explained, but a definition for \*certain types \* of unexplained. The ones associated with things that make people think they have encountered a spirit or disembodied entity, as opposed to non-airplane flying vehicles, for instance. No, not everything you described is a ghost. That’s why we have investigations, to see if there is an explanation we can provide. If not, it _might_ be a ghost, or maybe we weren’t meticulous enough. What I **think** is a ghost is irrelevent. It’s only what I can prove is a ghost that matters. There are ‘things’ that sometimes communicate with people when they are in receptive states, often very unfriendly, sometimes very friendly. There are ‘things’ that people ‘see,’ usually in dim light, that resemble human figures. There are ‘things’ that move objects without a visible mover, which make walking sounds around old houses, that appear in photos when they weren’t in the scene, that come to people in dreams an give them information. Some of these ‘things’ are mistakes, illusions, hallucinations, imagination, hoaxes, light flares or whatever. Those tht are not those things, which meert the requirements set above, people for years have been calling “ghosts.” Maybe they are angels, ETs, psychic communication, astral projection. maybe they are spirits, or manifestations of one’s own body energy, or astral projectors, or something else. Why shouldn’t we continue to call them “ghosts” until we find out differently? Maybe a better explanation would be: “Unexplainable phenomenon which people take to be the action of spirits, disembodied entities or other conscious energies or energy imprints.” I put the assumption in there because those people assume what ghosts are, we don’t really know. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/62 "2004-08-09T11:18:24Z")
I believe in UFO’s: Unidentified Flying Objects. I just don’t believe in spaceships or aliens. I’ve never seen any evidence for spaceships which didn’t turn out to be a natural Object which looked like it was Flying. I believe in Unidentified Scary Objects. I just don’t believe they’re ghosts or spirits. I’ve never seen any evidence for spaceships which didn’t turn out to be a natural Object which someone thought Scary. You seems to be proposing that we call Unidentified Scary Objects “ghosts”. Should we call all Unidentified Flying Objects “spaceships”? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/63 "2004-08-09T11:20:41Z")
Beg pardon: I’ve never seen any evidence for **ghosts** which didn’t turn out to be a natural Object (_eg. a dream_) which someone thought Scary. ---
**Author:** ![SnakeSpirit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snakespirit/32/7271_2.png) [@SnakeSpirit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakeSpirit)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/64 "2004-08-09T11:26:20Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > I believe in UFO’s: Unidentified Flying Objects. I just don’t believe in spaceships or aliens. I’ve never seen any evidence for spaceships which didn’t turn out to be a natural Object which looked like it was Flying. > > I believe in Unidentified Scary Objects. I just don’t believe they’re ghosts or spirits. I’ve never seen any evidence for spaceships which didn’t turn out to be a natural Object which someone thought Scary. > > You seems to be proposing that we call Unidentified Scary Objects “ghosts”. > > Should we call all Unidentified Flying Objects “spaceships”? Nooo… First of all, all “ghosts” are not scary. I, too, believe in UFOs, but I don’t necessarily believe that they are all “flying objects.” Still, I have no problem calling them UFOs. Why change terms when we already have a perfectly good one thats been used for centuries? “Unidentified Objects” is too broad… Maybe “Unidentified apparitions?” But the leaves out some, like poltergeists and night walkers… Wanna try inventing another term? ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/65 "2004-08-09T11:38:03Z")
> [@](#): > > Wanna try inventing another term? How about “dreams, hoaxes and misremembered events” until we find convincing evidence othewise? ---
**Author:** ![SnakeSpirit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snakespirit/32/7271_2.png) [@SnakeSpirit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakeSpirit)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/66 "2004-08-09T23:29:52Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > How about “dreams, hoaxes and misremembered events” until we find convincing evidence othewise? We already have terms and definitions for those. And here I thought for a moment you could carry on a serious debate. Try again. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/67 "2004-08-09T23:59:16Z")
It’s just that it is very difficult to take brain farts and brain farters seriously. Once you filter out the dreams, hoaxes and misremembered events, there is nothing left. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/68 "2004-08-10T00:09:16Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > Cite? I’ve heard nothing about this case being solved conclusively. I never claimed it had been solved conclusively, only that all available evidence supports the the explanation that it was a person in a costume. > [@](#): > > I’m not going to get into the big debate,- How shocking. > [@](#): > > -so I’ll make my points quick and concise. Not only is there more than ample evidence that ghosts exist (personal testimony- “The plural of anectdote is not data.” > [@](#): > > -EVP EVP? LOL! , > [@](#): > > photographs, movies, The overwhelming majority of which are hoaxes, or have been explained by other means. > [@](#): > > instrument readings Barometer? Thermometer? Check Engine light? > [@](#): > > , but the reports all over the world are similar Not until the invention of mass media and worldwide communication. Previously (as I’ve mentioned), different cultures had extremely