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Right. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but it creates a rebuttable presumption in favour of absence.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
It would be just as easy to dismiss you as being so open-minded that your brain has fallen out, but that gets us nowhere.

Being open to new things/information is of course vital. Pretending that you have to be open-minded about the existence of something for which there is not even the slightest shred of evidence and for which there are countless perfectly satisfactory alternative explanations is utter madness.

Where do you draw the line? Do you put teeth under your pillow in case the Tooth Fairy is real? Why not? Are you closed-minded, or is the Tooth Fairy childish nonsense with no evidential support in real life?

Do you believe in vampires? Sasquatch? Nessy? Santa?

Dismissing the swipe at the start (which you need to reign in a bit with your posting style. I thought Canadians were meant to be polite?)
I draw the line where the evidence is. Until the evidence is presented to be 100% infallible that something can or can not exist or happen (and that's just not too anything supernatural, that's too all things), then you have to keep in the back of your mind that the slim possibility is there. Sure, the odds are that nothing like that does exist, but if you believe it blindly, you're no different than those who believe it implicitly. You're just different sides of the same coin. But you're obviously 100% in your beliefs, (along with insulting) so there's not much point in trying to discuss it.

I'll leave you with a Conan Doyle quote that I'm sure you've heard and can quite happily apply to both sides of the argument:

"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth".

 Ketara wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
And that's exactly the sort of closed mindedness, blind belief and arrogance that embarrasses the human race in general. Well done in showing it off in one post.

The problem with the 'paranormal' (by which I'm referring to ghosts/weird feelings/poltergeists/etc) is that they fall prey to the same tests that organised religion do. And fail them just as rapidly.

There is a lot of problems with that analogy. Religion and ghost stories are not even remotely comparable or related (a religion being a cultural system of philosophy and worldview, the paranormal being anecdotes based on sensory perceptions). However, religions also often have a lot of paranormal superstitions based on their mythology, which are closely related to ghost stories. For Christianity those are for example stories of possession, excorcism, visits from angels etc.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
It would be just as easy to dismiss you as being so open-minded that your brain has fallen out, but that gets us nowhere.

Being open to new things/information is of course vital. Pretending that you have to be open-minded about the existence of something for which there is not even the slightest shred of evidence and for which there are countless perfectly satisfactory alternative explanations is utter madness.

Where do you draw the line? Do you put teeth under your pillow in case the Tooth Fairy is real? Why not? Are you closed-minded, or is the Tooth Fairy childish nonsense with no evidential support in real life?

Do you believe in vampires? Sasquatch? Nessy? Santa?

Dismissing the swipe at the start (which you need to reign in a bit with your posting style. I thought Canadians were meant to be polite?)
I draw the line where the evidence is. Until the evidence is presented to be 100% infallible that something can or can not exist or happen (and that's just not too anything supernatural, that's too all things), then you have to keep in the back of your mind that the slim possibility is there. Sure, the odds are that nothing like that does exist, but if you believe it blindly, you're no different than those who believe it implicitly. You're just different sides of the same coin. But you're obviously 100% in your beliefs, (along with insulting) so there's not much point in trying to discuss it.

I'll leave you with a Conan Doyle quote that I'm sure you've heard and can quite happily apply to both sides of the argument:

"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth".

I'm not Canadian, but that's a fantastic example of leaping two-footed to a conclusion based on incomplete information. I couldn't have set that up better if I had tried. I live in Canada, but I was born and raised in North Yorkshire, U.K..

I'll assume then that you do in fact believe in the Tooth Fairy and Santa since you decided not to engage with that fatal flaw in your... well lets be generous and call it an argument.

You should read The Phantom Tollbooth. It would be instructive.

Oh goodie, the usual "none of this stuff exists" people who also denounce religion and deities entered the thread to tell all of us we're wrong if we've experienced anything supernatural. What a shock. Do you guys have anything better to do than tell everyone who believes in more than just flesh and blood why they're wrong and only your narrow viewpoint is the right one? Jeez.

text removed.

Reds8n

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Oh goodie, the usual "none of this stuff exists" people who also denounce religion and deities entered the thread to tell all of us we're wrong if we've experienced anything supernatural. What a shock. Do you guys have anything better to do than tell everyone who believes in more than just flesh and blood why they're wrong and only your narrow viewpoint is the right one? Jeez.

