Do you believe in the paranormal? (page 4)

seven006

Reality in itself is what comes into question in topics like this. Psychologically speaking some people believe what they want to believe and that desire to "want" to believe, will determine their own level of reality. The human mind is easily manipulated, not only by someone else, but also by the person themselves. If you think you saw a ghost, and you have set your mind up to believe you saw a ghost, then chances are, you will convince yourself you did, and believe you saw one. Was it actually there? Science says no and personally I tend to agree with science over personal testimony.

Take the Salem Witch Trials and the testimony of those at the time who claimed young girls were possessed by the devil and acted very strange. They had convolutions, visions, heard voices and witnessed strange things that at the time was only seen as super natural phenomenon. Even the medical professionals of the time said their actions and visions were due to paranormal "demon" influence.

They all chose to believe what they wanted to believe and it became their reality. Science has proven that all the young girls probably did indeed see and experience what they said they saw and experienced. Not because of demons, the devil, witchcraft or the paranormal, but instead because of the same exact reason earlier witch trials in Europe were held. That reason was traced to ergot poisoning which is proven to give all the same exact reactions, convolutions, visions, etc., as was described in the witch trials as experienced by the young girls, a few older women, and a few men that were on trial and later executed for witchcraft.

In the human mind hallucinations are as real to you as an actual experience and played out using the same blob of electrochemical gray matter that tells you what is real and what is not. Ergot has the same exact level of hallucinogenic chemicals as LSD has. LSD is manufactured and ergot comes from a fungus mold that grows on rye. The earth is full of things that can momentarily tweak a persons mind whether it be electromagnetic or chemical and turn something that is not there, into something some will swear existed.

Was it real, or was it only real in your mind?

Dave

Realist

what is remarkable is the fact that paranormal observations depend on the society. central europe is great when it comes to dowsing rods or energized water, britian is great for ghosts, the US for UFOs and religion...

as george carlin puts it...pick your superstition and get happy with it.

Mary

My point was that the excuse you give - that paranormal events "happen unexpectedly" - also applies to other phenomena such as earthquakes, but there is not the same doubt over the occurrence of earthquakes as there is over - say - poltergeists. Why is it that paranormal phenomena never seem to leave any kind of measurable or testable effect?

Well, I'd say there's a big difference here. Earthquakes are a physical event that can be measured with instruments and there's plenty of eye witnesses to the events. Paranormal happenings are (obviously) not a physical event and therefore can't really be measured by human standards......I've never had a paranormal happening but I know people who have (all ex-Dubs). A friend of mine has had some pretty bizarre happenings in her house......a telephone flew off the table in the hallway when no one was anywhere near it, her son saw an old man hovering over him in his bed one night and then disappear into the wall, she's heard her husband call her name when he's 200 miles away at work. In fact her hubby was getting concerned because he tends to be very sceptical of any claims of stuff like this. Then one day he comes home from work and says "I'm home!" He hears his daughter yell down from upstairs "hi dad!". Within a couple of minutes after that, he gets a telephone call from his daughter: she needs him to come pick her up at work. The boys were in school and Shelly was at work. He went upstairs to check around and there was no one else there. Being a truck driver, he's a pretty burley, no-nonsense guy but he doesn't know what to make of it.

BrendaCloutier

Mary, the sceptics her will tell you that this is second hand hearsay and that these things are myth, etc.

Personally, I believe you and them.

There are many many things that are still undetectable and unexplainable. However, when YOU are the one who experiences them, during a very lucid, awake moment, it's difficult NOT to use the paranormal as an explanation.

I lived in a basement apartment in a house. The upstairs had wood floors. Whenever my landlady would come home, her dog would run across the floor to meet her at the door. Kevan and I were leaving my place one early afternoon, and I heard "Chewy" run across the wood floor, toenails clicking as she ran. I said "Marion's home, there goes Chewy" and Kev acknowledged that he heard the dog too.

When we got outside, yes, Marion had gotten out of her car and was walking up her steps. We said hello, and she said that Chewy had an accident last night, she ran out in front of a car and had to be put down. Kev and I looked at each other. I didn't have the heart to tell her what we heard.

This wasn't in a sweat lodge where the group singing, chanting, and praying, along with mild oxygen deprivation, can produce individual and group hallucinations. (Which I will accept for some of my experiences in the lodge, but not for all).

I believe all people have experienced the paranormal. Just many minds are not willing to accept what they experience and need to put their experience into a "reality" context, right down to "I didn't see that" or "I didn't hear that" or "I just imagined it".

Also, remember there was a time when epilepsy was considered demonic possession, and was scientifically-medically proved as such in that time. When someone can explain Chewy's last run to meet her owner with a reasonable, scientific explaination (I could not audibly hear Marion's car arrive home, and I did not expect her home. I heard her car door close after I heard the dog's run.) I'll consider accepting it.

Hugs

Brenda

funkyderek

target:

You are right. I am mistaken in my recollection. It was not Dateline. It was Ripley's Believe It Or Not.

A big difference, I think you'll agree. Dateline is a serious news program. Ripley's is a sensationalist entertainment show.

Now remember, the question here was not whether what took place was true or not, but whether such a show took place . It is about my credibility.

Yes it is. You remember seeing it on Dateline, it was actually on Ripley's. You remember seeing actual video of spirit creatures. Given how an event of this nature would cause worldwide upheaval (and it didn't) I have to assume that your recollection of the details is also flawed. Perhaps you mistook (or mis-remembered) a reconstruction for actual footagej, or perhaps the 'fog of time' has altered your memory, as it does to all of us.

Sunnygal41:

[Auras] have been detected and measured.

Not reliably. See http://www.skepdic.com/auras.html and http://www.skepdic.com/kirlian.html for details.

Mary:

Paranormal happenings are (obviously) not a physical event and therefore can't really be measured by human standards

If the events cannot be measured, how can you distinguish them from imagination? If the event can't be seen, heard, smelt, felt or tasted, in what sense can it be said to have occurred? The example you provide where the supernatural was detected by means of its interaction with the natural world could be measured indirectly with any equipment capable of measuring the observed event. (I'm sure a telephone flying across a room would register on video tape even if the supernatural being that supposedly caused it could not.) The other examples are of someone having a dream, and two people thinking they heard someone calling them and being mistaken. I don't see how they qualify as "paranormal happenings". They barely even qualify as happenings.

BrendaCloutier:

Personally, I believe you and them.

Why? Do you believe all claims that anybody makes about anything? Or just claims that violate the known laws of physics? Or just the ones you want to believe?

Jim_TX

I find it interesting that many people who say they do not believe in the 'paranormal' - and pontificate long and hard as to the 'unmeasureable' and whatever reasons...

...also tend to believe in God and the bible.

Go figure.

Regards,

Jim TX

AlanF

: ...also tend to believe in God and the bible.

Not this skeptic.

AlanF

Sunnygal41

Where, when, how, why? Quick! Get James Randi on the hotline! You are soon to be a MILLIONAIRE!!!!!

I have no wish to become a millionaire or talk to James Randi. I was merely responding to your comment. I assert, intone and state once again that auras have been measured and even photographed.

Terri

shotgun

Terri

I assert, intone and state once again that auras have been measured and even photographed

What about the damn Succubi...even a photograph from a succubi party would do!

funkyderek

Sunnygal41

I have no wish to become a millionaire or talk to James Randi. I was merely responding to your comment. I assert, intone and state once again that auras have been measured and even photographed.

And yet, no matter how much you assert, intone, state, affirm, declare, pronounce or testify, it is still untrue. Lucky for you you're not interested in the million dollars.

Do you believe in the paranormal?

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