Ghosts and Spirits

[The_Exile]

Anyone either A) believe in them or B) had any first hand experience?

Having a few...shall we say... odd occurances in the household, stuff that I can't logically explain, but I have never believed in any of this spiritual stuff, I always though there was a logical explanation for everything, latest thing to happen was a half full can of juice on the mantlepiece, not only fall off, but litereally take off and land 6 feet away, I thought perhaps it could be a gust of wind coming down a vent or something but there aint no vents anywehre I can find.

Other stuff happening too, found a glass when I woke up one morning, must have been me leaving it lying around before bed, I usually have a big glass of water with ice, so I came down in the morning and there was an ice cube still in it, how does an ice cube not melt overnight? I've got 3 wee ones so I've blamed it all on them :greengrin

That's just a coupld of things which I've experienced, we're 99% sure the previous owner died in the house. Would be good to hear if anyone else has experienced some odd stuff like this to make me feel like I'm not going to end up in a padded cell!

[Jay]

My ten year old son is obsessed with the paranormal and all that goes with it. He scares the beejeezus out of me. We have no idea where he got this from as we never (used) to watch TV progs or talk about stuff like that but for about 4 years that has been his passion. He is very level headed about it and likes to find a logical answer for stuff. He is a very very bright boy and studies pictures and videos and tries to have a conversation with me about his thoughts and findings and has converted me to the point of me being open minded about it.

He is absolutely desperate to go into Mary Kings close at night - not happening in the forseeable future!

The day he says "I see dead people" I swear I will keel over! :greengrin

[CB_NO3]

I dont believe in this type of stuff but am itching to see something. I would love to be proved wrong. Few guys in my work have seen stuff at night so i have sat in the warehouse on my own like a weirdo waiting for something to happen. Unfortunately nothing has happened. Boo.

[The_Exile]

I've been down Mary Kings close and must admit I didn't feel much down there, apart from the room where the wee girl apparently died, that was very very eerie! I've been down the vaults too, that was pretty hardcore, we had one lassie pass out and someone else claim to have been scratched, I didn't have anything odd happen to me, was just a bit creepy and dark I thought, always been fairly closed minded on this subject, now I'd describe myself as an 'open-minded skeptic'!

[Mon Dieu4]

Myself and 2 of my pals saw a ghost in my house a couple of times, at first it scared me big time, now it doesn't bother me

other family members have seen it too, there have been a fair few other really strange things happen as well like pictures falling off hooks that you physically need to lift off, the old lights going on and off, loud bangs etc

if i hadn't seen the ghost myself then i would still be pretty sceptical to be honest

[Pretty Boy]

Willing to believe but no first hand experience.

When I used to.suffer from.quite bad sleep paralysis I often had the sensation of being pinned down in bed with a hooded man standing over me. Very scary at the time but ultimately a perfectly logical explanation for it.

[hibsbollah]

i cant wait til twocarpets sees this :hilarious

[MSK]

i cant wait til twocarpets sees this :hilarious:greengrin...in fairness ..he does back up his case for not believing in the paranormal ..:agree:

[hibsbollah]

:greengrin...in fairness ..he does back up his case for not believing in the paranormal ..:agree:

I like the double rug-ed one, dont get me wrong. i just like watching a scrap :greengrin

[MSK]

I like the double rug-ed one, dont get me wrong. i just like watching a scrap :greengrinIm sure he will come through to this thread at some point ..:greengrin

[Nuitdelune]

Follow @Bored_Ghost on Twitter

[Sylar]

My fiance had two "invisible friends" when she was a wee lass. Nothing unusual in that really, but they lived in a very old house and when her mum asked her who she was nattering away to, the reply was her new friends, Alvera and Alvie. Both Victorian names which have since fallen out of usage - some of the stories her mum has of conversations and where she'd find her sitting talking to these "friends" are really unusual indeed.

My friend from school lived in a very old house in Bathgate (now a B&B) and there were certainly a lot of "odd" activities within the house. Bathroom doors locked (bolt shut) from the inside (with no window), really strange whisperings (most likely drafts in the house, but words were discernable), strange shadows on the walls, things moving.

I'm certainly willing to believe in unexplained phenomena but I don't believe in the psychic bull**** which attaches itself to it. It's a bit like the UFO thing for me - as a scientist, I'm utterly convinced that we're not alone in the Universe - the chance of that being the case are so remote - but to believe that aliens have regularly visited our planet, exsanguinated cows, abducted people and rammed probes up their ***** and placed strategic implants for future visits is a step beyond for me...

[One Day Soon]

i cant wait til twocarpets sees this :hilarious


Yep, he is gonna lose his lunch big time with this.

You better all stock up on supplies and dig in for a long one. If we can get God into too it I predict maybe as much as a ten pager.

[Glory Lurker]

Really interested in what the OP says here. When I was a wee guy, it was just accepted that the house we lived in was haunted. Lots of weird things seemed to happen, but it didn't scare us that much because that was just how it was. About 15 years after we left, I decided to jot down what I could remember about it before my memories disappeared. As soon as I started this, I thought "no, I just don't believe it". There's no doubt that I had a perception of something being there, that things did turn up in the wrong place, clocks seemed to be fiddled with etc, etc, but since the moment I picked up the pen I simply have not believed anything supernatural was going on. Indeed, any belief I had in ghosts disappeared at the same time. Not sure if that's weirder than the supposed hauntings!

[Speedy]

Anyone either A) believe in them or B) had any first hand experience?

Having a few...shall we say... odd occurances in the household, stuff that I can't logically explain, but I have never believed in any of this spiritual stuff, I always though there was a logical explanation for everything, latest thing to happen was a half full can of juice on the mantlepiece, not only fall off, but litereally take off and land 6 feet away, I thought perhaps it could be a gust of wind coming down a vent or something but there aint no vents anywehre I can find.

Other stuff happening too, found a glass when I woke up one morning, must have been me leaving it lying around before bed, I usually have a big glass of water with ice, so I came down in the morning and there was an ice cube still in it, how does an ice cube not melt overnight? I've got 3 wee ones so I've blamed it all on them :greengrin

That's just a coupld of things which I've experienced, we're 99% sure the previous owner died in the house. Would be good to hear if anyone else has experienced some odd stuff like this to make me feel like I'm not going to end up in a padded cell!

I've never had any experience with ghosts but I've hand the odd bad experience with spirits.

One of the reasons I tend to start the night on lager.

[Saorsa]

ghost and spirits, sorry but http://www.smileydesign.net/smileys/horror03.gif :hilarious


Rubbish http://freesmileyface.net/smiley/fantasy/ghost-17.gif quite like spirits though http://www.rotharmy.com/forums/images/smilies/smilie/brownbag.gif

[easty]

I don't believe in ghosts at all. No matter what anyone claims to have seen I could never be convinced.

Aliens on the other hand, they absolutley exist, and could very possibly be intelligent/advanced enough to have visited our planet. Considering that they could take pretty much any form imaginable, I suppose that when people think they've seen a ghost they might have seen an alien.

[Twa Cairpets]

ODS, happy, 'bollah, thanks for thinking of me guys...:greengrin

You may be unsurprised to learn I am not a believer in ghosts or spirits or afterlife. I know, you're shocked.

I'm prepared absolutely to believe in it if there is ever any evidence for it, but there's not. Ghostly activity or haunting that has been investigated disinterestedly has generally been shown to have entirely rational or earthbound causes, or at the every least they remain unexplained with the evidence available. On the (relatively rare) occasions where explanations aren't able to be shown, it isn't valid to fill the gap of knowledge with "well it must be a ghost". Its the same argument with UFO's (and in deference to ODS's expectations, its the same with God). You cant fill a gap in knowledge with an unsupported hypothesis - that's called guessing.

There was a thread on here a while back about people who suffered sleep paralysis, and had experience of "the black widow" sitting on their chest. In the past, that was a ghost for many people, and they believed their experience validated their belief. But its now medically understood - no ghost. The experiences that people cite as personal experience - such as the ice cube and falling pictures on the thread - will have explanation. At the very least falling pictures and retention of ice cubes would have to be seen as the most pointless bits of poltergeist activity imaginable.

I read somewhere about a question that was asked when someone said "I saw a ghost". the question was "how do you know it wasn't an alien?" That kind of sums it up for me.

[Future17]

I don't believe in ghosts at all. No matter what anyone claims to have seen I could never be convinced.

Aliens on the other hand, they absolutley exist, and could very possibly be intelligent/advanced enough to have visited our planet. Considering that they could take pretty much any form imaginable, I suppose that when people think they've seen a ghost they might have seen an alien.


I read somewhere about a question that was asked when someone said "I saw a ghost". the question was "how do you know it wasn't an alien?" That kind of sums it up for me.

Both posts posted at 11.33pm. Now THAT'S spooky! :greengrin

[Hibrandenburg]

Once saw a Yam get decked by a ghost at Tynecastle. Maybe it was just me having an OBE?

[Twa Cairpets]

Both posts posted at 11.33pm. Now THAT'S spooky! :greengrin :greengrin

Taking the point though, on the assumption that Easty is on the level, the same argument exists. if you lay down as a pre-condition that "aliens can take any shape", the premise you are building your belief/argument on isn't falsifiable, and therefore has limited worth from a rational standpoint. I can argue from precisely the same standpoint that ghosts are actually manifestations of earthly existence from parallel dimensions. You can't disprove that.

If there's no evidence, then there's no evidence.

As it happens, I think from a statistical standpoint it is almost certain there is life on other planets, but equally think it almost certain we haven't been visited by them. Seriously, why would you travel light years just to anally probe rednecks or torture cows?

[Liam_Hibs]

I was once sitting on the toilet, doing what I needed to do.. I was alone in my house, but out of habit I locked the door as I went in. Now, as I was sitting there I heard this click at the door. I quickly looked up to find the lock had been turned fully around, and the door was now unlocked. Crapped myself, literally.

[HibsMax]

OK, here's my thoughts, or at least some of them.

I have not had any weird experiences of my own to report. Bumps in the night, yeah, but nothing that I can't explain. You should hear the loud crack our deck makes in the very cold winter...it's just the wood contracting but it sounds pretty scary.

