paranormal stuff

[reorith]

so... is there anyone in the playground that is into paranormal phenomena? any cryptozoologists, or ufo spotters, cattle mutilators, or foil hat conspiracy experts?
this is not an attempt at rooting you guys out.

[Vella_Malachite]

Yeah...

There's a ghost in one of the year level centres of my school if that's what you mean.

[Phae Nymna]

Frankly, I can't stand most alien and UFO conspiracy stuff, but I'm fascinated by Psychic, Telekinetic, Possessive, Benevolent, and downright Spooky Paranormality. I'm particularly interested in hypnosis, old hospitals, and benevolent spirits. I've never had a spectral encounter, but I do believe I have come close. Psychic however, I believe I have witnessed and felt first hand.
I occasionally feel a truly synchronized link between someone else's and my mind. There is a brief moment where we think identically. It's funky.

[Serpentine]

Cryptozoologist is my dream job, but I don't really consider it "paranormal" :smallconfused:
Most of this sort of stuff I'm skeptical of, but very interested in.

[thubby]

I've always found things like hypnotism interesting. I'm no foil hat weirdo, but i would find it hard to believe we have all this space to ourselves.

[Serpentine]

Oh yes, on aliums: I think that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, it would be idiotic to assume that this is the only planet that ever has or ever will produce life, even intelligent life, anywhere. 'course, it's also extraordinarily unlikely that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, two such planets would coincide near enough in time and space to actually come into contact.

[reorith]

Oh yes, on aliums: I think that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, it would be idiotic to assume that this is the only planet that ever has or ever will produce life, even intelligent life, anywhere. 'course, it's also extraordinarily unlikely that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, two such planets would coincide near enough in time and space to actually come into contact.

my mind is blown! time to put my foil hat back on

[SurlySeraph]

Paranormal activity? Ha! There's no such thing, citizens! Ignore this foolishness and carry on with your lives.
Lord Illuminatus, this community may know about us. We must dispatch operatives to mind-wipe all them at once.

[Solo]

Will everyone who has posted in this thread please stare into the little red light...

[poleboy]

It makes for awesome fiction. It's pathetic when people take it seriously. Especially if they use their own delusions to con people who are even more stupid.

[Tempest Fennac]

I'm really interested in pretty much everything to do with the paranormal and I'm interested in conspiracy theories and cryptozoology. Why is it only suitable as fiction, Poleboy? I don't see any reason why a lot of stuff to do with the paranormal shouldn't be proven to be completely true one day. Incidentally, does anyone know anything about remote viewing? I'd really love to learn how to do that.

[Player_Zero]

Oh yes, on aliums: I think that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, it would be idiotic to assume that this is the only planet that ever has or ever will produce life, even intelligent life, anywhere. 'course, it's also extraordinarily unlikely that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, two such planets would coincide near enough in time and space to actually come into contact.

Why is it common belief that the universe is infinite anyway? If you ask me, what we consider the universe, is quite definately finite...

Also, actually "sightings" of aliens, ghosts, etc. are all in your head. Seriously. If 6 billion other people didn't see it and you did then who do you think is more likely to be right?

If a esper/time-traveller/alien decides to prove me wrong then I'd go with it, but until such time I'm gonna' go ahead and assume that it's all a load.

[Tempest Fennac]

Don't forget that a lot of people have seen this sort of thing over the years, in different parts of the world, since (at least) the start of recorded history. Regarding aliens, while the universe probably isn't infinite (it will eventially die at some point due to either a big crush due to the Big Bang reversing itself, or the stars will eventually all burn out), there are plenty of stars which are just like the sun which could easily have plaets which can produce lifeforms which are more advanced technologywise then we are. Even ignoring that possibility, there could be an infinite amount of other dimentions which we can't access yet which are likely to have produced life.

[poleboy]

Why is it only suitable as fiction, Poleboy? I don't see any reason why a lot of stuff to do with the paranormal shouldn't be proven to be completely true one day.

I have never seen anything that could be classified as paranormal. I have never read or heard a believable account of anything either. No one has ever proven that ghosts, UFO's, aliens or anything like that exist. I'll accept that aliens and UFO's may exist since the universe is potentially endless, but I don't believe that ESP, ghosts, aliens and stuff like that exist on our planet.
The human mind is incredibly fragile and easy to trick. You shouldn't trust it any longer that you can throw it. :smallamused:

[poleboy]

Don't forget that a lot of people have seen this sort of thing over the years, in different parts of the world, since (at least) the start of recorded history.

People are big fat liars. Seriously, people will say anything for attention/money/sex/food/not getting killed.

Do you also believe the people who claim to see Bigfoot? :smalltongue:

[Player_Zero]

Don't forget that a lot of people have seen this sort of thing over the years, in different parts of the world, since (at least) the start of recorded history. Regarding aliens, while the universe probably isn't infinite (it will eventially die at some point due to either a big crush due to the Big Bang reversing itself, or the stars will eventually all burn out), there are plenty of stars which are just like the sun which could easily have plaets which can produce lifeforms which are more advanced technologywise then we are. Even ignoring that possibility, there could be an infinite amount of other dimentions which we can't access yet which are likely to have produced life.

According to the Drake equation, which I admit is a load of crap, there would only be one planet with intelligent life able to transmit data... Even if aliens did exist, even with the literally astronomically low probability of their existance, they wouldn't be able to get over here.

Also, people over the years have claimed to see aliens and whatnot... But how many of these people were, shall we say, a little off. No offence intended to anyone who may believe in the paranormal, but I think you're wrong and I think that it's in your heads and the majority of people who claim to have experience the "unexplainable" are mentally unhinged or more than a little weird.

Sorry if that sounds a little harsh, but I have yet to see anything in my life which couldn't be explained via the laws of physics.

[poleboy]

Also, people over the years have claimed to see aliens and whatnot... But how many of these people were, shall we say, a little off.

Not very many of them, necessarily. Like I said, the human brain is crazy. It'll do anything to keep you alive, so if you feel that in order for things to make sense you saw the ghost of Napoleon who was actually also an alien and your grandfather, then that's what you saw. At least according to your brain.

[Tempest Fennac]

How do you explain things such as the Roswell incident as well as footage and photographs which have been analysed with no evidence of forgery being discovered? (Admittedly, there is a possibility that the experts don't have the technology to pick up some alterations, but there are stil other cases, such as CSETI ( http://www.cseti.org/index.shtml ) members getting responces from UFOs by flashing torches at them and one case where a contactee was able to get a skin sample from one humaonoid alien which was analysed and found to be more animal-like then human skin (Chubakabras have left some blood samples which are like a cross between human and animal blood as well)). In regards to other things, I've got plenty of personal evidence that there's a lot of truth to this sort of thing: I've got some really good results with Reiki, and my success rate when using psychic animal communication seems to be more then 50%.

[Player_Zero]

Alright, guy. You have your own beliefs about the matter and it appears to be quite clear that you're gonna' stick to them, so I'm gonna' go ahead and stop this thing before it ends in a flame war. :smallbiggrin:

[reorith]

Alright, guy. You have your own beliefs about the matter and it appears to be quite clear that you're gonna' stick to them, so I'm gonna' go ahead and stop this thing before it ends in a flame war. :smallbiggrin:

i'm harnessing the flaming to power my ion stabilizer which i will then use to generate large amounts of energy and when i have enough, i'll finally divide by zero.

