Ghosts

[The Atheist]

Darat made this post elsewhere:

It would depend on the definition - for example I have stated many a time here that I believe that ghosts exists and I have arrived at that conclusion by what I consider is skeptical reasoning.

Upon asking for details, he suggested taking it to a new thread.

Here it is.

[Darat]

See this thread: http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?p=2219466

In particular this post: http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2219251#post2219251 and this one: http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2219466#post2219466

[Darat]

I know that no one will be able to convince me I didn't experience what I have recounted, just like many "believers" won't be convinced that they are mistaken in their beliefs.

I think the difference between approaching something like this "sceptically" and "non-sceptically" is whether your conclusions (i.e. beliefs) go beyond the evidence you have access to.

My conclusion regarding whether the phenomenon of ghosts exists does not go beyond the evidence; in other words I cannot state that what I saw had anything to do with (in the instance I recount in the linked posts) a spirit, "energy" or anything like that.

[The Atheist]

My conclusion regarding whether the phenomenon of ghosts exists does not go beyond the evidence; in other words I cannot state that what I saw had anything to do with (in the instance I recount in the linked posts) a spirit, "energy" or anything like that.

Well, from your description of it, it appears to be nothing like a ghost - at least in the traditional sense. You state that you accept it was all in your mind:

To me this means what I experienced is accurately descibed as "seeing a ghost", however it did not and does not mean that I subscribe to any idea of a "life after death" other then how my grandmother continued to "live" on in my memory, in the thought processes of my mind and so on.

I'd agree that ghosts are all in the mind of the beholder, but surely that would make it a psychological effect rather than a ghost. Why do you describe it as "seeing a ghost"?

[Big Les]

I have to agree here; whilst I appreciate your honesty, this is a semantic argument at best. Are you sure you aren't compartmentalising just because you've had such an experience? How is this any different to me thinking I've seen my cat walk past in my peripheral vision?

What I experienced was a real phenomena, at moments I was so sure of the recognition that as I said I experienced profound shock and quite often couldn't identify what made me think I'd seen her.
[My emphasis]

How can it be an objectively "real" phenomenon and simply be a figment of your imagination? I think drawing a distinction between the two is pretty important as it relates to the woo debates (including life after death) and the conflating of "all in your head" and "real" serves no purpose but to confuse the issue (and possibly give the woos a cop-out).

Consider David Farrant's interpretation of a "ghost" in his thread as something that's projected into or otherwise manifested within, the mind of an individual. Your take on your own anecdotal experience seems on the face of it quite compatible with that hypothesis.

In other words, what does it really mean to say it was a "ghost", or even a "real" experience?

[Darat]

Well, from your description of it, it appears to be nothing like a ghost - at least in the traditional sense. You state that you accept it was all in your mind:




I do not state it was "all in my mind" (whatever that could mean!). At least some of my experiences had identifiable stimuli that were (in principle) accessible to other people.


I'd agree that ghosts are all in the mind of the beholder, but surely that would make it a psychological effect rather than a ghost. Why do you describe it as "seeing a ghost"?

Because my experience matches many descriptions I have seen of what other people describe as "seeing a ghost".


I have to agree here; whilst I appreciate your honesty, this is a semantic argument at best.


If you look at the posts this comes from you will see that this thread's origins was indeed from a reference to definitions of words and how they are important when trying to understand what other people mean.


Are you sure you aren't compartmentalising just because you've had such an experience?


I'm not sure what you mean by "compartmentalising" - I had the experience I described, which seems to match many of the general descriptions of "seeing a ghost" BUT I have no evidence that this was a "spirit" etc.


How is this any different to me thinking I've seen my cat walk past in my peripheral vision?


It might not be any differnet.



[My emphasis]

How can it be an objectively "real" phenomenon and simply be a figment of your imagination? I think drawing a distinction between the two is pretty important as it relates to the woo debates (including life after death) and the conflating of "all in your head" and "real" serves no purpose but to confuse the issue (and possibly give the woos a cop-out).

...snip...

In other words, what does it really mean to say it was a "ghost", or even a "real" experience?

I'm not going to deny experiences that happen to me or anyone else, what I will do is attempt to understand what they mean within the limits of my knowledge and ability to reason. So when I experienced what I did I did not need to go beyond the evidence so in some instances I was able to identify what stimulus caused my experience (i.e. a very similar little old lady) and in some others I can't.

Now I can speculate (and speculate using other knowledge and evidence I have) to come to what I think is quite a supportable conclusion i.e. what I saw was caused by stimuli that triggered recollections and therefore I experienced the sensation of having seen my grandmother.