We should remember that EVERYTHING we sense is our brain's interpretation of our surroundings. Maybe you DID see or hear something but that doesn't mean "it" was there. The imagination is very powerful. I include all senses in that by the way, not just sight and sound. You can feel something without actually being touched. Not a totally accurate example but think of people who have lost legs but can still feel their toes. I know, I said it wasn't totally accurate. :)

I like to think and challenge myself and sometimes that means coming up with absurd ideas. I am not claiming these are original ideas but I am saying that I came to these conclusions on my own. For example, consider time as the 4th dimension (nothing earth shattering there). Now consider the 3 dimensions we are all familiar with. Everything physical is at a precise X, Y and Z location. Those locations exist whether or not we are occupying them. I think, maybe, that time is the same way. That means that every moment in time exists at the same time. If you put two objects in the same X, Y and Z location, they are on top of one another. We can change X, Y and Z but we can't change time. But what if we could? Or what if time could "leak" so that it something we saw at X, Y and Z wasn't actually of this time but another time?

A couple of problems I have with that :
1. why are ghosts / hauntings always from the past? if this was really some crack in time, why does it only go one way? why don't we see ghosts from the future?
2. this is the most compelling flaw for me. the universe is expanding all the time. the earth rotates around its axis as well as around the sun. our solar system is part of the milky way galaxy which itself is spinning. it's also flying away from the center. And so on. What I am saying is that NOTHING remains in the exact same spot (relative to the rest of the universe) for very long at all. even as I sit at my kitchen table, feeling very stationary, I am far from it. I am hurtling through the universe VERY fast in multiple directions. freaky! My point is this. A haunted house may appear to be in the same spot as it was 100 hundred years ago but, again relative to the rest of the universe, it's nowhere near where it was back when the "ghosts" occupied that house. So unless that ghost / spirit is somehow physically attached to the haunted house, it's a very far distance away. This is also one of the reasons that I think time travel is very difficult, if not impossible. If you went back 100 years in time from now without changing your X, Y and Z coordinates, you would most likely be in the middle of space somewhere.

Just some random thoughts.

[Twa Cairpets]

OK, here's my thoughts, or at least some of them.

I have not had any weird experiences of my own to report. Bumps in the night, yeah, but nothing that I can't explain. You should hear the loud crack our deck makes in the very cold winter...it's just the wood contracting but it sounds pretty scary.

We should remember that EVERYTHING we sense is our brain's interpretation of our surroundings. Maybe you DID see or hear something but that doesn't mean "it" was there. The imagination is very powerful. I include all senses in that by the way, not just sight and sound. You can feel something without actually being touched. Not a totally accurate example but think of people who have lost legs but can still feel their toes. I know, I said it wasn't totally accurate. :)

I like to think and challenge myself and sometimes that means coming up with absurd ideas. I am not claiming these are original ideas but I am saying that I came to these conclusions on my own. For example, consider time as the 4th dimension (nothing earth shattering there). Now consider the 3 dimensions we are all familiar with. Everything physical is at a precise X, Y and Z location. Those locations exist whether or not we are occupying them. I think, maybe, that time is the same way. That means that every moment in time exists at the same time. If you put two objects in the same X, Y and Z location, they are on top of one another. We can change X, Y and Z but we can't change time. But what if we could? Or what if time could "leak" so that it something we saw at X, Y and Z wasn't actually of this time but another time?

A couple of problems I have with that :
1. why are ghosts / hauntings always from the past? if this was really some crack in time, why does it only go one way? why don't we see ghosts from the future?

Also - why are ghosts always clothed?

2. this is the most compelling flaw for me. the universe is expanding all the time. the earth rotates around its axis as well as around the sun. our solar system is part of the milky way galaxy which itself is spinning. it's also flying away from the center. And so on. What I am saying is that NOTHING remains in the exact same spot (relative to the rest of the universe) for very long at all. even as I sit at my kitchen table, feeling very stationary, I am far from it. I am hurtling through the universe VERY fast in multiple directions. freaky! My point is this. A haunted house may appear to be in the same spot as it was 100 hundred years ago but, again relative to the rest of the universe, it's nowhere near where it was back when the "ghosts" occupied that house. So unless that ghost / spirit is somehow physically attached to the haunted house, it's a very far distance away. This is also one of the reasons that I think time travel is very difficult, if not impossible. If you went back 100 years in time from now without changing your X, Y and Z coordinates, you would most likely be in the middle of space somewhere.

Even if you take the Earth to be a fixed point, the planet isn't stationary with plate tectonics so the x/y/z concept is flawed.

Just some random thoughts.

If you're disposed to believe, and to an extent if you're open to suggestion (even if the suggestion comes from your own brain), it's easy to convince yourself that "something weird" is going in. Pareidolia has a lot to answer for.

[HibsMax]

If you're disposed to believe, and to an extent if you're open to suggestion (even if the suggestion comes from your own brain), it's easy to convince yourself that "something weird" is going in. Pareidolia has a lot to answer for.

and how come given that there have been exponentially more animals living on this planet than humans we don't see more animal ghosts? A ghost of a t-rex would be pretty cool!

[SRHibs]

Zero. Nada. Nilch - documented evidence of 'ghosts'. They don't exist. For those that do believe, it's merely a self-willed delusion.

[Jay]

and how come given that there have been exponentially more animals living on this planet than humans we don't see more animal ghosts? A ghost of a t-rex would be pretty cool!

Excuse me!! I went to see a medium at a show and she gave me a message for my puppy from another dog who I didnt know! Nae messages from any of my family for me but the dug got a message- I kid you not!!

I opened the front door and bellowed - "Barney a big black lab in heaven says hello!" My hubby and kids thought I had lost the plot :greengrin

[Hibrandenburg]

The strangest thing that I've experienced was a prediction a medium made to my mother about 40 years ago. My old dear came home all excited and told me I was going to be a Doctor when I grew up and she then explained to me that the medium had told her that I would one day have Dr written on my house door.


Being not exactly academically talented I just shrugged it off and surmised that the old bat had finally gone la la.

About 7 years ago I moved in with Mrs Hiberlin after a few years of looking for our perfect pad. One day soon after moving in I came home and was hit by that twilightzone music ringing in my ears as I stared at the name plate on our door with an open mouth. I'd forgot that it's normal practise hear in Germany for landlords to put their tennents titles alongside their names on the house doors and because Mrs Hiberlin is a Dr, low and behold just in front of my name on the door there was the abbreviation Dr.

Of course I realise now that it was pure coincidence, but it really gave me the willies at the time and gave me a sense of how these things sow little seeds in the back of your head that could possibly lead someone to believe in such things as "The other side."

[Eyrie]

Only one experience of anything that could be classed as paranormal.

Years ago I had a recurring theme in my dreams which turned out to be a premonition of something outwith my control that has since happened to me. The closest I have come to anything like that was a period when I dreamt with a common thread that was almost the opposite, but shows no signs of coming true unfortunately.

And neither was anything useful like the winning lottery numbers or the year in which we win our next Scottish Cup :I'm waiti

[HibsMax]

Excuse me!! I went to see a medium at a show and she gave me a message for my puppy from another dog who I didnt know! Nae messages from any of my family for me but the dug got a message- I kid you not!!

I opened the front door and bellowed - "Barney a big black lab in heaven says hello!" My hubby and kids thought I had lost the plot :greengrin

Far be it for me to doubt your familys judgement. ;)

[Pete]

I haven't had any experiences but I'm not ruling anything out.

People analyze certain things using scientific methods and gathered evidence. They then come to certain conclusions. That's all very logical but how do we know there are no other factors involved...factors beyond our control and comprehension? The army of ants knows nothing of the humans that look upon them as they scurry around.

Are we really that closed minded to think that there might not be any other parameters than the ones we have created?

[The_Exile]

FAscinating stuff folks, I agree with the "how come there's no animal ghosts?" point of view, what makes humans so special that we would get to remain in some sort of ether world? Is it because we have a conscious knowledge of it? Even after everything that has happened to me and I've witnessed I still know that there will be a logical explanation for it, half cans of juice don't fly off fireplaces at a 90 degree angle and land 6 feet away naturally, but there must have been some kind of gust from the old bricked up fireplace or something.

I'm not religious in the slightest, I do believe there is Alien life somewhere, and I don't believe in ghosts, not until I actually see something concrete, I was thinking of doing EVP to see if I hear anything, even although I don't believe I will catch anything the thought of it actually terrifies me, I don't want to be seen to acknowledge it if anything was there, but my logical brain is telling me it's a load of cack!

[HibsMax]

I haven't had any experiences but I'm not ruling anything out.

People analyze certain things using scientific methods and gathered evidence. They then come to certain conclusions. That's all very logical but how do we know there are no other factors involved...factors beyond our control and comprehension? The army of ants knows nothing of the humans that look upon them as they scurry around.

Are we really that closed minded to think that there might not be any other parameters than the ones we have created?

That's something that I always come back to as well. I think we (humans) are really smart but I feel that we would have to be extremely arrogant (or ignorant) to think that we understand everything there is to understand. If you look at how much progress we've made in the last 2000 years, and if you were to chart that, I think you would see that our growth and understand has moved in leaps and bounds. It's frightening to think of where we might be in another 10, 50, 100 years.

All I can say is that I have not personally had any encounters that I can't explain. I've also never seen China but I know it exists. I think. ;)

[HibsMax]

Even if you take the Earth to be a fixed point, the planet isn't stationary with plate tectonics so the x/y/z concept is flawed.
I'm not sure if you are agreeing or disagreeing with me. :) I would say that even though the tectonic plates are constantly moving, the point in space remains the same - it's just that that tree growing "over there" used to be "over there". I know what I am trying to say. :)

[HibsMax]

I read somewhere about a question that was asked when someone said "I saw a ghost". the question was "how do you know it wasn't an alien?" That kind of sums it up for me.

I read something similar ("Why Darwin Matters", I think it was) that had a very similar question. If aliens visited earth it's safe to say that they would have to possess far greater technology than us since we are nowhere near sending humans to another inhabited planet. If these aliens were that advanced, perhaps they also look really weird and can perform feats that we think are absolutely incredible. So incredible in fact that we might mistake them for Gods. How would we differentiate between aliens and Gods? Maybe there is no difference at all. If ghosts DO exist and, perhaps, take on a different form and gain powers that we don't have during life, how do we tell them apart from aliens and Gods? I know a lot of this sounds like mumbo jumbo and it's certainly not something that I am stating as fact but I think it's really fun to think about this stuff.

I know I am going off topic here but hopefully you'll humour me.

