If you die before age 88 will you stop believing? 
Thats called “seeing stars”
yup… just like in cartoons… what you are seeing are actually white blood cells racing through the veins in your retina. Dont ask me why you can see them or why they look so bright due to physical excertion though. I dunno.
The first time I ever saw them was when I choked on a slice of orange.
In the early 70s I helped pay my way through college by reading the Tarot. So I guess I have messed with the occult. Basically I wore mystical looking robe thingy, made up stuff to go with the cards and mumbled a lot.
I even told most of my customers I knew nothing about what I was doing and didn’t believe it either and they just said, “You are so honest, I just know you’ll be do a good job.”
So it goes I guess.
If I thought vampires existed: yes.
I agree. I think that, while a lot of what is touted as ‘supernatural’ is just stage-magic or bunk, there really are both good and evil supernatural powers in the world. If you have the good ones (ie God) on your side you don’t have to be scared of the bad ones, but all the same it’s dumb to go messing with that stuff.
This brings to mind another question; does anybody here think they have been in the presence of true evil, from a person or a place? I mean make your hair stand up, complete heebie-jeebies for no apparent reason evil, not just humans behaving really badly (which is bad, too, of course).
I’m one who thinks that all that stuff is nonsense, but still I prefer stay away from it.
Vlad the Impaler rules.
I remember watching some show, I think it was Scariest Places on Earth, and this one couple were really into Aleister Crowley (wasn’t he a real prick?)
At any rate, the guy was in this cave, and saying in slow motion, in this low, growling voice, “Crooooowellllleeeeeyyy…” over and over and over…I almost peed my pants laughing.
Me too, on the occult stuff. It’s just not fun to me.
OTOH, I have twice had experiences of ESP that I am satisfied have no other explanation. Brain neurons taking long distance jumps, whatever your favorite theory may be. No way to prove it, but I’m satisfied that some form of telepathy is possible. Before anyone asks, no I can’t control it in any way, and I don’t have any reason to expect this to happen again. But due to my personal experience, I’m convinced it can happen.
“Evil is a point of view” - The Collected Wisdom of Lucien LaCroix
I believe vampires might exist–but they’re not doing talk shows. :rolleyes:
I am semi-psychic (or highly intuitive, take your pick), and I read Tarot, and I do some magic. Big deal. “Spirit is invisible nature, nature is invisible spirit”–why get freaked out by it?
I personally might try and build a Golem, if I could spare the time and find the proper instructions. Just for the heck of it.
As for most other occult stuff…Nah. Not my style. Though more in the aesthetic sense than any spiritual sense.
Ranchoth
I met Congressman Dick Armey once…
I don’t believe in “real” vampirism, just old folklore to me. Don’t want to mess with the whole vampire chic, bloodletting, etc. thing. Worried about diseases carried by blood, not anything supernatural.
Channeling just seems silly to me, a very bad parlor game. Ouija boards even more so. But I might try to spell out “gotcha” if I had the chance. Or “gotcha ya” if I knew other Dopers were around. 
The Occult, Wicca, witchcraft, voodoo, etc. interest me slightly to see them in practice, but I don’t believe in them and couldn’t take part. Just like I don’t believe in any other religion or faith.
I’ve had my Tarot read twice, months apart by the same person, and had the same outcome with most of the same cards turning up predicting my future. But the part describing what kind of person I was was completely different each time. I shuffled the hell out of the cards both times. The part about my future was slightly creepy. Too bad it didn’t turn out to be true. 
I’m a practising Christian, but otherwise a sceptic (so I suppose I’m open to accusations of inconsistency here). On my way to becoming a Christian, I went through a fair amount of … ummm… alternative belief systems. I wouldn’t presume to call myself an expert on the occult, but I think I’ve got a reasonable layman’s knowledge.
So, my take is: most of it is garbage, pure and simple.
I’ve got a pack of Tarot cards, and know at least the rudiments of the symbolism involved. They’re a tool for creating a story; if you are sufficiently insightful, you can link the story the cards tell with events from your own, or your querent’s, life. But any insight involved comes from you, not some dubious outside source… and you can develop such an insight with other sources of symbols. (And people have - the range of fortune-telling methods throughout history is remarkable).
Ouija boards? I’ve used 'em, so has my mother the Sunday school teacher. They’re toys.
