# Post your ghost stories here, and I will debunk them **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 18, 2010, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674 "2010-06-18T14:53:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/81 "2010-06-18T18:53:51Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > That’s not debunking that dismissing. In this thread “debunking” has been arbitrarily redefined as "provide one or more more plausible explanations, with “more plausible” defined as “not requiring dramatic changes to the scientific/secular understanding of the world.” You claimed to have a vision. People have visions all the time. I have them nearly every night. People have imaginations. People have daydreams. The most plausible explanation is that your brain invented the scenario. Especially since you were obviously in an environment and mindset conduscive to religious fantasies at the time. Now, if you’d visioned up the next day’s lotto numbers or Fermat’s Last Theorem or something, then that would perhaps be a different story. But it doesn’t seem you did. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/82 "2010-06-18T18:54:13Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I don’t have to know every explanation. I just have to debunk _impossible_ ones. > > I can explain it easily. She hallucinated it. It’s actually a very common phenomenon for people to hallucinate that they are seeing or being visted by loved ones shortly after they die. It’s an emotional coping mechanism and a well-known phenomenon. That’s what happened to your daughter. You’re welcome. Now see your explanation is sillier than any I’ve ever heard. Why in the world would she suddenly hallucinate her grandmother before she even knew she was dead? She was five and had never experienced losing a loved one. She didn’t understand “Meemaw will not be coming back because she’s dead.” She sure as HELL didn’t know about angels. I wouldn’t fill a kid’s head with that crap. I can still see her face when she said she knew, because Meemaw told her the night before that she was going to be going away for a long time. All I’d told her was that her grandma was gone. No further explanation. If she’d been older and/or exposed to these stories before I might understand hallucination, but without previous experience she had no reason to hallucinate. If anything I would have been the one to hallucinate. It was my mom, my best friend, she meant the world to me. I personally think my mom would be pissed about the whole thing too. I know it wasn’t her. I know it wasn’t some “presence” evil or benign. But hallucination? There was simply no reason for it. It makes less sense even than getting the idea from a TV show or hearing something whispered by friends or being a future story teller of great imagination. Hell even a ghost makes more sense than hallucination. And see by the snark I know you’re not interested in fighting ignorance. You’re having fun, being snarky. Nothing wrong with that, but you don’t fool me pretending you’re being noble, fighting the good fight. You’re welcome. ---
**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:** [June 18, 2010, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/83 "2010-06-18T18:55:54Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > And what if God is the best explanation? If that eever happens, then God will have been demonstrated to be the best explanation. So far, though, God has never even been shown to be a remotely _viable_ explanation for anything. > [@](#): > > Well, yes Gods have been used to explain stuff that we had no other explanation for and now we see that lightning is not caused why an angry storm god striking the earth with his mighty hammer. Does that mean that there is no God? It means there’s no storm god. ---
**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:** [June 18, 2010, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/84 "2010-06-18T19:02:24Z")
> [@Rushgeekgirl](#): > > Now see your explanation is sillier than any I’ve ever heard. Why in the world would she suddenly hallucinate her grandmother before she even knew she was dead? She was five and had never experienced losing a loved one. She didn’t understand “Meemaw will not be coming back because she’s dead.” She sure as HELL didn’t know about angels. I wouldn’t fill a kid’s head with that crap. I can still see her face when she said she knew, because Meemaw told her the night before that she was going to be going away for a long time. All I’d told her was that her grandma was gone. No further explanation. I don’t know why your kid hallucinated, but she did. She probably understood on some level or heard adults talking. If she wasn’t hallucinating, she was making it up. What she did NOT do was talk to a fucking ghost. That’s impossible. > [@](#): > > But hallucination? There was simply no reason for it. It makes less sense even than getting the idea from a TV show or hearing something whispered by friends or being a future story teller of great imagination. Hell even a ghost makes more sense than hallucination. What’s more likely, that your kid hallucinated or that a disembodied spirit went to talk to her? I’m sorry the explanation isn’t satisfying to you, but your kid was either imagining things or making them up. You can call that 'snarky" if you want, but I’m actually just being factual and blunt. