192 replies to this topic

[New Horizon]

Which pretty much suggests to me some reflection where you don't know the source. This is pretty common. Just try to figure out where exactly some light is coming from in some situations. It's VERY hard to do just by looking. My usual approach is to move the hand in the light and then move it so that I can find the source.

There were no reflections, no lights. I guess it's a case of having to be there but I also don't think a reflection can come and go at its own choosing. Basically, it shrank like a followspot as soon as she reached for the light switch. There were no mirrors, no uncovered windows, no lightsources that could cause a bluish haze, the fact that it was a haze and not a light in itself is somewhat bizarre.

At any rate. I'm not looking to prove or disprove it one way or another. It happened, to both of us and we both saw it before either of us were aware that we were both seeing it. Same thing with my parents and the figure at the foot of the bed. My father saw it before my mom ever said a word, she was too afraid to speak. She just shook him awake and he looked down and saw the exact same thing. I've seen enough weird things to know that we don't know half of the shit we think we know about the reality we live in. We can be as logical and scientific as we please but our knowledge only goes so far as to support our limited intelligence as human beings.

[New Horizon]

Scientific study has shown that people tend to stretch and embellish stories, even in their own minds. Tests asking people where they were during the moon landing and when the planes hit the world trade centre straight after the event, and then a few months to years after the event, shows that people not only add details to their memories but often change them to something far more exciting. I the same way some water reflected on a wall can, in twenty five years or so, become a phantom orb of doom. I'm not calling New Horizon a liar, this happens to everyone.

When I was about five I saw a shape coming in through one wall of my bedroom and out another. Over the years I told this story many times and had soon convinced myself that I had seen a ghost. That was until I was sorting through some books from my childhood and found a picture of a ghost that looked exactly like the one I thought I had seen. I had probably seen that picture when I was small and dreamed the rest, or subconciously added the ghostly image my memory over time.

Moral of the story: Don't trust your brain.

Well, that's definately one way of sweeping unexplained things under the rug.

Ahh well, if something wasn't interesting or exciting...I'm not going to waste my time embellishing it.

[oDDity]

You know oDD, one thing you learn from life is that trying to convince a Christian (for example) that there is no God is absolutely pointless because he won't listen. Simple. Would you believe me if i told you i knew your mom? no. Same with that. It only gives people the shits. The best way to go about it is to just let them believe it because it makes them happier and they also feel more secure knowing what that damned thing was rather then being told "oh it was just the psychotic killer next door". ie: stop being a tart.

What kind of fucking pathetic aruement is that. Whether a god exists or wheter you know my mother can't be compared in any way. You and my mother both exist for certain, so whether you've ever met is purely arbitrary. The other debate is about whether the deity exists at all, not wheter you've met it. Anyone who believes in a god has no good reason to do so, and therefore is wrong to let it influence their life in any way, and no, I will not let them get on with it and leave them alone to spread their filthy lies and fantasies to children.

I dunno if ghosts or whatever exist or not, but there is some pretty freaky shit that happens.

No there isn't. Nothing happens that doesn't have a reasonable explaination, it's just that some people jump straight to the most ridiculous explainaton possible in order to make their pathetic, boring lives more interesting and make themselves feel special or important.

Also oDD, just for the record, there are a few hypnosis tests they did and people were able to recall their "life before" or whatever. They even knew the location of their grave in some cases Now i dont know about you, but its not very possible that an 11 yr old kid can name a grave that is halfway across the world and never been there. Just keep an open mind oDD. Though with you that's unlikely. And pointless.....

Bollocks. That proves nothing. Those people simply researched those places beforehand, made up the whole story and then pretended to recall it. Don't be so naive and gullible.
It's also possible to hypnotise people into believing that they were sexually abused as children, even though they weren't. The brain can detect no difference between imagined things and reality. It's very easy to trick and persuade it, though some people's tiny brains are obviosuly more easy to trick and persuade than others...

[oDDity]

... and if something noteworthy happens soon after a connection is constructed. How often did something "strange" happen where nothing happened to stick it into your mind permanently?

Exactly.
All these people wo came out after 9/11 and said they had a dream about the planes crahsing to the the buildings the night before it happened.
WHat they fail to realise is this:
There are 7 billion people on Earth, each having about 3 dreams per night. THat's 20 thousand million deams that occur on the planet in any given 24 hours, so of course someone, in fact thosands of those dreams will have been about plane crahes on 9/10, thousands of those 20 billion dreams are about plane crashes every single night, it's just that people only think it strange when a plane crash happens in real life the next day.
THe only unusual thing would be if no one had a dream about a plane crash the night before a real plane crash happens.

