Ghosts.... Is There Any Proof, and Why do You believe.

reply to post by NorEaster


Well if you can't get a real peer, you might have to do it person by person until you create a whole new field lol. It's not like it hasn't happened before. Unfortunately for me, if it doesn't do 1s and 0s I'm an idiot. But I will check out the book and discuss it.

When it comes to getting your research out, if it's new, you gotta be patient. It's gonna take some time. I used to do artificial intelligence starting out, I just wasn't very good at it. But the keyword being USED to. I still have friends sending me research. Stack of papers and an inbox full of PDFs and I'm not even interested in it anymore. It's not even considered a popular field anymore lol. If someone did release something revolutionary on the subject today, I probably wouldn't even get to the first page for 8 months cause of all the crap that came before it. If someone doesn't listen right away, it doesn't mean they won't eventually.

So, just keep trying and if you find out you're wrong, revise and try again. Maybe one day. Hopefully soon.

Originally posted by tinfoilman
reply to post by NorEaster

 

Well if you can't get a real peer, you might have to do it person by person until you create a whole new field lol. It's not like it hasn't happened before. Unfortunately for me, if it doesn't do 1s and 0s I'm an idiot. But I will check out the book and discuss it.

Actually, you might just be the perfect type of thinker to do a good job of critiquing this thing. The entire existential structure is based on set logic, so 1s and 0s is what it's all about (with contextual sets providing contingency, of course). When factoring in existential imperative expressions, response triggers are very consistent (masculine versus feminine survival requirements determined by circumstance and precedence that create the set under examination), and the extrapolations are not subjective at all. In fact, there is nothing - below the epitome level of dynamic expression - that is subjective about any of it. I approached this as a logic circuit designer, and simply trusted that the 1s and 0s were the key to the whole infrastructure. It turned out that I was right, and that it could all be easily mapped out if sets were properly taken into account.

When it comes to getting your research out, if it's new, you gotta be patient. It's gonna take some time. I used to do artificial intelligence starting out, I just wasn't very good at it. But the keyword being USED to. I still have friends sending me research. Stack of papers and an inbox full of PDFs and I'm not even interested in it anymore. It's not even considered a popular field anymore lol. If someone did release something revolutionary on the subject today, I probably wouldn't even get to the first page for 8 months cause of all the crap that came before it. If someone doesn't listen right away, it doesn't mean they won't eventually.

So, just keep trying and if you find out you're wrong, revise and try again. Maybe one day. Hopefully soon.

I appreciate the encouragement. I'm pretty amped about the direction of this premise, and invite people, who have the same belief that I do concerning the requirement for existence to adhere to a rigid sub-structure in order to have developed what it is that we know to exist around us and within us, to take a serious look what what I've put together. The logic is primitive, but that's because what I'm examining is pre-math, pre-physics, and pre-consciousness. The dramas don't enter into any of this until humanity emerges to invent sophisticated motivation. Before that, the imperative expressions could not be simpler or more consistent.

It's driven by the logical imperative that if something exists, it will maintain that existence (in whatever logically accurate manner is possible for the item in question) for as long as it can. Beyond that, it's all set logic.

I believe in them because they are real. Period.

They are everywhere. I have yet to live in a house that doesn't have them. I've run into them in old homes; in new homes; in hospitals; in office buildings; in cemetaries; on the street corner. It is OBVIOUS that they are here but nearly everyone is off in their own world and not paying attention to the world around them.

My best ghost story - (and it is completely true).

Back in the mid 80's I was stationed in japan. I was with two friends and we decided to take a day trip into Kamakura to go visit The Great Buddah. We got to the temple and looked around and decided to look at the old part of the city before we got on the train back to post. (Army post - Camp Zama Japan). We got lost walking around the city. It was Bonodori time - the festival of the dead. Japanese people would go to the cemetaries to clean the graves of their ancestors and to leave gifts .. food .. that kind of thing. While trying to find the local train station, we were walking past a very old cemetary, with lots of old forest growth overhead, when we looked in and saw some candles lit by some tombs. Figuring that someone had just been there to celebrate Bonodori, we went in to see what had been done. When we walked in we saw a little old japanese man with white hair, and a white cat, sitting on a grave stone. He said hello in perfect English. We asked him if it were okay for us to look and to take pictures of the celebration that had just happened. He said it was perfectly fine and that the family wouldn't mind at all. We three turned to each other and said something like 'great' and then turned our heads back and he was GONE. The cat was still there but he was gone.