Don't waste your time. All you're going to get here is rudeness and sniping. No actual discussion because no one wants to discuss, as you've already seen.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Excommunicatus wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
It would be just as easy to dismiss you as being so open-minded that your brain has fallen out, but that gets us nowhere.

Being open to new things/information is of course vital. Pretending that you have to be open-minded about the existence of something for which there is not even the slightest shred of evidence and for which there are countless perfectly satisfactory alternative explanations is utter madness.

Where do you draw the line? Do you put teeth under your pillow in case the Tooth Fairy is real? Why not? Are you closed-minded, or is the Tooth Fairy childish nonsense with no evidential support in real life?

Do you believe in vampires? Sasquatch? Nessy? Santa?

Dismissing the swipe at the start (which you need to reign in a bit with your posting style. I thought Canadians were meant to be polite?)
I draw the line where the evidence is. Until the evidence is presented to be 100% infallible that something can or can not exist or happen (and that's just not too anything supernatural, that's too all things), then you have to keep in the back of your mind that the slim possibility is there. Sure, the odds are that nothing like that does exist, but if you believe it blindly, you're no different than those who believe it implicitly. You're just different sides of the same coin. But you're obviously 100% in your beliefs, (along with insulting) so there's not much point in trying to discuss it.

I'll leave you with a Conan Doyle quote that I'm sure you've heard and can quite happily apply to both sides of the argument:

"Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth".

I'm not Canadian, but that's a fantastic example of leaping two-footed to a conclusion based on incomplete information. I couldn't have set that up better if I had tried. I live in Canada, but I was born and raised in North Yorkshire, U.K..

I'll assume then that you do in fact believe in the Tooth Fairy and Santa since you decided not to engage with that fatal flaw in your... well lets be generous and call it an argument.

You should read The Phantom Tollbooth. It would be instructive.

Well maybe you should take some lessons from your neighbours and learn a little politeness. Might do you some good. But as I said before, if you bothered to read, I've never experienced anything supernatural one way or another. I'll just never dismiss anything out of hand without studying and considering all factors as that's idiotic to do otherwise. Almost like a blind belief you might say.

Eh, I just reported the general ass-hattery. So...hopefully the jerks get told to piss off by the mods.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

I draw the line where the evidence is. Until the evidence is presented to be 100% infallible that something can or can not exist or happen (and that's just not too anything supernatural, that's too all things), then you have to keep in the back of your mind that the slim possibility is there. Sure, the odds are that nothing like that does exist, but if you believe it blindly, you're no different than those who believe it implicitly. You're just different sides of the same coin. But you're obviously 100% in your beliefs, (along with insulting) so there's not much point in trying to discuss it.

What evidence would you require before you accept that something does not exist? Because if it's not something reasonable; this is the God debate and it's been done to death.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

There is a lot of problems with that analogy. Religion and ghost stories are not even remotely comparable or related (a religion being a cultural system of philosophy and worldview, the paranormal being anecdotes based on sensory perceptions).

Religions originate in 'ghost stories'; in effect. It's just man pretending to himself that he can control a phenomena he cannot explain by hedging it in with rules and makebelieve. It starts off as a 'ghost' story from a feeling or unexplainable occurrence, it spreads, someone says the 'ghost' spoke to them in a dream, devises a code of behaviour to placate the 'ghost', others begin to follow it, etcetc. Next thing you know you have a thousand churches or shrines dedicated to the 'ghost'.

The 'paranormal' as we understand it today is just the standard cultural legacy of whatever society you're in for explaining the unexplainable (water spirits, angels, whatever) before it develops into the full blown religion. The intrinsic logic remains the same behind either one; that is to say, it's always an attempt to justify or prove something with no evidence by a 'leap of faith' (to steal Kierkegaard).

That's precisely because it is the God debate again, anything of this nature is. Reasonable is going to depend on the individual. Personally, I'd want physical, consistent evidence on either side of the debate. Show me something that can be measured or viewed on the paranormal side and vice versa for non-paranormal. I'm sceptical in nature as I said before, but I like to study both sides of the fence in these things and never sit in with either side that loves to shout "I'm right" at the other.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
That's precisely because it is the God debate again, anything of this nature is. Reasonable is going to depend on the individual. Personally, I'd want physical, consistent evidence on either side of the debate. Show me something that can be measured or viewed on the paranormal side and vice versa for non-paranormal. I'm sceptical in nature as I said before, but I like to study both sides of the fence in these things and never sit in with either side that loves to shout "I'm right" at the other.