[The Atheist]

I do not state it was "all in my mind" (whatever that could mean!).

Eh?

You said it yourself:


...other then how my grandmother continued to "live" on in my memory, in the thought processes of my mind and so on

At least some of my experiences had identifiable stimuli that were (in principle) accessible to other people.

How is something "in the thought processes of your mind" even accessible in principle?

I see what you're doing here (or at least I think I do): you're saying that your experience of "seeing a ghost", which it still seems that you're aware was created by "the thought processes of your mind", was as real [and the same] as that of any Joe who claims to have "seen" a ghost.

Whether that's your intent or not, you're right, as far as I can tell - all ghosts are figments of the imagination.

I think your claim is highly disingenuous, however, and very much along the lines of me seeing a current bore at Loch Ness and claim to have "seen the Loch Ness monster", or seeing a deer in the bush and saying I've "seen Sasquatch".

[AuctionGuy]

I tend to consider myself an agnostic. I have never seen anything that I would call a ghost but I cling to the hope that some part of us survives death.

[petra10]

Welcome Auctionguy! I dont believe in ghosts or any kind of spirits left behind when we die. My gran was very dear to me I was very close to her. Sometimes I do feel her close and can imagine her near me But I feel this is just my memories of her.
Often when I think of her I can smell her presence and I feel comforted by her.This to me is brought on by my memories and not by her spirit.

[Paulhoff]

Have I seen a ghost as something like a UFO, meaning something that I could not identify, yes. Do I believe in ghost as something that is real, no. I am amazed that these so-called ghosts can pass thru walls, but seem to have no problem standing on a floor and not falling thru, to be made of so-called energy and not dissipate like energy does without some kind of confinement, and they also seem to have a great ability to follow the earth’s spin, orbit around the sun, the sun’s orbit around the center of the Milky-Way and the Milky-Way’s motion thru the universe and at the same time not seem to be influenced by gravity.

Paul

:) :) :)

[Paulhoff]

Often when I think of her I can smell her presence and I feel comforted by her.This to me is brought on by my memories and not by her spirit.
By the way, smell is the strongest of all the senses to set off a memory.

Paul

:) :) :)

[Darat]

Eh?

You said it yourself:

...snip...



You've taken that out of it's context - the full quote is:

To me this means what I experienced is accurately descibed as "seeing a ghost", however it did not and does not mean that I subscribe to any idea of a "life after death" other then how my grandmother continued to "live" on in my memory, in the thought processes of my mind and so on.

I was referring to the type of "after life" I do believe in e.g. memories and how they physically left an imprint on the world around them that continues after death.




I see what you're doing here (or at least I think I do): you're saying that your experience of "seeing a ghost", which it still seems that you're aware was created by "the thought processes of your mind", was as real [and the same] as that of any Joe who claims to have "seen" a ghost.

...snip...

All I am doing is providing my experience of seeing a ghost!



I think your claim is highly disingenuous, however, and very much along the lines of me seeing a current bore at Loch Ness and claim to have "seen the Loch Ness monster", or seeing a deer in the bush and saying I've "seen Sasquatch".

No, that would be going beyond the evidence. What I have done is taken the experiences that I have read about (that defines what "seeing a ghost" means) and compared them to my own experience and they seem very similar or even identical therefore I am using that term.

The issue is that many people go beyond the evidence their experience provides and say something "I saw a ghost, that means there is life after death". That is when someone making the claim that they have seen a ghost moves beyond "scepticism".

So to take us back to the origin of this thread: this is why it is very difficult to make generalisations and say something like "believers in ghosts cannot be sceptics" or "believers in [a] god cannot be sceptics" - it all depends on what the person making the claim actually means.

[RemieV]

Have I seen a ghost as something like a UFO, meaning something that I could not identify, yes. Do I believe in ghost as something that is real, no. I am amazed that these so-called ghosts can pass thru walls, but seem to have no problem standing on a floor and not falling thru, to be made of so-called energy and not dissipate like energy does without some kind of confinement, and they also seem to have a great ability to follow the earth’s spin, orbit around the sun, the sun’s orbit around the center of the Milky-Way and the Milky-Way’s motion thru the universe and at the same time not seem to be influenced by gravity.

Paul

:) :) :)

Clearly you haven't been keeping up with the explanations for these types of things ;)

Ghosts stand on the floor because the floor was most likely there when they were alive, whereas the walls of the building and where the doorways are located may have changed.

Therefore, they're just cruisin' through their old house, with the old house's layout. Or something. I think.