I believe in evolution. I don't believe it's a theory, I believe that's how we are here. I'm open to other suggestions or interpretations though. Rather than try to explain one way that humans came to be on THIS planet, I will use another planet as an example. Our planet is doomed. There is no doubt about that. Our beautiful sun will call it quits, super nova and consume us all. We don't stand a chance. So we need to find another home if we want to continue as a species. So let's say that in a couple of thousand years we have the technology to fly from star to star. We find another habitable planet...in fact, it already has life on it but only very basic life. We setup camp there. We flourish, something happens, we enter a dark age and all information about how we got there was lost. I know that seems far fetched in this information age but we've managed to do that on this planet already. Then we flourish again but without the basic knowledge of how we got there. This all happens over a long period of time, a couple of thousand more years. Humans then fight over how we got there. Did we evolve from the other animals that live on that planet? Did some God place us there? Nobody really knows.

I'm not suggesting that is how things happened HERE but if we can conceive that one day we will have the technology to populate another planet then you have to conceive that it's possible that we've done it before...or someone / something very like us. Maybe we won't visit a planet and setup shop as humans, maybe we'll be using that planet as an experiment before taking the plunge. Maybe we'll pre-populate 10 planets with very basic lifeforms and only pick one for our eventual new home....leaving the other 9 planets to evolve "naturally". If those lifeforms evolve over millions of years and humans are born again then we ourselves might be Gods in that respect. And since we never go back to those 9 planets we would, in fact, be absentee Gods.

Oh yeah, not sure where ghosts fit into all of that. :)

[The_Exile]

Pedant alert: The Sun will not supernova, it's much too small, it will blow off it's outer layer, expand to probably the orbit of Juputer and end up a red dwarf I think, apart from that though............:greengrin

Always found the following article fascinating, even now I read it and it blows my mind, even if it was at all possible! The what if's! Perhaps that says more about me than the author though! http://www.fullmoon.nu/articles/art.php?id=tal

[Twa Cairpets]

I haven't had any experiences but I'm not ruling anything out.

People analyze certain things using scientific methods and gathered evidence. They then come to certain conclusions. That's all very logical but how do we know there are no other factors involved...factors beyond our control and comprehension? The army of ants knows nothing of the humans that look upon them as they scurry around.

Are we really that closed minded to think that there might not be any other parameters than the ones we have created?

Another phrase I like is "if you open your mind too much your brain will fall out"

[.Sean.]

My mates house is haunted as ****. It's an ancient big three-story pad above a shop on Haddy High Street.

We were watching a film, went to the kitchen, came back and the TV had unplugged itself. The plug had been pulled clean out the socket. Same night the light in his sitting room swithched itself off, on, off then back on. I was asolutely terrified.

Another time, we'd been out on the bevvy and arsing about. He jokingly sayd something along the lines of if there's anything/ anyone there give us a clue, and his alarm started ringing. The time was 3:07. Hardly a time any alarm would go off. I had to leave, I couldn't stay there, steaming drunk or not. Petrified didn't come close.

Other stuff happens now and again, stuff moving, dissapearing then turning up again.






I know it probably sounds absolutely ludicrous, but there's my tupenceworth.

[steakbake]

I believe in the phenomenon of "ghosts" but don't know what they are or what purpose theyd serve. They might have a totally earthbound explanation than anything that mysterious and other worldly. People are experiencing something but it could have a rational psychological or physical explanation.

I haven't seen a ghost but have experienced a few bizarre things: premonitions, been "visited" in dreams by dead relatives who have told me things which have turned out to be correct - stuff like that. That could all have a reasonable explanation but when it's happening, it goes beyond what you accept as reality.

Aliens: yes, without question that they exist. Some
are capable of visiting this planet and have done so for a long time. I've seen various things which lead me to believe theyre capable of being here.

There's more to life than what we can possibly know.

Sent by iOuija for iPhone

[bandylegs_jLeighton]

I've always been the worlds biggest skeptic when it comes to ghosts - so I decided to stay overnight in the Edinburgh vaults and do a spot of ghost hunting.
I was equipped with a flashlight, EMF detector and an open mind. At first I just wondered about hoping something would happen - nothing. Then I decided to try the old, 'if anyone's here give me a sign' - nothing. Then in desperation I decided to call Mr. Boots a big girls blouse to try and provoke some sort of reaction - nothing.

I think if anything I am even more skeptical now. Other people on the same night claimed to have been touched, or heard something. Funnily enough these where the same people at the start of the night who fully expected to see something as they were believers. Mmm.

Also, given the amount if apparent sightings etc, and the popularity of ghost hunting nowadays you would think that somebody would have caught something on camera by now. If anyone has any links to such footage that actually appears even slightly convincing, feel free to post away - because I've seen nowt!

[RyeSloan]

I've always been the worlds biggest skeptic when it comes to ghosts - so I decided to stay overnight in the Edinburgh vaults and do a spot of ghost hunting.
I was equipped with a flashlight, EMF detector and an open mind. At first I just wondered about hoping something would happen - nothing. Then I decided to try the old, 'if anyone's here give me a sign' - nothing. Then in desperation I decided to call Mr. Boots a big girls blouse to try and provoke some sort of reaction - nothing.

I think if anything I am even more skeptical now. Other people on the same night claimed to have been touched, or heard something. Funnily enough these where the same people at the start of the night who fully expected to see something as they were believers. Mmm.

Also, given the amount if apparent sightings etc, and the popularity of ghost hunting nowadays you would think that somebody would have caught something on camera by now. If anyone has any links to such footage that actually appears even slightly convincing, feel free to post away - because I've seen nowt!

Sums it up for me. If you believe you will find reason for continuing that belief despite the lack of any real evidence.

I also like the 'come and have a go if you think you are hard enough' approach.....Sure some people will recognise the scenario when you are home alone or last in the work and soemthing 'weird' happens, a sound, a light whatever and you get the shiver up your spine. This happened to me a few times in my previous house and it was freaking me out until I found some balls and the next time it happened I would just go to where I thought said 'weirdness' had came from and boldy ask for 'it' to do it's worst..strangely enough nothing ever happened and I can now quite happily hear noises and creaks and even suffer picture falling from the wall situations without any spine shiver nonsense.

Firm non believer in ghosts per se...not saying it's not possible for certain 'impressions' to be left by previous owners or occupants (a kind of dent in space time fabric if you want a rather lame effort in explaining what I mean) but as for physical manifisations and the like, naa much much much more likely to be the witnesses own mind or peoples own presence that is the result of any strangeness than a 'ghost'.

[Dinkydoo]

I don't believe in the typical idea of 'ghosts' simply because I haven't experienced anything that I would classify as evidence to strongly support the idea. Sure, I've experienced weird things happening such as hearing footsteps in the house when I am the only person in, things moving or falling off the wall - all of which can be explained in a pefectly logical manner.

My mind isn't closed to the idea that energy from a living thing could manifest itself reciprocally in a manner that we, as of yet, do not understand or can accurately measure - Newton's third law of motion type of thing, but in a seemingly less mechanical process.

[The_Exile]

I don't believe in the typical idea of 'ghosts' simply because I haven't experienced anything that I would classify as evidence to strongly support the idea. Sure, I've experienced weird things happening such as hearing footsteps in the house when I am the only person in, things moving or falling off the wall - all of which can be explained in a pefectly logical manner.

My mind isn't closed to the idea that energy from a living thing could manifest itself reciprocally in a manner that we, as of yet, do not understand or can accurately measure - Newton's third law of motion type of thing, but in a seemingly less mechanical process.

Before we got the carpet down on the stairs and the upstairs hall we thought we used to hear footsteps at night, I always assumed it was floorboards snapping back into place after being walked on all day, we had a joiner in one day and I asked him about it and he said once one floorboard snaps back it causes a cascade effect and they all follow, which sounds eerily like footsteps, and he even done it there and then to show me. So anytime I hear "footsteps" I know how to logically explain it.

For me a lot of this stuff is probably caused by the mind. It's one of the last great unknowns, the human mind, can we make stuff appear etc? Probably! We only use something along the lines of 30-40% of our minds.

[HibsMax]

Pedant alert: The Sun will not supernova, it's much too small, it will blow off it's outer layer, expand to probably the orbit of Juputer and end up a red dwarf I think, apart from that though............:greengrin

Always found the following article fascinating, even now I read it and it blows my mind, even if it was at all possible! The what if's! Perhaps that says more about me than the author though! http://www.fullmoon.nu/articles/art.php?id=tal

Lol. I knew it would wipe us out, just got my terminology and dwarves mixed up. :)

[HibsMax]

I believe in the phenomenon of "ghosts" but don't know what they are or what purpose theyd serve. They might have a totally earthbound explanation than anything that mysterious and other worldly. People are experiencing something but it could have a rational psychological or physical explanation.

I haven't seen a ghost but have experienced a few bizarre things: premonitions, been "visited" in dreams by dead relatives who have told me things which have turned out to be correct - stuff like that. That could all have a reasonable explanation but when it's happening, it goes beyond what you accept as reality.

Aliens: yes, without question that they exist. Some
are capable of visiting this planet and have done so for a long time. I've seen various things which lead me to believe theyre capable of being here.

There's more to life than what we can possibly know.

Sent by iOuija for iPhone

One thing I find strange about people from the past making predictions about the future is "how would they know"? If someone was visited by someone from the future, that would make more sense to me.

[--------]

ODS, happy, 'bollah, thanks for thinking of me guys...:greengrin

You may be unsurprised to learn I am not a believer in ghosts or spirits or afterlife. I know, you're shocked.

I'm prepared absolutely to believe in it if there is ever any evidence for it, but there's not. Ghostly activity or haunting that has been investigated disinterestedly has generally been shown to have entirely rational or earthbound causes, or at the every least they remain unexplained with the evidence available. On the (relatively rare) occasions where explanations aren't able to be shown, it isn't valid to fill the gap of knowledge with "well it must be a ghost". Its the same argument with UFO's (and in deference to ODS's expectations, its the same with God). You cant fill a gap in knowledge with an unsupported hypothesis - that's called guessing.

There was a thread on here a while back about people who suffered sleep paralysis, and had experience of "the black widow" sitting on their chest. In the past, that was a ghost for many people, and they believed their experience validated their belief. But its now medically understood - no ghost. The experiences that people cite as personal experience - such as the ice cube and falling pictures on the thread - will have explanation. At the very least falling pictures and retention of ice cubes would have to be seen as the most pointless bits of poltergeist activity imaginable.

I read somewhere about a question that was asked when someone said "I saw a ghost". the question was "how do you know it wasn't an alien?" That kind of sums it up for me.


