If there is something like spirits, supernatural, ghosts, any of that crap..

[snooper2]

How come nobody has been able to prove it...

All you would have to do is leave a note when you are alive. Yo, when I kick the bucket fools I'm going to haunt this shit. On October 12th I'll be in the kitchen throwing plates on the floor. On the 13th I'll make your car not start and on the 14th I'll continue to change whatever channel you are watching to Lifetime Network.


That wouldn't be that hard to do would it? You believe in that stuff, write a letter telling everyone what you will do. Then we will have "evidence".



Easy Peasy right?

[REP]

1. Meet Harry Houdini

(from Wikipedia)

Before Houdini died, he and his wife agreed that if Houdini found it possible to communicate after death, he would communicate the message "Rosabelle believe", a secret code which they agreed to use. This was a phrase from a play in which Bess performed, at the time the couple first met. Bess held yearly séances on Halloween for ten years after Houdini's death. She did have a contact through Arthur Ford in 1929. Ford conveyed the secret code, but Bess later claimed the incident had been faked.[13] In 1936, after a last unsuccessful séance on the roof of the Knickerbocker Hotel, she put out the candle that she had kept burning beside a photograph of Houdini since his death. In 1943, Bess said that "ten years is long enough to wait for any man."

[libodem]

2. hmmm

You never know.

[Shadowflash]

3. Right.

It's not easy because there is nothing there.

[zappaman]

4. Why do ghosts always have clothes on?

Does a shirt have a soul?
Shouldn't all ghosts be buck nakkid?

[frogmarch]

5. Here ya go:

If spirits have any sort of control over the energy they are now comprised of (or even if their personalities are somehow manifested in the energy), then I would think it possible for the witness to see the spirit as the spirit sees itself. If the personality really does remain, the spirit would visualize itself as it was when alive, appearing as a living person and wearing clothing.

http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghosthuntinggeninfo/a/aa042708.htm

When I die and appear as a ghost, I want to look like my flower child self and be wearing my Fuck Nixon t shirt.

[zappaman]

6. I will be nakkid.

Buck nakkid.

[frogmarch]

7. haha!

Not I. No sirree. Being clothed has always been important to me - so much so that I think it's possible that my favorite ones (see my post above) will materialize without me in 'em.

[Cherchez la Femme]

8. They don't

Research Radiant Boys, for one.

I'd give you links but I don't know how to copypasta on my new mobile yet & I really don't want to type out all that syntax.

[left-of-center2012]

10. Shouldn't all ghosts be buck nakkid?

One can hope.

[RKP5637]

43. Only if they're good looking! I don't want any ugly and naked ghosts handing around my place!

[Ghost in the Machine]

9. Some people will NEVER believe, unless/until they have their own personal experience...

Let me tell you about some experiences I've had in my own home. The previous owner died in this house, in her bed, which is my room now.. the master bedroom.

I have been in my living room, and just happened to look back toward my bedroom, and have seen someone walking from the bathroom, across the room to where the bed is. Now, it would be easy for you to say that *I* was just seeing things... but several others have witnessed it, too. My children, a few of their friends, my girlfriend, my sister and a couple of other friends, all at different times. I have also been laying in bed and felt someone/something sit or lay down beside me on several occasions. My girlfriend has had the same experience.

A few years ago we had a counselor here talking to my son. In the course of small talk, we were telling here about some of these stories when, out of nowhere, my front door opened, then closed, by itself. A few seconds later, a computer in the living room turned itself on and started playing music. The counselor jumped up, ran out of the house... and never came back! We had a new one show up the next week.

Are we ALL "just seeing things", or is there really something going on here?? I don't honestly care *who* believes it or not, we all *know* what we have experienced...

Peace,

Ghost

[Logical]

12. So do ESP believers, Alien Abduction believers, Faith Healers, And the Romans thought Zeus changed..

their life.

Personal experiences are not proof.

I KNOW I saw Santa's boot go up the chimney when I was 6.

Proves nothing.