different ideas of how ghosts looked and behaved. > [@](#): > > and the theory used to explain the phenomena both makes sense and has explanatory power (as a good theory should). Again you misuse the term theory. > [@](#): > > I have experienced the phenomena myself. No one doubts that you experienced something. We doubt you experienced an actual ghost. > [@](#): > > People I know and now have devices that take clear spirit photographs on a _regular_ basis (not ghosts per se, which are lost spirits, but spirit visitors). Either provide a link to these images, or admit that are not distinguishable from hoaxes, illuminated straps etc and therefore do not constitute proof. > [@](#): > > The skeptics on SMDB are actually arguing that ghosts are _a priori_ impossible. In my first post to this thread I explicitly state that I disagree with that position. > [@](#): > > Yeah, ghosts are real. Then post a link to the evidence which proves that they are real. More simply, Cite? ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/69 "2004-08-10T02:44:35Z")
I’ve post a link to this photo before, and some people told me it was faked and discounted it out of hand which irritated me. I’m not saying I believe it’s a ghost, but it is definitely not faked. The baby in the picture is someone I know. I know it wasn’t faked, because the family had never even considered there was anything unusual about the picture. I was the one who borrowed it and scanned it, because I found it interesting. Perhaps it’s a developing flaw and someone here who knows about these things can nail it down as such. In fact I believe that a developing flaw is most likely the correct explanation. But it is certainly and INTERESTING developing flaw. There’s no denying that. The photo is probably about 55 years old. I found it going through the family pictures of a friend about 20 years ago. All I did was scan it - I didn’t mess with it in any way. Check it out: [![](https://joker49.tripod.com/Ghost1.jpg) ](https://joker49.tripod.com/Ghost1.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/70 "2004-08-10T03:14:24Z")
> [@pohjonen](#): > > I’ve post a link to this photo before, and some people told me it was faked and discounted it out of hand which irritated me. I’m not saying I believe it’s a ghost, but it is definitely not faked. The baby in the picture is someone I know. I know it wasn’t faked, because the family had never even considered there was anything unusual about the picture. I was the one who borrowed it and scanned it, because I found it interesting. Perhaps it’s a developing flaw and someone here who knows about these things can nail it down as such. In fact I believe that a developing flaw is most likely the correct explanation. But it is certainly and INTERESTING developing flaw. There’s no denying that. The photo is probably about 55 years old. I found it going through the family pictures of a friend about 20 years ago. All I did was scan it - I didn’t mess with it in any way. > > Check it out: > [http://members.tripod.com/joker49/Ghost1.jpg](http://members.tripod.com/joker49/Ghost1.jpg) I don’t see an image, just a white page with a Tripod logo in the corner. ---
**Author:** ![harmless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/2acd7d/32.png) [@harmless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/harmless)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/71 "2004-08-10T03:17:48Z")
I’m curious about the subject of ghost as my mother’s family has always had a strong belief in them, telling stories growing up in my grandparent’s house and almost all nine sibling claiming to have strange occurrences. Even my sister has had some unusual experiences that she can’t explain away but I’ve never had one. My husband and I went to our local cemetery to take pictures of old head stones and stuff for his web page. We took about 110 pictures with our digital camera, and had two strange things happen; the first of which I’m sure was just a weird, coincidental camera glitch. I took a picture of a marker that just had a “P” on it, which later turned out to be the only picture that would not download and would not erase from the camera without fully formatting the memory card. It was just strange is all I’m saying. It had never happened before or nor since. The second was [this picture.](http://www.suzi-quzi.com/FaceinRainbow.jpg) This is the whole untouched picture as was downloaded off the camera so it’s pretty big. Check the bottom right-hand corner. [Here’s the close up circled and the contrast adjusted.](http://www.suzi-quzi.com/Cemetarycropped.JPG) I know it’s gotta be a prismatic effect from the sun, but dang, it’s spooky to me how much it looks like a face. Kind of sad looking too, wearing a funky triangle shaped hat. I think it looks like a child’s face. I know it probably doesn’t mean a lot, but I’ve been wanting to share it since I took it. Overactive imagination, you think? 😉 **Diogenes the Cynic** , I had to type in \*\*pohjonen’s \*\* link to make it work. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/72 "2004-08-10T03:25:44Z")