[Serpentine]

I suppose my opinion of "the paranormal" is sort of a variation on that quote, "any technology sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic" - any subject upon which we have sufficiently little understanding it indistinguishable from the "paranormal". I do believe that not everything can be explained by present science - if it could, we wouldn't need scientists anymore, just a whole lot of writers and archivists - but I do believe that everything can be eventually. There is nothing in this universe that can't be. If there was, it wouldn't exist in the universe.
Take "aura photography", for example. I have read some pretty convincing evidence that it's basically just taking photos of sweat and other vapours exuded from the subject. I must, as a skeptic rather than a cynic, accept the possibility that some people may indeed see "auras". Science, at the same time, tells us that all living things, especially ones as complicated as, say, primates, are highly electrical, especially the brain. It's reasonable to suppose - I believe it's been demonstrated? - that we have an electrical field around us. If the electricity is coming from the brain, couldn't it be possible for the field to alter slightly with one's mood? And wouldn't it be interesting if some... defect, or mutation, or difference in some people's eyes or other sensory organs allowed them to detect these electrical fields? It's not that far out - electric eels and platypuses find food through electricity, and some people have that thing that lets them "see" smells and sounds and the like (synthesisia? Something like that).
I think that should give a reasonable idea of what I mean by "paranormal" things just ("just") being poorly studied scientificly explainable phenomena.


one case where a contactee was able to get a skin sample from one humaonoid alien which was analysed and found to be more animal-like then human skin (Chubakabras have left some blood samples which are like a cross between human and animal blood as well))."Animal-like"? "A cross between human and animal"? :smallconfused: You do realise that humans are animals, right? And our materials are virtually indistinguishable from that of other animals, especially things like primates? And that we have something ridiculous like 40% of our genetic material in common with a carrot? It's really pretty meaningless to say that skin or blood is "animal-like", as any living thing that isn't plant, fungi, protozoa, or that other one or two kingdoms I can't remember, is animal.

[Tempest Fennac]

You're right about humans being animals. (Sorry about that. That's how the book described it). I'm assuming it meant that the blood had characteristics which were unique to both human blood and blood from other creatures.

[Shademan]

paranormal is only "para" until it gets proven. then its normal!
... not funny? oh ok...
anyways! what i really belive in is...
Roswell. it is just to much shadyness around it to not be any truth in it. s'pecially considering how some witnesses have been silenced.
tatzelwurm. oh come on! its so god-damned cute!!! i WANT it to be true! :smallbiggrin:
Mothman. but what it is i dont know...
that mutant thingie i cant remeber the name of, it was spotted by some bridge. big eyes, no visible mouth... well. strange thing happens. mutations are one of them.
ghosts. kinda. i belive the "soul" is some kind of energy. and the basic rule of nature is that energy can NEVER be lost. it will only ...change.

theres prolly more but not that i can think of from the top of my head.
i know some peopel that have experienced strange stuff and i have meself seen atleast one crazyass thing i couldnt explain but right now im hungry. and thats a mystery i CAN resolve! HAH!

[Vella_Malachite]

Personally, I have heard of a couple too many things to be a skeptic, but everyone is entitled to their view.

For example, friends and I have communicated mentally with each other across suburbs.

[banjo1985]

I'm not into conspiracy theories, though I must admit they're entertaining and make great fiction.

Ghosts however are a different matter. The road through the countryside near my house is haunted by a Victorian girl, and I personally believe I've seen her sometime ago, before it ever made the local paper. I guess that makes me a believer, at least in restless spirits I suppose.

[Natania]

I agree with Serpentine. I think it's rather arrogant to think that we are the only intelligent form of life in the rather huge universe. I mean there are ants who harvest and fertilize their ground to grow fungus so why can't there be other intelligent life?
On ufo's and stuff. I don't know if I believe in it. I'm the sort of person who want's to see before actually believing. that is, with most things. But the father of a friend of mine is photographer and he has some pictures that he has taken. One is of an airplane and you can see something huge behind it that is out of focus and is really behind it. And as the airplane was in focus that means that it was pretty far away and it was like twice the size of the plane. I have no idea if it's real or true but it was rather interesting to speculate about it.
On stuff like telepathy and ghosts. I have seen ghosts and not alone this one time we were with a group of 5 and we all saw it so I can't deny it. It has to be true. And I have used telepathy before so yes that is also possible.
One more thing about conspiracy theories. Frankly if the gouverment is going to inject tiny microchips into us so they know everything... I don't want to know.

[evisiron]

I thought I had seen a ghost in the past. Of a man stepping directly in front of the car I was in, and passing through us.

Since then I have seen how easily the human eye can be fooled, so attribute the occurrence to some eye trickery.

Does not mean I do not believe though...

[Tom_Violence]

Oh yes, on aliums: I think that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, it would be idiotic to assume that this is the only planet that ever has or ever will produce life, even intelligent life, anywhere. 'course, it's also extraordinarily unlikely that, in an infinite universe with an infinite time-span, two such planets would coincide near enough in time and space to actually come into contact.

No its not. In fact, its guaranteed that in such a universe two such planets would occur that near to each other. That's what infinity means, see? :smallwink:

[Solo]

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/the_data_so_far.png

'Nuff said.

[Mx.Silver]

Do I believe in the paranormal? No. As far as I'm concerned things are either part of the normal world or they're imaginary and aren't. They may make for interesting fiction (depending on the author) but not as guide to how things are.

The problem I have with is that most paranormal 'explanations' require pretty big leaps of faith. For instance, in ghost sightings, the person who had it claims that the only 'reasonable' explanation is that human beings have a soul that can survive death, that this soul, instead of disappearing off like most souls are said to do is able to continue to exist in the physical world retaining the shape of its old body and that it is also capable of influencing the world around id despite lacking any form of physical presence.
Now, that's rather a lot of big assumptions being made without evidence here. Maybe not quite as many as claiming it as evidence of a society of highly trained, fully equipped ninja poodles out on a training mission, but it's close.

Without some evidence for any of these base assumptions, or even a situation where that answer can be the only possible explanation (i.e.a situation where conditions mean it couldn't be down to halucinations, camera faults, tricks of light or ninja poodles etc.) then assuming paranormal activity is highly illogical.


Don't forget that a lot of people have seen this sort of thing over the years, in different parts of the world, since (at least) the start of recorded history.
Means nothing. A few hundred years ago thousands of people believed the earth was flat, and even more were convinced that the sun orbited us rather than the other way around. Anecdotal evidence is not proof, and neither is the number of people who believe something. Oh, and let's not forget the considerable number of people who hae come forward and admitted that they've faked a lot of paranormal phenomena.


Regarding aliens, while the universe probably isn't infinite (it will eventially die at some point due to either a big crush due to the Big Bang reversing itself, or the stars will eventually all burn out), there are plenty of stars which are just like the sun which could easily have plaets which can produce lifeforms which are more advanced technologywise then we are. Even ignoring that possibility, there could be an infinite amount of other dimentions which we can't access yet which are likely to have produced life.
First, being infinite is not the same as being eternal. The Universe is infinite in size but the number of planets inside it is finite.
Second while there certainly is a possibility for life on other planets (there's certainly a precedent) there's not much to say that it would be intelligent and more technologically advanced. There is of course a much bigger problem: the universe is fricking huge! It would take years, if not decades, just to travel from a planet in the nearest star system. Start going further away and it just gets worse. You know most of the stars you see in the night sky? The light that they give-off and that we see left them several million years ago. And that's still within our own galaxy. Travelling these distances is not exactly an easy feat, especially just for making a few crop circles and scaring photographers.



And I have used telepathy before so yes that is also possible.

For example, friends and I have communicated mentally with each other across suburbs.
I don't suppose you'd be willing to agree to take part in a scientific experiment to prove this would you? I know the James Randi foundation would be interested in seeing it, among many others.

[Gorbash]

Oh come on. I'd like to have Jedi SUPAH POWAS as much as the next guy, but vivid imagination and reality are two different things. As much as I'd love for these things to exist, it's scientifically impossible and not proven by evidence. Excuse me for not believing when somebody says: I've been anal probed by aliens...

[Dallas-Dakota]

WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!
WE ARE NOT WORTHY!

Serious dude, whatever did we do to deserve that knowledge or those skills?

[Tempest Fennac]

How do you explain suspected alien implants as well as the cases where the abductees had radiation poisoning?