[sparhawk]

I guess any of the tests that have actually supported the claims would not be 'proper' by your definition? The typical skeptical argument goes like this:

"There is no evidence to support X."
"What about the experiment Y, that did suggest evidence?"
"Experiment Y is a faulty experiment."
"How do you know?"
"Because it showed proof of X, and everyone knows X is impossible."

Spot the logical fallacy.

Apparently you don't know about the tests from James Randi. All it requires, is that a single instance of a claimed power is demonstrated under scientific sound circumstances. The actual circumstances to proof that the power has been demonstrated are negotiated BEFORE the demonstration begins and has to be agreed upon by both parties. None of your "logical fallacities".

[sparhawk]

Also oDD, just for the record, there are a few hypnosis tests they did and people were able to recall their "life before" or whatever.

And? None of these sessions can proove anything verifiable about this "former life". At least not under conditions that would indicate a real occurence of such happenings.

[New Horizon]

Essentially, there is just going to be a lot of gray areas because in a lot of cases it can't be proven or disproven.

Next topic........UFO's. Do they really exist? Find out next on...."Deconstructing your Reality".

[Macsen]

Essentially, there is just going to be a lot of gray areas because in a lot of cases it can't be proven or disproven.

Well, I am the Loch Ness Monster. No one can disprove this. I can take on many forms.

[Springheel]

Apparently you don't know about the tests from James Randi.

Yes, I am quite familiar with "The Amazing" James Randi. While he does some good work exposing frauds, he is not a scientist. He is a stage magician and professional skeptic. He also designs the tests and sets the condition for "winning" the million dollars (many people have asked him for proof that the million dollars actually exists, but that proof hasn't been forthcoming yet). If people don't want to agree to the conditions of his test, then they 'agree' to not participate, at which point Randi can point to yet another failed attempt.

I could offer a million dollars as well to the first TDM team-member to prove they are a real person, yet set the 'victory' conditions so that they could never realistically be met. Offering a million dollar reward is great for press, and for Randi's personal publicity, but it doesn't make good science.

Anyone who has visited Randi's website is familiar with his, shall we say, strong personal bias towards materialism. Given this bias, his lack of scientific credentials, and his personal control over the conditions of the test, it is hardly surprising that serious researchers are not lining up to try and claim it.

[Vadrosaul]

I love it how people argue over something that is immaterial. So what if ghosts exist or not? Does that change your life at all. Will you do anything differently. Even if ghosts do exist, what they mean to our living world is pittance, beyond seeing forms and fogs.

[Springheel]

Perhaps you'll give me some examples of what I beleive in through faith alone, and I'll be glad to put you straight.

Try not to misquote me. What I said was, "virtually everything we believe to be true is based on some measure of faith and trust." (emphasis added) That is not the same as saying "faith alone".

I assume, for example, that you believe that the United States is currently fighting in Iraq. What tangible proof can you offer to me that this is really going on, that does not require me to trust either:

1) Mass Media
2) The personal account of someone I don't know
3) The opinion of the majority?

Without direct, personal experience, most of what we believe requires us to have faith in one of the above. Yet it is fairly plain that all three are fallible and can be both intentionally, as well as unintentionally, misleading. When you choose to believe something you hear from a source that you know can lie, you are exercising trust.

[sparhawk]

Essentially, there is just going to be a lot of gray areas because in a lot of cases it can't be proven or disproven.

I know that a similar argument is sued by creationists to push their agenda into classrooms. That doesn't make better though. The fact that something can not be disproven, that mean that we should believe everything. Even more so, a fact that can not be disproven in principal is highly suspicious on it's own.

If I tell you that a pink invisible unicorn is living in my garden, would you believe me? The problem is I can not show it to you because only I can see it.

A god is logical problem, which is a principal matter. Even if you can not proove a particular god, the priniciple of a deity in itself is already an unprooveable act, and believing in a god doesn't even help you, because a god answers exactly zero questions.
Saying "It's that way because god made it so." is the same as saying "I don't know." only shorter and more honest.

[oDDity]

Try not to misquote me. What I said was, "virtually everything we believe to be true is based on some measure of faith and trust." (emphasis added) That is not the same as saying "faith alone".

I assume, for example, that you believe that the United States is currently fighting in Iraq. What tangible proof can you offer to me that this is really going on, that does not require me to trust either:

1) Mass Media
2) The personal account of someone I don't know
3) The opinion of the majority?