**Diogenes** Cut and paste the link in the adress bar. You get a picture of a baby, and various blobs that are easily explainable by lighting conditions (note how much darker the baby’s legs and arms are than the baby’s face. Note the ligh coming through the window), develping flaws (Note the flaw running vertically up the right side of the photo, parts look almost like a brush stroke) or simply uneven weathering (heat, light, pressure) over the course of five decades. **Pohjonen** I doubt very much it’s faked. Black blob and white lob that kinda look like things the same way clouds do. Why bother to fake that? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/73 "2004-08-10T03:35:44Z")
Ok, let’s start with **pohjonen’s** picture. I agree with **Doc**. I see a bay with some indistinct blobby stuff around it. The details are so indistinct and washed out that I’m not even sure what I’m supposed to be puzzled by. It’s just a very old picture with blobs on it. They could be just about anything, clouds, smoke, shrubbery, who knows? It would certainly never cross my mind to think of ghosts. **Harmless**. I looked at both of your pictures and all I see is some lens glare that might look like something, I suppose, in the way that clouds look like something. I’m betting that if you hadn’t taken this picture in a cemetary you would have thought nothing of it. As an aside, I hate to belabor this point, but beleabor it I must. Before we can intelligently discuss whether something is or is not a “ghost,” we really do have to clearly define what a ghost _is_ in a falsifiable way. I realize that may sound like smug gamesmanship to some people but it isn’t. It is an absolutely crucial point for scientific investigation. ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/74 "2004-08-10T03:36:56Z")
**Harmless** , it’s amazing how easily the human eye is trained to recognize faces or things which are vague face-shaped. I think you’re right in that it’s a pattern of streaking effects that happen to come together, coupled with the fact that you took the pictures in a Spooky Place. If we were to ascribe humanity and consciousness and ghosthood to every occasion where it looks like a face pops up, then our world would be swimming in ghosts: on tortillas, in clouds, in oil scum on the pavement, on the surface of Mars… oh, wait, we already have done that one. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![SnakeSpirit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snakespirit/32/7271_2.png) [@SnakeSpirit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakeSpirit)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/75 "2004-08-10T03:41:46Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > It’s just that it is very difficult to take brain farts and brain farters seriously. Once you filter out the dreams, hoaxes and misremembered events, there is nothing left. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![TonyF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9de053/32.png) [@TonyF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonyF)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/76 "2004-08-10T03:50:14Z")
> [@Fish](#): > > **Harmless** , it’s amazing how easily the human eye is trained to recognize faces or things which are vague face-shaped. Yep, especially when you’re in the mindset to look for them. I saw a ghost slightly to the left of the center of **Harmless’** larger picture, but I didn’t see the child in the corner at first. He’s smiling for the camera, and you can see a bit of his left shoulder. See him? I still attribute it to lens flare. That can expose dirt on the lens pretty easily. Plus I was looking for a ghost, and a ghost I did find. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/77 "2004-08-10T03:55:58Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > **Diogenes** > (Note the flaw running vertically up the right side of the photo, parts look almost like a brush stroke) or simply uneven weathering (heat, light, pressure) over the course of five decades. Doc, the vertical flaw on the right is something my old black and white scanner used to do to all the black and white pics I’d scan. It wasn’t on the original pic. You’re right about the light from the window shining on the baby’s face, but it’s the misty stuff I found interesting. Could the white misty stuff be a light leak on the receiver paper during developing? I used to work the camera in a print shop and that’s one explanation of the flaw I thought of. I’ve never done any really photographic stuff, just made half-tones and line shots for printing. I’ve seen light leaks, but they were very obvious and not diffuse where you could still see the stuff behind them like the misty areas in that photo. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/78 "2004-08-10T04:03:49Z")
I meant to say a light leak between the negative and the photographic paper. Or however you make prints from negatives. Duh… ---
**Author:** ![SnakeSpirit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snakespirit/32/7271_2.png) [@SnakeSpirit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakeSpirit)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/79 "2004-08-10T04:11:50Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > As an aside, I hate to belabor this point, but beleabor it I must. Before we can intelligently discuss whether something is or is not a “ghost,” we really do have to clearly define what a ghost _is_ in a falsifiable way. I realize that may sound like smug gamesmanship to some people but it isn’t. It is an absolutely crucial point for scientific investigation. No, I agree, and this is what I was trying to do back around post # 50 or so. Then **muffin** got frivolous. I think we need a good definition for a “ghost.” One that eliminates hoaxes, misinterpretation, illusion, hallucination and such, and which removes the assumptions that such things are spirits of the deceased, etc. Can we get serious here? Also, as to the picture of the baby and the graveyard, the baby could be simply a double-exposure (easier to do with cameras 50 years ago, I remember), and the other one does look like lens flare. I wouldn’t call them ghosts without more evidence. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2004, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542/80 "2004-08-10T05:25:49Z")
Whoa, is this the same dude who is able to recognize “fully actuated beings” by means of his computer? (I’ll dig up some old threads if I have to, bud.) Since when did _you_ become a born again skeptic? I ask because you say “LOL” in regard to EVPs, which is an area that has some of the best research and hardest evidence available. Shameless. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-ghosts-exist/258542.md?page=5)