[Tom_Violence]

it's scientifically impossible

No such thing, at least not according to any decent scientific method that I'm aware of. I dare say Karl Popper would have issue with you there, to say the least. :smalltongue:

[Mx.Silver]

How do you explain suspected alien implants
These like the ones where the 'implants' turned out to be free-floating lumps of fat? (I cannot for the life of me remember the proper medical term)


as well as the cases where the abductees had radiation poisoning?
There's rather a lot of ways to get radiation poisoning besides being taken onboard a spaceship, most of which tend to be insulated against radiation anyway.

[Tempest Fennac]

Don't forget the Villas Boras case (I think I spelt that right) or the one where a UFO was seen by 3 people who all got radiation sickness from it (the UFO was being accompanied by Chinooks at the time). Regarding implants, some of them are artificial rather then organic (I read about them in a book called Aliens: Encounters with the Unexplained).

[Illiterate Scribe]

There is no paranormal; only

http://img507.imageshack.us/img507/8971/scienceqh2.jpg
OK, I'm not a strict verificationist, but, for reasons constrained by board rules, I don't seek to prove those things that would go against empirical evidence.

[Tom_Violence]

Don't forget the Villas Boras case (I think I spelt that right) or the one where a UFO was seen by 3 people who all got radiation sickness from it (the UFO was being accompanied by Chinooks at the time). Regarding implants, some of them are artificial rather then organic (I read about them in a book called Aliens: Encounters with the Unexplained).

Okay, now I can't help but get the impression that you're being sarcastic or something. A book on the subject sounds an awful lot less like evidence and a lot more like pop entertainment to me.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Okay, now I can't help but get the impression that you're being sarcastic or something. A book on the subject sounds an awful lot less like evidence and a lot more like pop entertainment to me.

Also, the title doesn't exactly hide which way it's trying to argue either.

[Tempest Fennac]

How does that post come across as being sarcastic? Also, there are a lot of books on the subject. I mentioned that particular book because I was refering to something which was mentioned in it.

[Mx.Silver]

How does that post come across as being sarcastic? Also, there are a lot of books on the subject. I mentioned that particular book because I was refering to something which was mentioned in it.

I once read a book which claimed that the moon landings were faked because NASA was in contact with the aliens who had established a mining colony on the moon's surface and didn't want to interfere (entitled The Moon Landings: Did NASA lie?). His evidence for the alien mining colony theory went something like this: 'see those lines in this picture of the moon's surface? they're straight. You know what leaves straight lines? Vehicles!'. I wish I was making this-up (the really sad thing about this? I found the book in a school library).
'I read it in a book' is not evidence without some serious discussion of the author, the sources of information she/he used and whether he/she is a stark raving lunatic. David Icke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Icke) writes books he claims are non-fiction but that doesn't make them any less ridiculous.

[Telonius]

In general, I do think that the brain is easily fooled - but that we shouldn't completely discredit the people who claim they're seeing UFO's.

Example: Stories of things like succubi have existed throughout human history, but nobody's ever verified the existence of such a succubus. If someone told you that they swore they were visited by a succubus, would you think they're crazy? Seriously, a demon woman ravished them during the night. Dreaming, or crazy, correct? Well, not really. That person may have been experiencing sleep apnea or sleep paralysis. But if we'd completely dismissed the claims of all of those people having that experience as crazy, deluded, or attention-seeking, we never would have learned about the actual cause of it.

I strongly suspect the same kind thing is happening with experiences of ghosts, UFOs, ESP, and the like. The experiences are real - people are actually having those experiences, seeing those things. Those experiences are empirical evidence. They are data points. Any "scientist" who completely dismisses them without examining them is unworthy of the name. But those experiences have to be explained.

Some of the hypotheses have been thoroughly debunked (sleep apnea is a much better explanation than demonic visitors). Others seem unlikely (ghosts) to most people, but science hasn't yet found an explanation other than, "You want to see it, so you see it," or, "You're trying to profit from it." Neither of those explanations would have been very persuasive to somebody a hundred years ago who had a succubus experience. Those arguments won't convince somebody who's seen a ghost today. Rightly so - they really did have some kind of experience. There's nothing wrong with their logical faculties. They merely experienced something they can't explain, and their brains are doing exactly what they're designed to do - fit that experience into existing categories.

[Tempest Fennac]

I know that books aren't alays correct. I was mentioning the name of the bok so that you'd know which source I was using. I've heard some other (more convincing) arguements concerning the moon landing photos being faked (eg: the lighting and the dust appearing to be soft mud). There is one theory that the original footage contained footage of UFOs, and there are supposedly recording from ham radio operators who had bypassed NASA's broardcasting outlets which had Armstrong reporting seeing huge spaceships (Armstrong claimed at a symposium that they were warned off by the craft). Which part of Icke's claims in particular are you saying are ridiculous?

[Mx.Silver]

Others seem unlikely (ghosts) to most people, but science hasn't yet found an explanation other than, "You want to see it, so you see it," or, "You're trying to profit from it." Neither of those explanations would have been very persuasive to somebody a hundred years ago who had a succubus experience. Those arguments won't convince somebody who's seen a ghost today. Rightly so - they really did have some kind of experience.
But there is nothing about the 'placebo effect' argument that is flawed. Even if what you experience is a delusion or a halucination it is still an experience. If you can't convince convince a schizophrenic that the voices he/she hears are in his/her head this does not make the statement that they are just a product of the mind invalid. (note: I'm not saying people who believe they have seen ghosts are suffering from schizophrenia or mental illness).



Which part of Icke's claims in particular are you saying are ridiculous?
Most of them, although the whole 'shape-shifting reptilian aliens' thing does kind of stick-out as being particularly insane.

[Solo]

Don't forget the Villas Boras case (I think I spelt that right) or the one where a UFO was seen by 3 people who all got radiation sickness from it (the UFO was being accompanied by Chinooks at the time). Regarding implants, some of them are artificial rather then organic (I read about them in a book called Aliens: Encounters with the Unexplained).

CashLandrum Incident is what you are referring to (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cash-Landrum_incident)


However, Brad Sparks contends that the symptoms are not compatible with ionizing radiation, but rather some kind of chemical contamination, presumably by an aerosol.

Just for the record.


As always, no concrete evidence.



I've heard some other (more convincing) arguements concerning the moon landing photos being faked (eg: the lighting and the dust appearing to be soft mud).

If the moon landings were faked, you can bet your mother that the Commies would have caught on and exposed the US Space Program, then gone on to land on the moon for themselves.

I mean, seriously, you have to have thousands of people sworn to secrecy, then expect them to not tell a thing about the most massive conspiracy every.

As Benjamin Franklin once said, "Three may keep a secret if two are dead."

Someone would have leaked it by now; whether it'd be a NASA employee selling the secret to the Soviets or someone blowing the whistle now, someone would have come clean.

And don't give me nonsense about the government having people assassinated. If that was real, Bernstein and Woodward would have been found dead in a garage long ago.

[Tempest Fennac]

Thanks for finding that, Solo (I disagree about the concrete evidence comment, though: I'd say that something definitly happened). I didn't find the shapeshifting part to be implausible if I'm honest (I tend to think that there's a good chance that creatures on other planets would have abilities which we would class as implausible). I know what you mean about the moon landings as well, Solo (it's hard to determine what happened due to it being hard to verify whether the trasmissions which various ham operators found was real or not).

[valadil]

First, being infinite is not the same as being eternal. The Universe is infinite in size but the number of planets inside it is finite.
[/QUOTE]

I agree with this, sort of. Space is infinite. The universe, I define as the set of all matter included in the Big Bang. In that respect, yes the number of planets is indeed finite. However, I see no reason to believe that ours is the only universe going through big bang cycles.

Anyway, I'll pass on ESP and ghosts. I think aliens are out there somewhere, but highly doubt that anyone on earth has seen evidence of them.

[Solo]

Thanks for finding that, Solo (I disagree about the concrete evidence comment, though: I'd say that something definitly happened).

To get me to believe something, you have to do a few things.

First, in any case involving purely eyewitnesses, make sure none of them were lying. This is rather hard to do. People lie. A lot.