Hi, TC.

i don't see why we should entertain the proles with another discussion on the existence-nonexistence of God or the afterlife. :wink:

I would agree that most 'supernatural' experiences can be explained perfectly satisfactorily in rational terms. Same goes for UFOs and aliens - it's no accident that West Lothian has so many reported 'UFO' sightings - it's right under the flight-paths of two airports, and so many of the reporters seem to have been driving on either the M8 or M9 at the time of sighting. The only possible supernatural aspect to the thing is that they didn't cream themselves or anyone else trying to see what the lights in the sky were doing while driving at 70 mph on a motorway in the darkness ...

Leave it as said that I don't agree with you about God - likesay, no need to netertain the proles - but on the narrow subject of ghosts and spirits, I'd say we were probably much of a mind.

[Rory]

I never believed in the afterlife . Thought it was all tosh. Last June though i saw the ghost of frank bruno which has made me wonder . Still undecided though.

[danhibees1875]

I had first hand experience with spirits last night.

His name was Glen and I mixed him with coke. :greengrin

[Eyrie]

I had first hand experience with spirits last night.

His name was Glen and I mixed him with coke. :greengrin

Philistine!

My grandfather used to tell a tale about Jo Grimond visiting a constituent. The consituent poured half a glass of whisky, then stopped and out of courtesy asked Grimond "What do you take in it?"

Grimond took one look at the half empty glass and growled "More".

Which is of course the only correct answer :greengrin

[Twa Cairpets]

Hi, TC.

i don't see why we should entertain the proles with another discussion on the existence-nonexistence of God or the afterlife. :wink:

I would agree that most 'supernatural' experiences can be explained perfectly satisfactorily in rational terms. Same goes for UFOs and aliens - it's no accident that West Lothian has so many reported 'UFO' sightings - it's right under the flight-paths of two airports, and so many of the reporters seem to have been driving on either the M8 or M9 at the time of sighting. The only possible supernatural aspect to the thing is that they didn't cream themselves or anyone else trying to see what the lights in the sky were doing while driving at 70 mph on a motorway in the darkness ...

Leave it as said that I don't agree with you about God - likesay, no need to netertain the proles - but on the narrow subject of ghosts and spirits, I'd say we were probably much of a mind.

Agreed.

Tempted though I am of course to explore the obvious crossover, it would end up going down familiar route. However, that said, from a comparative point of view, do "ghosts" from different religious backgrounds have different types of manifestations. I don't know, but if they do it would suggest strongly a cultural/human explanation behind the experiences.

[VickMackie]

Diverting to psychics but my gf went to one and she was saying how amazing it was and how they knew so much.

People's minds believe what they want them to. They hear things they want to.

I had a house where the toilet used to flush itself and you'd see a shadow going down the hall. It was a hall with glass windows down the middle.

The toilet flushing could probably be explained but the shadow was weird.

[HibsMax]

Diverting to psychics but my gf went to one and she was saying how amazing it was and how they knew so much.

People's minds believe what they want them to. They hear things they want to.

I had a house where the toilet used to flush itself and you'd see a shadow going down the hall. It was a hall with glass windows down the middle.

The toilet flushing could probably be explained but the shadow was weird.

It's called a ghost flush. Seriously. It happened at my wife's parents house. It's caused by a leaky flapper.

[--------]

Diverting to psychics but my gf went to one and she was saying how amazing it was and how they knew so much.

People's minds believe what they want them to. They hear things they want to.

I had a house where the toilet used to flush itself and you'd see a shadow going down the hall. It was a hall with glass windows down the middle.

The toilet flushing could probably be explained but the shadow was weird.


It's called a ghost flush. Seriously. It happened at my wife's parents house. It's caused by a leaky flapper.


And wherever you have windows, you have moving shadows. Did the shadow always follow the flush?

[GhostofBolivar]

Diverting to psychics but my gf went to one and she was saying how amazing it was and how they knew so much.

What they know is called cold reading. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading) It's basically a not very elaborate con and those who perform it and pretend it's more than a trick are a grubbily nasty group of individuals, IMO.

This TV show (http://www.youtube.com/show/derrenbrowninvestigates) by Derren Brown is really a very good expose of the techniques these individuals use and the sort of people they are.

[Pretty Boy]

What they know is called cold reading. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading) It's basically a not very elaborate con and those who perform it and pretend it's more than a trick are a grubbily nasty group of individuals, IMO.

This TV show (http://www.youtube.com/show/derrenbrowninvestigates) by Derren Brown is really a very good expose of the techniques these individuals use and the sort of people they are.

Agreed.

Nasty individuals who exploit people who are going through a traumatic time.

[Twa Cairpets]

What they know is called cold reading. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading) It's basically a not very elaborate con and those who perform it and pretend it's more than a trick are a grubbily nasty group of individuals, IMO.

This TV show (http://www.youtube.com/show/derrenbrowninvestigates) by Derren Brown is really a very good expose of the techniques these individuals use and the sort of people they are.

There was a thread a while back on spiritualism, and I agree absolutely that it is at best deluded, at worst criminal.

My avatar is from the best and funniest book you'll ever read on spiritualism - "Attack of the unsinkable rubber ducks" by Christopher Brookmyre. Brilliant read.

People claim spiritualism as part of the body of evidence supporting an afterlife/ghosts/spirits. Is has been roundly and soundly debunked - what is sad is that cold reading/hot reading mixed with credulity and emotional vulnerability are powerful tools to convince people of the "power of the other side". Loathsome.

[Fantic]

and how come given that there have been exponentially more animals living on this planet than humans we don't see more animal ghosts? A ghost of a t-rex would be pretty cool!

A woman I know lives in a big house that used to be a slaughter house before it was converted. She often gets woken up by what sounds like cows mooing, and finds that when her grass gets long there are bits flattened into paths. She's got her house on the market as she can't stand it anymore!

[HibsMax]

A woman I know lives in a big house that used to be a slaughter house before it was converted. She often gets woken up by what sounds like cows mooing, and finds that when her grass gets long there are bits flattened into paths. She's got her house on the market as she can't stand it anymore!

I love cows. :)

The flat grass could be other animals making them. Rabbits. Deer. Etc. we have tracks around our property too, mostly created by deer. I think they're probably very old ad well since they're creatures of habit and routine.

[steakbake]

Re aliens/ufos: I see the human race, who can barely treat some diseases which affect 1 in 3 or feed its total population properly, landed a probe on Mars this morning.

If we can do it at even our stage, what is to say that others cannot perform the more elaborate trick of sending manned missions to other planets? Theyd need to be advanced but not unimaginably more advanced than us.

[--------]

Re aliens/ufos: I see the human race, who can barely treat some diseases which affect 1 in 3 or feed its total population properly, landed a probe on Mars this morning.

If we can do it at even our stage, what is to say that others cannot perform the more elaborate trick of sending manned missions to other planets? Theyd need to be advanced but not unimaginably more advanced than us.


That's travel within the solar system - the interstellar equivalent of popping round to the corner shop for a pint of milk.

As Hitch-Hiker says, "Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space ...."

Even at the speed of light it would take four and a half years to reach the nearest star. The other stars you can see in the night sky are much, much farther away - way beyond any human's reach.

OK - but you might say that alien visitors would be very different life-forms from human beings. True - they would have to be so different from humans that their existence is so purely speculative as to lie firmly within the realm of Sci-fi fantasy. Even coming from within our own galaxy they would have to either live for hundreds/thousands of years, or have developed some sort of life-suspension device. They must be able to arrive without being detected until they're here; and be able to leave without being tracked back into space. Their space-craft, if they exist, exhibit a level of technology far into the farthest reaches of the sci-fi writer's imagination.

But if they're landing here and abducting humans, they also have to be life-forms compatible with conditions on this planet.

Which is what ufologists claim they do.

Which would suggest they're just like us some of the time, but totally unlike us the rest of the time.

Personally, I agree with Douglas Adams - "It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination." (The Restaurant at the End of the Universe)

I have little doubt that when someone reports seeing an unidentified flying object in the sky there was indeed something up there (unless, of course the witness is drunk or deranged, which many of them seem to be). I simply don't believe it came from a galaxy far, far away.

[Hibee87]

I to find the subject of ghosts fascinating. I have never seen one so am a non believers but some storys I have heard do seem to be unexplained and i find these stories interesting.

The one and only i have witnessed was when i was in primary school, we went to mary kings close on a day trip and one of the mums who came along had a strange experience, we were in the room where the girl is said to be and her camera started to rewind the spool. she claims the spool was new in and only had a couple of photos on it and no where near finished, she had taken a couple of snaps down there and went to take one of us all together then it rewound....i put this down to her pressing the wrong button but she is adamant she never touched anythign other than the button to take a photo.

my sisters old house had a few strange things, she had a cabinate in the living toom and the handles were those that could flip up and down they would constantly come home and they would all be pointing up alan her BF at the time made a diliberate point of pushing them all down before leaving one night, came home and they were all up again. She also had a mortis lock key on top of the leccy box in the hall one night they heard a bang then sliding on the wooden floor, alan went to look and the key was at the other side of the hall way, he put it back up and pushed it off several times and each time it hit the floor and never moved, he says the key was that heavy that a gust of wind would not have been able to move it accross the floor. They told the upstair neigbour about this and they also said they had strange things happen like the clocks moving , again all stories but sound strange.

the strangest of the lot was my cousin, when she was about 4 or 5 they moved to a new house, one day she came i nwith a pound in her hand and my aunt asked where she got it ' elizabeth gave me it' she explained her mum told her off said dont tell lies etc the same thing happened a few weeks later and her mum got really annoyed and thought she was nicking it. The woman who they bought the house from lived down the street and she was tellign her about it. the womans face dropped and said her grandma (whos house it was and had died in the house prior to hem buying it) was call 'lizzy' she explained that noone ever called her elizabeth she was always known as lizzy so it unlikey she would have overheard someone talking about her and make the story up. They left it and never mentioned it again till one night they heard her crying in her room and saing stop it, both aunt and uncle burst in and said whats wrong? she was standing in the middle of the room crying saying elizabeth keeps holding my hand. my uncle then said a couple of weeks later he was in on his own and in bed when he felt someone sitting on the end he woke and no one was there but could see they bed indented as though some was sitting on it, he was sleeping on the other side and hadnt even rolled over to the side the bed had been sat on.

about 4 month had passed and the taps in the bath kept turning on when they were in it, he thought rationally that the washer was gone and since they had not long moved in got a new bathroom fitted - same thing started happening.
then about 5/ 6 month in the ladys grandchild had visited with her new born baby and my cousin came down stairs with one of those old 50p's you know the big muckle things we used to have and said elizabeth gave her it and said she was leaving now and said goodbye.