[Ghost in the Machine]

13. Sorry, but you should know that I don't suffer fools lightly...

"Personal experiences are not proof."

LMMFAO @ you! Please return to your alternate universe where magic unicorns fly over rainbows and shit skittles. *Nothing* is proof to the willfully ignorant and/or obtuse. Go play your games on someone else, as they have no merit or affect on me.

Thanks in advance,

Ghost

[Logical]

15. LOL, I love it you mentioned unicorns! Explains a lot! n-t

[Ghost in the Machine]

17. Yes, it apparently explains your lack of reading comprehension...n/t

[Dash87]

41. The "sitting down on chest" thing is called "old hag."

I'm not saying this is definitely what you had, but it sounds like it. It's named after "hags" of folklore who would supposedly come in the night and plop down on your chest.

Basically, it's an effect of your body going to sleep or waking. It goes hand-in-hand with sleep paralysis, which may cause disturbing imagery before your body actually wakes up.

Many dont realize that the body and mind 'sleep' separately. We don't realize it because the transition to wakefulness is usually without incident. When ones' mind wakes up before their body, though, they may believe that something is holding them down or sitting on them - whatever hallucination they're dreaming at the moment.

[Ghost in the Machine]

42. Thank you for the info... but, if you re-read my post, I never said that

.something was sitting *ON* me, I feel it sit, or lay down, *NEXT* to me. Entirely different...

As for the body and mind sleeping separatley.... I have, on several occasions, woken up and felt paralyzed from the neck down, and it takes a few minutes for feeling to come to my body. However, I don't ascribe this to anything paranormal. I suffered a very serious neck injury in an accident 10 years ago, resulting in a small tear in my spinal cord, which allows the cerebrospinal fluid to leak inside my spinal cord, causing a fluid filled cyst (known as a syrinx) to grow, basically destroying my spinal cord from the inside out. I also have "tethered cord syndrome", which is where part of my spinal cord has attached itself to one of my vertebrae. It is right on the C-4 level, and if it ever does tear loose, I drop where I'm standing, paralyzed from the neck down. So, when I experience the waking paralysis, I just ascribe it to my condition. I just lay there and think "well, here it is, the day has come", because my neurosurgeon has told me that that day *WILL* come.

If you're interested, google "syringomyelia" ... There are 3 types: Congenital, Post Traumatic & Idiopathic.. Mine is post traumatic..

Peace,

Ghost

[LiberalAndProud]

46. You're right, you know.

If I were to personally experience what you have done, I would likely be convinced. I believe you when you relate your encounters, and reading such tales gives me pause. Still, I am not able to place full faith and credit without personal experience to inform my belief.

I have the same problem crediting my brother's purported experience of hearing the voice of God -- not the still, small inner voice, but an external auditory sound. Your personal experience cannot translate to evidence for this skeptic. Surely something unexplained is happening. Is it a ghost? I must answer, I think probably not. And I think we must leave it that you believe in ghosts, and I do not.

Some part of me hopes to be proven wrong. I love a good ghost story.

[left-of-center2012]

11. I had a 'weird experience'

A close friend of 37 years died suddenly a couple weeks of a heart attack.
A few days after his death, I was sitting at my computer writing an email to someone telling them of his death.
Something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye.
I turned toward my right and noticed a flashlight I had standing upright about two feet to my right on the desk
was wobbling quit vigorously.

Nothing else on the desk was moving.
The building wasn't shaking.
No traffic outside.
Nothing. Nada. Zip.

I can't say why it happened,
I don't know what caused it,
but I took it to be a sign from my friend just saying "Hi".

I reached out and took hold of the flashlight, stopping it's movement and said :
"Now cut that sh*t out !"

[Behind the Aegis]

14. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

[snooper2]

16. 7 Billion people on this planet, nobody could have pulled it off by now?

A little video before they die and then documented proof of doing the deed in the afterlife?

When I die I'll move that pile of bricks over there?

[Behind the Aegis]

18. Did you understand what I wrote? (Well, what Carl Sagan wrote.)

You're simply doubling down.

