You have the facts. Have at 'em.
Again, it’s a good thing that nobody’s saying it was “magic”.
The situation is indeed physically impossible but it did happen. Twice. I honestly have no idea why or how.
It depends on what you mean by “ghosts.” If you mean sentient spirit beings that interact with the living and/or their surroundings, then no. It would be wicked neat if they existed, and I love movies and books with that sort of story line, but I don’t believe they really exist.
If you mean instead what are sometimes called “residual hauntings,” yes. I believe that it’s possible that a moment in time can be captured, and I suspect that by the end of this century these things will be proven to exist, most likely as a result of electrical or magnetic impulses on the grounds of the haunting that record a small period of time like VHS tape does movies.
No, I have an unverifiable anecdote with no hard data or evidence. There’s no way to investigate your claim (or even know that your claim is true), so there’s no possible way that anyone can tell you what happened based on your message board posts alone.
If you’re claiming it didn’t have a natural explanation then you’re resorting to magical ones. I’m not going to quibble over semantically vacant distinctions between “magic” and “supernatural.” They’re exactly the same thing.
[quote]
The situation is indeed physically impossible
[/quote
Obviously not or it wouldn’t have happened.
You don’t know why it happened therefore a ghost did it? :dubious:
That’s quite a rigorous investigative method you’ve got there, sir.
Sorry, I tried to post this earlier, but got caught by the board trouble this evening.
Wait, wait. Now you’re saying that it’s physically impossible
that the guy in the next room stumbled through and tossed the blanket
at you? Physically impossible that you grabbed the blanket
unconciously in your sleep and tossed it onto yourself? Physically
impossible that you halucinated or dreamed the who thing, or
misremembered it?
Any one of those things may be very unliely and unsatisfying as an
explanation, but none of them is physically impossible.
On the other hand, if the entire event as you described it really is
physically impossible, then the explanation is simple: it
didn’t happen. By describing it as physically impossible, you’ve
admitted as much yourself, even if you don’t want to believe it.
I have no explanation, natural or otherwise.
Did I say it was?
What ARE you trying to suggest happened? For some strange reason, you seem to have a problem with me pointing out the truism that everything has a natural explanation and you appeared to be citing this blanket story as evidence to the contrary. If you’re not claiming it was magic, are you admitting it had a natural explanation. Is there any reason whatsoever not to assume that it did?
Yes, it’s physically impossible. This person cannot see in the dark well enough to safely negotiate the room and, in fact, prefers to not be in the room with the lights out.
The blanket was too far from the bed to randomly pick up without getting out of bed.
This was no dream or hallucination and too simple to be passed off as misremembering.
Easy for you to say. You’re not the one who was hit in the face with a blanket that should have been on the floor.
You probably did it in your sleep.
Whatever it was, it wasn’t magic.
Do you not understand the phrase “I don’t know”?
I am offering the events as evidence that some things are not easy to explain.
Sorry, neither. I’m not claiming it was magic, nor do I have a natural explanation that fits.
Becuase something that should not happen did. I can’t explain it and, apparently, neither can you.
I’d buy that if it weren’t for feeling cold due to not having enough blankets.
That doesn’t mean that magic is a feasible hypothesis.
It has to be one or the other. It can’t be neither. It was either natural or it was magic. Since magic is impossible. it had to have been natural.
What do you mean by “shouldn’t happen?” Why shouldn’t roommates throw blankets at you? Why can’t you get out of bed and grab them in your sleep? Why can’t you just have a mistaken memory about where the blanket was to begin with?
It;s also disingenuous to imply that you’ve proven the existence of magic (or “ghosts” or the “supernatural” or any other undefinable nonsense word you want to insert here) because someone on a message board can’t tell you who threw a blanket at you.
Lute, is it possible that you or someone else might have placed the blanket at the foot of your bed and that you didn’t notice or forgot. Hypothetically, you might have hooked you feet under them in your sleep and kicked them towards your head.
Do you have a shelf near the head of your bed. Maybe it fell on you.
Don’t be so sure of your memory and your subjective interpretation of events when you’re half-asleep. We’ve all had the experience of being dead certain about how we remembered something and still being wrong, and a sleepy state of mind can play weird tricks.
[Moderator Underoos On]I want the both of you to take this debate elsewhere now![/Moderator Underoos On]
No, I don’t believe in ghosts.