We took the pictures and eventually found our way to the train station. On the train ride home we all started remarking how it was intersting that an old japanese man could speak perfect english without a trace of accent. I said 'yep, and he sounded like he was from my hometown in Connecticut' ... then my friend from Georgia said 'no, he had a Southern accent'. And then my friend from Ohio said 'no, it was a midwest accent'.

We all had heard him speak perfect english and it was all heard in our own accents.

THAT IS A TRUE STORY.

Originally posted by openmind444
reply to post by palg1

 

Feeding some of theses individuals with accounts of personal experiences really does nothing but feed another debate and another argument all together for these types of people, believe me I have tried. If the available evidence, from various mediums, isn't enough to satisfy this jolly lot, then tales of personal ghostly and paranormal encounters are just as unlikely to have any affect. These folks have their opinions and beliefs, and obviously, will not be dissuaded. I don't mind arguing and debating, I have just noticed that there are not too many paranormal investigators around ATS that are willing to go to bat for the paranormal field, but I will because this is what I do, and I am most certainly not going to let someone downplay it's relevance, because in their minds it isn't good enough or is worthless. Though, I also realize when it is time to stop debating and move on to other, more worth while, endeavors.

What I'm trying to tell you is pick your battles. Kevin? and others like him will never be convinced regardless of the "proof" you bring to the table. I not saying don't bother, I'm saying don't bother debating them. Instead recount your stories and experiences, show your photos and EVPs and let them speak for themselves.
As you say "These folks have their opinions and beliefs, and obviously, will not be dissuaded."

I'm a theologian, I know what it like to debate on a subject with people who bait their arguments in order to cause and to feed into our doubts. The trick is to not let yourself be baited. I recognize the bait in Kevin?'s original post. He has no intention of arguing, he wants you to slip in order to prove him right. He brings no new argument to the table. He will however use your past arguments and quotes against you.
As for tin-man, well his take "that someone taking pictures and EVPs is a waste of time" is counterproductive. It's a shame, he but he admitted himself that when he did his ghost-hunting thing it was for fun. The fact that didn't take it seriously is obvious through his own admission. That said, his argument cannot be taken seriously when he trash talks the evidence that others have worked hard collecting, and he will never understand the dedication and hard work that true paranormal investigators do.

PS: No offense intended Tin-man that's just the way it is.

I am one who believes in life after death in more than one fashion. This gets me kicked around quite a bit in my peers groups.

reply to post by palg1


Theres a famous picture of an Astronaut at 19th century Freemason meeting, but HE can only be seen in the photograph of the event...Perhaps the origin of ghost is not paranormal at all.

This poster has a damn good point, a person cannot belive in hearsay...all these orbs etc, are all a trick of the camera...i take my photography quite serious..i,ve had loads of so called orbs...a trick of the light.
post flagged

Originally posted by palg1

Originally posted by openmind444
reply to post by palg1

 

Feeding some of theses individuals with accounts of personal experiences really does nothing but feed another debate and another argument all together for these types of people, believe me I have tried. If the available evidence, from various mediums, isn't enough to satisfy this jolly lot, then tales of personal ghostly and paranormal encounters are just as unlikely to have any affect. These folks have their opinions and beliefs, and obviously, will not be dissuaded. I don't mind arguing and debating, I have just noticed that there are not too many paranormal investigators around ATS that are willing to go to bat for the paranormal field, but I will because this is what I do, and I am most certainly not going to let someone downplay it's relevance, because in their minds it isn't good enough or is worthless. Though, I also realize when it is time to stop debating and move on to other, more worth while, endeavors.

That said, his argument cannot be taken seriously when he trash talks the evidence that others have worked hard collecting, and he will never understand the dedication and hard work that true paranormal investigators do.

PS: No offense intended Tin-man that's just the way it is.

