Do you believe in ghosts and the paranormal?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
61

Cite? I guarantee you that your average sentient cat would disagree. :smiley:

The number of dreams that occur in the world on any given night would number well into the billions and some of the most ancient writings in existence attest that people dreamt (and were just as puzzled by what they dreamt) since writing began. In dreams we are all schizophrenic:

-You’re in your first grade classroom and you know absolutely it’s your first grade classroom except now it’s a Starbucks. All of the kids from first grade- including some you haven’t thought of since first grade are there, though you’re the age you are now, and you never noticed before that your first grade teacher has wings (like a butterfly, though, not like a bird or an angel). Mussolini and Aunt Bea are having sex up against the wall and nobody seems to notice, and for show and tell you’ve brought a perfect miniature swimming pool complete with live miniature swimmers, all of them alive and seemingly unaware that they’re in a little glass bubble you wear around your neck, one through which you can also see Dayton, Ohio (and sometimes Lima, Peru) if you look through it in the right way. The bell rings and you think “shit, that means Mrs. Moorehead’s desk is going to turn into a burning futon” and sure enough it does, and it makes perfect sense- why shouldn’t it turn into a burning futon?"*
Or, perhaps, you might even think in the dream itself “this is screwed up… wtf is going on?” But at the same time it’s also very real- you can hear Aunt Bea grown with pleasure at Il Duce’s every thrust and you can feel the water on your chest when the little mini swimmers splash it through the little ocular at the top of their glass sphere (they think it’s a sun), you can smell the smoke from the burning futon. Weirdest of all is when you take home a souvenir from the dream, such as waking up and thinking “Susan Dietrich… sat about two desks behind me in Mrs. Moorehead’s class… her mom had a big mole on her face… her family was military and moved somewhere in the middle of second grade… I haven’t thought of her in 25 years, was never friends or enemies with her… and yet there she was. Where’d that come from?” (Assume for purposes of this writing that Susan Dietrich from the dream did exist in your real first grade class- I’ve definitely had things like this happen [sometimes with people, sometimes with inanimate objects or a long forgotten detail like a snag in a rug at your grandmother’s house or the name of a babysitter’s dog {Snowball, who’s been dead for 35 years or more but who licked my face in a dream recently}).

The crazy thing is that nobody really knows what a dream is. There are hypotheses ranging from the mystical to the just plain silly to the scientific; we can monitor a brain’s actions during the dream state, we even know that there are different kinds of dreams. We’ve all felt ourself jump back with a start in a dream, we’ll talk out loud in the waking, sometimes you might even feel your teeth falling out after you wake up before you realize “twas a dream… they’re just find”… whatever, and there’ll even be bleedover from the Waking into the Dream (Anderson Cooper narrates it talking about the same bedouin camp he happens to be visiting on the TV which is on even though the dream takes place in a grocery store). But we’re no closer to understanding dreams now- really- than we were 4000 years ago- “Why did I see Susan Dietrich who I haven’t seen or thought about in 30 years? Why did Mrs. Moorehead have wings- and like a butterfly and not an angel? Why was the first grade classroom a Starbucks and what in hell made my inner porn director say “Spinsterly asexual plump TV icon, get over there and do it with a mid 20th century European dictator” (and why Aunt Bea instead of Alice the Maid or Aunt Clara and why Mussolini instead of Tito or Franco?).” We have absolutely no idea how these images are chosen, what their significance is (if any), or even "why’d we have this dream last night instead of the mundane ‘I can’t find my car keys and I need to get to class’ dream that’s so boring it could actually happen.

I find it very hard to express what I want to say… somehow I think dreams and ghostly perceptions are related. That’s not to say that I think dreams are real- I honestly don’t think Snowball really licked my face recently- or that I think all ghostly encounters (for lack of a better term) are hallucinations exactly (though I don’t discount for a moment than many, probably the vast majority, are). But I do think that whatever it is in our subconscious or our various “cranial wrinkles” that sometimes allows us to pull up Snowball/Susan Dietrich/that snag in a carpet you haven’t seen since childhood also makes us perceptive to something… out there… that might actually be out there but not usually… perceptible.