So...you want someone to prove to you that something does not exist with 'physical consistent evidence'? Because I'm really not sure how one can provide 'physical consistent evidence' something does not exist. Could you clarify?

By showing the causes for those instances. If a ghost is seen, as an example, can you show me if it was a hallucination, a mental condition, drugs, bad curry etc. Is there a measurable and/or recordable factor that caused that incident and can be identified as the cause? Or if there is no factor that can be identified, what do we move onto afterwards?

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
And that's exactly the sort of closed mindedness, blind belief and arrogance that embarrasses the human race in general. Well done in showing it off in one post.

No, he isn't wrong. As KGT mentions, ghost stories have been around for a very long time. Probably since the dawn of time. There is millions upon millions of anecdotes. But in all that time, and with all those stories, there has never been a single shred of evidence that ghosts are real. And it is not like people haven't been trying their hardest to proof the existence of ghosts. They have. It is just impossible to find any evidence whatsoever for all of those anecdotes, and so the scientific method urges us to dismiss the existence of ghosts and look to alternative, more mundane explanations instead. The Human mind is a funny thing. In my opinion, many of these ghost experiences are just tricks of the mind, where our mind misinterprets something mundane but unexpected as "ghost", and others can be explained by hallucinations, which contrary to popular belief occur even in perfectly sane and healthy people under normal circumstances.

Yeah but sometimes different people experience similar experiences in the same place, years apart and not knowing each other to get their stories straight. And again, we are grouping ghosts into one general category here, but in the events involving replays of events or emotions, those do not require god or religious beliefs either. There just could be some residual energy left behind that some are better at picking up than others, like the poster above who sat in the chair. He didn't see anything, just felt something. How do you scientifically measure that? Not sure you can. Doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

There was a story I heard about, and I will have to research where the heck it was, but over the years visitors to some old church/chapel reporting seeing ghostly apparitions and maybe even singing but I am not sure on that. Well, the crazy part was that the witnesses (and there were several over time) reported that the figures were walking down the isle with only their hips and above showing (which had to be a creepy sight itself). These apparitions did not seem to react to the visitors, and just seemed to be a replay of some previous event. The crazy thing was that the figures were only partially showing. Some years later it was realized that the floor had actually been raised at one point, and the original floor was indeed lower and to the level where the apparition's would have stood had the new floor not been laid down. Now, I do not know how you scientifically prove that these apparitions show from time to time, but who comes up with a story like that? I mean, if someone is going to report a ghost, I imagine it would involve a cooler event than just that. Some of these sightings are very mundane.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
By showing the causes for those instances. If a ghost is seen, as an example, can you show me if it was a hallucination, a mental condition, drugs, bad curry etc. Is there a measurable and/or recordable factor that caused that incident and can be identified as the cause? Or if there is no factor that can be identified, what do we move onto afterwards?

So in order to dismiss ghosts as a realistic prospect that could potentially exist; you require every single 'sighting' ever made to be disproved with a burden of evidence that could only be met in a controlled environment? Psych evaluations, cameras, etcetc. If not every one, what proportion? For what period of time? From what people?

Also, do you require this burden of proof for every imaginable item that it is likely does not exist before you discount it as being beyond the realm of rational believability?

Cant we all just enjoy our spooky scary skeletons?

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
I thought Canadians were meant to be polite?)

Interesting story about Canadians being polite (not to derail).

Was just in Canada a little over a week ago, Saint John to be exact. Me and the soon-to-be-missus were about to go into a coffee shop (Java Moose, quite tasty). A guy was coming up the street toward us, he got to the door first and opened it for us to let us in... not too uncommon. We said thanks, and he said no problem... then he left. We were like... WTF! Who goes out of their way to open a door for someone just walking down the street when you're not going in there too?

Then, we were inside, waiting on our coffee, found ourselves a table and were checking our emails and facebooks since our cruise ship didn't have wifi and we were going through withdrawal. The girl behind the counter called out my name. I was just getting up when some other customer who was waiting in line was like "here ya go" and walked it over to me before I could even stand up. Double WTF! Mind blown. Canadians are nice.