Without direct, personal experience, most of what we believe requires us to have faith in one of the above. Yet it is fairly plain that all three are fallible and can be both intentionally, as well as unintentionally, misleading. When you choose to believe something you hear from a source that you know can lie, you are exercising trust.

The belief in a god, ghosts etc is based on faith alone though. That's the point.

I have a personal account form someone I do know - my sisters husband. He was in Iraq with the Bristish territorial army and saw the Americans there fighting.
I have that, plus independant accounts from others I don't know, and accounts from various media organisations.
THe only possiblity apart from it being true, is that the entire world's media and some of my relatives are involved in a planned conspiracy against me in order to trick me into believing there's a war in Iraq involving Americans.
That's got nothing to do with faith, it's simply weighing up which of the two possibilites is more likely, and the the US army fighting in Iraq is by far the most likely of the two options.

That holds true for almost anything you come up with as an exapme of something I have to have blind faith in.
It's either a matter of believing it, or believing that the world or some part of it is involved in a conspiracy against me.
The decision as to which is true is more to do with common sense than faith.

[_Atti_]

well its pretty cool in auswitz as far as i know..and if the camera was near his mouth it can be because of his breath too i guess..it is highly possible that it wasnt noticable while on the little screen of the camera..

[sparhawk]

Yes, I am quite familiar with "The Amazing" James Randi. While he does some good work exposing frauds, he is not a scientist. He is a stage magician and professional skeptic.

Exactly. And as a stage magician he knows the tricks of the trade and how to debuk them. SOmething that scientsts are not very familiar with.

He also designs the tests and sets the condition for "winning" the million dollars (many people have asked him for proof that the million dollars actually exists, but that proof hasn't been forthcoming yet). If people don't want to agree to the conditions of his test, then they 'agree' to not participate, at which point Randi can point to yet another failed attempt.

So what you are not content with, is that the potential psychic should expalin exactly what it is that he can achieve, under what conditions he can achieve that, and how it can be verified THAt he achieved that. I see. I guess if you were to make this test, you would have lost the million long ago, because the first guy who comes along and says "I can show you X, but you are not allowed to control it, because it doesn't work otherwise." would have gotten the million from you.

I could offer a million dollars as well to the first TDM team-member to prove they are a real person, yet set the 'victory' conditions so that they could never realistically be met. Offering a million dollar reward is great for press, and for Randi's personal publicity, but it doesn't make good science.

Well, if you set the terms unrealistically then of coure they can not be met. But if this were the case, then none of the participants would have agreed to the contract. As a matter of fact, there were a LOT who seemed to agree to their mutual conditions, which suggests, that under this agreement, they claim to be able to perform their particular feat, but the million is still there up to grabs.

Anyone who has visited Randi's website is familiar with his, shall we say, strong personal bias towards materialism. Given this bias, his lack of scientific credentials, and his personal control over the conditions of the test, it is hardly surprising that serious researchers are not lining up to try and claim it.

That's where you are wrong. It's not a lack of people who try it, quite on the contrary, it's more a lack of proofing their feats.

There is also a public site registering prophecies. You can send you your personal prophecy and register it there and then everybody can see if you were right or wrong. There is not much room for manipulation because it is publicy available, unless you claim refuge with a conspiracy theory.

[sparhawk]

Try not to misquote me. What I said was, "virtually everything we believe to be true is based on some measure of faith and trust." (emphasis added) That is not the same as saying "faith alone".

That's another thing you are wrong with, and is also a favoured argumetn from creationists. The basis of math is ther to learn for you. You can go back to the arguments as from ancient greek and follow all their logic arguments until today. Everything is based on the same prinicipals and can be deducted and proofen. The same is for physics. Since most of modern science is also based on physics and math, you can also deduct many other areas as well. Of course it will be hard to try out quantum physics experiments on your own, because the more advanved thign syou want to test for yourself the more expensive equipment you will need. But if you think that such things as quantum physics is made up by a mutual agreement of scientsits, then there is still the fact of working laser discs running in your computer, space travel, GPS which relies on effects from the relativity theory and all the other stuff that you use in your daily live. Medicine, plastics, and so on. You would have a hard time taking all this things on "faith alone" and create some new stuff. You don't really want to tell me that scientists took light physics just "on faith" and happened to be able to build a reliable laser disc drive that is no reading your favourite porn DVD for your pleasure? It would be a REALLY big coincidence if they got this part right and made a working device out of it.