[cpwm17]

19. Absence of evidence is great evidence of absence

it's just not proof.

When there's no evidence for something the default position is that the something isn't true – that is if one cares about the truth. One could also believe in things just because it feels good. That's what gives us crazy conspiracies, religions, and wars.

[Behind the Aegis]

20. Not quite.

The default position is unknown. For something to be true, there must be proof. One cannot declare something "true" because there is no proof, that is if one cares about actual logic. One could also believe things don't exist because they have limited scope.

[cpwm17]

21. The default position is that the something isn't true when there's no evidence for the something.

That is very different (at least how I hoped what I wrote would be understood) than claiming the default position is that the something is known to be not true. No such knowledge necessarily exists. So one could accurately claim that the default position is that the something is unknown, but that would also be somewhat misleading.

One would have an anarchic belief system without some evidence to back it up. We should mostly concern ourselves with things that have evidence.

[Behind the Aegis]

22. No, it isn't.

If there is no evidence, there is no proof; therefore, it can be neither true, nor false as the data/information doesn't exist. If your assertion was correct then the "earth is round" argument from way back would be, by persons adhering to your criteria, false. There was no evidence (by conventional ancient standards) the earth was round, but there was evidence it was flat, which, of course, was later disproved.

Sagan was very clear when he made that statement. Just because something can't be proved, doesn't mean it isn't true (or doesn't exist), it simply means there is nothing in the way of proof to claim it is true or does exist. You cannot claim something is true (or false)without proof, which is exactly what you are trying to do by saying the "default" position is something is 'false' if no proof exists. For something to be either true or false, proof has to exist, period. You cannot claim something is false because there is no proof.

[cpwm17]

23. In the context of this thread, whole new realities, such as "spirits

Last edited Sun Nov 4, 2012, 10:58 AM - Edit history (1)

the supernatural, ghosts, any of that crap...", require evidence for them to be regarded as reasonable possibilities. There can be an infinite number of imagined realities, so the odds of imagining a correct reality by chance are nil.

Other issues, such as life beyond Earth or universes beyond our own, where we have no direct evidence, the default position isn't that it is untrue. In fact we do have evidence that there can be life beyond our Earth, and the evidence is us.

We see that we are alive, and that our Earth is full of life. Life on other planets isn't a whole new reality. Based on this evidence it seems probable that there is life beyond Earth.

The Ancient Greeks might have determined that the Earth was round from the different positions of the stars from different locations on Earth, or by observing the somewhat round horizon of the surface of the sea. They had evidence.

[Behind the Aegis]

24. It appears we are talking about two different things.

The quote I provided from Carl Sagan, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." demonstrates that one cannot claim something is true without proof, but just because proof doesn't exist doesn't mean "it" doesn't exist. For something to be true, proof must exist; the same is true for something to be "false," proof must exist. Facts require proof. What you are discussing is probability as rationale. I have no issue with it, but it is still not "fact," it is opinion and speculation.

If someone says they don't (do) "believe" in the Yeti because they don't (do) see the possibility; cool. If, however, they say the Yeti doesn't (does) exist and claim it is "fact" because no evidence exists (proving it doesn't exist), then they are flat out wrong.

"The Ancient Greeks might have determined that the Earth was round from the different positions of the stars from different locations on Earth, or by observing the somewhat round horizon of the surface of the sea. They had evidence."

The might have (and now there is speculation a few did), but most in the Ancient World didn't have evidence because they didn't know how to gather it.

[William Seger]

25. Sagan was aware of the distinction

The statement is logically true, but that quote gets abused a lot by pseudo-scientists who would like to use it to defend their "argument from ignorance." But it's actually a quote from his "Baloney Detection Kit" and in context, it's part of how to detect an argument from ignorance. There are other considerations, such as this from "The Varieties of Scientific Experience":

Questioner: As a scientist, would you deny the possibility of water having been changed into wine in the Bible?

Sagan: Deny the possibility? Certainly not. I would not deny any such possibility. But I would, of course, not spend a moment on it unless there was some evidence for it.