 Ketara wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
By showing the causes for those instances. If a ghost is seen, as an example, can you show me if it was a hallucination, a mental condition, drugs, bad curry etc. Is there a measurable and/or recordable factor that caused that incident and can be identified as the cause? Or if there is no factor that can be identified, what do we move onto afterwards?

So in order to dismiss ghosts as a realistic prospect that could potentially exist; you require every single 'sighting' ever made to be disproved with a burden of evidence that could only be met in a controlled environment? Psych evaluations, cameras, etcetc. If not every one, what proportion? For what period of time? From what people?

Also, do you require this burden of proof for every imaginable item that it is likely does not exist before you discount it as being beyond the realm of rational believability?

Ultimately? Yes.

Because, as the introduction of a book of ghost stories I had as a kid points out, if only one of the stories is true it proves the existence of ghosts.

For some, ghost stories are a bit of spooky fun.

For others, they are an insufferable challenge to the scientific paradigm and must be thoroughly discredited.

Seems a bit disproportionate, really.

 Ketara wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

There is a lot of problems with that analogy. Religion and ghost stories are not even remotely comparable or related (a religion being a cultural system of philosophy and worldview, the paranormal being anecdotes based on sensory perceptions).

Religions originate in 'ghost stories'; in effect. It's just man pretending to himself that he can control a phenomena he cannot explain by hedging it in with rules and makebelieve. It starts off as a 'ghost' story from a feeling or unexplainable occurrence, it spreads, someone says the 'ghost' spoke to them in a dream, devises a code of behaviour to placate the 'ghost', others begin to follow it, etcetc. Next thing you know you have a thousand churches or shrines dedicated to the 'ghost'.

The 'paranormal' as we understand it today is just the standard cultural legacy of whatever society you're in for explaining the unexplainable (water spirits, angels, whatever) before it develops into the full blown religion. The intrinsic logic remains the same behind either one; that is to say, it's always an attempt to justify or prove something with no evidence by a 'leap of faith' (to steal Kierkegaard).

No, they do not. Ghost stories originate from unexplained sensory perceptions, hallucinations and the like. Religions, along with culture and society as a whole originate with people seeking to give meaning to their life. The origin of religion is a relatively well-studied and understood subject (and very interesting). There is no such thing as a 'stage' where people believe in something paranormal before that develops into "a full-blown religion". Rather, it is the reverse. People experience something weird they can not explain and then use the their frame of reference, which is formed by the religious-cultural complex of their society to makes sense of their experience. Religions do not form from 'ghost stories', 'ghost stories' form from religion (or rather the entire mythology of a given society. It is impossible to seperate religion from culture in general since they form and feed into one another).

As a reminder~~~~ there is a ban on discussing politics and religion in the OT. Thanks!

 Ketara wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
By showing the causes for those instances. If a ghost is seen, as an example, can you show me if it was a hallucination, a mental condition, drugs, bad curry etc. Is there a measurable and/or recordable factor that caused that incident and can be identified as the cause? Or if there is no factor that can be identified, what do we move onto afterwards?

So in order to dismiss ghosts as a realistic prospect that could potentially exist; you require every single 'sighting' ever made to be disproved with a burden of evidence that could only be met in a controlled environment? Psych evaluations, cameras, etcetc. If not every one, what proportion? For what period of time? From what people?

Also, do you require this burden of proof for every imaginable item that it is likely does not exist before you discount it as being beyond the realm of rational believability?

Apologies, was in a meeting. But as Azrael says, pretty much yes. If you're to eliminate the idea 100%, you must present 100% infallible proof that something like ghosts can't exist. As long as you leave even 1%, you leave the possibility that they could exist.

 Desubot wrote:
Cant we all just enjoy our spooky scary skeletons?

No. 2spooky4me

 Manchu wrote:
As a reminder~~~~ there is a ban on discussing politics and religion in the OT. Thanks!

Oh, yeah. Almost forgot it wasn't just politics. But we are discussing not religion per se but rather the relation of 'ghost stories' to religion. Does that fall under the ban or not?

 Iron_Captain wrote:

No, they do not. Ghost stories originate from unexplained sensory perceptions, hallucinations and the like. Religions, along with culture and society as a whole originate with people seeking to give meaning to their life. The origin of religion is a relatively well-studied and understood subject (and very interesting). There is no such thing as a 'stage' where people believe in something paranormal before that develops into "a full-blown religion". Rather, it is the reverse. People experience something weird they can not explain and then use the their frame of reference, which is formed by the religious-cultural complex of their society to makes sense of their experience. Religions do not form from 'ghost stories', 'ghost stories' form from religion (or rather the entire mythology of a given society. It is impossible to seperate religion from culture in general since they form and feed into one another).