Second, we must figure out of they really saw what they think they saw; as any psychology student will tell you, eyewitnesses tend to modify their memory of an event after the fact. (Citation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyewitness_identification#Rapid_Decline_of_Eyewitn ess_Memory))

Third, we must look for physical evidence. There is no physical evidence in this case, though the car passengers were stricken with some sort of illness. It may have been radiation poisoning, but the guy in the article notes that it could have also been from chemical contamination.

So ultimately, inconclusive. I am not convinced.

[Serpentine]

No its not. In fact, its guaranteed that in such a universe two such planets would occur that near to each other. That's what infinity means, see? :smallwink:Yes, but the chance of that pair of planets including ours in near enough to infinitely small to not matter.

Regarding aliens, while the universe probably isn't infinite (it will eventially die at some point due to either a big crush due to the Big Bang reversing itself, or the stars will eventually all burn out)I missed this bit. While it's still just a theory, and a pretty damn sketchy one at that with no real way to prove it or even just support it, at the moment I like the idea that the Big Bang was just one of many, stretching back into an eternity of contraction and expansion. Thus, the universe will be infinite, at least in the dimension of time. I've also read somewhere that the human mind is incapable of comprehending the idea of "infinity". If the universe is finite, where does it stop? What's there when it stops? But that's pretty much beside the point.

Like I said, I think all these phenomena are just things that haven't been explained yet. I doubt that most of them are what people believe they are - take the unicorn. Marco Polo was apparently very disappointed when he saw a real live one, because it was big and grey and ugly, not at all like the pretty white horses he'd heard so much about. The "flying rod" things you see here and there, that supposedly move around at supersonic speeds? Conclusively demonstrated to be nothing but insect. Interesting, but not as first assumed. I would also note that "UFO" stands for "Unidentified Flying Object". If they're alien spaceships, they're no longer unidentified, and therefore not UFOs :smalltongue:

My problem with these phenomena isn't that they're taken seriously and discussed by the scientific community, it's that no matter how many convincing alternative explainations they come up with, no many how many studies debunk the traditional paranormal explaination, so many people cling to the supernatural theory. They just don't care.
Ooo, I've got a good one! The Mary Celeste, the ghost ship. There's all these stories around it: they were abducted by aliens, went mad, ate each other, monsters got them, etc etc. Noone asks about the insurance investigation into it. Their conclusion? Several casks of alcohol were found broken in the hold. The fumes from these caused everyone on board to become drunk. They needed to clear the air, as it was unsafe to breathe in the fumes for too long. So everyone climbed into the lifeboat to drag along behind. Unfortunately, their drunken state meant that they didn't tie the ropes properly, and they came loose, sending the boat and the crew adrift. They came up with that perfectly plausible and well-investigated theory within years of the incident. Does anyone mention that? Nope. Well, 'cept for in that documentary, obviously.
Easter Island? Chopped down all the trees to make those statues, starved as a result, and ate each other.
The pyramids as some sort of calendar? Total bunk, wishful thinking, and bad mathematics.
Auras? Already given my opinion, looking forward to a proper scientific one.
Cryptids? Very interesting, probably depends on the individual creature, probably one or more of exaggeration, altered mentality, self-delusion, stories passed down and altered on the way, and genuine organisms.
UFOs? Again, probably depends on individual incidents, with a plethora of other explainations. My father likes to point out two things: 1. Why would they come across the galaxy just to mess with drunken farmers? and 2. Isn't it interesting how sightings and fuzzy images have plumetted in frequency with the rise of digital photography and decent camera phones? Surely with the latter, in particular, we should be getting heaps more examples? And don't, don't bring up the "recordings" in art. Any art historian can give you a truly comprehensive explaination for every single one of them.
Psychic ability? No idea. Look forward to more reliable and consistent scientific study.
Ghosts? Dunno. Probably mostly psychological stuff, but I can see the possibility of a sort of "imprint" or whatever. That would be cool.

Why does something need to be "supernatural" to be interesting? :smallconfused:

Tempest: Heard of Von Daniken? Your opinion?

[thubby]

about the anti-big-bang, we now know the bodies of the universe are actually accelerating away from one another (on the large scale). so no known force will cause the universe to collapse/crush/compact us.

[Mx.Silver]

I didn't find the shapeshifting part to be implausible if I'm honest (I tend to think that there's a good chance that creatures on other planets would have abilities which we would class as implausible).
Wait. Think about this for a second, about what you're saying. David Icke claims that the vast majority (if not all) of world leaders are shape-shifting reptilian aliens who are manipulating all the world events to keep humanity under their control.

Are you really sure that you consider this plausible?


My problem with these phenomena isn't that they're taken seriously and discussed by the scientific community, it's that no matter how many convincing alternative explainations they come up with, no many how many studies debunk the traditional paranormal explaination, so many people cling to the supernatural theory. They just don't care.
Humans naturally anthropomorphise the world around us, we like to see intent in events (particularly in significant ones) even if none is present. It's easier to accept that bad things are happening because some evil force is actively making them happen than if it's just coincidence or the way things are. If it's an evil force you can identify it, predict it's likely actions or fight against. But if it's the state of the universe or just old human nature then there's not a lot you can do to prevent it or protect yourself.

Moreover, saying something was a dream or trick of the eye can often seem to demean what, at the time, felt like a 'magical' experience. Most people want to believe in magic, for something 'more' to be, and therefore are likely to want the paranormal to be real. The presence of ghosts would confirm that there is something after death, that your lost friends and loved ones might be seen again. With aliens there's the thrill of seeing something new and exciting, if you've been 'abducted' then what does this say about you that a bunch of 'otherworldly' beings chose you personally out of the 6 billion others they could have picked? The reason why these are so stubbornly held-onto is that a fair number of the people who believe in them strongly want them to be true.

[Solo]

Tempest: Heard of Von Daniken? Your opinion?

Thoroughly discredited by the scientific community.


Every theory he proposes has more plausible, human based explanations.

heck, the fact that the alternative explanations are human based makes them more plausible to begin with...

Take the Nazca lines. VD believed them to have been made by aliens as a sort of giant airport.

Disregarding the question of why advanced aliens would need dirt marking sto land their super advanced aircraft with, let us answer the question of whether or not it is possible for humans to construct the Nazca lines.

The answer is yes; researchers such as Joe Nickell of the University of Kentucky, have reproduced, without aerial supervision, the figures using the technology available to the Nazca people of the time.

At the sites of the Nazca lines, even, there have been found remains of rope, stakes, and other primitive pieces of tools and equipment.

Thus we conclude that it was ancient man who build the Nazca lines, not aliens - or at least, if aliens did do it, then they used the same primitive technology that the Indians had available back then.

[BugFix]

How do you explain things such as [...] footage and photographs which have been analysed with no evidence of forgery being discovered?

This is a logical fallacy: absence of evidence isn't the same thing as evidence of absence. Not being able to prove that something isn't a forgery isn't proof that it's not, it just means that no one's bothered to find out.

And in any case, (and speaking very generally) it's generally quite easy to forge "evidence" of whatever you like if grainy film and bad photographs are allowed as "evidence". All the stuff you list are anecdotes. Anecdotes are just stories. You can believe them if you like (I certainly can't stop you), but believing them doesn't make them true either, and won't convince anyone else.


I've got some really good results with Reiki, and my success rate when using psychic animal communication seems to be more then 50%.

Now, that sounds like science. It doesn't make me believe you, but at least it tells me that you're off on the right track. Care to document your findings so that someone else can repeat the experiment?

And are you sure you designed the experiment correctly? For example, using your number above, I can prove beyond any hope of disproof that I have psychic control over a random coin toss. Are you sure the phenomenon you are measuring isn't just a 50/50 random probability? You did a control to measure the baseline value, right?

[Telonius]

With aliens there's the thrill of seeing something new and exciting, if you've been 'abducted' then what does this say about you that a bunch of 'otherworldly' beings chose you personally out of the 6 billion others they could have picked? The reason why these are so stubbornly held-onto is that a fair number of the people who believe in them strongly want them to be true.