Without direct, personal experience, most of what we believe requires us to have faith in one of the above.

At least in science you can look for yourself. You may not be able to proof everything, and of course science is an on-going process, but you can easily learn the basics and check them for yourself. Actually our physics teacher always made our lessons this way. He didn't want us to take this "on faith" of his word alone which makes the lessons much more interesting.

[Springheel]

The belief in a god, ghosts etc is based on faith alone though. That's the point.

I don't know how we got into discussing god--that wasn't really part of what I was saying. A belief in ghosts might be based on faith alone, or it might be based on careful study of the research and a decision that there is sufficient evidence to suggest that something is going on. What constitutes "sufficient evidence" is going to vary quite widely from person to person, based on their sense of what is "more likely" (see below). However, that's not the same thing as saying it's based purely on faith.

That's got nothing to do with faith, it's simply weighing up which of the two possibilites is more likely, and the the US army fighting in Iraq is by far the most likely of the two options.

That's still not the same as factual proof. You have faith in the sources you are getting that information from. You trust that they are telling you the truth. You believe (even though you can't prove it) that worldwide conspiracies are less likely than factual wars. But that's all belief, not necessarily fact.

There are plenty of other examples where we have fewer facts to deal with. I believe that the US did land on the moon, but I admit that it would be possible for them to have hoaxed it without me being able to tell the difference. So my belief is based on faith, not hard evidence. I currently suspect that global warming is a real trend, but I know that there are also studies that say it isn't, so I'm choosing to trust certain studies over others.

We all do this every day, choosing to trust some facts and not to trust other ones. We simply don't have the time or resources to check and double-check every piece of information before trusting that it is true.

[heXen]

I agree with oDDity 100% ghosts, UFO, paranormalities are complete crap. What's wrong with you? Ancient Indian civilizations thought planets were gods, Greeks believed in griffons and medusas and gods on the Olympus. Way, at a certain times people believed in unicorns, but some smart traders captured narhvals and sold their horns as unicorn horns. People buy them and say - oh! Unicorns really exist! To some point at the time of Columbus people were convinced that the Sun revolved around the Earth. Rubbish it is, ghosts and other, just nice tales - I wouldn't mind griffs flying around, but they are not there. Ghost is an explanation for something we can't get, as was a god an explanation for a planet. Soon we will know what it is, and people after us will joke thinking that we belived in ghosts!

[sparhawk]

I agree with oDDity 100% ghosts, UFO, paranormalities are complete crap. What's wrong with you? Ancient Indian civilizations thought planets were gods, Greeks believed in griffons and medusas and gods on the Olympus. Way, at a certain times people believed in unicorns, but some smart traders captured narhvals and sold their horns as unicorn horns.

Unfortunately the only ting that is proofen by what people believe in is that people believe in this. It doesn't matter what people believe in, becasue this neither prooves, nor disprooves it.

[New Horizon]

I agree with oDDity 100% ghosts, UFO, paranormalities are complete crap.

So you're saying, that amongst the BILLIONS of stars beyond our galaxy, it's impossible that an intelligent race of beings have harnessed the ability to travel vast distances to other worlds...or that they could even exist? I think that idea in itself is impossible, for the very reason that our ancestors thought the stars were Gods...and I think that reasoning can easily be used to argue that these things and even paranormal entities could exist. It doesn't really affect our own existence if we believe in other life forms or not but I think it's far more likely that intelligent life exists on other worlds than it is there are spiritual residue left to manifest itself when humans die.

I'm not going to try and convince anyone that spirits or whatever you want to call them exist but I don't think it's fair to say something someone has experienced is complete crap. I'm sure a lot of the technology we take for granted today, would freak the shit out of people from the past. I'm sure there is a logical explanation for a lot of the things we see but it doesn't necessarily have to disprove it. Keep your minds open.

[oDDity]

I don't know how we got into discussing god--that wasn't really part of what I was saying.

Because belief in god is the prime example of blind faith. A lot of people actually alter their lives based on religious teachings.

A belief in ghosts might be based on faith alone, or it might be based on careful study of the research and a decision that there is sufficient evidence to suggest that something is going on. What constitutes "sufficient evidence" is going to vary quite widely from person to person, based on their sense of what is "more likely" (see below). However, that's not the same thing as saying it's based purely on faith.

