Believers who have perceived ghosts...?

Question

...do you think the "bump in the night" variety of ghosts reported by so many on here cheapen your own experience?

Many people seem to be almost eager to declare they have a ghost, despite a lack of any compelling evidence to support their claim. Believers, do you think such people give the ghost phenomenon a bad name?

Answer 1

Yeah, they are douchebags. But real Ghosts exist.

Answer 2

Most people on YA don't even know this section exists. So they usually go to Myths or R&S...where they rarely get the answers they need.Lots of people who've had unexplainable (to them) things happen to them....come to the conclusion that it's paranormal. For example (& this is NOT paranormal). The other night we heard a loud BOOM. We went running out of the house to see if there had been a car crash  or plane crash...or a gun shot (which it didn't sound like). We discussed all the possibilities. If someone had had a tire blowout...they would be stuck on the street. We discussed all the things that made that sound. (No...UFO wasn't mentioned.) lol It sounded like the power lines blew..but all the electricity was still on. It was extremely loud. In the past few days we listened for reports of what might have happened. Just now....we just discovered that a tire on an antique truck in our garage had blown out.SOLVED. "Paranormal" NEVER came into our minds.

  When things happened to me...there was no other possible explanation other than spiritual (parnormal).I still haven't found any other explanation for most of it.(some of it..but not ALL of it.) I HAVE thought of the possibility that maybe someone in prison...or seclusion..might know how to astral travel and be able to make some of these things happen...but not all of them. Of course I've thought ..and researched...all the possible "mental" possibilities. I haven't found anything there either that explains it. I don't say that what happened to me came from a good..or bad..source. I don't know for sure. It seemed really good at first...except it turned out bad. I didn't have any personal guidance...only what I read and heard on tapes and at services etc. The same things seemed to be happening to other people (in churches).So now I don't go to any church any more...because that turned out so badly.

I think it's a good thing that these people come here with their "bump in the night" stories so they can find reasonable answers about what happened to them. When they're reassured it was from natural causes....their fear goes away..as with Wush when he found out about sleep paralysis.   I wish that I had had someone at the first to tell me to keep these experiences to myself. (There wasn't a YA then to go to  in secret.)(Come to think of it..someone DID tell me that...but I cared about people & was sure they'd want to know about these "wonderful"spiritual things that were happening. It would give them "hope". I was wrong.)

Answer 3

I think that there may be evil activity in my house.

Answer 4

When you speak of "ghost phenomena", you are speaking essentially of "I don't know what this was so therefore it must be spirits/demons/dead people".  The fact is, despite all the claims, there is yet to be that "compelling evidence" to back supernatural explanations. Does that mean there is no such thing as supernatural? No, though the lack of that evidence supports the null theory. As it is, most people are either unaware or reject other, more mundane reasons that might explain their experiences, from water pipes suffering water hammer to ultra low frequency sound waves.   But it is impossible to explain all phenomena. Sometimes the circumstances that created the original incident are not duplicatable simply because we don't know all the factors.  So the "bump in the night" claimants don't do any more damage to paranormal claims than the more spectacular episodes do. Each side is going to hold their ground, barring the occasional 'defector". At least or until some sort of proof positive, and/or a testable and falsifiable theory to explain supernatural phenomena in the light of the known laws of physics is presented.

Answer 5

Nope. The experiences I've had can't be cheapened. If I can't find the answers THIS side of Heaven, then I'll be patient and get them IN Heaven!

Answer 6

I'm not so sure I fit the qualifications for responding, since I am more of a skeptic than a believer, yet I like to think I have an open mind about it.

I'm not so sure that it gives belief in ghosts a "bad name"; since the belief is universal, transcending all cultures, but it does muddy the waters and makes it difficult for any disciplined and objective scientific investigation and research to take place.

"Ghosts", or the beleif in ghosts, are relics of our primitive past; still embedded in that primitive area of our brains, called by Freud the "Id".  It's a psychological phenomenon called "group psychosis" -- you essentially "bring your ghosts with you" -- and then, placed in an environment where one is conditioned to perceive as "haunted", that is, a less ordered, rmore primitive envrionment that the primitive parts of our brains still recognize as unfamiliar, "unnatural" and thus threatening.

In a "haunted house" we return to a more primitive state of mind, recreating the vast unknown of our prehistoric world where unknown threats lurk everywhere, an everyhting is strange and unnatural.  

As with "extraterrestrials" and "UFOs"  the mere relating of a "sighting", tends to be self-justifying -- people who WANT to believe WILL uncritically believe on the flimsiest  of "evidence", and then imagination and "suggestion" takes over:  any event or "happening" -- wind, noise, temperature changes or optical illusion -- takes on the qualities we expect, anticipate, and WANT to happen.

The so-called "Ghost Hunting" TV shows and events rarely find anything specific, they tend to talk themselves into a psychological state -- any "encounters" are usually of the "did you [hear/see] that?" variety, but all WE see are a group of people scaring themselves.

Answer 7

Your definitly right I mean I've had expiriences and I have proof that something is in my house but people definitly are coming up with bizare stories that kinda ruin the paranormal for me. I try to figure people's stories like are they fact or fiction or just trying to get some attention. But I feel that if you have had a paranormal expirence nothing can change what you saw heard or felt so I like sharing my expirence but I won't lie to impress people.

Answer 8

Look, everyone has their own views & feelings & experiences.

Who is to say that they are not having experiences?  

Honestly, I don't have too much time to worry about everyone else as I have my own to deal with.

Do I feel cheapened?  Why should I?  That is their lives not mine.

Answer 9

sometimes Mr.Peter D there are things that are only explainable only to those who are experience them i wish everyone could see what i saw felt what i felt so they could get a picture that we are not just empty shells one day when your time is going to come you'll say oh so it's true but only then not now by the way i like your answers they keep this section down to earth you and Dinnie are my favorites two opposites

Answer 10

No, not really a bad name because it is up to us to determine what is actual paranormal activity and what is caused naturally.  If it is possible to rule out any other explaination and you cannot duplicate the activity reasonably, then you are left with something that is paranormal.

I think many people are scared of something that they know very little about so they are willing to put it down to paranormal activity because they not willing to say I don't know what it is and I am scared.  No one wants to feel that they have no control over any given situation.

Then you have those who would try to fool you...they can get pretty inventive sometimes with a hoax.  But they are nearly always caught because they don't really know enough about the subject to "make it real."

In closing, I just stick to what I know to be real.  It is a lot better than the made up stuff anyway.

Answer 11

No, I don't think that the cliche that most people claim to have experince cheapens my own in any sort of way.

I do agree that there are some who will immediately say that it is a ghost or a supernatural experince of some sort without looking into ALL the possibilities first, but I do not think or feel in any way that that gives the unknown phenomena that does happen a bad rep.  What I do feel gives the supernatural, as most people prefer to call it, a bad reputation are the tv shows, and movies that make the claims, and all it is is a trick of the camera, computer generated images.  In general, fiction that they claim is fact just for the ratings and monetary value that they (the ratings) provide to the individuals that try to fool, and succeed with most people. Another party that I feel creates a bad rep, are the so called "Paranormal Experts."  My question is, how can those individuals be experts when the supernatural is unknown and science cannot even offer explanations, or even accept that there is something else out there?