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/85 "2010-06-18T19:03:19Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > In this thread “debunking” has been arbitrarily redefined as "provide one or more more plausible explanations, with “more plausible” defined as “not requiring dramatic changes to the scientific/secular understanding of the world.” Wait what? The word has a definition.\* Debunk\* doesn’t mean to offer more plausible explanations. If we’re going to change the meaning of words I say “ghosts” can mean “anything we damnwell want it to believe in”. And now they’re swirling all over this board. See what you’ve done now? We’re all doomed. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/86 "2010-06-18T19:05:27Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > A better answer for what? I guess what I was trying to say was that noone disproves God, they just dismiss the notion he exists because his existence cannot be proven. There are subatomic particles that we cannot prove exist (yet) but there are scientists that believe they exist because their existence would explain a few things. > [@](#): > > “Because I cannot explain his existence he must not exist?” What does that _mean_? > > Too often teh retort of athiests is that God must not exist because i cannot prove his existence. > > > [@](#): > > > > The default assumption is that sky gods don’t exist until you can show some kind of reason to believe they do. > > Sky god? Did I say that he lived in the sky? Perhaps on a cloud? Why is the onus on me and the other 90% of humanity to prove to the small percentage of athiests that God or the soul exists? Why shouldn’t those with the minority view have to prove their beliefs? > > If you want to posit "God"as an explanation for something, it is incumbent on you to show _why_ it’s a better answer and to do so with scientific methodology. Just saying “a wizard did it” is not anything that it is rational to consider without evidence. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/87 "2010-06-18T19:08:02Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Assuming the psychic _was_ on the level, let’s do a comparison. You’re chalking a lot up to coincidence. He was either set up or this is a case of the monkey typing shakespeare. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Hamsandwich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4bbf92/32.png) [@Darth\_Hamsandwich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Hamsandwich)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/88 "2010-06-18T19:08:41Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > It doesn’t have to be the case that your brother was involved in the the dog going missing to being with, but it may be that he somehow figured out where it was, and then decided to devise this kooky “psychic” thing as a way to divulge it. > > It may even be (and I’m not saying this is likely, only that it’s more likely than the supernatural) that he gave the dog away or sold it or something, then felt guilty and came up with this “psychic” thing as a way to steal the dog back without letting on that he’d been guilty of anything. Ahahaha!! You guys were right on the money! Listen to this: I just spoke on the phone to my brother after I posted my story and he told me he set me up. Apparently, at the end of the three week interim that Jake was missing, he got a call from our neighbor that they had found Jake huddling under her porch. My brother went up to NY without telling us and brought Jake to our summer house. Anyway, the guy who does our landscaping up there came by and got to talking. He and my brother concocted the whole scheme! I CANNOT wait to tell this to Mom and Dad at the next family dinner. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/89 "2010-06-18T19:08:49Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I don’t know why your kid hallucinated, but she did. She probably understood on some level or heard adults talking. > > If she wasn’t hallucinating, she was making it up. What she did NOT do was talk to a fucking ghost. That’s impossible. > But hallucination? There was simply no reason for it. It makes less sense even than getting the idea from a TV show or hearing something whispered by friends or being a future story teller of great imagination. Hell even a ghost makes more sense than hallucination.[.quote] > What’s more likely, that your kid hallucinated or that a disembodied spirit went to talk to her? > > I’m sorry the explanation isn’t satisfying to you, but your kid was either imagining things or making them up. You can call that 'snarky" if you want, but I’m actually just being factual and blunt. Satisfying to me? It wasn’t an valid explanation. It’s your opinion based on your personal beliefs. You didn’t observe the experience. Without observing her how can you expect to know more than I would? Here’s the thing, DtC. You’re not debunking anything. That’s my point. That’s all I’m trying to say here. Yes, she was probably imagining something based on some experience she had. Damned if I know what it was. It wasn’t a ghost. But you debunked nothing about my story. BTW, I appreciate bluntness. I know blunt from snark. Sorry you’re not able to see that in yourself. Here’s a hint though: “You’re welcome”. That’s snark. There ya go. You’re welcome. ---