Also, consider the alternative explanations provided. If a person has any strange experience*, the alternatives are generally...

1. "You're making it up."
2. "You're crazy."
3. "You saw something but made a mistake. It wasn't actually what you think you saw."
4. "You actually did see what you think you saw."

Most people will discard 1 immediately - you know that you saw it, and you know that you didn't make it up. 2 isn't much better. Nobody wants to believe they're crazy. 3 is a possibility only if another explanation is available, and if the explanation is believable/squares with the person's own experience. It's really not very surprising at all that most people would pick #4, out of those choices.

* - This isn't limited to supernatural occurrences. Any eyewitness of odd events might experience these reactions.

[Ilena]

Well personally i dont have anything to say about aliens and all that but as for what is called "paranormal" i can say that i have personally seen future events, it operates randomly and normally when im between rem sleep and awake it seems, kind of a semi consous (SP), the events themselves are normally not important events, everyday kind of things, and i normally only remember the dream itself when the event accually happens and its more of a feeling, well i remember this, this this and this are going to happen and i move on normally. The best example i have is my friend and I were fishing for tadpoles when we were younger in a pond, i saw this far before it happened. That was the only time i have ever been there or seen that pond physicaly, so i know it is not a case of repeatedly doing it or being there before and such. Common term for this i believe is Deysha-vu (def SP).

[Solo]

People have been trying to prove that psychics exist for centuries and have not found a psychic phenomena that could stand up to the rigors of scientific testing.

Of course, if someone on a Internet website says they have magical powers, I suppose the best thing to do would be to contact researchers and have a well run, statistically sound scientific study done, no?

It's not like scientists are ganging up to stifle reports of psychic phenomena. You have nothing to lose by submitting yourself to a rigorous scientific test.

You'll probably have less free time, but isn't that a small price to pay for confirmation of psychic powers? You could revolutionize the world.

Or find out that your psychic powers are nothing, and have your dreams shattered, joining everyone else who has claimed psychic powers before.

Edit: This is in response to all who have claimed psychic powers in this thread - 2 people, I believe.

Edit 2:

to the person above me

it is not enough that we know of your successes, we must also know of your failures. How many times have you failed to predict the future? Statistically, how do you fare when predicting future phenomena? And how can you guarantee your memories of prediction are not contaminated later, as is what happens with eyewitnesses' memories of events?

These are just some of the hard questions you must be able to answer.

[Tempest Fennac]

I saw that documentary as well, Serpentine (I thought it was quite interesting). I know a lot of Von Daniken's research was made up, but I think the theory could hold a certain amount of truth to it (have you heard about the Dogon tribe in Africa having knowledge about the Sirius star system ages before Western science proved that they were right?). regarding the point about Icke's theories, the sad thing is that I've heard significantly less plausible theories then that one.

In regards to BugFix's question, I typically send Reki to anyone who needs it, so I don't know how I could do a controlled experiment without the ability to create exact clones of people before I start sending them Reiki. Regarding animals, I don't know anyone else who has learnt how to do it so I can't really ask anyone else to get in touch with the same animals as I do (most of the questions I ask are multiple choice such as "wha's your favourite food", or "where do you sleep", so there's less then a 50 chance of me getting those questions right).

[Ilena]

to the person above me

it is not enough that we know of your successes, we must also know of your failures. How many times have you failed to predict the future? Statistically, how do you fare when predicting future phenomena? And how can you guarantee your memories of prediction are not contaminated later, as is what happens with eyewitnesses' memories of events?

These are just some of the hard questions you must be able to answer.

Well, going in order, failed i would have to say out of all the dreams that i remember none (2 i did change how things played out, for example turned left instead of turning right when i came up to a main road, i did tell you they are odd more or less everyday thing), it is possible that there are some dreams that never happen IRL because the events that lead up to them dont happen and thus never come to pass, and thus ill never remember them. #2, would you mind discribing predicting future phenomena for me please, im not 100% sure i know what you are meaning there, #3 - i cannot guarantee the memories are not contaminated from previous events nor later from just remembering, the only thing i could say to that is this, i normally go by feeling, if something feels right then it is to me, when these events occur that is what i remember, the time of the event and that feeling of this has already happened comes, that is how i know, then the accual memories of the event that is going to happen in 1 - 5 seconds comes and i know exacly how it will play out. That is the point that i remember and i do not think it changes at all with future events/ passage of time.

[Semidi]

Fantastic statements require fantastic proof.

Ex. I have psychic powers. I predict that the price of stamps will go up in the next decade.

-Not a strong statement. Anyone without psychic powers could make that guess.

Ex. In the year 2008 May 24, the St. Peter's Basilica will collapse.

-Specific claim, specific date, unlikely event. If someone could show me that they predicted something like this, then I would certainly think that some psychics were credible.

Ex. In the year of the flaming duck, darkness will cover the city of dogs, and cause the beginning of the end days.

-it could be made to be more vague. But this is how the majority of predictions are written. They are vague enough so that many random events could arguably fit the predictions.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Ah well, actually, I am now totally convinced by the paranormal, and the existence of aliens. After all, the lack of convincing evidence for it just shows that the government's instituting a coverup.

[Tempest Fennac]

Illiterate Scribe, what's youe explanation of what happened at Roswell? (Same for a case in Brazil in 1996 where a UFO crashed and several aliens were apparently seen.)

[Solo]

(have you heard about the Dogon tribe in Africa having knowledge about the Sirius star system ages before Western science proved that they were right?).

You fail.

Western astronomers postulated the existence of a companion star to Sirius that they hypothesized must be small and dense in order to account for the gravitational wobble they observed. This occurred before the Dogon tribe gave their testimony. Cultural contamination is suspect.

Furthermore, if the Dogon people got astronomical knowledge from aliens, how come their belief system does not include more plants in our solar system that are visible with the naked eye? They only believe 5 planets exist: the solar system has 7 (or six, depending on how you look at it) planets. Incoming aliens would have noticed that; human observers on the ground would not have.

Similarily, their creation myths (involving twins and a basket) and other lore does not reflect anything other than colorful folk tradition and belief.

Well, that's not true. They also knew about Saturn's rings and the moons of Jupiter, but that knowledge was around long before them.

Conclusion: Coincidence or cultural contamination.

Scenario: A European visitor to the Dogon (missionary, explorer, whatever) talks with them about astronomy. As Sirius is significant to the Dogon, he tells them of the latest European discovery about Sirius, one hotly debated amongst the leading academia of his country; that Sirius has an invisible twin.

They take note of this and add it on to their legends about the star. Later explorers get their own theory about Sirius flung back in their face.*

Bit more plausible than alien visitors.

*This has happened before to Russians in Polynesian islands. They sand one of their Russian songs to a tribe, then visited another tribe after some time to find that the Russian song has spread over there, with no one of that tribe able to give an explaination as to where the song had originally come from. I take these examples from Carl Sagan's book Broca's Brain.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Illiterate Scribe, what's youe explanation of what happened at Roswell? (Same for a case in Brazil in 1996 where a UFO crashed and several aliens were apparently seen.)

I answer in a picture:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Nssl0020.jpg/395px-Nssl0020.jpg

i think military is a pretty cool guy. eh seems to be aleins and doesn't afraid of anything.

[Solo]

Illiterate Scribe, what's youe explanation of what happened at Roswell? (Same for a case in Brazil in 1996 where a UFO crashed and several aliens were apparently seen.)

The incident happened in the late 40's but it was 30 years until anyone made a big deal of them. At the time, it was ignored even by UFO researchers!

A lot can happen after thirty years. People's memories are contaminated; eyewitness testimonies to crime often show contamination after just a few days, how much greater must the affect be in thirty years?

There have been numerous testimonies about Roswel, many conflicting and contradictory, some made by people who have later been proved to be liars.

Conclusion: Something happened to be sure, since wreckage was recovered, but I doubt it was anything as grand as conspiracy theorists imagine.