Black magic? I’ve read several “authentic” occult texts; they’re straightforward wish-fulfillment fantasy. Can’t get a girlfriend? Demon X will “procure any woman the caster wishes”. Homework too hard? Demon Y will “teach the caster all arts and sciences in an instant”. There are people out there who will buy into this stuff; the texts themselves are written in order to exploit such people, by would-be cult leader types (Aleister Crowley being an excellent example). Sometimes these cult leaders wind up believing their own propaganda (there’s Aleister Crowley again).
Now, I realise there are pagans out there for whom what we term “occult” is what they call religious practice. And I don’t have any problem with that; we all seek the truth in our own way. What I’m knocking here is “the occult”; the idea of magic (or “Magick”, if you’re pretentious) as a tool for improving your sex life or telling your future. If there is any power in any of this stuff, it comes from within; merely reciting incantations or shuffling bits of pasteboard around has no power to affect you or anyone else, for good or for ill.
As for those of my co-religionists who think that “the occult” is “dangerous” and will “let the forces of darkness into your life”: get real. God gave you free will, the Devil can’t take it away. If you want to fight evil, there is plenty of the real stuff around, so let’s not waste any time on the fakes.
I’m a practising Christian, but otherwise a sceptic (so I suppose I’m open to accusations of inconsistency here). On my way to becoming a Christian, I went through a fair amount of … ummm… alternative belief systems. I wouldn’t presume to call myself an expert on the occult, but I think I’ve got a reasonable layman’s knowledge.
So, my take is: most of it is garbage, pure and simple.
I’ve got a pack of Tarot cards, and know at least the rudiments of the symbolism involved. They’re a tool for creating a story; if you are sufficiently insightful, you can link the story the cards tell with events from your own, or your querent’s, life. But any insight involved comes from you, not some dubious outside source… and you can develop such an insight with other sources of symbols. (And people have - the range of fortune-telling methods throughout history is remarkable).
Ouija boards? I’ve used 'em, so has my mother the Sunday school teacher. They’re toys.
Black magic? I’ve read several “authentic” occult texts; they’re straightforward wish-fulfillment fantasy. Can’t get a girlfriend? Demon X will “procure any woman the caster wishes”. Homework too hard? Demon Y will “teach the caster all arts and sciences in an instant”. There are people out there who will buy into this stuff; the texts themselves are written in order to exploit such people, by would-be cult leader types (Aleister Crowley being an excellent example). Sometimes these cult leaders wind up believing their own propaganda (there’s Aleister Crowley again).
Now, I realise there are pagans out there for whom what we term “occult” is what they call religious practice. And I don’t have any problem with that; we all seek the truth in our own way. What I’m knocking here is “the occult”; the idea of magic (or “Magick”, if you’re pretentious) as a tool for improving your sex life or telling your future. If there is any power in any of this stuff, it comes from within; merely reciting incantations or shuffling bits of pasteboard around has no power to affect you or anyone else, for good or for ill.
As for those of my co-religionists who think that “the occult” is “dangerous” and will “let the forces of darkness into your life”: get real. God gave you free will, the Devil can’t take it away. If you want to fight evil, there is plenty of the real stuff around, so let’s not waste any time on the fakes.
I’ve read a couple books by William Schnoebelen (and I did like the books).
His main one, Lucifer Dethroned mentions his life as a high level occultist, and his drinking and craving of human blood.
Scary.
Gross, too.
This all being said, I think blood can be rather tasty…
Vampirism:
I wouldn’t mess with it because it’s a buncha crap.
Secondly, because it’s a bunch of crap with rather cruel and unpleasant conotation, which makes me extremely leary of the individuals who are drawn to such crap.
I don’t believe those belief are evil, but I do believe that nasty people would be drawn to them. So yeah, I think there’s a certain amount of actual evil associated with it, in the sense that any group of people involve, will be people who are attracted to the idea of drinking people’s blood.
Tarot and Channeling:
More harmless, but very silly. Also, I would think that those who would share this interest could well be people who are attracted to the idea of getting their decisions from “who knows where”, and effectively wanting to have something to replace their own judgement. Again, I don’t want to deal with people who are looking for a way to say “it wasn’t me! It was the dog down the street that made me do it!” Even if I don’t believe that this is objectively what actually happened to them, that not who I want to be associated with.
Me no can type good today. Ack. Sorry…
Guin, Gophergod, thanks for the info on weird lights. I knew there was a name for it, but didn’t know what the name (or explanation) was. Yay straight dope!
Arken, that’s nothing. Jesse Helms was at my great-uncle’s funeral, and I was less than two feet from him.
Daniel