**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:** [June 18, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/90 "2010-06-18T19:08:54Z")
> [@Rushgeekgirl](#): > > Wait what? The word has a definition.\* Debunk\* doesn’t mean to offer more plausible explanations. In this case it does, because any plausible explanation at all automatically rules out magic. The possible automatically trumps the impossible. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/91 "2010-06-18T19:09:08Z")
> [@Rushgeekgirl](#): > > Now see your explanation is sillier than any I’ve ever heard. Ghosts are sillier than lying or mistaken children. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/92 "2010-06-18T19:09:32Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > And what if God is the best explanation? God is never a ‘best’ explanation. God is a cop-out default explanation for those too lazy to use their brains or too stubborn to admit “Huh, I guess we just don’t know.” How people make this jump from the unknown to “don’t know? Whelp, it must be god then” I’ll never understand. It makes as much sense as saying “What, you can’t identify what that thing up in the sky is? Well then the best explanation is space aliens.” ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/93 "2010-06-18T19:10:24Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > That’s an opinion. No, it’s a statement of fact based on the available information. Until you actually come up with something, all _you_ is an opinion based on… What facts is your opinion based on, again? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/94 "2010-06-18T19:10:40Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > No, that’s a logically inescapable axiom of scientific methodology. No that is an opinion. Until you can prove that God does not or cannot exist, it is merely your opinion that he does not exist. No matter how much you want your opinion to be fact, it is still an opinioon isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![UncleMoose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e0b2c6/32.png) [@UncleMoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleMoose)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/95 "2010-06-18T19:12:05Z")
OK, I’ll repeat my own experience from the original thread (and I’m sorry if I should have quoted this in a different manner): I have a reverse banjo clock from 1916 that belonged to my maternal grandparents. It has two keyholes for winding, one for the clock itself and the other for the chimes. I was in the habit of only winding the clock itself, as the chimes were rather loud. At the time in question, the chimes had not been wound or rung for weeks if not months. The mechanism of the chimes is that it would chime once on the half-hour, and chime the time on the hour. It would only chime on the hour or half-hour, not at any other time. The last piece of info is that if the chimes spring had mostly unwound, the chiming would be very slow and “draggy”. As I returned to the house from my father’s wake, the clock started chiming. It chimed very clearly, not dragged out at all, and it chimed 10-12 times (I was so stunned I didn’t start counting), and was heard by my wife and daughter. It was 10:43. I’ve had enough math where I understand the power of coincidence, but the clock should not have been capable of chiming at that time. I have tried to partially wind the chimes, let them run down, move the clock to between the hour and half-hour, move the clock, shake the clock, etc. I’ve never been able to get the clock to chime at a time it shouldn’t. My father was the type who lothed religion, but always felt that there might be something past death. I feel the same way, especially now. A few more facts, for whatever they are worth - I have a BS in Physics and Astronomy (back in '78, but still…) I’m not convinced of the existence of ghosts, even with the above occurrence, but I am more than a little weirded out by it, and am more inclined that there may be some part of us that survives. I tried like hell to reproduce this by varying the amount of winding on the chime spring, playing around with the position of the clock, banging on the wall, etc. My last try was to move the hands of the clock past the half hour mark, fully wind the chime spring, then move the clock around, bang on the wall, open and close doors, etc. The clock would not chime except on the hour and half hour. It baffles me, but I felt it fit the original OP’s question. ---
**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:** [June 18, 2010, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/96 "2010-06-18T19:13:03Z")
> [@Rushgeekgirl](#): > > Satisfying to me? It wasn’t an valid explanation. I’m sorry, but yes it is. So is the possibility that your kid was making it up. What is NOT valid is anything which is physically impossible, and ghosts are physically impossible. It’s not as fun to know that your kid was hallucinating or dreaming or (actually the most likely now that I really think about it) just making shit up, but there you go. Ghost story debunked. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/97 "2010-06-18T19:13:13Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > No that is an opinion. Until you can prove that God does not or cannot exist, it is merely your opinion that he does not exist. No matter how much you want your opinion to be fact, it is still an opinioon isn’t it? I think I see the problem here. Can God be proven not to exist to your satisfaction? If so, how? ---