The lady kept saying how stange it was how when she brought the new born in 'lizzy' decided to leave as though she was waiting for the birth. they still live in the house and since that day they have never had any other strange things happen.

[NAE NOOKIE]

My attitude to Ghosts is the same as my attitude to God.

Until somebody proves to me that he / they dont exist I will believe. Or at least in the case of ghosts keep an open mind :greengrin

[Twa Cairpets]

My attitude to Ghosts is the same as my attitude to God.

Until somebody proves to me that he / they dont exist I will believe. Or at least in the case of ghosts keep an open mind :greengrin

Sticking to Doddie's idea of not going down the route of God, I'd like to query your logic on ghosts.

The accusation of lack of "open-mindedness" is often one thrown at unbelievers or skeptics of anything supernatural or "unexplained". The implication is that in holding such a view, you are being overly dogmatic or unwilling to concede the possibility of the existence of things outwith the bounds of science. Equally, the associated idea of "if its disproved then I'll concede they aren't real" is raised to demonstrate such open-mindedness.

A couple of points.
1) The obvious one, where there is a logical fallacy associated with an argument where it is based on the disproof of a negative. I cant prove ghosts don't exist. No-one ever will be able to prove it, because it is impossible to do so. However, the onus isn't on providing evidence of lack of existence, but on providing enough evidence to back the hypothesis of ghostly existence. I equally can't disprove the hypothesis that ghost sightings are actually hyper-dimensional gladiator hamsters trying to communicate through occasionally locking doors or turning lights on and off, which leads me to the second point.
2) Being open-minded requires some filtering, otherwise you have to believe everything that is conjectured. I'm guessing you don't believe in Nessie, Bigfoot, Mermaids, Leprechauns or the Hall of Valhalla - none of these have been disproved or will ever be disproved. You are (I'm assuming) making an informed decision that the evidence presented doesn't support their existence,and that you would be disposed to being, therefore, closed-minded regarding their existence. (I don't think you would be in fairness, but the accusation would be valid by the logic of "it's not been disproved".

Not a pop, just interested in why you would believe in ghosts and (presumably) not the other things?

[NAE NOOKIE]

Sticking to Doddie's idea of not going down the route of God, I'd like to query your logic on ghosts.

The accusation of lack of "open-mindedness" is often one thrown at unbelievers or skeptics of anything supernatural or "unexplained". The implication is that in holding such a view, you are being overly dogmatic or unwilling to concede the possibility of the existence of things outwith the bounds of science. Equally, the associated idea of "if its disproved then I'll concede they aren't real" is raised to demonstrate such open-mindedness.

A couple of points.
1) The obvious one, where there is a logical fallacy associated with an argument where it is based on the disproof of a negative. I cant prove ghosts don't exist. No-one ever will be able to prove it, because it is impossible to do so. However, the onus isn't on providing evidence of lack of existence, but on providing enough evidence to back the hypothesis of ghostly existence. I equally can't disprove the hypothesis that ghost sightings are actually hyper-dimensional gladiator hamsters trying to communicate through occasionally locking doors or turning lights on and off, which leads me to the second point.
2) Being open-minded requires some filtering, otherwise you have to believe everything that is conjectured. I'm guessing you don't believe in Nessie, Bigfoot, Mermaids, Leprechauns or the Hall of Valhalla - none of these have been disproved or will ever be disproved. You are (I'm assuming) making an informed decision that the evidence presented doesn't support their existence,and that you would be disposed to being, therefore, closed-minded regarding their existence. (I don't think you would be in fairness, but the accusation would be valid by the logic of "it's not been disproved".

Not a pop, just interested in why you would believe in ghosts and (presumably) not the other things?

Hi TC

Not so much that I believe in Ghosts ... I just think that there are many things that are possible that we humans dont understand and I prefer to think thats the case .. just makes life a wee bit more interesting. Certainly dont have anything against folk who dont think that way coz logic would dictate that they are much more likely to be right.

I do firmly believe that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe ... logic would dictate that the chances against there not being are astronomical ... do they visit us ...... hmmmm dunno.

[Twa Cairpets]

Hi TC

Not so much that I believe in Ghosts ... I just think that there are many things that are possible that we humans dont understand and I prefer to think thats the case .. just makes life a wee bit more interesting. Certainly dont have anything against folk who dont think that way coz logic would dictate that they are much more likely to be right.

I do firmly believe that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe ... logic would dictate that the chances against there not being are astronomical ... do they visit us ...... hmmmm dunno.

I agree with this, I just think there is a major difference in attributing assumptions about ghosts as being "if its not explained sit must be a ghost" (not saying you think this, but it is a common fallback position), and looking to try to understand what the reason behind a phenomenon actually is? Isn't it much more interesting to examine with a truly inquisitive mind the real reasons (which may include ghosts), than start off with a stance of "lets find ghosts"?

[Phil D. Rolls]

There is usually an explanation for the paranormal, it's just that people don't look hard enough for answers. I remember the story about the unexplained banging that people heard in cellars in Liverpool. After some investigation, it transpired that it was due to vibrations from pumps at the Mersey Tunnel miles away.

Also people can often misinterpret their thoughts as coming from other people. Maybe what people think happened was a trick of their mind - no one will ever be able to prove or disprove.

That said, I have heard stories from nurses who have been working night shift that have seen ghostly figures walking about the wards at night. I wouldn't discount anything. I could be they saw a ghost. Or it could have been tiredness - who knows?

[MSK]

There is usually an explanation for the paranormal, it's just that people don't look hard enough for answers. I remember the story about the unexplained banging that people heard in cellars in Liverpool. After some investigation, it transpired that it was due to vibrations from pumps at the Mersey Tunnel miles away.

Also people can often misinterpret their thoughts as coming from other people. Maybe what people think happened was a trick of their mind - no one will ever be able to prove or disprove.

That said, I have heard stories from nurses who have been working night shift that have seen ghostly figures walking about the wards at night. I wouldn't discount anything. I could be they saw a ghost. Or it could have been tiredness - who knows?That could be me walking around ..although I would say more "zombie" than "ghosty"....:greengrin

[HibsMax]

Hi TC

Not so much that I believe in Ghosts ... I just think that there are many things that are possible that we humans dont understand and I prefer to think thats the case .. just makes life a wee bit more interesting. Certainly dont have anything against folk who dont think that way coz logic would dictate that they are much more likely to be right.

I do firmly believe that there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe ... logic would dictate that the chances against there not being are astronomical ... do they visit us ...... hmmmm dunno.

This is it in a nutshell for me.

With respect to traveling unimaginable distances in space, I think the problem we have is that we are constrained by scientific limitations e.g., the speed of light. If it is possible to travel in another way that is not constrained by the speed of light (no, I don't have any suggestions :) ) then perhaps that star 100 light years away is not impossible to reach. I'm not suggesting that it IS possible and we just haven't found the way, I'm suggesting that it's maybe possible.

I know I'm getting even more off base now but the more you think about space travel the more impressed you have to be with the guys and gals at NASA (and other space agencies). It's not as simple as aiming towards an object, sticking your foot to the floor and going for it. EVERYTHING is moving. So unless you want to constantly chasing after your destination, you have to be smart and try to figure out where it will be by the time you get there, which means that you have to set off in the totally wrong direction. For example, someone throws a frisbee. You see it and run for it. If you ran in the direction of the frisbee when you first saw it, it would be gone by the time you got there. You could start off running towards it and then keep changing your course as it flies through the air. But that's not what you do. You try and figure out it's speed and path and you try to cut it off. The most efficient way to do that is by running in a straight line towards where you think it will be by the time you get there. That's just for a frisbee, one moving part. Now imagine trying to intercept a planet orbiting another star. Wow. Earth is spinning. We're orbiting the sun. Our solar system orbits the galactic center. I have no idea what direction our galaxy is traveling but I *think* it's "away from the center of the universe".

On another note, can you imagine hurtling through space? At the speeds we're talking about, assuming a physical means of travel, how could you possible avoid debris? Most of space is empty but what happens if you hit an asteroid at 10x the speed of light? Ouch. So many things to consider. We're stuck in our solar system for the foreseeable future IMO.

[Just Alf]

As a kid, 6 or 7 I'd guess we moved to a house with a grave yard at the bottom. My bedroom was at the back and I remember vividly ****ting myself, it was pitch black.
I've got a memory of one night being lifted up out my bed and going through the window across the garden and out into the graveyard..... I was whisked all over the place... I wisnae scared, it felt like a big bruv (I've never had one) showing me all the cool places to play and hang out.

A dream so far?

Next morning I told my mum who said I was imagining it, I described trees you could climb, bushes with Gaps in the middle which would be great gang huts etc.

To prove it was imagination, mum took me for a walk the next day... I was still cool with it all but it was her that had the Heebie jeebies as I unerringly pointed out all the stuff I'd already described to her.

Until I moved away I still happily took the dug a walk through the grave yard in the middle of the night :-)

[--------]

I don't think anyone's posted this yet:

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy ...."


:devil:

[One Day Soon]

I don't think anyone's posted this yet:

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy ...."


:devil:


That heaven bit will get you in bother.

[Phil D. Rolls]

That could be me walking around ..although I would say more "zombie" than "ghosty"....:greengrin

Ah, walking around, I knew there had to be something that the night shift do. :agree:

[MSK]

Ah, walking around, I knew there had to be something that the night shift do. :agree:Only tae stretch the legs for 5 mins & put the kettle on ..:agree:

[Phil D. Rolls]

Only tae stretch the legs for 5 mins & put the kettle on ..:agree:

Naturally, I always found I started to make mistakes in my Puzzler Word Search Compendium, around 2am. Whereas between 4 and half five, well that's the time everyone is ready to kill. Keep your eyes open and avoid eye contact were the two objectives for that bit.

[NAE NOOKIE]

Like the big bang. What did it big bang into?

Genuinely interested in that one. If nothing existed before the big bang, what was it that didnt exist? :greengrin

[Dinkydoo]

That said, I have heard stories from nurses who have been working night shift that have seen ghostly figures walking about the wards at night. I wouldn't discount anything. I could be they saw a ghost. Or it could have been tiredness - who knows?