Furthermore, I have to wonder how an alien spacecraft, after enduring the rigors of interstellar travel, far greater than any challenge on earth, manages to just go kaput and crach in the relative safety of our planet's atmosphere?

[Tempest Fennac]

I never knew that, Solo. All the books I've read which mentioned it said that scientists only discovered Sirius B decades after those 2 anthropologists studied them. IS, if it was a waether balloon and nothing else, why did the millitary initially claim it was a flying saucer, and why would several eye witnesses say that the wreckage looked nothing like a weather balloon? Does that theory also cover the Brazil sighting? Regarding Solo's Roswell point, could it have been somehow damaged after entering the Earth's atmosphere?

[reorith]

Furthermore, I have to wonder how an alien spacecraft, after enduring the rigors of interstellar travel, far greater than any challenge on earth, manages to just go kaput and crach in the relative safety of our planet's atmosphere?

it was made from soluble materials which lost integrity in the moisture of the atmosphere. paper ufos

[Ilena]

I neve rknew that, Solo. All the books I've read which mentioned it said that scientists only discovered Sirius B decades after those 2 anthropologists studied them. IS, if it was a waether balloon and nothing else, why did the millitary initially claim it was a flying saucer, and why would several eye witnesses say that the wreckage looked nothing like a weather balloon? Does that theory also cover the Brazil sighting? Regarding Solo's Roswell point, could it have been somehow damaged after entering the Earth's atmosphere?

What is this about Sirius B?

[Solo]

I neve rknew that, Solo. All the books I've read which mentioned it said that scientists only discovered Sirius B decades after those 2 anthropologists studied them.
Your books are wrong. As Carl Sagan points out in Broca's Brain Europeans know of Sirius a bit before the Dogon revealed their legends.

Also (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius#Discovery_of_a_companion),

In 1844, German astronomer Friedrich Bessel deduced from changes in the proper motion of Sirius that it had an unseen companion.[33] Nearly two decades later, on January 31, 1862, American telescope-maker and astronomer Alvan Graham Clark first observed the faint companion, which is now called Sirius B, or affectionately "the Pup".[34]

Or it could be a coincidence instead of cultural contamination. Sirius is an important star to those people, and twins feature heavily in their legends. (Remember the one about the creation of the world, with twins and a basket?)

Even if the Dogon were never told about Sirius from Europeans, they would have given Sirius a twin because of their own beliefs.


Regarding Solo's Roswell point, could it have been somehow damaged after entering the Earth's atmosphere?

With our primitive Earth technology, we have managed to make resuable space shuttles. What do you think aliens are capable of?

It's possible the craft was damaged in atmospheric reentry, but then again it's also possible that I am related to Ghengis Khan.


why did the millitary initially claim it was a flying saucer, and why would several eye witnesses say that the wreckage looked nothing like a weather balloon?

Well, to be fair, "flying saucer" was a hot term those days, kinda like the term "UFO" now, used as a catch-all for things that aren't necessarily properly classified as UFOs. The military guys who released the information would ahve been excessively liberal with the term.

Also, we don't know if he eye witnesses knew what a crashed weather balloon looked like to begin with....

Of course, I'm speculating here. Don't hold me to this, I'm just pointing out alternative explanations.

[Illiterate Scribe]

I neve rknew that, Solo. All the books I've read which mentioned it said that scientists only discovered Sirius B decades after those 2 anthropologists studied them. IS, if it was a waether balloon and nothing else, why did the millitary initially claim it was a flying saucer, and why would several eye witnesses say that the wreckage looked nothing like a weather balloon? Does that theory also cover the Brazil sighting? Regarding Solo's Roswell point, could it have been somehow damaged after entering the Earth's atmosphere?

I apologise, but the forum rules prevent me from answering that question. Perhaps you can infer from that what my answer would be. And my answer in no way references God.

[Ganurath]

The only reason I'm not into the paranormal stuff is because those involved locally have forbidden me, despite my past experience. Saw some sort of spirit a few years ago while bikeriding and nearly got run over by a car out of nowhere when following it... A girl in all white, and disappeared as soon as the car appeared.

There's other stuff, but it relates to what the Wiccans did allow me so crosses into religious territory.

[Tempest Fennac]

Weather conditions could have damaged it. (Don't worry about pointng out alternative explanations: it would be a boring debate if everyone agreed with me.:smalltongue:). Crixon, the Dogon Tribe claimed to have learnt about sirius B from a race of fish-like aliens called the Nomon. The informaton was concerned with sirius B's orbit as wee as the fact that it's much heavier then Sirius A dispite being smaller. They also claimed that the star system ghas an as of yet undiscovered 3rd star. Ganurath, what did you mean about being forbidden to talk about your experience?

[Solo]

The only reason I'm not into the paranormal stuff is because those involved locally have forbidden me, despite my past experience.
The scientific method disapproves.

[Solo]

Crixon, the Dogon Tribe claimed to have learnt about sirius B from a race of fish-like aliens called the Nomon.

Read about the Dogon in Carl Sagan's book. Read about them on Wikipedia. Nomon were not mentioned in either. Nor were they mentioned int he original reports by anthropologists. I think you've been getting some faulty information.

[Tom_Violence]

In regards to BugFix's question, I typically send Reki to anyone who needs it, so I don't know how I could do a controlled experiment without the ability to create exact clones of people before I start sending them Reiki. Regarding animals, I don't know anyone else who has learnt how to do it so I can't really ask anyone else to get in touch with the same animals as I do (most of the questions I ask are multiple choice such as "wha's your favourite food", or "where do you sleep", so there's less then a 50 chance of me getting those questions right).

Can you tell us more about these two things, such as the actual effects and procedures and whatnot? It sounds interesting, to say the least.


It's possible the craft was damaged in atmospheric reentry, but then again it's also possible that I am related to Ghengis Khan.

Quite likely, given the rumours about the guy. :smalltongue: And heck, if Dan Brown's right you're also probably related to Jesus.

[Tempest Fennac]

(Sorry about the mistake: they are apparently called Nommos according to my UGOlogy books: I got confused about their name). In regards to animal communication, I meant I was able to get more then 50% of my questions right when talking with animals (I'll try and find the instructions I used if you want them). Reiki involves channeling positive energy (I prefer to send it over IM or Gabbly: when I do it like this, the client and I form a mental link while we both focus on the health problem going away. I need at least 3 minutes to gather Reiki once we've started).


EDIT: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-59613.html . I posted the animal communication instructions exactly as I was given them (I'm sorry about my friend's punctuation and grammar).

[Solo]

(Sorry about the mistake: they are apparently called Nommos according to my UGOlogy books: I got confused about their name).

You mean the Dogon's deities? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nommo)

They do believe their gods came from Sirius, again note that it is an important star to them.

In the legends about their gods, notice the twin motif again.

These two concepts could have just reinforced one another as I pointed out earlier.

Anyways, if the Nommos were aliens and imparted astronomical knowledge unto the Dogon, how come so little else of their astronomical knowledge is scientifically correct?

Furthermore, the article itself reads:


An anthropologist studying the Dogon (namely Walter van Beek) found no evidence that they had any historical advanced knowledge of Sirius. Van Beek postulated that Griaule engaged in such leading and forceful questioning of his Dogon sources that new myths were created in the process by confabulation, writing that

"though they do speak about sigu tolo [what Griaule claimed was Sirius] they disagree completely with each other as to which star is meant; for some it is an invisible star that should rise to announce the sigu [festival], for another it is Venus that, through a different position, appears as sigu tolo. All agree, however, that they learned about the star from Griaule".[3]

Carl Sagan has noted that the first reported association of the Dogon with the knowledge of Sirius as a binary star was in the 1940’s, giving the Dogon ample opportunity to gain cosmological knowledge about Sirius and the solar system from more scientifically advanced, terrestrial societies whom they had come in contact with. It has also been pointed out that binary star systems like Sirius are theorized to have a very narrow or non-existent Habitable zone, and thus a high improbability of containing a planet capable of sustaining life (particularly life as dependent on water as the Nommos were reported to be).

