I don’t understand that’s to people almost in a row who say they don’t believe in ghosts, but who describe first hand incidents that are difficult (I’m being generous) to explain in “non ghost” terms. Why not just say “I don’t know” maybe there are ghosts and maybe there are not? After all which universal law of Physics is violated by ghosts (here I fear that I may get an answer difficult to refute so I ask this question at my own risk)? Of course the onus is on those who claim that ghosts are real to prove their claim. Fine, I accept that and ghosts are unproven (or some variation of spritual existence that would account for the manifestations commonly described as ghosts). However, I don’t get the allmost hostile intellectual opposition to the very concept that they might exist. Have we become so haughty as a species that we must understand every mystery of the universe at this point in our development?
Sorry, that should read “two” people.
Probably because said freaky incidents could be caused by a million other unknown forces or not understood things than the spirits of dead humans.
Those sorts of things should be investigated and admittedly no one knows for sure what causes them, but I don’t think it serves as evidence of ghosts, either.
Well, I agree that there are many other potential explanations besides spirits (a good number of which might invovle phenomina not currently understood by science). However, one very simple explanation that fits the evidence is that its sometimes caused by spirits! All, I’m saying is that if I witnessed my Heinz catsup bottle levitate in the air for three seconds and then move itself across the table while I was writing this post my description would read something like " well if spirits don’t exist then something equally mysterious must or else give me some nice pills and a padded room because I saw what I saw." However, instead I see a strong reluctance to call “a duck a duck.” We are not talking about a few incidents in isolation, but many thousands sometimes in context over the whole of human history.
Why is it more difficult to believe that spirits might exist than it is that our universe is expanding at an ever faster rate with over ninty percent of its mass unaccounted for? I’m not saying that spirits definitely exist, but if they were proven beyond doubt my attitude would be something like “well that’s fascinating, but far less mysterious than many long known elements of quantum mechanics, astrophysics or even molecular biology.”
What’s the difference between ghosts picking up your ketchup bottle, and an invisible kitchen gnome named Phil? Or, say, a freaky pocket of messed-up energy uh… with the earth’s magnetic field or something?
Except in the case where people specifically see dead relatives or animals or human figures, there isn’t compelling enough evidence to say even “this could be because of dead spirits.” It’s just an isolated event. And having had a very real and frightening ghost experience myself, a lot of times it really is just overactive imagination. Halluncinations from stress, sleep paralysis, overactive imagination, seeing things you want to be there…
And the rest is just unexplained. For some people, that may be enough to say “well I think maybe it could be spirits” but for many, it’s not. And there’s nothing wrong with healthy skepticism. :dubious:
People used to believe the Earth was flat and the Sun orbited the Earth.
There have been millions of UFO sightings, loads of crop circles and claims of dowsing.
However anecdotal evidence is not reliable by itself. By all means follow up with scientific testing.
Indeed. And we are still waiting for that one such experience.
Well most UFO sightings have been explained. Planets, aircraft, weather and hoaxes. This shows that eye-witness accounts are generally wrong. Why would it be ‘simpler’ to believe in ‘life after death plus ability to communicate from the afterlife’ than ‘mistaken eye-witness’?
We have no examples of resurrection and masses of examples of mistakes.
There have indeed been scientific evaluations of the most haunted houses. Nothing has ever been observed.
After how many centuries of ‘nothing being observed’ should we decide ghosts don’t exist?
I guess we will just have to differ on the issue that nothing has ever been observed. As stated I personally know people that have had paranormal experiences. Furthermore, I have listened to some really impressive EVP’s, and seen videos (taken by members of the IGT in my area) of things happening (objects moving around the room) that are difficult to explain. Of course this is not proof since they could be hoaxes or explainable in some other terms (and probably are). What exactly would constitute sufficient evidence? That’s really the rub isn’t it? It’s a high hurdle (and it should be) to declaire that something like “ghosts” are objectively valid. On the other hand just because the evidence is not sufficient also doesn’t mean that it is false either. Of course it could be gnomes or what not and for that reason I believe the first goal of paranormal researchers should be to prove that something outside the rhealm of the normal exists without trying to quantify, or qualitatively describe what it is.
I didn’t used to believe in ghosts.
Then, one day, as I was sitting in a restaurant, at a vacant table, a hot sauce bottle exploded with no one around.
That convinced me. Obviously it was a poltergeist – there’s no other explanation.
It’s so easy to find proof when you know how to look.