There is no current evidence for ghosts that any scientific test would accept. Evidence can't be an arbitrary requirement which changes from individual to individual, or from ghostly anecdote to ghostly anecdote, it has to be the result of a series of indenpendantly verified tests carried out under controlled conditions which preclude any chance of cheating or chance events.
I believe science works and is correct, because I see and use the results of scientific experiments every day. It's methods are tried and tested.

That's still not the same as factual proof. You have faith in the sources you are getting that information from.

You're confusing faith, trust and belief. Yes I trust in the BBC and members of my family not to knowingly lie to be about such matters, becasue I have no reason to believe they'd lie, can't thnk of anything they'd have to gain from lying about it, and have no examples of them lying abiout such matters in the past.
I'm drawing the conclusion that I should believe them, not based on blind faith, but based on my knowlegde and experience.

There are plenty of other examples where we have fewer facts to deal with. I believe that the US did land on the moon, but I admit that it would be possible for them to have hoaxed it without me being able to tell the difference. So my belief is based on faith, not hard evidence. I currently suspect that global warming is a real trend, but I know that there are also studies that say it isn't, so I'm choosing to trust certain studies over others.

These are examples of matters which may or may not be true. I haven't made up my mind either way on them, because I don't have sufficent reason to do so. The moon landing could have been faked. Global warming may or may not be casued by human activity.

We all do this every day, choosing to trust some facts and not to trust other ones. We simply don't have the time or resources to check and double-check every piece of information before trusting that it is true.

It's not black and white like that. You don't have to either beleive something or not believe it. You can choose to be undecided on most matters, or you can choose to accept it or reject it for now with reservations, hoping to get furthur evidence in the future.

[OrbWeaver]

I'm not going to try and convince anyone that spirits or whatever you want to call them exist but I don't think it's fair to say something someone has experienced is complete crap.

Nobody is saying the experiences are crap, they are saying the conclusions drawn from the experiences are crap.

The witnessing of ghosts that you have described are (amongst other things) consistent with stimulation of the temporal lobe, such as by an electromagnetic source or internally through epilepsy. They can also be explained by self-suggestion or the intake of certain substances, intentionally or otherwise. Many experiments have been performed to successfully induce such experiences in test subjects.

Assuming that any subjective experience is evidence of something strange or supernatural when there is a plethora of tested and well-understood phenomena that would produce that exact same experience is simply irrational.

[oDDity]

So you're saying, that amongst the BILLIONS of stars beyond our galaxy, it's impossible that an intelligent race of beings have harnessed the ability to travel vast distances to other worlds...or that they could even exist? I think that idea in itself is impossible, for the very reason that our ancestors thought the stars were Gods...and I think that reasoning can easily be used to argue that these things and even paranormal entities could exist. It doesn't really affect our own existence if we believe in other life forms or not but I think it's far more likely that intelligent life exists on other worlds than it is there are spiritual residue left to manifest itself when humans die.

I didn't mention aliens, and I don't group them in with this other nonsense. However, whether they exist or not somewhere in the universe, and whether they abduct people from ther beds to do experiments on them are different matters.
It's no coincedence that the huge jump in UFO sitings happened last century at exactly the same time the US and Soviet govenments had started secret military bases to develop new weaponry, aircraft and spacecraft

I'm not going to try and convince anyone that spirits or whatever you want to call them exist but I don't think it's fair to say something someone has experienced is complete crap.

Yes, it is. Unless that person has something other than their little anecdote about it, then it is to be considered complete crap.
There's a massive difference between what such a person thought they experienced, and what they actually experienced. The problem being that their feeble anecdote always consists entirely of the former.
I have to say, I didn't realise we had so many new-age crackpots on the team. At least sparhawk is a fellow arch-skeptic.

[Dram]

Why are some people trying so hard to prove their inches?

FFS, life has been on this planet for at least 3.3billion years. Oldest fossil record is 3.3billion years and is of cyanobacteria, which are around today, in still the same form. The point is, the universe is just a taaaaaaaad bit older then that, so never say that life on another planet is impossible, cos thats just crap. Im not saying it is or isnt, im saying you cant exclude the possibility.

Also, just for the fuck of it, google Ball Lightning. It is not a paranormal bullshit, it has been proven to exist. Its a ball of floating electric something like that shit. Just google it before you try to prove more inches.

After you do, then tell me that hundreds of scientists just "thought it up"

[heXen]

I wasn't talking about aliens, I was talking about UFO. Or I wasn't talking about ball lightning. It is proven. Are ghosts proven?

Edited by heXen, 25 October 2005 - 04:22 PM.