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Ghosts?

JammieDodger

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Originally Posted by matadorpoeta
and why do you disregard the next part of my post?



the highest authority is not science, or faith, but your own experience. someone who has experienced a ghost knows they exist. someone who has not experienced a ghost has no experience on which to base an opinion. they can still have an opinion, but to say they don't exist is simply being close-minded.


There is such a massive logical fallacy here I don't know where to start (unless this is just a joke).

Actually, science is the highest authority. This is because scientific thought works on the basis that there has to be evidence for something existing before it is said to exist.

How is saying something does exist just because of your own experience (inspite the lack of evidence) not close-minded? If anything people who are sure they've seen something are far more close-minded and biased because they are not considering what evidence there is to say what they saw is true.

People who haven't "seen" ghosts do have experience to base an opinion on, the experience of not having witnessed anything. These people are the least biased because they can look at evidence objectively.
 

rxcats

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Originally Posted by matadorpoeta
the highest authority is not science, or faith, but your own experience. someone who has experienced a ghost knows they exist. someone who has not experienced a ghost has no experience on which to base an opinion. they can still have an opinion, but to say they don't exist is simply being close-minded.

My grandmother saw lots of things I didn't see. She saw bugs singing in the playroom of my parents house. She saw and heard people that none of the rest of us could see or hear. She also believed that my sister was my mother. I always thought this was because she needed another shock treatment or an increase in her Haldol dosing. Maybe I was just being close-minded.
 

Dedalus

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I am a pretty hard atheist, perhaps at best a pantheist, maybe a skeptic, whatever. I'm fairly flexible in terminology when it comes to a denial something greater. But I am a hard agnostic when it comes to ghosts, because it resonates so much more closely to my being than some creator or what have you.

For the skeptics out there:

-What are you? Ultimately, your brain activity, no? Brain activity is essentially electrical activity, neurons stimulated by chemicals firing off. Does the means of this electrical activity matter, then? Why should it matter whether it is electrical meat, electrical silicon, or some other means? Galaxies have complex electrical activity; do galaxies experience subjectivity? What if every once in a while, it's just in the air? If electricity is all it takes, how far am I from being someone else rather than me?

Some of these questions might be absurd, but the point is that we don't understand what causes subjectivity. A ghost is the idea of an invisible object with consciousness and agency. We have no empirical means of determining whether an object experiences agency and consciousness. At best, maybe we can know some conditions for consciousness similar to our own, but there is no testing for consciousness itself. I think the more interesting question is not whether ghosts exist, but whether we are ghosts.
 

redcaimen

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Originally Posted by Dedalus
I am a pretty hard atheist, perhaps at best a pantheist, maybe a skeptic, whatever. I'm fairly flexible in terminology when it comes to a denial something greater. But I am a hard agnostic when it comes to ghosts, because it resonates so much more closely to my being than some creator or what have you.

For the skeptics out there:

-What are you? Ultimately, your brain activity, no? Brain activity is essentially electrical activity, neurons stimulated by chemicals firing off. Does the means of this electrical activity matter, then? Why should it matter whether it is electrical meat, electrical silicon, or some other means? Galaxies have complex electrical activity; do galaxies experience subjectivity? What if every once in a while, it's just in the air? If electricity is all it takes, how far am I from being someone else rather than me?

Some of these questions might be absurd, but the point is that we don't understand what causes subjectivity. A ghost is the idea of an invisible object with consciousness and agency. We have no empirical means of determining whether an object experiences agency and consciousness. At best, maybe we can know some conditions for consciousness similar to our own, but there is no testing for consciousness itself. I think the more interesting question is not whether ghosts exist, but whether we are ghosts.


That is sort of Emily D's point. What are we? Arent we every bit as bizarre and really frightening as any ghost when you think about it? We are concerned about phantoms that may or may not be real but we are certainly real.
 

teddieriley

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I've heard way too many stories from credible people (by my judgment) to discount the existence of ghosts. Since the manifestation of ghosts is through energy, I think certain individuals are more predisposed to experiencing them than others. I have no doubt they exist.

I particularly enjoyed (and got spooked by) stories from a family friend who lived in an apt. in San Francisco that was haunted during her undergrad days at USF. She lived there with 3 other girls. I visited the apt. on a few occasions, but luckily had no personal experiences. Here are the more significant happenings:

(1) On a number of occasions my friend would enter the kitchen in the morning when either one or more of the other roommates were not home. All the doors to the cupboards and drawers would be open. Any other roommates who were home (and still asleep at this time) swear to not having opened anything during the night.