This is sounding way more X-FILES and Deepak than I mean it to or than I am, but I do think the mind is a fascinating thing that can sometimes, as we all know, perceive patterns even when there’s no pattern there and we have to supply it (i.e. there’s nothing intentional about that tortilla chip looking like Don Rickles), but there are also times when we perceive an order that is there (of course Susan Dietrich was in the first grade class because she was in real life, and even though we haven’t thought of her in 30 years she’s zapped into the dream). I am not explaining this well at all (weird subject on little sleep), but I think sometimes we’re more perceptive than others.

But I still think professional psychics are 99.9% bunk . :wink: (There are a couple of people I’ve known who I do believe have some mild psychic capabilities- one gave me and my mother some advice of sorts that was incredibly specific [not cold reading but a “there’s a book here that is marked with a check…”- well, long story] way in advance of lucky guessing or “remember the hits/forget the misses”- but both hated the ones who charge, claiming “it’s not a water nozzle I can turn on and turn off- I get absolutely nothing when I try to get something”.)
OTOH, one of them was also into astrology which I think is slightly less a science than the writing of fortune cookies, so… c’est la vie say the old folks, goes to show you never can tell.

*This isn’t a dream I’ve actually had but more an excercise in random name and summoning and placement.

62

I wouldn’t know. I’ve never encountered a sentient cat. I’ve seen them move toward food, but so do slime molds under certain circumstances. I realize that modern science classifies cats as vertebrates, but I feel there are still legitimate counterarguments to be made in favor of “fungus” or “quicksand.”

Even if other cats have do souls, though, I can guarantee that Tippy didn’t. The two-decade-old network of scarred flesh on my arm is my cite. If Damien from The Omen had been born with white eartips and toes, they would have named him “Tippy” instead. I trust my point is clear.

Perhaps this disqualifies me from an unbiased perspective on the subject. However, I refuse to even entertain the possibility that Tippy might somehow be watching me from beyond the grave… waiting. I would never sleep again.

63

I think that would have made the film both more interesting and more terrifying.

We had Bela, the god-king of cats in rural central Alabama for almost two decades. He was a feline combination of Hercules, John Wesley Hardin, William Quantrill, and Ramses the Great, constantly pillaging, killing, raping, begetting issue, assembling concubines, and moving on. He was found abandoned as a tiny kitten, was groomed to be the house cat (cushy job), and yet was permanently exiled outside before he was anywhere near grown. (We had a jet black green eyed cat named Spooky who was also pure mean and were worried Spooky would hurt Bela until he bit my mother once too often and she no longer cared; within the week we heard cats fighting in the woods and then Bela, scratched and bloodied, came back to the house and Spooky was never seen again.)

If Bela’s dead by now (if not he’d be well over 30 but for Bela I don’t discount it) I’m guessing he has the only pyramid ever raised by cats.

64

Do you think the same thing about stage magicians? That is, do you think maybe there’s a tiny chance that the occasional stage magician really is doing magic? Psychic acts really are just a form of stage magic.

There has never been a single verifiable instance of any so-called “paranormal” event or ability ever shown to science. Not only that, but it’s impossible. It’s ok to assume the impossible is impossible until proven otherwise.

65

Nope. If these things exist in a way such that they can impinge upon our world enough to (a) be detectable by human senses and/or (b) manifest physical effects [like doors slamming, objects moving, etc.], then they would be detectable to scientific instruments. Over a century of scientific investigation into the paranormal has so far turned up zero, zip, zilch, and nada. I draw the obvious conclusion.

66

That does not mean it does not exist. For 95% of recorded human history there had never been a germ, molecule, or supernova demonstrated to science and flight in a device made of metals was a scientific impossibility.

Incidentally this isn’t GD so I’m not making or defending a claim. I can’t prove it and wouldn’t even * want* people to believe on my say-so.

So life on other planets can’t exist then, since there’s no real way of proving their existence. Perhaps one day we will be able to prove it and then life on other planets will come into existence, for our benefit.

The problem with seeing doors slamming/objects moving/things that go bump in the night in general is that they’re terribly impunctual and I never seem to have my scientific instruments handy when they happen.