Ever since I lived in my second house, I’ve had a ghost that follows me around. He’s a tall man, dark clothes, and I think he has a tall hat.
Several times in the third house I lived in, I’d leave friends alone in my room, and they’d come find me a few minutes later. “Dude, something just slapped me on the back of the head.” This happened one time to everyone who was left alone in my room (my mom says the ghost is just doing a, “Hey, look, I’m here” kind of thing).
After I moved in with The Cody, he got slapped once, and felt something small (like a marble or coin) hit him in the back of the head while he was on the computer. Also, we were sleeping in a room with both doors closed and an AC vent aimed toward the doors, which would (if anything) push them closed rather than open. Cody is a compulsive door-closer. We woke up, and both doors were wiiiiiiide open.
My mom has a ghost of her own, and her ghost likes to rearrange things and knock Santa figures onto the ground. But it leaves Buddha and Virgin Mary alone.
When Mr. AFG and I first moved into our apartment, similar weird things started happening, too. I was cooking one day and out of the corner of my eye I saw a man standing beside me. I thought it was Mr. AFG, but when I turned to look, nobody was there. I also swore I saw a cat walk past the door of our office on another occasion. But the creepiest was one time we were watching tv and suddenly we heard a BAM, BAM, BAM come from the kitchen. I ran to see what was going on, and 3 full cans of pop that I had put on the counter earlier - upright, nowhere near the edge, and no breezes anywhere - had inexplicably flown off the counter in succession and hit the floor. But just like you, one day it all just stopped. We’ve had nothing weird happen in months.
Let me make this observation if I may. How many first hand serious sounding accounts of paranormal activity (that resemble hauntings) do we have just in the above threads? Without going through again I would say at least three and maybe up to five. Now if someone were to post the thread " How many of you have had experiences with seeing Unicorns", I doubt that we would get many if any serious responses. My point is simply that this is a serious subject since whether you are a Christian, Atheist, or Agnostic of one thing you can be certain you are going to die. I maintain that the possibility of paranormal activity (to include ESP, OBE’s, and hauntings) is supported by thousands of credible accounts and some (albeit limited and disputed) circumstancial evidence. Everyone should want to investigate this further and do so in a serious manner with an open (but skeptical) mind.
Probably gas built up inside the bottle until there was enough pressure for the cap to be forced off.
As for the other accounts, haven’t got a clue.
You think? 
Naah. It’s a well-known fact that ghosts like ketchup. And hot sauce.
There was a unicorn in my garden once, browsing in the roses. He had a golden horn in the middle of his forehead. I said, “Here, Unicorn,” pulled up a lily and gave it to him. He ate it gravely.
Roland, there are members of this Board who are very anti-paranormal activity. That’s just the way it is. I personally remain on the fence, not having seen enough evidence to make a decision one way or the other. See my sig - it pretty much sums up how I feel about stuff like this.
I replied to you frivolously, but now I will reply seriously. 
Roland, this thread is tottering dangerously towards GD territory, and leaning towards ground we have covered frequently in the past. If you care, and have a few thousand hours to kill, search in the GD forum for the obvious keywords.
First, “thousands of credible accounts” do not a proof make. Not only is the status of “credible” a debatable one, but if no single account can stand on its own merit, the multiplication of poor evidence does not improve its quality.
Perhaps you have heard this before: Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out. That means that all evidence must be weighed on its merits: good evidence merits further investigation, poor evidence, not worth the time. Extraordinary claims require…(you know the rest, right?)
As to your unicorn suggestion, it seems your point is that since we don’t have frequent unicorn signtings in the 21st Century, unicorns don’t exist, but since we do have ghost sightings, they do. Nonsense. Consider these paranormal and doubtful phenomena, just a random list I thunk up:[ul][li]ghosts[]succubi[]aliens[]bigfoot[]demons[]poltergeists[]dragons[]gods appearing in human form[]UFOs[]angels[]witches[/ul]Now let’s separate these according to when they were popular. I would put succubi, demons, dragons, gods, angels and witches in the “hundreds of years ago” time slot, but aliens, bigfoot, UFOs and poltergeists in the “modern” time slot. Maybe ghosts can go in both.[/li]
If, in Salem, Mass, year 16xx, you claimed to have seen a bigfoot or UFO, you probably would have been ignored. But witches were so real that dozens were put to death because of credible eyewitness testimony. Conversely, in 2005, if you claim your neighbor is a witch, you probably would be considered crazy, but if you see a bigfoot or UFO, you get written up in the paper.