[Behind the Aegis]

26. Sagan was aware, but cpwm17 didn't appear to be.

Thus, the exchange between the two of us. The quote also gets abused by skeptics who like to claim if there is no evidence then it is factually false, which is as incorrect a position as the one you describe.

[cpwm17]

27. Another Sagan quote: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

When imagining whole new realities, or making any other bold or far-fetched claim, extraordinary evidence is required.

As far as supernatural claims, there isn't any evidence at all. The total lack of evidence is great evidence that supernatural claims are untrue.

Out of the infinite number of possible claims that can be made about anything, the only way to separate fact from fiction is with evidence. The burden of proof is on the one making the positive claim. No evidence equals irrelevance.

[Behind the Aegis]

28. I agree with that statement as well.

As far as supernatural claims, there isn't any evidence at all. The total lack of evidence is great evidence that supernatural claims are untrue.

Again, it doesn't mean it is false. There is still no proof one way or the other. Burden of proof is on the one making the claim...period. You can't claim something is false, then have no proof. There is a difference between speculation (belief) and fact (truth).

[cpwm17]

29. Evidence does not equal proof

I've never claimed any proof of the negative. As I wrote on my first post in this thread: "Absence of evidence is great evidence of absence – it's just not proof."

But the burden of proof is on the one making the positive claim, so proof of the negative is really irrelevant, especially when making far-fetched claims. After one comes up with positive evidence for a particular claim, the person claiming the negative should then counter the alleged evidence.

Absence any evidence of any kind equals evidence of absence.

[Behind the Aegis]

30. No, it doesn't, but it is a good indicator.

Evidence can be proof, which is why people ask for it and when it doesn't exist, jump to the false conclusion the questionable issue is false. However, this has gone on long enough. Basically why I used that response to the OP is because the snide nature indicated to me the OPer 'knows' those things don't exist.

I believe Bigfoot exists. Fine. This is an opinion. The person may or may not have reasons for such belief.
I believe Bigfoot doesn't exist. Fine. This is an opinion. The person may or may not have reasons for such belief.
I know Bigfoot exists. This is false. There is no proof.
I know Bigfoot doesn't exist. This is false. There is no proof.

The last two are both arrogant in that they think they "know" something, when in fact they don't. The really interesting thing is both are two sides of the same coin and often use the same arguments against each other, which can be entertaining.

[tama]

31. It's not necessary to assume

there is "reality" beyond experience. There is little disagreement over experiences of communicating with various "spirits", or that people learn from such communications, or that such experiences can affect how we experience intrapersonal experience of consensus "reality". Many children have what we call imaginary friends, such experiences happen, they are often very meaningful and important and interpreted in various ways, but there is no necessity to assume that anything is.

[Quantess]

32. When I become a ghost I'll leave a hard poop on your doorstep,

with a nametag on it.

Anyway, if you're such a tough guy, why don't you take a swing at a ghost? Scooby Doo.

[snooper2]

33. ghosts can defaecate at will?

I thought that only happens after you die and the bowel and bladder lose function LOL

[demwing]

36. it will be a ghost poop

you'll smell it, but you wont see it.

[Smilo]

34. Because once the Spirit moves on

it has much better things to do than play games with imbeciles.

There are many, many explainable stories of ghosts and spirit appearances. Have you ever thought of spending a night in a haunted hotel?

[zappaman]

35. I have spent more than one night in more than one "haunted hotel"

and begged any ghosts listening to show me something.
nothing.

by the way, why do ghosts wear clothes? does underwear have a soul?

[CanSocDem]

40. Yeh....what you said.

"Because once the Spirit moves on it has much better things to do than play games with imbeciles."


.

[clarice]

37. BOO !!!!!! nt

[zappaman]

38. Jeez dude!

You scared the shit outta me!

[clarice]

39. lol....I'm a spooky girl. nt

[fadedrose]

45. The fact that there is a Lifetime network

PROVES that that there are ghosts and "crap" . . .