[Paulhoff]

I was referring to the type of "after life" I do believe in e.g. memories and how they physically left an imprint on the world around them that continues after death.
Oh, homeopathy, more then just the water remembers, hey.

Paul

:) :) :)

[Archangel]

Clearly you haven't been keeping up with the explanations for these types of things ;)

Ghosts stand on the floor because the floor was most likely there when they were alive, whereas the walls of the building and where the doorways are located may have changed.

Therefore, they're just cruisin' through their old house, with the old house's layout. Or something. I think.


Yeah I think that's the current explanation that believers are using.

I seem to recall a story about a sighting in Britain where some "Roman Centurions" were walking along what was an old roman road a few inches below the current ground level.
I've just spent a couple of minutes trying to find the story again, unfortunately my google-fu fails me today.

As to Darats claim, I think I can see what he means, it's not a ghost in the traditional sense (a disembodied spirit / recording), but when the correct stimulus was implanted in his psyche (seeing an old lady who was wearing a similar outfit to his grand-mothers, shortly after her death) his mind allowed him to see something that he may have thought subconciously(sp?) would comfort him ie his grandmother.

To him, it was like seeing a ghost.

[CFLarsen]

It is similar to a very scary experience I had, after seeing the movie "Halloween" (yes, in days of yore), where the baddie (plot here (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077651/synopsis)) wears a white mask throughout the movie.

When I walked home in the dark, a white cat suddenly zipped across the road, and I immediately got a "flashback" of the white mask - it scared the living crap out of me!

Our senses sure can play some nasty tricks on us!

[The Atheist]

All I am doing is providing my experience of seeing a ghost!

Call it what you will, you're clearly playing games with the description, as you admit yourself:

The issue is that many people go beyond the evidence their experience provides and say something "I saw a ghost, that means there is life after death". That is when someone making the claim that they have seen a ghost moves beyond "scepticism".

Then this bit:

No, that would be going beyond the evidence. What I have done is taken the experiences that I have read about (that defines what "seeing a ghost" means) and compared them to my own experience and they seem very similar or even identical therefore I am using that term.

Nope, it's exactly the same as what you've done. You've assumed that your experience is the same as some other people's and classed it in the same terminology that believers of the myth do. As I said, it is identical to seeing a deer which, seen through bush, looks like a humanoid and claiming to have seen Sasquatch. (And a lot better result than mistaking it for human. Check how many hunters get killed through being mistaken for game if you think subjectivity's cool.)

Why are you so sure that your own "vision" was the same as what other people saw? Pretty subjective subject, eyewitness testimony, especially when the subject is the subject.


That you can't see the identical nature of the claims suggests deliberate obfuscation for a reason known best by yourself. When someone outside at night tells me they can see a star, I'm quite happy to accept that they can see a flaming gaseous object outside of the solar system - not Brad Pitt.

I'd say that the overwhelming majority of people associate "ghosts" with supernaturality. You clearly don't, and why you bother to say you have "seen a ghost" is really your affair, but it's at odds with the [un]realities of the statement.

So to take us back to the origin of this thread: this is why it is very difficult to make generalisations and say something like "believers in ghosts cannot be sceptics" or "believers in [a] god cannot be sceptics" - it all depends on what the person making the claim actually means.

Which really confirms the need to separate sceptics and skeptics. I, as a sceptic, will seek to clarify, not confuse. Skeptics may call it "a hard-, but brittle-shelled vessel containing genetic information and nutrients to allow a zygote to grow into a young chicken", but a sceptic will be quite happy with "egg".

[The Atheist]

To him, it was like seeing a ghost.(bolding miner)

Bingo!

If that was the statement, the OP would never have been put. Four letters.

[JoeTheJuggler]

Darat, it sounds like you use "seeing a ghost" to mean just having some sort of personal experience and not as a conclusion that you have seen a disembodied entity of some sort.

For most people the term "ghost" means something like that--the manifestation of discarnate dead person. As such, I think applying Occam's Razor to explain the experience would make almost any other explanation more likely than a ghost.

Even your definition of ghost as maybe being memories somehow leaving an imprint on the world would call for the overhaul of everything we know about how memory works. (At the very least, everything about memory depends on there being a real, living, physical brain present.)

[Soapy Sam]

Even your definition of ghost as maybe being memories somehow leaving an imprint on the world would call for the overhaul of everything we know about how memory works. (At the very least, everything about memory depends on there being a real, living, physical brain present.)

Correct.
In this case, the real, living, physical brain is in Darat's head, as are the memories.
Just as he already made clear.

[Davo]

[QUOTE=The Atheist;2898717]

Check how many hunters get killed through being mistaken for game if you think subjectivity's cool.)