Funnily enough I too have heard similar stories. Some from work but others from my mum, who occasionally worked as part of the Night Team at a local Nursing Home many years ago. Unidentfied people wandering about the home at night and patients with no mobility pressing thier buzzer to get a nurse to come to pass them the water which was out of reach, only for the nurse to get there to find the glass already in thier hand - with only one other person on the night shift who was apparently dealing with another patient at the time.

Pretty weird, but also explainable.

A healthcare environment lends itself to people adopting this (sort of) default position on 'unexplained' goings on.

The building I currently work in used to be one of grandest psychiatric hospitals in Scotland, and up until last year still had a dementia ward within it. The mind can play tricks on you when working alone in the winter when it gets dark at tea time and you have to stay on for an hour or two.

[SRHibs]

For me a lot of this stuff is probably caused by the mind. It's one of the last great unknowns, the human mind, can we make stuff appear etc? Probably! We only use something along the lines of 30-40% of our minds.

This is taken massively out of context. We can't 'make stuff appear'. The brain has numerous different areas that are used to perform various different biological actions. Granted, each area isn't in use at all time, but technically, we DO utilise 100% of our brains, or close to anyway.

[HibsMax]

This is taken massively out of context. We can't 'make stuff appear'. The brain has numerous different areas that are used to perform various different biological actions. Granted, each area isn't in use at all time, but technically, we DO utilise 100% of our brains, or close to anyway.

Just one text about the 10% myth. (http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/tenper.html)

I do think we can make stuff appear though...in the sense that we see something that isn't really there. I don't mean that I could see a car drive through my back garden as though it were really there. I mean in poor conditions you might think you see something out of the corner of your eye that isn't really there.

[SRHibs]

Just one text about the 10% myth. (http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/tenper.html)

I do think we can make stuff appear though...in the sense that we see something that isn't really there. I don't mean that I could see a car drive through my back garden as though it were really there. I mean in poor conditions you might think you see something out of the corner of your eye that isn't really there.

Yes, I agree. I'm pretty sure that fear and expectation can play a big part in conjuring up both visual and auditory hallucinations.

[Twa Cairpets]

Like the big bang. What did it big bang into?

Genuinely interested in that one. If nothing existed before the big bang, what was it that didnt exist? :greengrin

A singularity, which essentially contained all time, energy and matter. It warps the brain to think about because its massively outwith out frame of reference. If you look at it from a scientific point of view, to my knowledge (but I might be wrong), there's no settled preferred hypothesis. From a philosophical/religious point of view, that's a different barrel of haddock altogether.

[NAE NOOKIE]

A singularity, which essentially contained all time, energy and matter. It warps the brain to think about because its massively outwith out frame of reference. If you look at it from a scientific point of view, to my knowledge (but I might be wrong), there's no settled preferred hypothesis. From a philosophical/religious point of view, that's a different barrel of haddock altogether.

I am aware that from the unimaginable violence of that explosion every single bit of matter and everything else in the universe was created ( including time itsself ) and that to this day it continues to expand .... to either expand into limitless nothing and darkness ... or to eventually retract back onto itsself depending on which scientist you listen to.

But the problem is, as I alluded to in my wee statement ..... what was there before the Big Bang? .... Even if it was nothing.. I mean not even nothing as we know it as in a vacuume, but just nothing. What was that type of nothing and where did it come from?

Even if our big bang ( I was thinking this way before I ever heard any scientist mention it, as I'm sure a lot of folk were ) was in fact just one of trillions of billions of big bangs happening all the time .... what has caused that to be the case and what is the purpose ( if any ) to it?

In other words .......... does it all mean nothing, or is there more to it, some purpose?

My head hurts now :greengrin

[One Day Soon]

A singularity, which essentially contained all time, energy and matter. It warps the brain to think about because its massively outwith out frame of reference. If you look at it from a scientific point of view, to my knowledge (but I might be wrong), there's no settled preferred hypothesis. From a philosophical/religious point of view, that's a different barrel of haddock altogether.

Well Mr Due Tappeti, might that singularity not be unified in conception by describing it as God?

[NAE NOOKIE]

Well Mr Due Tappeti, might that singularity not be unified in conception by describing it as God?

Dont think the singularity could be described as God ...... he might have knocked it up with sticky backed plastic and Fairy Liquid bottles though.

This is what I'm trying to get at. In human thinking cause and effect is everything, as far as I know there cant be one without the other. If that isnt the case ( though in the back of my mind I think there is a theory that stuff can just spring into existance ) then what?

Can it be that our view of what is, is limited by the fact that we can only base our thinking on what we know to be true or can theorise about based on our understanding of science and nature as it is known to us.

In fact I am willing to bet that somewhere out there ( I dont mean in the Universe ) there is something more .... much much more, that no matter how hard we try, or how far we look, we will never be able to understand, or even conceive of.

For example .... If there is a God, then where did he come from? But that statement only works if cause and affect is part of the equation .... take that away and anything is possible.

Even God.

[Twa Cairpets]

I am aware that from the unimaginable violence of that explosion every single bit of matter and everything else in the universe was created ( including time itsself ) and that to this day it continues to expand .... to either expand into limitless nothing and darkness ... or to eventually retract back onto itsself depending on which scientist you listen to.

But the problem is, as I alluded to in my wee statement ..... what was there before the Big Bang? .... Even if it was nothing.. I mean not even nothing as we know it as in a vacuume, but just nothing. What was that type of nothing and where did it come from?

Even if our big bang ( I was thinking this way before I ever heard any scientist mention it, as I'm sure a lot of folk were ) was in fact just one of trillions of billions of big bangs happening all the time .... what has caused that to be the case and what is the purpose ( if any ) to it?

In other words .......... does it all mean nothing, or is there more to it, some purpose?

My head hurts now :greengrin

There are competing ideas about "what was there", and I'm no expert in them - previous Universes that have collapsed ad infinitum is one I tend to favour, but probably just because I can kind of get my head around it (although this isnt a particularly strong argument).

As for purpose - Live a good life, be good to people, be remembered fondly - that would about do it for me.


Well Mr Due Tappeti, might that singularity not be unified in conception by describing it as God? .

Yes, it could, and it often I suspect is. Calling it God doesnt make it so though. :wink:


Dont think the singularity could be described as God ...... he might have knocked it up with sticky backed plastic and Fairy Liquid bottles though.

This is what I'm trying to get at. In human thinking cause and effect is everything, as far as I know there cant be one without the other. If that isnt the case ( though in the back of my mind I think there is a theory that stuff can just spring into existance ) then what?

Can it be that our view of what is, is limited by the fact that we can only base our thinking on what we know to be true or can theorise about based on our understanding of science and nature as it is known to us.

In fact I am willing to bet that somewhere out there ( I dont mean in the Universe ) there is something more .... much much more, that no matter how hard we try, or how far we look, we will never be able to understand, or even conceive of.For example .... If there is a God, then where did he come from? But that statement only works if cause and affect is part of the equation .... take that away and anything is possible.

Even God. .

I think you are absolutely right, and the acceptance of uncertainty and gaps in knowledge is critical.

Taking the subject matter of ghosts as an example. There may be ghosts, we may just not be able to conceive of the physical happenstance that needs to exist to create them, but every shred of evidence that exists that we are capable of understanding suggest that they dont. Therefore, to all intents and purposes, they dont.

The key is that lack of knowledge cant be filled with assumption of stuff that hasnt got any evidence to support it. The assumption of the supernatural is simply that - an assumption.

[NAE NOOKIE]

As for purpose - Live a good life, be good to people, be remembered fondly - that would about do it for me.

The key is that lack of knowledge cant be filled with assumption of stuff that hasnt got any evidence to support it. The assumption of the supernatural is simply that - an assumption.

Agree totally with your attitude to purpose :agree:

I agree to a point with the highlighted bit, but there are a lot of folk out there who would say that they do have evidence through personal experience.

As for the origin of everything .... there is no proof that anything exists, or did exist, prior to the singularity. But to my mind, even without evidence it is not unreasonable to assume that something does / did exist outwith that event. Mainly because it is much more difficult to try to imagine something having a point of origin in time and space ( which the big bang does ) and there being nothing behind it or preceding it.

[VickMackie]

I am aware that from the unimaginable violence of that explosion every single bit of matter and everything else in the universe was created ( including time itsself ) and that to this day it continues to expand .... to either expand into limitless nothing and darkness ... or to eventually retract back onto itsself depending on which scientist you listen to.

But the problem is, as I alluded to in my wee statement ..... what was there before the Big Bang? .... Even if it was nothing.. I mean not even nothing as we know it as in a vacuume, but just nothing. What was that type of nothing and where did it come from?

Even if our big bang ( I was thinking this way before I ever heard any scientist mention it, as I'm sure a lot of folk were ) was in fact just one of trillions of billions of big bangs happening all the time .... what has caused that to be the case and what is the purpose ( if any ) to it?

In other words .......... does it all mean nothing, or is there more to it, some purpose?

My head hurts now :greengrin

It could be that a being created a planet and primitive man, we evolved far enough to create the hydron collider, successfully achieved their aim of creating a black hole that sucked everything in, a big bang ensued, evolution took place and we reached the point of being smart enough to get to the point of building another HC. And repeat. Hahaha

[SRHibs]

I read once that if it's ever proven that a simulation mimicking real life can be created, then it'll mean the chances are that we are in a simulation created by beings in a higher universe.

[NAE NOOKIE]

It could be that a being created a planet and primitive man, we evolved far enough to create the hydron collider, successfully achieved their aim of creating a black hole that sucked everything in, a big bang ensued, evolution took place and we reached the point of being smart enough to get to the point of building another HC. And repeat. Hahaha

:greengrin

[Twa Cairpets]

Agree totally with your attitude to purpose :agree:

I agree to a point with the highlighted bit, but there are a lot of folk out there who would say that they do have evidence through personal experience.

As for the origin of everything .... there is no proof that anything exists, or did exist, prior to the singularity. But to my mind, even without evidence it is not unreasonable to assume that something does / did exist outwith that event. Mainly because it is much more difficult to try to imagine something having a point of origin in time and space ( which the big bang does ) and there being nothing behind it or preceding it.

Thats the kicker - personal experience is just that. Without going down the route of "it's not scientific" (although it of course isn't) personal experience as evidence is very shaky. Experience is coloured by any number of things - culture, credulity, intoxication, expectation, desire, intelligence, imagination, mood, lighting etc - the list could go on.