Should give you some food for thought.

Not entirely sure about binary star systems necessarily having a narrow habitable zone; it is not always the case (for more information, I can PM you a paper I wrote on the subject of habitable zones), but I'm not in a mood to edit reality.

[Ganurath]

The scientific method disapproves.The scientific method also pees on the electric fence a second time to make sure it wasn't a fluke. As I understand, the forbiddance is a combination of concern for what I'd do with the insights they possess and for fear of my safety from the more dangerous elements of the world they understand.

[Tempest Fennac]

That sounds like an interesting paper, Solo (to be honest, I probably wouldn't understand much of it: scientific terminology confuses me). That sounds worrying, Ganurath (I won't ask anymore questions about it).

[Tom_Violence]

(Sorry about the mistake: they are apparently called Nommos according to my UGOlogy books: I got confused about their name). In regards to animal communication, I meant I was able to get more then 50% of my questions right when talking with animals (I'll try and find the instructions I used if you want them). Reiki involves channeling positive energy (I prefer to send it over IM or Gabbly: when I do it like this, the client and I form a mental link while we both focus on the health problem going away. I need at least 3 minutes to gather Reiki once we've started).


EDIT: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-59613.html . I posted the animal communication instructions exactly as I was given them (I'm sorry about my friend's punctuation and grammar).

That confused me more than anything else. The animal communication thing seems to involve just imagining you're talking to an animal. Or is the point that a friend of yours is supposed to ask you questions that only they and the animal know the answer to, and the animal is somehow talking through you? Also, what sort of health problems does your Reiki deal with, and what general results do you get?

[Solo]

The scientific method also pees on the electric fence a second time to make sure it wasn't a fluke.

Pass. Too easy. Not enough XP.


As I understand, the forbiddance is a combination of concern for what I'd do with the insights they possess and for fear of my safety from the more dangerous elements of the world they understand.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

[Ganurath]

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.Cost benefit analysis. These are friends of mine, so friendships are at risk just to acquire the information, nevermind how I'm assuming their concerns are invalid should I acquire the information.

[Tempest Fennac]

When I'm talking with animals, I typically as a friend who has an animal who I've never met if I could try talking with them. I then ask the animal the questions before giving my answers to the animal's carer so that they can confirm the answers. Reiki can help witha lot of different things (I was able to help 1 person with an ankle problem that they've had from years due to it getting broken before not being set properly. Apparently, the problem cleared up completely after I'd sent a few lots of it.) I've also been experimenting with using it to help people with exams (the effectiveness in these cases is practically impossible to measure scientifically, though).

[Ranna]

I am only interested in stuff that scares me, ghosts and fairies.

[Bayar]

Ok, first thing: My theory about Roswell is that they were covering a russian project. It was the cold war and the CIA wanted to cover the story, unwillingly sparking another conspiracy theory.

Now on the subject: Sometimes I can "feel" stuff. I can sense when someone will call on the phone, or that a certain movie will come up on TV without seeing any commercials about it. Yeah, this sounds more like gut feeling. But sometimes, I can feel things. Things that are not there. And that gives a chill down my spine.


When I'm talking with animals, I typically as a friend who has an animal who I've never met if I could try talking with them. I then ask the animal the questions before giving my answers to the animal's carer so that they can confirm the answers.

This happens to me all the time. It is about body language and true feelings. Animals can sense thoughts and fear.

[Shadowcaller]

Paranormal stuff huh?
Well personally I don't belive in the paranomal and I have never seen or heard anything that have convinced me otherwise.
I like to belive that everything can be explained without adding ghosts or well other supernatural (if you could call it that) explanations.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Ok, first thing: My theory about Roswell is that they were covering a russian project. It was the cold war and the CIA wanted to cover the story, unwillingly sparking another conspiracy theory.

Much more likely to be the Americans. They were the ones looking for nuclear weapons by that point.


Now on the subject: Sometimes I can "feel" stuff. I can sense when someone will call on the phone, or that a certain movie will come up on TV without seeing any commercials about it. Yeah, this sounds more like gut feeling. But sometimes, I can feel things. Things that are not there. And that gives a chill down my spine.

To echo others in the thread; what about all the times when gut feeling was wrong?


This happens to me all the time. It is about body language and true feelings. Animals can sense thoughts and fear.

Well, body language can be read to some extent (across species barriers, as well; but look out for false friends like chimps' smiles) but I'm sorry, 'speaking to animals'? No dice.

[Shademan]

Now on the subject: Sometimes I can "feel" stuff. I can sense when someone will call on the phone, or that a certain movie will come up on TV without seeing any commercials about it. Yeah, this sounds more like gut feeling. But sometimes, I can feel things. Things that are not there. And that gives a chill down my spine.


i have the same thing. on several occasions i have predicted the return of old shows on tv and other minor stuff.
i also get the feeling of deja vu unsettling often. tho' that might just be a "fault"
;P

[Mx.Silver]

Now on the subject: Sometimes I can "feel" stuff. I can sense when someone will call on the phone, or that a certain movie will come up on TV without seeing any commercials about it. Yeah, this sounds more like gut feeling. But sometimes, I can feel things. Things that are not there. And that gives a chill down my spine.


i have the same thing. on several occasions i have predicted the return of old shows on tv and other minor stuff.
i also get the feeling of deja vu unsettling often. tho' that might just be a "fault"
;P



The feeling thing is probably just coincidence. Something similar will happen to everyone at some point, particularly if your mind wanders a lot (I've done similar things with films on tv and phone calls). In all honesty, this shouldn't be that surprising, TV stations tend to favour certain films and shows so if you watch a lot of TV your guesses are going to be reasonably accurate. I'd be willing to bet that most of the time you won't be able to predict who's going to call you next with any degree of accuracy. Of course, this is perfectly hence the times when you do are going to be the ones you remember most clearly.

[WalkingTarget]

Personally, I haven't experienced anything external that could be even remotely considered paranormal or supernatural. I don't even get "creeped out" easily.

I occasionally have deja vu, and when I do it has the explicit feeling of being something that I saw/experienced in a dream (which is weird because I never actually remember my dreams). Not to say that I think this is particularly significant in any way, especially since I only ever get deja vu about mundane events and since I can't log my dreams it's not like I can keep track of any possible "predictions". I just chalk it up as something weird my brain does sometimes that's unimportant but I can't really quantify.

On the other hand, there's one of my brothers. He has seen 3 UFOs. By this he means that he has seen Objects that were Flying around that he was Unable to identify. I haven't pressed him on it, so I don't know if he has any particular theories about what they might have been.

[CurlyKitGirl]

:smallbiggrin: I love the smell of all my hobbies gathered into one place. Now as what I have to say, I'll spoiler it all in sections. Many of you may remember some of these theories from one of the other Supernatural threads I was involved in.