If we're going to be completely honest here; you're generalising as much as I am and just as inaccurate (not to mention pushing several positions on me I never took). 'Religion' originates from several places, going from good old Hubbard's 'How much money can I make here' through to people extracting meaning from a hit sci-fi series and deciding to write a life code about it.

It is however, more or less established fact that there are plenty of cases of 'unexplained phenomena' being the key point for a supranatural religious entity which makes people conceptualise and believe in it. Without the sea, an (at the time) unexplainable phenomena which dashes sailors into rocks, there is no Poseidon. Without the sun, an (at the time unexplainable) phenomena which emits heat and light every day, there's no need for a giant beetle to push it across the sky. You get the drift. Sure, people use their existing cultural framework in formulating what their particular supranatural entity is (a culture without demons cannot make up demons to explain a phenomena); but the concepts of Gods and spirits are spread across more or less every cultural framework, East to West.

People are empirical by nature. They get that shiver down their spine, they see something they don't comprehend or can't easily explain within their existing knowledge and framework, and then what? What do they ascribe it to? Inevitably, the answer is your collective local cultural framework of spirits/demons/Gods.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
By showing the causes for those instances. If a ghost is seen, as an example, can you show me if it was a hallucination, a mental condition, drugs, bad curry etc. Is there a measurable and/or recordable factor that caused that incident and can be identified as the cause? Or if there is no factor that can be identified, what do we move onto afterwards?

So in order to dismiss ghosts as a realistic prospect that could potentially exist; you require every single 'sighting' ever made to be disproved with a burden of evidence that could only be met in a controlled environment? Psych evaluations, cameras, etcetc. If not every one, what proportion? For what period of time? From what people?

Also, do you require this burden of proof for every imaginable item that it is likely does not exist before you discount it as being beyond the realm of rational believability?

Apologies, was in a meeting. But as Azrael says, pretty much yes. If you're to eliminate the idea 100%, you must present 100% infallible proof that something like ghosts can't exist. As long as you leave even 1%, you leave the possibility that they could exist.

So, do you accept the possibility of a teapot being in orbit around the sun? Or the possibility that I am in fact a god who controls the entire world through an army of invisible pink unicorns? Or the possibility that everything you know of is not real and just exists only in your mind?
You can't proof a negative, so if your position is that something can not be dismissed until its non-existence is proven 100%, you have to keep in account all of these possibilities as well.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

Apologies, was in a meeting. But as Azrael says, pretty much yes. If you're to eliminate the idea 100%, you must present 100% infallible proof that something like ghosts can't exist. As long as you leave even 1%, you leave the possibility that they could exist.

Okay. So let's say I think that you are occasionally a small budgie named Kevin, because I had a really realistic dream about it once. Naturally, you'll disbelieve me. 'Budgies can't type or talk about ghost stories' you'll think after all. It flies in the face of all our existing stock of scientific knowledge of the world, you turning into a budgie from time to time.

But really, how can you prove it, 100%? How do you know that for even just say, maybe twenty seconds of the day, whenever you're unobserved, you're not transformed into Kevin the budgie? We just can't be certain. Therefore it is best to keep an open mind that in reality, you might actually be a budgie called Kevin for part of every day.

This is clearly a reasonable and open minded thing to do. And anybody who does disagree with this must be a closeminded person.

 Ketara wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

No, they do not. Ghost stories originate from unexplained sensory perceptions, hallucinations and the like. Religions, along with culture and society as a whole originate with people seeking to give meaning to their life. The origin of religion is a relatively well-studied and understood subject (and very interesting). There is no such thing as a 'stage' where people believe in something paranormal before that develops into "a full-blown religion". Rather, it is the reverse. People experience something weird they can not explain and then use the their frame of reference, which is formed by the religious-cultural complex of their society to makes sense of their experience. Religions do not form from 'ghost stories', 'ghost stories' form from religion (or rather the entire mythology of a given society. It is impossible to seperate religion from culture in general since they form and feed into one another).