(2) The girls would receive a call every Tues. in the afternoon at 4pm. In the beginning they would answer it and wonder what the hell and just hear silence on the other line. A few times, they would hear, "mommy?" on the other end. This, in conjunction with the other happenings with the "little girl ghost" made them freak out every time the phone would ring at that time. And this was consistent week after week.

(3) One of the roommates (she was a bit ditzy and dense - not sure if this has anything to do with the fact she was one of the roommates with a personal experience) saw the apparition of a woman near the bathroom who straight up said she was looking for her daughter and asked the roommate if she had seen her (I don't know how the roommate heard this ghost speak). There was an apparition of a little girl right next to the "mom ghost" but I guess the mom ghost couldn't see the child (I suspect they were existing on different "planes"). The roommate pointed to the little girl and said she was right there, and then the apparitions just disappeared.

(4) Two chicks shared a room, and one of them was sleeping and awoke to the apparition of a face floating above hers, she pulled the sheets over her head and could still see the face which kept asking the roommate if she had seen her baby. The other roommate finally woke up to the commotion, woke up the others, and they were freaked out the rest of the night. The girls finally consulted a Catholic priest to bless the apt. and hopefully get rid of the ghosts. They told this story to the priest and the priest mentioned that someone who has a ghost experience where a woman ghost is looking for her baby is a person who has had an abortion. Turns out the girl who had the ghost floating above her face had an abortion, unbeknownst to her roommates before that time. I doubt the priest would have known about the abortion with the roommate. freaky.

The girls finally got the hell out of there after a few months of putting up with other weird things in that apt.

I got the chills remembering and typing about these stories.
 

whodini

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Both of my parents swear to have experienced "ghosts." My father lived in a small house with my uncle and his wife for several months. He claimed he would hear knocks on the walls above or to the side of him as he walked around the house. Normal, right? Except the knocks would follow him throughout the house. Still plausible. Except the knocks would also continue even if he stopped in his tracks and didn't make a move. Huh? He said this happened many times to several people in the house over the course of his stay. My favorite story of his was how he would sometimes hear the noises of his father coming home from work. He'd hear the sound of footsteps walking up the gravel walkway and up the doorsteps. My dad and grandmother weren't the only ones who would hear this. Their dog at the time would always get super excited when my grandfather came home. It'd hear the noises but if they immediately opened the door to see who it was, the dog would freak out and run to the bedroom, shaking and crying. At first they just assumed it was a prank but they would answer the door within seconds of the sounds hitting the steps and nothing would be there. Also, there was never the sound of whatever it was running away on the gravel. But my favorite part is...why would the dog be affected by it repeatedly? My grandmother figured it was the "ghost" of my grandfather being so miserable at work sometimes that he would come home. So far it's the only story I've heard of a "ghost" of someone who was still alive at the time.
 

celery

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Damn, I wanna see a ghost. This is lame. Stop hogging all the unexplained phenomena you greedy bastards!


Perhaps we should start a thread concerning lucid dreams. I've had a few of those, they're pretty sweet.
 

sho'nuff

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In japan, there are a lot of occurences of or ghost phenomena.
A group of persons camping one time took a group photo in the woods. When they returned home and developed the film, there was an uknown person sitting amongs them smiling and posing for the photo.
One other story about group photos was one occurence of a photo showing one of the members having two heads or double head one on top of the other.
Bizarre, eerie stuff that makes your hair stand on end and tingles down your spine.
 

Dedalus

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Originally Posted by redcaimen
That is sort of Emily D's point. What are we? Arent we every bit as bizarre and really frightening as any ghost when you think about it? We are concerned about phantoms that may or may not be real but we are certainly real.
Heh, that is what I suspected, but I am terrible at interpreting poetry. One of my favorite Neutral Milk Hotel lyrics (from an album about being in love with a ghost no less): Can't believe How strange it is to be anything at all
 

redcaimen

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Originally Posted by Dedalus
Heh, that is what I suspected, but I am terrible at interpreting poetry. One of my favorite Neutral Milk Hotel lyrics (from an album about being in love with a ghost no less):

Can't believe
How strange it is to be anything at all


One need not be a house to be haunted.
 

