I've been talking to a friend of mine who's appearing on a TV show about the paranormal soon. He called himself a skeptic, but then went on to say that on they show they had evidence of ghosts beyond a shadow of a doubt and shit. I kept asking it if was empirical evidence or was it based on partials, and he told me it was empirical. He talked about the footage as "orbs" flying all around the place, and then went on to talk about how it's the energy or "soul" of the body that's still there after you die that leaves, and that's what they captured.

I don't really believe any of that though, because that kind of evidence is entirely subjective. You need to first know that what you're capturing is what you think it is, but there's no conclusive proof that "orbs" aren't anything more than light hitting particulates in the air and reflecting off the lens. It requires you to first believe in a "soul" when viewed from a spiritual perspective. I don't believe in that, science hasn't taught me that. I believe in chemicals and electrical signals that stop when we die, and that's it.

So if I don't believe in what ghosts are supposed to be, then how I can I realistically believe ghosts exist? I don't know, I'd be interesting in hearing what other people think about paranomal shit.

It's interesting that he considers these "orbs" as ghosts, when there could be a number of things that it could actually be. For instance, some people regard UFO in the sky as some form of alien spacecraft, when it could be just an aircraft or possibly a natural cause. It depends on the context in which the conclusion was made. Thus his eye witness account is not sufficient to provide solid proof of the existence of "ghosts", but the presence of something that is unidentified. Furthermore, he is placing a subjective interpretation into his account, which makes his observations bias; an interpretation in which is based on assumptions and the reasoning of a generic horror story. He expects for it to be a ghost because he is on a show that specifically hunts for ghosts, acting as a demand characteristic. However, if he was on a show that explores physics, the outcome could perhaps be different. The most difficult thing, is finding evidence that clearly suggests the existence of ghosts, however there are so many factors that could have influenced it being there.

Although I say I don't believe in ghosts, at the back of my mind I am doubtful. I think this is the result of my upbringing where the fear of ghosts and the dark has been conditioned into me (media, ghost stories, etc). Irrational yes, but it is difficult to overcome a fear.

i think ghost exist, i kind of meet some think like that before

Many people seem to also overestimate how perfect their mind is. As hard as it is for most to believe, your mind can literally conjure up an image that you see right in front of you, or something that you hear very clearly, that never actually happened. This sort of thing makes almost every ghost story unbelievable, in the same way that someone telling you they almost caught a fish that was THIS BIG is probably a bunch of baloney. Actual ghost reports are infrequent enough (at least from what I have seen) that I think it is reasonable to say that a reasonable portion of them are just people's minds playing tricks on them.

I saw a video once that went into detail about how every photo-related supposed ghost can be *easily* explained by regular camera phenomena, and I can't find it now, but I'll look for it.

It's the same sort of reasoning that anyone uses for anything supernatural, be it psychics, god or ghosts. People don't seem to understand that deciding whether something actually EXISTS or not HAS to be a scientific claim, and therefore has to have an extreme amount of empirical or rational evidence for its existence. If it falls short of that, it's a hypothesis at best.

One thing that I do find both interesting and sad, however, is that I find myself being just as close-minded as someone that believes in this shit. What I mean by this is what happens whenever someone says "I have empirical evidence for ghosts", they show it to me, and I cant disprove it. Even though at a first glance I cannot disprove their empirical evidence, I do not even partially accept their claim. I mean, sure, I can say that the dismissal is based upon my previous experiences with similar things being disproved, but that's still being a little close-minded.

I don't think it's being close-minded if you ask them to verify their claim. If someone says, "I have proof that ghosts exist, here." And then shows me a picture with a transparent lady in it, I'm going to ask a lot of questions. Where did this photo come from? What context was it taken? Where was it taken? Who was it taken by? Can it be recreated? Etc. You gotta remember where the burden of proof lies. It's not on you to disprove it. If I'm shown audio of constant tapping and someone says it's "proof", I'm gonna remind them that it could be any number of things. Pipes in the walls, someone in another room, the house expanding and contracting, a clock, etc.