As a Christian, I believe in some form of afterlife, the “eternal life,” as they say, but I don’t believe in ectoplasmic shades who “haunt” those on earth. I have never experienced a ghostly presence or encounter, but I doubt I would believe the cause was a ghost even if I did.
S’okay. I don’t care enough about the subject to devote a thread to it and Dio is so full of assumptions that any meaningful discussion with him is impossibie, rendering any further attempts at communicating on the subject utterly pointless.
::Answering the OP ('bout time, right?))::
I am open to the idea of more things in heaven and Earth that are dreamt of in our current understanding of nature. I have experienced too many weird things to simply dismiss them, and submit that Dio hasn’t experienced enough.
Lute Skywatcher:
That would be the half-asleep person, yes?
So you’re describing the reported memory of somebody about something that happened while he was half-asleep?
And you’re assuming that a) he’s providing an accurate description of his memories; and b) that the memories he’s describing are an accurate recording of the sensory input he received at the time of the incident?
And to buy all this, we have to further assume that you’re accurately relaying the half-asleep person’s statement? (If that person is you, then ignore this part.)
And there’s no other evidence that the alleged incident actually happened?
Gosh, you’re right – clearly the burden of proof is on us. Well, I’m stumped. Bitter indeed is the taste of my failure.
Oh, to answer the OP – No, I don’t believe in ghosts. As a child I was really afraid of them, though; I remember the first time we had a new house built, asking my mother for reassurance that since it was new, nobody had ever been killed there. I still get creeped out sometimes. It’s the human condition that our modern intellects have to live in the same brain with ancient primal instinctive fear reactions that make our hearts pound. Keeps things interesting.
If I lived in a house with weird sounds, movements, etc. that I didn’t have a ready explanation, I’d certainly want to find out what caused it, and wouldn’t discount the possibility that it was something previously unknown to science. But jumping to the conclusion that some sort of surviving essence o’ dead people was causing it – that would be silly.
Can’t say I believe in ghosts but most people will have a story about something they can’t explain. Got 2 of them:
One night at a large, well lit intersection I saw a hooded figure walk in front of my car as if it was a reflection. When I looked straight at it, it was gone. I wondered if he had ducked under my car so I literally jumped out of and did a 360 and then looked underneath. If some kid was walking past this deserted intersection then the only way he could have disappeared was to dive headfirst into a ditch.
One fall day I was in a recently-cleared lot (site of old mill) next to a house with a history of being haunted (the usual underground railroad urband legend kind of story). I’m not superstitious and didn’t buy into any of it. Anyway, I’m standing next to a guy when the sound of footsteps approaches us in the leaves. No mistaking the gate of a person walking. The sound comes right up to us and stops. There are no animals around (deer populate area). There is nothing around that could reflect sound. We both just looked at each other in a confused state.
I’m a skeptic myself. That said I work in one of only two “officially” haunted houses in California, the Winchester Mystery House. I haven’t seen a ghost myself, but some people who work with me have reported some strange experiences. I’ll reserve judgment until I see something myself, though.
OK. It’s mildly offensive, if only for a moment. Maybe your problem is you don’t know me, or any women like me. If you ever find yourself sleeping next to me, and we hear a boogie noise, I’ll go first, and you can either stay in bed or be backup. ’Kay? ’Course you’ll have to shake me awake to tell me there’s a boogie noise, because I don’t hear them.
I am quite, entirely, XX-in-every-celledly, female and I do NOT hold a heart-felt belief in the Supernatural.
I am in the camp of Alan Smithee as described in this thread. Here’s my opinion: This is a physical world. It’s physically explainable even when we do not know the explanations.
I have autopsied close to 3,000 dead bodies, which means I looked into their dead eyes, touched their dead hands, opened them up and handled them inside and out. I have carefully examined maybe 500 more dead bodies which did not need an autopsy. I have been in the room with at a rough guess 6000 more, who were being examined or autopsied by colleagues in multi-gurney rooms. Total count: no ghosts. Zero, zip, nada. Not when I went to bed that night. Not when I came back into the morgue with the lights off late at night. At least a fifth of those bodies were homicide victims, and the vast majority of them died suddenly and alone without anyone around to hear their dying words. Wouldn’t you think they’d want to tell me something?