You may recall the homeopathy thread from a while back: There are individuals who on that absolutely swore blind that it cured them/made them feel better, and without opening that can of worms either, their anecdotal certainty cannot be taken as evidence, regarldess of the depth of belief. Me swearing blind that I saw a ghost/was abducted/whatever doesn't mean it was real, even if there isn't a shadow of doubt in my mind that it happened, unless there is some objective, disinterested, dispassionate evidence to support it.

Millions of people believe in visions of the virgin Mary, or Ganesh, of the presence of spirit guides, guardian angels and malevolent demons. People believe they have been touched by various holy spirits or are driven to achieve feats thats are "just not possible" without faith. People believe fanatically in spiritualism and aliens, and will claim to have had experiences that they know in themselves to be true. People know they've seen ghosts and poultegeists, or have been guided by invisble hands to safety in times of danger.

The only thing that is consistent with all such claims which are backed by total personal certainty is the complete lack of any - any - other evidence that could support the claim.

While belief is a hugely strong force and it is impossible, for the most part, to shake people of such concrete convictions: "I know what I saw, I was there, etc", I think there has to be a filter applied to what is credible and what is not credible. To claim its credible on the assumption that it might be if things we know nothing about and have no evidence for are "allowed" to be taken into consideration is in itself making the argument entirely fallacious.

Without such a filter, a madmans utter and total conviction that, say, the 3-headed pixies that live in his garden are planning a secret takeover of Tesco because he's heard them talk about it has the same evidential validity as someone elses certainty that they've seen a ghost.

[RyeSloan]

Without such a filter, a madmans utter and total conviction that, say, the 3-headed pixies that live in his garden are planning a secret takeover of Tesco because he's heard them talk about it has the same evidential validity as someone elses certainty that they've seen a ghost.

Wow...when are they planning the attack?

[Twa Cairpets]

Wow...when are they planning the attack?

I cant tell you. If I do the invisible gladiator hamsters I have total belief in said they would peel my eyeballs like an onion.

[RyeSloan]

I cant tell you. If I do the invisible gladiator hamsters I have total belief in said they would peel my eyeballs like an onion.

Ha finally an insight into the brain of Twa Cairpets :greengrin

8608

[just_joe]

Around 10 years ago I was on the 44 bus going through Milton Road on route to Musselburgh . I was with my friend. we were sitting upstairs on the bus. he was in the seat infront of me. I asked him what the time was but he said that he didn't have his phone. I didnt have mine either lol anyway.... there was an old man sitting in the seat just opposite of me. I said to him "excuse me do you have the time please?" he just looked at me and gave me a smile. I then asked him the same question and once again he just gave me a weird smile. At this time my mate was shaking his head looking away from me. while others were given me a weird look as if I was daft. We later got off the bus and my mate said "your an idiot! why did you do that?" I said "what you on about?" he then says" who were you supposed to be talking to" I said "I was asking that guy what the time was but he just ignored me" anyway my mate still swears to this day that there was no one there and that i was talking to myself. I can still picture the old mans face.

another one was where I was staying overnight with a friend when I was a kid. he lived in a middle flat of a stair. The people who lived above him had moved house several weeks before and the house windows and door was all boarded up with steel. We heard kids laughing from the bed room and massive bangs on our roof as if there were kids jumping on and off a bunkbed. was really weird so yeah I believe in ghosts and still enjoy watching paranormal programmes to this day.

[tynesideirish]

My wife is a total non believer and even if she saw a ghost would probably think she imagined it. I've told her this story and she thinks I might think it happened but it didn't. We no longer discuss ghosts etc, it just causes arguments. The problem with threads like this, all you sceptics are just 'It's pish' and then there are the 'I've maybe seen a ghost' who are a bit more open minded about it. Then there are us unfortunates who have had repeat encounters and I for one really wish I hadn't, I'd love to be a sceptic, yes really I would.

When I was about 6 we were rehoused as the council knocked our house down for a new road. I liked our new house it was bigger, and lots of kids lived nearby to play with I was over the moon. That didn't last. Oh and those days, like most working class kids, I was a latch key kid. House layout was weird in that the Living room, kitchen, toilet and little bedroom were upstairs. The main bedroom, the other big bedroom and bathroom were downstairs.

It started with just a feeling. I was a right one for the little 'OO' sized soldiers and would have my armies spread all over the living room floor and I'd be happily playing, then the atmosphere in the room would change and be really menacing and oppressive, for no apparent reason, I'd start to feel like someone was there near me, the hairs on my neck would rise up and I'd get scared and run out the room. This feeling of someone appearing and coming towards me happened at various times in most of the rooms of the house. At this point it was only a feeling, a strong feeling but that's all. This was all in broad daylight.

Then things started to happen. Things would just suddenly be in strange places. Ornaments on the settee, toys in the kitchen, food on the stairs, I'd always replace them to their usual place once spotted. You'd be playing, the 'feeling would come' you'd run out, go to another room, or run out to the street and play out. Later when you hoped 'it' had gone again you'd go back in and try to resume your game, or book and a potato peeler would be sitting in you Action mans tank or such like weirdness. I never saw 'things moving around at this point, they seemed to just be there. This went on for months and when my parents got home I'd be asked what had I been doing with this or that, whatever object I'd failed to notice in it's strange new position.

Then things started moving. I'd be in the living room watching the tele and the cupboards in the kitchen would start banging, the clothes horse would move across the kitchen floor and the bowls would all be noisily stacked inside the washing machine. All the baubles on the Christmas tree started falling off one time and then the tree twisted around until it forced the lights to unplug as the wire was tightly wrapped around the tree. The Bath would often start running. When I'd get down the stairs to turn it off, the bathroom lightbulb would be floating in it. The bath was about 4 foot away from the light. Doors would open and slam.

The scariest things started. I had an alcove in the bedroom. I wanted a 'den' so asked my Dad if he would pull out the big Victorian double wardrobe a bit so I could get behind it. He complied and I put my little stool in there and my pile of Comics. I covered my den walls and the back of the wardrobe in Marvel Comic posters, from the Marvel Fan Club. I loved it. Then one day I was sitting in the den and the dreaded oppressive menacing feeling came. It wasn't just a feeling this time as a big black shape was stood in the entrance to my den. I was petrified and couldn't pluck up the courage to run as I'd have to have ran towards /through it, then it would come towards me and then I had to run towards it. Eyes tight shut and arms out stretched until I hit the wall, then around through the gap and out the door. This thing was happening now, on so many occasions, that I was now too scared to play in my den and told my Dad to push my wardrobe back as I no longer wanted a den. I got wrong on more than one occasion when the wardrobe had been moved back out of the alcove into the room. My Dad said, it was really too heavy for me to move and if I wanted my den just ask and he'd move it for me, he didn't want me hurting myself moving it on my own! If only.

All the things I mentioned up until now, and loads of other things along the same lines, I've not mentioned, the feeling, the objects moving, the doors, furniture moving, taps running, strange running noises, all happened more or less on a day to day basis. The black shape was relatively new.

At night I was even more scared than I was during the day and dreaded night time. I'd be lying there, and the feeling would come and I would curl up with my head under the covers and feel it standing over me. Eventually the feeling would go and I'd relax enough to fall asleep. To my shame, around this time I started wetting the bed. I don't know now if I was just too scared to get up and go or too traumatized to stop myself. My parents were anxious, they listened to my pleading to get a night light, so it wasn't pitch black anymore. I was bed wetting (yes), always tired (yes), Jumpy (yes), Sullen (yes), leaving objects everywhere(!!) , moving furniture and running around at night (!!!) I was now about 10 and I had told my parents on more than one occasion about the ghost. They were obviously of the sceptic persuasion as just dismissed me as a silly lad with sillier notions.

Then at night the dreaded feeling came again, this time it lifted my bed up. Not in a Alladin floaty type way but in the back of my bed being suddenly lifted up and pulled out so this poor petrified wee lad lying in it toppled down onto the head board, rolled up in my blankets. My parents ran in at the noise and went ape at me for messing around, making noise etc. I was sobbing that it wasn't me blah blah to deaf ears. It was only when it happened again and again that my Dad stopped telling me off. Even the sceptics started to realise I was to skinny and young to be moving a big heavy bed in such a manner. No one spoke about the 'ghost' ever.

The 'hauntings' continued. One night I was in bed, light on reading, my parents upstairs. I heard a loud gasp and a massive thud, then my mam shouting. I got out of bed and ran to see. My Dad was sitting in the passage between the living room and kitchen white as a sheet. My mother all concerned. I was told to go back to bed and did. There was lots of loud talking and arguing. I found out a long while later that my Dad had came out to make a cuppa and walked straight into a confrontation my large black man shape, which promptly ran towards him. He was over powered by it and with a horrible feeling helplessness of dread and horror and he collapsed onto the floor.

We were out of that house within a month. I was now 13. It didn't follow us. Thankfully.

Don't believe a word, that's fine obviously, but writing that was hard, though it comes nowhere near close to really describing the countless incidents and the shear horror of those 7 years.

[StevesFamau5]

Im genuinely scared by that last post.
Its weird for me. I have an irrational fear of the dark. Have done for most of my life. It seems to be worse now. I fear someone or something is going to hurt me. As i write this im reminded of all the weird things that make me fear darkness. Random noises, weird lights, shapes moving and odd breezes. I used to suffer heavily from bed wetting as a child and almost untill i was 13. During teenage years i had nightmares and would wake up screaming or crying. And now as an adult i cant sleep unless im a. With my fiancee (or in the past previous partners) or b. Its light outside.
The only thing i can attribute all this too is the seperation attatchment disorder i seem to have that comes from being adopted. I know its not exactly ghost or spirit based but while i convince myself they dont exist.. A part of me fears they do and im honestly wondering is this all connected? Or am i just being a giant wimp? :(

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

[Twa Cairpets]

My wife is a total non believer and even if she saw a ghost would probably think she imagined it. I've told her this story and she thinks I might think it happened but it didn't. We no longer discuss ghosts etc, it just causes arguments. The problem with threads like this, all you sceptics are just 'It's pish' and then there are the 'I've maybe seen a ghost' who are a bit more open minded about it. Then there are us unfortunates who have had repeat encounters and I for one really wish I hadn't, I'd love to be a sceptic, yes really I would.

When I was about 6 we were rehoused as the council knocked our house down for a new road. I liked our new house it was bigger, and lots of kids lived nearby to play with I was over the moon. That didn't last. Oh and those days, like most working class kids, I was a latch key kid. House layout was weird in that the Living room, kitchen, toilet and little bedroom were upstairs. The main bedroom, the other big bedroom and bathroom were downstairs.