67

I always look at What Happens with a hopefully keen eye, but this event bent all of that:

Went to Chicago when my dear hon’s grandfather died, for the funeral. We stayed in the house he had lived for decades, and died in. While sleeping in the guest bedroom, with my Hon, I woke up to feeling a tug at my toe, like someone was jiggling my big toe, to wake me up. It was an absolute physical feeling. I then got scared, felt an electricity, and saw a figure in the corner of the room. I wasn’t able to handle that, and shut eyes, huddled down to go to sleep .Heard a voice say some things, too, but cannot share that, sorry, private. I’ve never heard the like since, though.

After the funeral of Papa, Hon and I were at a roadside restaurant travelling back home, and I told him about the Toe-jiggling thing . It was so vivid. He paid attention and teared up: that was what his dear Grandad did always on vacations to wake the boys up for fishing trips— he’d specifically grab onto their big toe, and jiggle it —“Wake Up Boys! Time to Go!” When I told him what happened , he teared up, it was exactly what his grandad would do to get attention.

I did not know of that at all before the funeral. Tis the wierdest, most absolute evidence experience for life beyond I’ve had.

68

Yes.

69

But did you get it on camera? :wink:

70

Stage magic is always based on intentional misdirection, though. There’s no such thing as an inadvertent stage magician. Contrariwise, I think it’s quite possible to be a professional psychic without being a charlatan. Charlatanry requires intent to deceive. I think a person could easily earn a living talking to ghosts or reading Tarot or dowsing or whatever, without ever actually realizing that there’s no there there. If a lot of readings or messages from beyond seem to hit home with the client, I could see how a person might genuinely believe in one’s own psychic gifts, in much the same way that astrology keeps earning converts. It’s not just a question of “real” or “fake.” There’s also a third potential category: “mistaken.”

Of course, such a person would likely have no problem offering to demonstrate those gifts under controlled conditions. James Randi documented a number of such people who seemed completely in earnest about the reliabilitiy of their talent. It’s probably fair to say that none of the really big-name psychics fall into this category, but I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of the others do.

71

I am really working on getting that chip implanted. Soon come!

72

If that happened, I’d think the US would be overrun with massive herds of ghost-cattle. Ronald McDonald’s corpse would be found looking like that girl in the closet in “The Ring”.

73

I think the reason for this seeming contradiction is that ghosts don’t fit well with Christian belief. The soul is supposed to go to heaven or hell after death, not hang out here on Earth showing up as blobs of light on ‘Ghosthunters’.

74

No. At the same time, I think it would be presumptuous to assume that we can explain all phenomena, or that we’ll ever be able to.

75

There I have a step up. I was abducted by aliens from a studio planet in an arm of NGC 1055 (or, in their own language, “wis con zen”- I didn’t have the heart to tell them) in my former life, and strangely the chip actually transcends lifetimes. Sometimes I get a little bump and the memory messes up and briefly I’m right back there in 13th century Australia fighting off Mongols and Templars (long story there, but let’s just say history books have it allllll wrong), but at least it makes it easy for them to find me. (Curious thing about NGC 1055-ers: there are two distinct races, one of them a sort of sentient shape-shifting silvery soil and the other something akin to an ocelot only made of gas, and they can’t stand each other yet are obsessed with what the other’s doing… “So like on the soily’s ship, do you really think they have better taste in fabrics? Tell the truth, you feel the turbulence a lot worse on theirs, don’t you?” and “When the goselots take you, do they even try to make you feel comfortable before the probes? Because if you ask me manners are just something that never evolved in them… that or taste in fabrics…”. Real big on fabrics, both of them. Generally speaking I prefer the soilys- they don’t take themselves as seriously- but for the love of Christmas and Idaho don’t ever let one of them get on the subject of their grandkids! You’ll be fumbing with your keys and telling them “If you don’t get me back soon then 8,000 years will have passed… again!” while they’re “oh yeah I will… but let me shift into my oldest granddaughter just one more time, I want you to see her in her graduation outfit!”