Nicely pointed out

The topic was raised on Radio Live after a couple of hunting deaths here in NZ.

There is a definite psychological aspect to these cases. The hunter was eager to see a deer to shoot, so his mind had tricked him into seeing a deer even though it was a human. Being aware of this aspect is critical knowledge before pullling the trigger.

This phemomena probably works in reverse, if you believe in and are scared by ghosts you are probably more likely to see them.

[Paulhoff]

It was Saturday morning and Jake, an avid hunter, woke up ready to go bag the first deer of the season. He walks down to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee, and to his surprise he finds his wife, Alice, sitting there, fully dressed in camouflage. Jake asks her, “What are you up to?” Alice smiles, “I'm going hunting with you!” Jake, though he has many reservations, reluctantly decides to take her along.
They arrive at the hunting site. Jake sets his wife safely up in the tree stand and tells her: “If you see a deer, take careful aim on it and I'll come running back as soon as I hear the shot.” Jake walks away with a smile on his face knowing that Alice couldn't bag an elephant -- much less a deer.

But not 10 minutes pass when he is startled as he hears an array of gunshots. Quickly, Jake starts running back. As Jake gets closer to her stand, he hears Alice screaming, “Get away from my deer!” Confused, Jake races faster towards his screaming wife. And again he hears her yell, “Get away from my deer!” followed by another volley of gunfire.

Now within sight of where he had left his wife, Jake is surprised to see a cowboy, with his hands high in the air. The cowboy, obviously distraught, says, “Okay, lady, okay! You can have your deer! Just let me get my saddle off it!”


Sorry, I just had to.

Paul

:) :) :)

[The Atheist]

The topic was raised on Radio Live after a couple of hunting deaths here in NZ.

Been a particularly bad year for that. Utterly bloody ridiculous.

You're right though - if people can kid themselves badly enough to end up killing someone, how much easier must it be to see a ghost?

[Miss Whiplash]

Been a particularly bad year for that. Utterly bloody ridiculous.

You're right though - if people can kid themselves badly enough to end up killing someone, how much easier must it be to see a ghost?

Hmm...It's not unusual here at all. Hunting deaths are very common due to buck fever. That's why hunters wear blaze orange.

[The Atheist]

Hmm...It's not unusual here at all. Hunting deaths are very common due to buck fever. That's why hunters wear blaze orange.

It always happens, but this year we seem to have had far more than usual. I doubt there's any part of the world where no hunting deaths happen.

I wonder if many ghosts get shot?

[jimbob]

Antarctica, sorry

[Cainkane1]

I was once sitting alone in my parents home watching TV when out of the corner of my eye I saw movement. I saw in the darkened living room next to the room where I was watching TV a short hairy scowling man walking a few inches above the carpet. This little ugly creature had a striking resemblance to Lon Chaney in werewolf makeup. I don't believe in ghosts and if I did it wouldn't have looked like ol Lon Chaney. The creature saw me looking and hid behind an easy chair. I got up and looked behind the chair and nothing was there. I've been a lifelong skeptic and years later talking to a psychologist about this weird episode in my life he explained it thusly. Your mind was trying to entertain you. You like scary movies and you were bored. Your brain was trying to entertain you. It was a typical ghost vision. Trouble is I'm not a fan of the paranormal.

[The Atheist]

Antarctica, sorry

Ed Hillary, McMurdo, or a different one?

[jimbob]

I was refering to the continent as a place with no hunting fatalities recently.

I'd guess there would have been in the time of industrial sealers and whalers. (Though probably not through "friendly fire").

[The Atheist]

I was refering to the continent as a place with no hunting fatalities recently.

I'd guess there would have been in the time of industrial sealers and whalers. (Though probably not through "friendly fire").

Gotcha. I just wondered if you were referring to ghosts - there are a couple of famous examples down there.

Hunting fatalities? Can we count Japanese whalers?

[jimbob]

Shurly not cases of mistaken identity, the "friendly fire"

As far as I know, no sumo wrestlers have ever been swimming in the southern ocean. I want to be wrong om this.

[The Atheist]

Shurly not cases of mistaken identity, the "friendly fire"

As far as I know, no sumo wrestlers have ever been swimming in the southern ocean. I want to be wrong om this.

There was Jap whaler which caught fire a little while back, but that doesn't quite fit...

If anyone ever went hunting there, it would be a likely place for an accident. One of our Air NZ pilots once failed to see an entire mountain (http://library.christchurch.org.nz/kids/nzdisasters/erebus.asp), so mistaking a hunter for a seal would be possible.