And you're condemned to haunt a forum? Worst ghost ever.

I have to put other because I kind of do, but kind of don't to be honest. There are ethereal things that do happen that are beyond our explanation which is why we invent ways to describe it. The ghost hunters on SyFy being one example where they call it residual hauntings, child type hauntings, etc... . However to me a lot of it can be explained as people's imaginations running away with them. Many refuse to believe it, but the mind is a very powerful entity and can produce very unique results. One result being suppressing pain believing they have received powerful pain killer (The placebo effect as it is called). If you eliminate that possibility through experimentation then what you are left with is a plausible supernatural experience, but again that's why i'm skeptical since it's really hard to get others to believe it.

I'm playing dumb as much as you do, the difference is that I do it intentionally.

Ghost "sightings" are, in some cases, very not-nice people who decide to (on some occasions possibly even get paid to) make other people look stupid by making them think they've seen a ghost (you don't think they do? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cuQXHqDciE). In other cases it's illusions brought about by fear or sheer will to see a ghost.

Besides, some very young kids actually do think that the man dressed as Santa indeed is Santa. Some actually think that he really exists.

I did see The Mystery Machine drive up at the Play N Trade one time and driving by Westgate Lanes..
Along with Mario and Luigi at the Play N Trade.

Now how was it put in Videodrome? "After all, all that exists are our perceptions of reality", or something. People can see and hear things that don't exists, and for them they do seem real. In reality (the one that we base our perceptions of ) It's all about the chemical state of the brains.

If that's the semantics you want to be dabbling with then I guess yes, ghosts do really exist for some people as much as colours do really exist for people who are not colour-blind. However, the main question is malformed in that case - it should have been "Do ghosts exist for you?" and I would have answered "No, for me they don't."

I am not a believer in ghosts as spirits of the incorporeal dead as such, I believe it is more to do with the person seeing the ghost than any external factor.

I do.

I've had a few experiences. I live in a really old house so all my family has at least one story.

Do ghosts, as in wispy apparitions exist? possibly, I have not seen any but know some people that claim to.

Do ghosts, as in strange things happening that can not be explained? yes. I've seen solid objects moved or otherwise displaced when there is no normal force affecting them (not even wind)

As to why ghosts wear clothes, that can be explained (in theory at least). If a ghost is some sort of psychic footprint then they wear clothes because they chose to. Similar to the "residual self image" Morpheus used to explain to Neo in The Matrix.

And what about how they can have memories without a brain?

I just find it an interesting idea that what is "real" may differ a bit between persons. So when a person say he saw something, i don't doubt they saw, or think they saw something, what that something was is open to wide interpretation. In the "real" reality, however, i have no reason to beleive they exist.

Personally i watch Most Haunted and similar shows purely for comedy value, same as UFO conspiracy "documentaries". Though the last one made me facepalm so hard i had to turn off the TV to avoid brain damage.

:grad: "As an enlightened person I cannot possible believe in something that doesn't readily present itself or evidence thereof to me"
:rolleyes:

:laugh:

With a ghost-brain. Duh.

Then why do person's memories get damaged when the material, non-ghost brain, gets damaged?

Perhaps the non-corporeal mind is only created on the death of the corporeal one?

Why wouldn't they? I don't see why a non-ghost would have a backup ghost-brain. Ghosts obviously don't have the physical one floating around as a spare either.

I'm hoping you realized the whole ghost-brain response was a joke, by the way.

So it doesn't exist, then when a person dies it plops into existence? How and why?


Of course, I was just replying as a precaution because you never know when someone might think that that response was actually something I had no argument against.

We don't like to use the word ghost, we prefer to be called corporeally incapacitated individuals. Ghosts have rights too you know. Woooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

Anyway, I don't. I'll believe it when I see it and I doubt I'll be seeing it any time soon.

Well "how and why" are really moot points if we're discussing ghosts in the first place. Its not like this is an area with a lot of scientific data on which to ground theories. Perhaps the electrical patterns in the brain become fixed upon death, sometimes dissipating, sometimes reforming as a ghost entity.

What is a ghost?

Your consciousness, or spirit, or whatever you wanna call it, after it leaves the body is one definition.

One theory goes that your spirit transcends to another plane of existence. So now all we have to do is figure out if there is more than one plane of existence. And if so, if your collective being (minus the physical) can and/or does move on to another plane after the physical fails.




Its funny to me that the people that claim to be enlightend and all scientific in their thought processes won't even admit that it might be possible, they spend their time opposing any theory that isn't already confirmed by massive amounts of evidence. That does not make you scientifically minded, it makes you as close minded as a religious zelot, and makes you look like one too. Shouldn't you be thinking about it scientifically? Not shooting it down because there is no solid evidence of it. Imagine if thats how all scientists thought. We wouldn't know [censored].

Perhaps their ghostly heads contain ghostly brains

You're acting like the burden of proof is on the people who don't believe. It's up to the people who do believe to present facts to back themselves up. There's plenty of branches of science that are purely theoretical (like theoretical physics, obviously) that have enough proof and work behind them so that they are generally accepted. You can't just go making baseless claims and justify it by saying ''Well, we don't know... it could be true''. There is a really good phrase I've heard before about how being open minded is a good thing, but if you open your mind too much your brain will fall out. I'm pretty sure anyone who's posting an argument for the non-existence of ghosts would be happy to be less skeptical if there was some solid proof or at least a valid theory that makes sense to explain any possible existence of ghosts.

Nope.
I've seen what could be interpreted as ghosts, but there must be a rational explanation. Fatiuge, psychological trauma, misinterpretation of physical data.

There is plenty of evidence out there, but many are quick to claim it false because it wasn't collected personally. Ghosts are not something you can recreate in a lab, if it is true that they are aware, then repeatable evidence is gonna be extremely hard to come by. To say that there is no evidence out there, to me, is ridiculous. There are also valid theories out there. My whole point is that the vast majority of "skeptics" aren't skeptics. They flat out choose not to accept any theory or evidence. I just think its funny that people who claim to be scientifically minded choose not to be in this case.