If we're going to be completely honest here; you're generalising as much as I am and just as inaccurate (not to mention pushing several positions on me I never took). 'Religion' originates from several places, going from good old Hubbard's 'How much money can I make here' through to people extracting meaning from a hit sci-fi series and deciding to write a life code about it.

It is however, more or less established fact that there are plenty of cases of 'unexplained phenomena' being the key point for a supranatural religious entity which makes people conceptualise and believe in it. Without the sea, an (at the time) unexplainable phenomena which dashes sailors into rocks, there is no Poseidon. Without the sun, an (at the time unexplainable) phenomena which emits heat and light every day, there's no need for a giant beetle to push it across the sky. You get the drift. Sure, people use their existing cultural framework in formulating what their particular supranatural entity is (a culture without demons cannot make up demons to explain a phenomena); but the concepts of Gods and spirits are spread across more or less every cultural framework, East to West.

People are empirical by nature. They get that shiver down their spine, they see something they don't comprehend or can't easily explain within their existing knowledge and framework, and then what? What do they ascribe it to? Inevitably, the answer is your collective local cultural framework of spirits/demons/Gods.

Whether scientology qualifies as actually being a religion or not is heavily debated.
We are both generalising yes, in a debate that involves such a nebulous, all-encompassing and variable concept as 'religion', generalisation is impossible to avoid. Regardless of that, you have a good point in that the belief in some deities (particularly those linked to natural phenomena) or other concepts that some religions have and the belief in 'ghost' stories share a common characteristic in that they are both theories that people use to make sense of something they see or experience. But that is also where the similarities between religion and ghost stories end.

 Excommunicatus wrote:


Do you believe in vampires? Sasquatch? Nessy? Santa?

No, no, yes, and duh of course (if I don't he'll stop bringing presents!)

I also believe in my own experiences. But hey, it could just be mental illness.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ketara wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

Apologies, was in a meeting. But as Azrael says, pretty much yes. If you're to eliminate the idea 100%, you must present 100% infallible proof that something like ghosts can't exist. As long as you leave even 1%, you leave the possibility that they could exist.

Okay. So let's say I think that you are occasionally a small budgie named Kevin, because I had a really realistic dream about it once. Naturally, you'll disbelieve me. 'Budgies can't type or talk about ghost stories' you'll think after all. It flies in the face of all our existing stock of scientific knowledge of the world, you turning into a budgie from time to time.

But really, how can you prove it, 100%? How do you know that for even just say, maybe twenty seconds of the day, whenever you're unobserved, you're not transformed into Kevin the budgie? We just can't be certain. Therefore it is best to keep an open mind that in reality, you might actually be a budgie called Kevin for part of every day.

This is clearly a reasonable and open minded thing to do. And anybody who does disagree with this must be a closeminded person.

Agree wholehearteadly. I don't even know what a budgie is, but I now understand that I turn into one occasionally.

EDIT: I get that you're being facetious.

I notice that those arguing that hauntings do not exist have offered nothing to the examples some have given here on there experiences, just general reasoning as to why someone couldn't have. I don't think Tony and others would have taken the time to tell their stories if they didn't believe what they saw. How about someone try picking apart one of those experiences? Or are you going to deny them of those too?

Jacksmiles wrote:

EDIT: I get that you're being facetious.

I'm really not. I'm simply swapping words around for equivalent words. Sure, the budgie example sounds absurd, but I'm just doing what the Flying Spaghetti Monster does for God. It has no lesser likelihood than ghosts or demons existing. You cannot disprove it 100% using the criteria provided to disprove ghosts/demons/etc.

Yet at the same time, you wouldn't insist that everyone should maintain an open mind about it, and dub people who looked at you funny as 'closeminded'. Because, y'know, they're suggesting you turn into a budgie in the early hours of the morning. Which is ridiculous.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 KTG17 wrote:
I notice that those arguing that hauntings do not exist have offered nothing to the examples some have given here on there experiences, just general reasoning as to why someone couldn't have. I don't think Tony and others would have taken the time to tell their stories if they didn't believe what they saw. How about someone try picking apart one of those experiences? Or are you going to deny them of those too?

I wake up once a week to see demons and ghosts walking around my bedroom. Not 'I have a weird feeling' or the like, I literally see them. I've named some of them. What do you think that says about the reliability of empirical experience?

Isn't it weird how most paranormal stuff seemed to mostly stop happening once nearly everyone had a camera in their pocket all the time?