Times change. The paranormal has its fads just like anything else. Our job, since “fighting ignorance” is our motto, is to try to see thru the fads to the truth hiding behind. Here’s hoping our vision is 20-20 and we have X-ray specs.
I meant scientifically observed.
Well I believe in an invisible force that occurs between all masses.
of course the only proof I have of gravity is that anyone can observe it. 
I believe that ‘well-organised’ light can burn holes in metal and be bounced off the Moon and return to Earth.
I believe that I can press buttons on a box in my room in the UK and that anyone anywhere on Earth with a similar box can read my words shortly afterwards.
I believe that soup placed in a box can be ‘agitated’ to boiling point in just a few minutes.
I believe that rubbing a balloon on my woolly pullover will make the balloon stick to a ceiling for days.
But there is no such evidence for ghosts. Every single time a scientist investigates ghosts, nothing happens. Every single time.
Not that high. Just one single ghost. that’s all we need. Just one.
The evidence is not insufficient. It is completely non-existant!
No true scientist cares if it’s gnomes, ghosts, psychics, unicorns or whatever. We just want to see one piece of evidence. Just one.
Who are these members?!
I personally think aliens exist somewhere in the Universe purely because of mathematics.
All I need to believe in ghosts is one piece of evidence (scientific, not anecdotal, of course!).
What ‘evidence’ have you seen for ghosts?
Nah. People would assume you are referring to a Wiccan person.
I’m not one to automatically assume that there’s a ghost behind every weird thing that happens, but our stereo system has been acting weird for a long time now, and I can’t think of any explanation for it.
It started out that once or twice it would pause in the middle of a song. Didn’t think much of it. Then it started switching to standby mode randomly, and sometimes doing so multiple times in a row. Oooookay, getting weirder. I’ll just mention here that these occurances always happen during the first song I played–I always use shuffle and this has happened with multiple discs, so that certainly isn’t it-and if it makes it through the first song (or if I hit next, which I rarely do unless I don’t like the song) it works fine. We don’t really use it for anything besides listening to CDs, so I don’t know if this would happen in other modes.
Then, one day I turned on the stereo to listen to some music. Music stops. I sigh, get up and hit the power button again. Nothing happens, and now I notice that the screen is completely blank. This should only happen if there is no power running to the unit, i.e. it is unplugged or the power goes off. Naturally, my first thought is, the power went out. But no, other appliances are still working, it’s just the stereo that’s off. Check plug just in case, it’s firmly stuck in the wall. Wait about 20 seconds or so, power starts running to the unit again.
And it proceeds to pull the same trick three more times.
Now if someone has an explanation for that, I’m more than happy to hear it. I’m stumped, and the supernatural is all that I’m left with.
First, thank you everyone, for your responses.
I was just looking for unscientific, anecdotal experiences. The I-don’t-have-it-on-videotape but I-saw-what-saw-and-wasn’t-drunk experiences. Not really looking for explanations. We all know what the arguments are. I’m looking for the human experience, whatever it is.
[as a nod to the no-evidence-whatsoever-for-the-paranormal crowd, there doesn’t, for example, seem to be videotape of a ghost, (or if they don’t show up on videotape, then there’s no videotape of, say, three people all turning to look at something that’s not there); or maybe there is videotape, but it’s debatable, and we can debate things forever because it’s hard to disprove a negative]
I was curious beause, existent or not, I haven’t seen a ghost (or other such thing). Now, I think, with someone’s help, I have figured out why –
Obviously, I’m too boring – there used to be a ghost in the house, but he got bored watching me and left!
–
Here’s my second-hand ghost story. I can’t remember all the details. There was this kid. He went to camp, really enjoyed it, and went home. He died of a rare brain tumor a few months later. Tragic. Back at camp, sometime afterward, a couple of counselors were making a tape. They set the machine going. After it finished, they played the tape. There was a huge gap of silence in it. Broken by the clear sound of footsteps, perhaps walking into the buidling, and back out. But no one else was around. No footprints in the snow.
The tale was told as true.
Why disbelieve? It came from camp counselors at camp. We got the Ivory Soap story, and the cough drop story, too.
Why believe them? Though it was told by one of the tall tale-telling camp counselors to us kids, it wasn’t one of the tall tales. And the dull, boring, reliable, non-tale telling counselor (who was a witness) confirmed it when prodded. (dull and boring in a relative sense; we all liked her).
But still, it was at camp.