76
  1. I’m not saying if we haven’t detected something it doesn’t exist. That would be a stupid thing to think, and I curteously request that you be more charitable in the beliefs you attribute to me. (Not trying to be bitchy; I’m just asking for the benefit of the doubt.) I’m saying that if something should be detectable, and probably should have been detected by now if it existed, and it hasn’t been detected, then in all likelihood it doesn’t exist.
  2. Our means of detecting life on other planets is so feeble that our failure to detect same proves nothing. So that example has no bearing on the issue of the supernatural.

And neutrinos hitting water molecules thereby creating detectable Cherenkov radiation is more impunctual by several hundred billion orders of magnitude. But scientists have figured out a way to be around when it happens. And yet strangely nobody, since the advent of advanced detection instruments, has figured out a way to detect supernatural forces which are allegedly so easily detectable that the unaided human senses can detect them. So probably such supernatural forces do not exist.

77

Don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it but I had a strange experience once that I couldn’t explain. I was standing next to a historic structure that was being cleaned up and the sound of footsteps (human stride) came up to me and stopped. I was standing next to someone who heard the same thing. It was one of those “did you just hear what I heard” moments. It was in the fall and the sound was of leaves crunching underfoot. If it was a practical joke it was done really well since I had 360 degree view of the area. Definately a Harvey moment.

78

I’m really not trying to either- honest- but I don’t exactly follow the logic that the unexplained (e.g. elelle’s experiences and my experiences) should be considered “detectable”. Using her’s (to avoid being self-referential), she had a strange experience one night in that bedroom, one later synchronized with a tale of her grandfather-in-law; I don’t think it necessarily follows that every time she- or somebody else- spends the night in that room the same thing is going to happen, any more than “one night I went to sleep and heard a cricket chirping in that corner/saw lightning strike that field on a clear day- therefore there must always be crickets chirping in that corner/lightning striking in that field from a clear sky- or else there never was, because there’s not now”. I’m making this frustratingly unclear, but I hope you get the general point.

Besides which, there are many things that “exist” but cannot be detected except on the individual- almost solipsistic level. Thoughts, emotions, memories, dreams- all exist, but it’s impossible to prove any of them. I won’t embarrass myself by talking about advanced scientific theories- I’ll state up front I have only the most superficial knowledge of them- but I am aware of the existence of (if I know none of the details of) the notions that there are many different dimensions, the theory that all events past/present/future are happening at once/that without space there is no such things as time and vice versa/etc., and all of these things are unproven and none are really stranger than the notion that “something” usually imperceptible can sometimes be perceived (I’m not saying it has intelligence or a will or a purpose or is always there).

The “evidence” such as it is is all anecdotal. I don’t have the least bit of exasperation with anyone who doesn’t know me well IRL not believing my sincerity in these experiences (and frankly I haven’t told anywhere near the weirdest ones), and for those who do know me well IRL I don’t really take offense at them believing I believe it but being skeptical themselves- I certainly am on the topic of religion and many other things. This is why I could never call anything certain until it’s scientifically proven and falsifiable or at least observed by many reliable witnesses, but… just a personal belief, I think there’s something that’s not just “the mind playing tricks” behind some “ghost stories”. And while science is the greatest thing we have in proving truth, it’s still in all probability in its infancy (plus there’s the lesson of the Ptolemaic System: the most brilliant people alive using the best information and the best logic can be completely wrong; that does NOT mean science is nonsense and in fact they were wrong for the right reasons and because of this we got to the truth, and the wrong theory was far from useless [e.g. you could accurately predict eclipses using the Ptolemaic model], but ultimately it didn’t account for all knowledge and was, for the most brilliant of reasons, wrong.
But I could be well be.

79

No, I completely understand what you’re saying. Neutrinos don’t hit water molecules often, but a scientist can monitor a tank of water until it does happen, because he knows where to look–in this tank he filled with water. Whereas with supernatural phenomena, you don’t know where to set up the monitoring equipment in the first place. But when I say such phenomena should be detectable, I mean just this: in **elelle’s ** case, something (in her view) interacted with the physical world: it stimulated nerve endings in her toes, in her auditory pathways, etc. At the very least, it affected her brain to simulate these stimulations. That kind of intervention in the physical world is, like any intervention in the physical world, in principle detectable, simply because it induces a physical change in some object or substance.

80

In other words, buy a P-K reader.