**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:** [June 18, 2010, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/98 "2010-06-18T19:16:05Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > No that is an opinion. Until you can prove that God does not or cannot exist, it is merely your opinion that he does not exist. No matter how much you want your opinion to be fact, it is still an opinioon isn’t it? No, it’s a logical default assumption. I think you also have to realize that a _presumption_ of non-existence is not the same thing as an _assertion_ of non-existence. Science doesn’t do the latter. The presumptions are always conditional and changable. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/99 "2010-06-18T19:17:14Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > That’s not debunking that dismissing. It’s not intended to be a dismissal. But if you read a couple of my posts in this thread you’ll see I have acknowledged it’s not possible to debunk a personal experience with no witnesses because I didn’t even experience the event we’re talking about. You did, and you’re relating it to me. We can talk about what the possible explanations are, and what is more or less likely. To debunk something we would need some level of independent confirmation that it happened. For example: imagine a spoon on your kitchen counter starts floating in the air. You videotape it and say you’re sure it’s a ghost telling you to get out of the house. (Incidentally, why do the ghosts never say “I hope you enjoy this house as much as I did?”) If I can point out that a truck passed by your house carrying a huge magnet at that moment, or there was a fluctuation in the Earth’s magnetic field, then we might be able to say I’ve debunked your version. I can’t debunk something that didn’t happen in the first place in any location other than your own mind. > [@](#): > > How do you figure? Because you asked why anybody would want to debunk something like this, which implies you’d have to be a grinch to want to do so. If that’s not what you were trying to say, fine. It did come off that way. > [@](#): > > I am saying that even if what you say is true, is there no value in faith? Faith has positive and negative qualities like pretty much anything else. The positive qualifies can be very reassuring, and the negatives can be very dangerous and open to manipulation. > [@](#): > > And what if God is the best explanation? Then all you have to do is explain God. Which is by definition going to be more complicated than explaining anything else. > [@](#): > > But do you believe that there is anything that the scientific method will never be able to explain? I think it’s possible. We may never know what happened in the first instants after the Big Bang, for example. I think some physicists believe the events that happened in the first 1\*10[sup]-43[/sup] seconds are unknowable. We’ll see. > [@](#): > > Well, yes Gods have been used to explain stuff that we had no other explanation for and now we see that lightning is not caused why an angry storm god striking the earth with his mighty hammer. Does that mean that there is no God? It’s a big freaking hint as far as I’m concerned: the problem with “The God of the Gaps” is that the gaps keep getting smaller. You talk about the cause of lightning as if it was obvious, which is understandable. Someone gave you the basics on lightning when you were a small child, and Thor seems kind of ridiculous. But there was a time when people really didn’t have a better explanation for that. There was a time we couldn’t explain why things burned, why objects fell downward, what the lights in the sky were, why it got dark at night, what the Earth looked like, how the human body worked, how life developed… I could go on. Today we can explain those things thoroughly and in great detail and at least in developed countries, people learn a lot of that stuff before they’re 10 years old. Years from now the stuff you are saying about physics may seem equally obvious, at which time few people will offer it as specific proof of god or use it to say science can’t explain the world. They’ll be talking about quantum foam or something else even more arcane. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674/100 "2010-06-18T19:17:50Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > No, it’s a statement of fact based on the available information. Until you actually come up with something, all _you_ is an opinion based on… > What facts is your opinion based on, again? OK then prove for a fact that God doesn’t exist based on the available information. When 90% of the world disagrees with you why is the 90% to prove that God exists to the 10%? Why shouldn’t the 10% have to prove their beliefs to the 90%? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-your-ghost-stories-here-and-i-will-debunk-them/543674.md?page=6)