I'm not going to say I understand all the hard work and evidence. Instead I'll say I appreciate all the hard work paranormal investigators do. What I'm trying to express is that very few other people do. When I did ghost hunt, it was just for fun. But that doesn't mean I didn't get evidence, but when I did. Nobody would even look at or take it seriously most of the time. No matter how many EVPs or ghost photos I showed them, to them it was just another old ghost photo and it was no different than all the others.

I just got fed up with people and realized maybe we need more than just evidence to prove anything to anyone. Maybe they're just not looking at the evidence because that's not the way most people work. I just figure people will believe what they want to believe.

Like I said, I HOPE I'm wrong. I'm HOPING that if you have good evidence or a good logical argument that most people will listen. It's just not been my experience so far.

Some very interesting responses, I have to confess I am really rather busy just now so I haven’t had the time to give each post the justice they deserve but I have had a quick skim of the posts. I have noticed that some of you agree with me and that’s excellent good to know some of us still have our feet firmly attached to the earth. I have also noticed that others have claimed they exist just because they believe in ghosts for whatever reason and one poster who claimed they were everywhere, if that was the case then why am I not seeing them everywhere.

One post however I do want to address directly


reply to post by palg1


it is very strange of you to claim that I will never be convinced regardless of proof, that I have no intention of arguing (I would call it debating) and that I have no arguments of my own without me having any input into this thread since my OP. How can you possibly make such assertions without me making any comment since my OP which states my views and arguments anyway, I have yet to see any proof that Ghosts exist. Just because I do not spend every waking hour of every day glued to ATS does not make my arguments or view’s any less than yours, I have a life outside of ATS right now it’s very busy and takes place over ATS.

I am also interested in what qualifications you hold in theological and paranormal studies. As far as I can tell this is your only real argument for why ghosts exist, because you’re a “expert” in this field. I noticed in your first post you wrote something to the effect of “I can’t make you believe in ghosts”. If there was any solid evidence then you wouldn’t have to make be believe because the existence of ghosts would then become a scientific fact as opposed to what I view as a religious believe. And then tried to plug your book, that I have no intention of buying.

The short of it is NO SOLID EVIDANCE = NO GHOSTS. I shouldn’t have to physically see a ghost to believe in a ghost, for example I can’t see the oxygen in the air I breathe by I know it exists. That may make me a doubting Thomas, but so be it.

Originally posted by kevinunknown
And then tried to plug your book, that I have no intention of buying.

The short of it is NO SOLID EVIDANCE = NO GHOSTS. I shouldn’t have to physically see a ghost to believe in a ghost, for example I can’t see the oxygen in the air I breathe by I know it exists. That may make me a doubting Thomas, but so be it.

um....that would've been me plugging a book in this thread. Sorry, but the bulk of my argument resides there, and to suggest that the logical presentation required to defend the notion of ghosts can be encapsulated into bullet points for an Internet forum post is to completely misunderstand the nature of the issue being discussed.

It takes tracing the progressive development of physical existence all the way back to where the human thought leadership on the subject strayed off path to even begin explaining what an Intelligent Haunting is, and why it exists. Your acknowledgement of modern humanity's ignorance of what "ghosts" are is accurate, but your abject dismissal of the phenomenon on the basis of that ignorance is an irresponsible extrapolation. If a coded message is mistranslated, no one assumes that there was no message to begin with. The effort continues to properly translate the message. Paranormal indications are a message concerning the full nature of physical reality, and with so much indication, in so many different cultures, over such a long period of time, it's irresponsible to simply imagine that there's no reason to seriously work to determine what it all indicates about what exists that we have yet to be able to discern.

Your example of the air as being present but invisible is a good example. You know that there are molecules of oxygen in that air, but you only know this because you were taught that they exist, and you have decided to believe what you were taught concerning their existence. You have no capacity to examine a molecule of oxygen, and by doing so, to distinguish that molecule as being oxygen (as opposed to any other molecule within the gaseous slurry we refer to as atmosphere). And even if you were to isolate such a molecule (with the assistance of expensive equipment and a research technician), you'd still be dependent upon the word of people who are telling you that this is what you're observing. If you were determined to remain skeptical, they could only point to the available published literature on the subject and say "You're free to believe it or not, we can't force you to accept our word for it."