I think for there to really be solid proof, it has to be done scientifically, which would involve explaining what ghosts are, and how they can exist. Say I propose that ghosts are unstable pockets of vibrating matter, I have to set up tests and make observations to prove that my theory is correct. If I can replicate a situation which every time undoubtedly points to unstable pockets of vibrating matter popping in and out of existence, then my next step is to further explore how if at all these things relate to humans or consciousness. It could lead to proving that human consciousness doesn't actually disappear when we die, but attempts to stabilize itself by latching on to any matter it can find. Who knows. But that's why I think the scientific method is important. There will be no faith or belief involved, at this stage it's just fact.

ghosts are a supernatural claim,although there have been encounters.but,as Fusion said,we can see things that werent there at all.but there are some super scary stuff.


case 1:this is horrifying.read if you are older than 7.so there was this woman.she was doing something occult in a place called Leap Castle in Ireland.then,after finishing she waited.nothing happened.then a cup started to move across the table and after a few minutes,it jumped and fell of the table.there was a deep evil laugh.she ran to her room and slept with the covers over her entire body,head,and feet.she felt a malevolence that woke her.she tried to get rid of it.she grabbed a shotgun and loaded it.

Her first response... was to sleep. Oh shit there's an evil spirit trying to kill me, let me just take a nap and it'll go away.

Quote from Envoy

Her first response... was to sleep. Oh shit there's an evil spirit trying to kill me, let me just take a nap and it'll go away.

no she didnt want to see it.yeah,well,she hit her head,so yeah.

spirits do exist. you can learn that from my good friend king james ;)
ghosts... now that seems slightly different! ghosts, to my understanding, are spirits that didnt leave the earth, correct? which spirits have no purpose for.
once your spirit leaves your body you go to hell or heaven. there's no staying around to haunt people and shit.

Too bad that nowadays it's easy to say that things are Photoshopped and stuff.
May be If we Look a old pictures before photo editing was able we could get real proof, then again, I once say a picture of the lockness monster that looked real but was actually fake, and it was taken before any major photo editing software.

That's probably because there's not a magical barrier around old photos that prevents them from being photoshopped, bro...

The bible is not a valid source of proof for the existence of spirits. Sorry. This thread is based on science.

Well like you said, there's nothing scientific about claiming the existence of ghosts.

It's the same thing as people who "scientifically prove" stories in the bible - they begin with a conclusion, and then look for any evidence that can be bent or interpreted to fit their conclusion. People see what they want to see and ignore dissenting evidence and theories to avoid cognitive dissonance.

Unless the evidence logically and naturally leads to a non-biased, peer-reviewed conclusion that ghosts exist, then no one has any reason to believe they do.

Quote from emo

ghosts are a supernatural claim,although there have been encounters.but,as Fusion said,we can see things that werent there at all.but there are some super scary stuff.


case 1:this is horrifying.read if you are older than 7.so there was this woman.she was doing something occult in a place called Leap Castle in Ireland.then,after finishing she waited.nothing happened.then a cup started to move across the table and after a few minutes,it jumped and fell of the table.there was a deep evil laugh.she ran to her room and slept with the covers over her entire body,head,and feet.she felt a malevolence that woke her.she tried to get rid of it.she grabbed a shotgun and loaded it.

and then she realized it was the middle of the night.she went to the hall with the shotgun and waited.nothing happened.then a hand rested on her shoulder and came off.she turned around.there was a creature.it was STINKIN SCARY.and it smelled REALLY bad.and she couldnt shoot it because the smell distracted her.it smelled of sulfer and rotting corpses.

case 2:this is short.ok so there was a maid.she was setting a bed in a hotel.then some warm air was being breathed down her neck.then,when she turned around,there was a smokey wisp in the air.


well with these yeah i believe.but no,its not the stories,its the fact that they exist.