IUtoSLU

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Originally Posted by JammieDodger
There is such a massive logical fallacy here I don't know where to start (unless this is just a joke).

Actually, science is the highest authority. This is because scientific thought works on the basis that there has to be evidence for something existing before it is said to exist.

How is saying something does exist just because of your own experience (inspite the lack of evidence) not close-minded? If anything people who are sure they've seen something are far more close-minded and biased because they are not considering what evidence there is to say what they saw is true.

People who haven't "seen" ghosts do have experience to base an opinion on, the experience of not having witnessed anything. These people are the least biased because they can look at evidence objectively.


Actually, philosophy is the highest authority.
 

Dragon

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Originally Posted by redcaimen
In keeping with my previous vaguely **** poetry entry:


Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau;
Mock on, mock on; 'tis all in vain!
You throw the sand against the wind,
And the wind blows it back again.
And every sand becomes a gem
Reflected in the beams divine;
Blown back they blind the mocking eye,
But still in Israel's paths they shine.

The Atoms of Democritus
And Newton's Particles of Light
Are sands upon the Red Sea shore,
Where Israel's tents do shine so bright.

William Blake


I`m not trying to mock at all. Just pointing out that MAYBE people should not put so much faith in science, just like people should not put so much faith in religion.

Originally Posted by Dedalus
I am a pretty hard atheist, perhaps at best a pantheist, maybe a skeptic, whatever. I'm fairly flexible in terminology when it comes to a denial something greater. But I am a hard agnostic when it comes to ghosts, because it resonates so much more closely to my being than some creator or what have you.

For the skeptics out there:

-What are you? Ultimately, your brain activity, no? Brain activity is essentially electrical activity, neurons stimulated by chemicals firing off. Does the means of this electrical activity matter, then? Why should it matter whether it is electrical meat, electrical silicon, or some other means? Galaxies have complex electrical activity; do galaxies experience subjectivity? What if every once in a while, it's just in the air? If electricity is all it takes, how far am I from being someone else rather than me?

Some of these questions might be absurd, but the point is that we don't understand what causes subjectivity. A ghost is the idea of an invisible object with consciousness and agency. We have no empirical means of determining whether an object experiences agency and consciousness. At best, maybe we can know some conditions for consciousness similar to our own, but there is no testing for consciousness itself. I think the more interesting question is not whether ghosts exist, but whether we are ghosts.


You believe/know all that, but still remain an atheist?
smile.gif
 

bk4

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I don't want to believe in ghosts, but do for several reasons. For 3 years growing up, I slept on a couch in our house because I refused to sleep in my room due to the fact that in the same weekend, my best friend, while going to the bathroom saw a white shoe in the doorway, only to come downstairs and realize nobody was close to that part of the house. Then, the next night, I woke up at 3am because it felt like another person had sat down on my bed, because the mattress suddenly shifted that way. Coupled with the fact that I always felt like I was being watched, made me swear off my room. Other instances were noises of cabinents slamming at night while construction was being done on the kitchen, and when a new bathroom was being put in the house, my mom came home to find all of the pictures had fallen off of a wall, and then been stacked in an alternating pattern, with the one on top shattered, but the glass several feet away. The house was locked at this time, and my sister was asleep. Noises have been heard, pets have starred at walls with the hair on the neck up, and things have been seen. Not to mention that a closet in the dining room, that at one point used to be the front door, is wide open almost every morning, even though their is often times things in front of it. Several people have died in the house as well, which makes me think it's haunted.
Other friends have similar stories about where they grew up, including one friend who grew up on a farm that was where Thomas Jefferson lived as a boy.
 

Tokyo Slim

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I don't know if I believe in ghosts or not. Nor do i care either way if they exist, are a figment of brain activity, the devil, or mass delusion.

So far, its had absolutely nothing to do with me, so I have no real opinion on it.
 

redcaimen

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Originally Posted by Dragon
I`m not trying to mock at all. Just pointing out that MAYBE people should not put so much faith in science, just like people should not put so much faith in religion.



smile.gif



I know you aren't. I agree with what you said. I provided the Blake poem in support of your position, him being a world class genius and me being your average opinionated internet gnome, I thought his words would carry more weight. Blake is saying this reductionist focus on the material "blinds the mocking eye". The rationalists ( I may not be using this term properly) can only see one facet of the gem.
 

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