There are millions of people who seriously believe that the Earth is only 6,000 years old, and there's nothing you can show them that will prove to them that they are mistaken in their belief. They do not believe in carbon dating. They don't see dinosaur bones as being anything that clashes with their accepted narrative, and you can bury them under science books on the subject. In the end, your proof is just your opinion in their minds.

What scientists use to verify an acceptable theory is responsible logic and related extrapolation. This is because they know that there are those things that exist that cannot be replicated within a laboratory environment, and that science is crippled if objective proof is the only criterion for acceptable assertion. Logic and responsible extrapolation are what base most scientific theory, and the way that they "prove" these theories is through formulas that defend the internal logic of what is being asserted. In the case of "ghosts" and the paranormal, physics formulas and math equations are fairly useless, since what is being examined does not involve the corporeal activities of molecular physics.

That doesn't mean that logic is useless. In fact, logic turns out to be extremely useful in examining what is and is not possible in this area of inquiry. That said, most paranormal advocates have no interest in applying logic to the study of what goes bump in the night (and morning and afternoon). And that makes folks like you (and me) roll the eyes and dismiss the whole of it all as horsesh*t.

But it doesn't mean that it is horsesh*t. It just means that its examination is generally not being addressed properly. I like that the paranormal investigation community has gone to electronic gizmos in recent years. Still, the absence of logical extrapolation is hampering the accurate translation of the data that is being compiled, and that's holding back a lot of breakthroughs.

I agree with you that 90% of what's paraded around as supernatural is either lies or delusional nonsense. There is that 10%, and there is the logical infrastructure that not only allows for what humans have been detecting for centuries, but that demands that it must exist.

Yeah, I have a book, and no, you don't have to buy it. But being willfully ignorant of what's been discovered concerning the non-corporeal realm is not the same as being right that the non-corporeal realm doesn't exist. For those hundreds of years before humanity finally accepted the assertion that the Earth rotates around the Sun, the Earth was rotating around the Sun anyway. While humans were blaming plagues on demons, viruses and bacterial infections were busy killing tens of thousands without any regard for what the dying and soon-to-be-dying believed about what was happening to them. There's something there that is causing people to believe in ghosts. That's enough of a reason to make the effort to figure out what it is, and to not just assume that it's nothing.

reply to post by tinfoilman


My apologies Tinfoilman, your explanation is less in line with someone who doesn't believe as I understand it.
You just seem jaded by the lack of respect and the flippant replies your hard work received. Your attempts at convincing others fell on skeptic ears.

I'll tell you what, stop trying to convince the convinced. They are entrenched in their beliefs and have no intention of ever taking our evidence seriously. Even producing a ghost would never be enough. They would right it off a an illusion or fatigue or a result of the power of suggestion. In the end, they will know the truth when they are forced to make an EVP in order to have the living hear them. Tell the tale instead to those who are searching and open to the thoughts of the paranormal. It may actually fall on the ears of someone who one day finds that magical piece of hardware that proves without a doubt, the existence of the paranormal.

(We are bolts in a giant machine. As long as we remain tightly in place the machine will run well. But do you know what happens when a bolt is not tight enough or when it works itself out of place? Bigger parts also work loose or the gear-wheels get damaged and broken. The work is slowed up. Perhaps the whole machine will be rendered useless. What a big thing it is to be a little bolt!)
--quote from St. Josemaria Escriva's: The Way

Arguing with a nut in that machine is pointless. Your job is to stay tight and hold your position. Don't let the gears of exploration of the paranormal ground to a halt. I seems to me that your argument with the nuts have affected the gear-wheels (your exploration) and you are now one of the loose bolts that is encouraging the wobble in the gears in the rest of the machine (other peoples exploration). Don't let the machine come to a halt. Tighten yourself up and let the nut be entrenched in his position.

reply to post by NorEaster



Wow, very well said!

reply to post by kevinunknown


Dude, don't try to find proof or scientific/religious explanation for ghosts. Just hope you'll meet one and everything will be clear

Some things are better left out of the science books and internet.

reply to post by kevinunknown


What is your definition of ghost? What I believe is that we each have a certain energy about us. If you've studied physics at all then you know ENERGY can not be destroyed, just changed. I think some of our energies hang around too long.