It started with just a feeling. I was a right one for the little 'OO' sized soldiers and would have my armies spread all over the living room floor and I'd be happily playing, then the atmosphere in the room would change and be really menacing and oppressive, for no apparent reason, I'd start to feel like someone was there near me, the hairs on my neck would rise up and I'd get scared and run out the room. This feeling of someone appearing and coming towards me happened at various times in most of the rooms of the house. At this point it was only a feeling, a strong feeling but that's all. This was all in broad daylight.

Then things started to happen. Things would just suddenly be in strange places. Ornaments on the settee, toys in the kitchen, food on the stairs, I'd always replace them to their usual place once spotted. You'd be playing, the 'feeling would come' you'd run out, go to another room, or run out to the street and play out. Later when you hoped 'it' had gone again you'd go back in and try to resume your game, or book and a potato peeler would be sitting in you Action mans tank or such like weirdness. I never saw 'things moving around at this point, they seemed to just be there. This went on for months and when my parents got home I'd be asked what had I been doing with this or that, whatever object I'd failed to notice in it's strange new position.

Then things started moving. I'd be in the living room watching the tele and the cupboards in the kitchen would start banging, the clothes horse would move across the kitchen floor and the bowls would all be noisily stacked inside the washing machine. All the baubles on the Christmas tree started falling off one time and then the tree twisted around until it forced the lights to unplug as the wire was tightly wrapped around the tree. The Bath would often start running. When I'd get down the stairs to turn it off, the bathroom lightbulb would be floating in it. The bath was about 4 foot away from the light. Doors would open and slam.

The scariest things started. I had an alcove in the bedroom. I wanted a 'den' so asked my Dad if he would pull out the big Victorian double wardrobe a bit so I could get behind it. He complied and I put my little stool in there and my pile of Comics. I covered my den walls and the back of the wardrobe in Marvel Comic posters, from the Marvel Fan Club. I loved it. Then one day I was sitting in the den and the dreaded oppressive menacing feeling came. It wasn't just a feeling this time as a big black shape was stood in the entrance to my den. I was petrified and couldn't pluck up the courage to run as I'd have to have ran towards /through it, then it would come towards me and then I had to run towards it. Eyes tight shut and arms out stretched until I hit the wall, then around through the gap and out the door. This thing was happening now, on so many occasions, that I was now too scared to play in my den and told my Dad to push my wardrobe back as I no longer wanted a den. I got wrong on more than one occasion when the wardrobe had been moved back out of the alcove into the room. My Dad said, it was really too heavy for me to move and if I wanted my den just ask and he'd move it for me, he didn't want me hurting myself moving it on my own! If only.

All the things I mentioned up until now, and loads of other things along the same lines, I've not mentioned, the feeling, the objects moving, the doors, furniture moving, taps running, strange running noises, all happened more or less on a day to day basis. The black shape was relatively new.

At night I was even more scared than I was during the day and dreaded night time. I'd be lying there, and the feeling would come and I would curl up with my head under the covers and feel it standing over me. Eventually the feeling would go and I'd relax enough to fall asleep. To my shame, around this time I started wetting the bed. I don't know now if I was just too scared to get up and go or too traumatized to stop myself. My parents were anxious, they listened to my pleading to get a night light, so it wasn't pitch black anymore. I was bed wetting (yes), always tired (yes), Jumpy (yes), Sullen (yes), leaving objects everywhere(!!) , moving furniture and running around at night (!!!) I was now about 10 and I had told my parents on more than one occasion about the ghost. They were obviously of the sceptic persuasion as just dismissed me as a silly lad with sillier notions.

Then at night the dreaded feeling came again, this time it lifted my bed up. Not in a Alladin floaty type way but in the back of my bed being suddenly lifted up and pulled out so this poor petrified wee lad lying in it toppled down onto the head board, rolled up in my blankets. My parents ran in at the noise and went ape at me for messing around, making noise etc. I was sobbing that it wasn't me blah blah to deaf ears. It was only when it happened again and again that my Dad stopped telling me off. Even the sceptics started to realise I was to skinny and young to be moving a big heavy bed in such a manner. No one spoke about the 'ghost' ever.

The 'hauntings' continued. One night I was in bed, light on reading, my parents upstairs. I heard a loud gasp and a massive thud, then my mam shouting. I got out of bed and ran to see. My Dad was sitting in the passage between the living room and kitchen white as a sheet. My mother all concerned. I was told to go back to bed and did. There was lots of loud talking and arguing. I found out a long while later that my Dad had came out to make a cuppa and walked straight into a confrontation my large black man shape, which promptly ran towards him. He was over powered by it and with a horrible feeling helplessness of dread and horror and he collapsed onto the floor.

We were out of that house within a month. I was now 13. It didn't follow us. Thankfully.

Don't believe a word, that's fine obviously, but writing that was hard, though it comes nowhere near close to really describing the countless incidents and the shear horror of those 7 years.


Partially as resident uber skeptic, but partially also as a critic of creative writing, I frankly dont believe a word of it.

Its astonishing isnt it how almost all the experiences seem to happen to young children. Weird how its young children that have the best imaginations, eh? Odd ocincidence that.

[tynesideirish]

Partially as resident uber skeptic, but partially also as a critic of creative writing, I frankly dont believe a word of it.

Its astonishing isnt it how almost all the experiences seem to happen to young children. Weird how its young children that have the best imaginations, eh? Odd ocincidence that.

I got it off my chest for my sake, not yours. You don't believe in any of it that's fine, though I can't really see why you bother reading or replying to posts like this. I don't believe in Allah, Buddah or the God of the Bible, that's why I don't waste my time visiting religious threads. It's not very creative for supposedly creative writing either is it? Even I have better things to do than sit making **** up on the board.

Was it a ghost, spirit, demon or something from one of those other dimensions you hear about? Well I don't know, I cannot explain it, but it wasn't a waking dream, Sleep paralysis or made up. A figment of my imagination moving furniture, that is worrying.

[steakbake]

Partially as resident uber skeptic, but partially also as a critic of creative writing, I frankly dont believe a word of it.

...and partially as the hibs.net resident contrarian...

[Twa Cairpets]

...and partially as the hibs.net resident contrarian...

Ooohhh I rather like that.


I got it off my chest for my sake, not yours. You don't believe in any of it that's fine, though I can't really see why you bother reading or replying to posts like this. I don't believe in Allah, Buddah or the God of the Bible, that's why I don't waste my time visiting religious threads. It's not very creative for supposedly creative writing either is it? Even I have better things to do than sit making **** up on the board.

Was it a ghost, spirit, demon or something from one of those other dimensions you hear about? Well I don't know, I cannot explain it, but it wasn't a waking dream, Sleep paralysis or made up. A figment of my imagination moving furniture, that is worrying.

I have no reason to doubt that you believe what you do fervently.

I do have reason to doubt that the supernatural associations you assign to the happenings are correct. Could you have moved the items subconsciously and forgotten that that had happened? Could the heavier objects have been moved by someone else? Could your apparent (and rightly justified, i may say) love of marvel comics inspired your imagination to the extent that they became real? Could your Dads "experience" have happened for some other reason - a real intruder, a bad dream resulting from the bad dreams his son had been having?
I don't know, and I don't think it worth exploring, as the only evidence is your belief, which is strong but hardly impartial.

The alternative to the non-supernatural flies somewhat in the face of Occams Razor - for your view to be correct everything that is know about space/time/physics/chemistry/biology etc must be fundamentally changed.

Maybe this is the case - I don't know, but I'm very, very skeptical.

[steakbake]

Ooohhh I rather like that.

Contrarians are vital! Anyhow, you heard it here first..

[The_Exile]

My wife is a total non believer and even........................................

What an incredible story, thanks for sharing, I have a pal who has had similar experiences such as yours, think she was around the same age too, fascinating stuff. Must be utterly terrifying when something takes an actual "physical" form such as this.

Edit: I'm still a sceptic though :greengrin

[Peevemor]

Nothing ghostly, but I've had a couple of experiences that are difficult to explain. I remember each one as though they happened yesterday.

The first happened when I was about 6 years old. I was watching Magpie on the tv one Tuesday afternoon (no Blue Peter nonsense in my house!) when all of a sudden I felt what I can only describe as a huge weight of sadness and I simply knew that my grandmother (my Dad's mum) had died. My mum saw that I was upset and asked me what was wrong. I started off by saying that there was something wrong with granny and, after further prompting, I told her everything. About an hour and a half later our neighbour came to the door to say there was a call for us (we didn't have a phone at the time) - it was my grandad calling from the infirmary confirming the news. She died, aged 59, of a massive heart attack, even though everyone thought she was in good health.

The reason my mother was so attentive to what I was saying was because almost exactly the same thing had happened 10 or so years previously with my big brother (who was about 3 at the time and didn't really understand death) and our other grandmother.

There were witnesses to both events and, as I say, I remember "mine" vividly. I've no idea how what happened can be explained (maybe it's down to our gypsy blood :greengrin), but both our parents have since died suddenly and neither of us felt the slightest twinge.

The second incident, a freaky déjà-vu type thing happened a couple of years later the first time I went to Rothesay. I went on a day trip with my parents and my sister to see my brother who was halfway through a 2 week BB camp. We got the train to Wemyss Bay then the ferry across to Bute. As I got off the ferry I had the feeling that I knew the town. Not ghost story, hundreds of years old stuff, but modern crappy things - where the castle was, where the amusement arcades were, a specific café in a certain street, the windy road that goes up the hill (the serpentine). This lasted an hour or two and then I was back to normal. My folks were incredulous and my brother and sister just thought I was a chancer. Okay it's a lot less glamourous than dead/dying grandparents stuff, but it's pretty weird all the same.

[HibeeEmma]

I'm sceptical about ghosts, demons, dementors etc but I do have a personal experience which makes me believe in some sort of supernatural. When I was about 15 I saw a medium with 7 of my friends. The woman said things about relatives/family friends who were "with her" and the information she gave she couldn't have made up or expanded on from previous knowledge.

If I hadn't been to her, and heard other stories, I wouldn't have believed it but I was definetly reassured there are people who can see/understand people who have passed over.

[Hermit Crab]

I have just read every post in this thread. Absolutely brilliant to read. Both sides of the argument. I'm a believer in ghosts and the paranormal. Very glad this thread was pointed out to me. Top marks folks.