Ghosts/poltergeists/possessions and related occurences:

There is something that happened to me when I was, oh sixish. The Doll Experience. Two adult witnesses and somewhere in the archives is my post, including removal of most common explanations. Go find it somewhere.
Clearly there are people thinking of an urban legend that leaps into mind. Nothing like that - no matter how I made up 'the sequel'. :smallamused:
Still; that kickstarted my interest.
Somewhere I have an actual interview list where I asked people (admittedly many relations) about any experiences they had.
Where these things crossed over (and were mentioned as saying "I think [mum's name] seen something like it too." it was verified, but with small differences each time.
Strangers and friends also had significant evidence which corroberated with legends that they 'didn't know of'. Simple enough to explain away. I will announce right now that maybe 10% were not made up/obviously based on urban legends. And I'd concluded this by the time I was tenish.
I also have in possession one ghost photo (taken by me) that could not be explained in normal means and one I've seen first hand. One by digital camera: checking six photos pre- and post-this photo there is no chance of accidental exposure this way. Using my admittedly limited skill I checked out the original camera and photo on photoshop. It was still evident on the camera, no matter how I tried to explain it away.
Thing is, nothing was there bar my brother (and you can see the double exposure from the previous photo of where he was so it wasn't him) and my Mum saw it irst and scared the hell out of everyone else.
So I will concede that the majority of ghot sighting are fake or imagined. But here's the thing: every year there are probably two billion sightings. Now generally 98% can be explained somehow - hoax, accident, trick of the eye, whatever.
There's still that 2% though. And 2% of two billion (UK billion) is a lot.
Back in Y7 (eleven) me, another Y7 friend and a Y8 friend (twelve) were discussing ghosts.
We came to the conclusion that every second is its own indidvidual universe - a literal bubble of time - so that people who see ghosts are actually seeing snippets of time. Naturally, the bubbles can be as big as whatever event is recorded.The occurence was then categorised from the 'ghost' being unaware and carrying out its own actions each time - a simple recording.
One where actions change according to the events happening is a broken bubble where both bubbles know something is wrong.
Ones where the 'ghost' is trying to interact with a specific person is subconciously or deliberately (in their own time) trying to reach said experiencer are called deliberates for obvious reasons. This is a successful attempt to break their 'time bubble' for a pre-determined reason. This explains the typical 'visit from a loved one who died recently'. These are obviously stronger and more repeated the closer to their death this happens.
We then hypothesised that time bubbles were recorded because of a certain tendency of the environment being able to physically record and replay these occurences - we didn't have the vocabulary then, but we called it pyschic earth or 'something to do with magnetic things'.
All this in about half an hour max. Not bad eh? Considering that we were young and not very experienced at this sort of thing.

UFOs:
Life exists somewhere else. COnsidering the size of things of mathematical principalities.
Whether it's intelligent, as advanced as we are or more is doubtful. Even more so is thatthey would travel millions of light years to etch grafitti into crops and abduct people for no reason is rather foolish. Especially cow mutilations and what not.
One more statistic: in I don't know, let's say 100 years there've been 500 million (not entirely sure, but somewhere in the hundreds of millions) sghtings of 'UFOs'. 95% are easily disproved. The remaining 5% are more . . . confusing. Call it secret technology making up another 3% just because. So 2% truly unknown that not one single person can explain.

Vampires and witches and werewolves oh my!:
WItches who visit when you're asleep and can't move are almost certainly sleep paralysis. Same for succubii and incubii.
Those three (allowing werewolves to be any shapeshifter) are literally all over the world in one form or another from your stereotypical versions almost certainly of Europen origins to less common ones like the tik-tiks of the Phillipines.
I can't say with 100% certainty that there's been a verified case of tribes existing in perfect isolation from other tribes/populations. Perhaps the best case could be Aboriginal Australians - been there 60 000 years (help Serpie!) isolated pretty much for all of it bar 300 years. Now I know that tribes interact so we'll call it Australian legned now rather than individual tribes. Autralians have things which are clearly variants of the three above.
The following continents have been contimainted to hell by each other and cannot be counted as 'pure' sources thanks to amalgamations, mutations and cultural mixing: Europe, Africa, Asia. Thus, we can say that the people who emigrate from Asia to North America before the Bering Sea was a sea are probably more 'pure' myths of actual beings.
This then requires us to accept that there were no indiginous huans in either North, South or Central America.
A very likely premise. But then they evolve over time to match their own habitat. South/Central America has Tetzcatlipoca (sp?) and Quetzacoatl (sp?) who are pretty much derivatives of basic gods found everywhere. Both can shapeshift, but Quetzacoatl is (from what I can recall) white.
Three words: cultural contamination happens.
Still; these three are literally everywhere. This indicates a 'primal beast' or 'original beast' from which all come from. This is probably linked to the twelve supergroups of languages. And shaman-like traditions in every culture. Things like this indicate that at one point there were something like shapeshifters, vampires and witches. Possibly died out. Possibly still around. Almost definitely based on animals.
Either way; you can't say 'Ah! But x has these myths and are similar to y's myths bbecause of these things.' And, quite honestly, have you looked at them in detail.
Greek vampires had red hair. Tik-tiks are freaky bat things who rip a persons throat out for blood. Another type of Phillipine vampire feasts on spinal fluid and doesn't die until you destroy the head which acts independantly of th body.
Evidence of linking: yes. But twisted.

Psychic stuff:
Only 10% of the brain is used. Fact. What's the other 90% for? Say half that is like junk DNA and no longer useful. Still 45% left.
It's also unreliabe at best. It fluctuates all over the place. Sometimes it's seen, sometimes it doesn't work. It may only work once.
There is definitely more than five senses. More than ten; twenty; thirty. You have one where you can tell (sometimes) who's coming up behind you. Pyschic or other sense?
Personally pyschic skills are just activation of older, maybe archaic senses. Or new ones being tested out. These things do exist but aren't supernatural. Just part of chemicals in your brain reacting in newer and very different ways. And they're nothing like what people perceive pyschic skills.
Hell; 95% of the time in a bus bay of twenty odd buses I walk straight to one (of three) that's my bus. Not luck. Just skill. I tote it as pyschic but I can tell which one it is. I think, perhaps, that it could be a 'herd-sense' because I know a lot of people who catch those buses whom I've known for years. Or maybe it's deep-down pattern recognition. Just an example for you.

And in all these cases; where one success is picked up on and shown as proof, what about the hundreds where it's failed? Exemplifying only the good or bad shows it how you want it - biased to hell.
Ouija boards: unconcious human movement out of a deep primal desire to know you don't just end. You want to carry on forever. Have you ever sat down and thought one day I will stop and never be again. I have. With granny. She ended and it terrifies me. No afterlife means she can't see me again. I can't see anyone. Loneliness at the end is black and cold and nothing.
A lot of the time it's because of loneliness. We don't want to be alone. We want more than one world makes it easier to be.
Pratchett helps when you think of that. Humans have two sets of eyes. One is always closed to hide the truth. We're always a bit insane.
Those with two open sets of eyes are either terrifyingly sane or terrifyingly insane. It hurts to be aware of eerything. Some people see too mcuh that is empty ot maybe too much that is full.
They want shadows and dreams and promises. What if there's nothing beyond the dark desert? Just desert for more eternities than even Death can stand.

Wow. I apologise for what is probably my longest post and scary existentialism at the end.

[Shadowcaller]

That only 10 % of the brain is used is actually just a myth, just look here (http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/10percent.asp).

[CurlyKitGirl]

Ach, my apologies.
Can I amend that to: there are parts of the brain which have 'less common' uses and are not used for that specific purpose as often.
Even if I exhibit 'pyschic powers' according to friend I say it comes from a certain spot that hops around depending on my 'psychic' activty.
Admittedly a lot is bull, trying to see if they really believe me. But correct. How did I know what was on TV???
I point to the part of my head where memory is associated and say pyschic.

But there are sections of my brain I consider more 'paranormal' than others - mostly the hindbrain because it's where the monkey is. (Oh Pratchett my explainatron)

I'm not well versed in heads, brains and headology to explain it but when people have 'pyschic flashes' they tend to point to a certain part of their brain and say it came from there.
Not so much 10% only used; but a different way to use the 100%. Is that a better way to explain it?

[Mx.Silver]

Ghosts/poltergeists/possessions and related occurences:

There is something that happened to me when I was, oh sixish. The Doll Experience. Two adult witnesses and somewhere in the archives is my post, including removal of most common explanations. Go find it somewhere.
Clearly there are people thinking of an urban legend that leaps into mind. Nothing like that - no matter how I made up 'the sequel'. :smallamused:
Still; that kickstarted my interest.
Somewhere I have an actual interview list where I asked people (admittedly many relations) about any experiences they had.
Where these things crossed over (and were mentioned as saying "I think [mum's name] seen something like it too." it was verified, but with small differences each time.
Strangers and friends also had significant evidence which corroberated with legends that they 'didn't know of'. Simple enough to explain away. I will announce right now that maybe 10% were not made up/obviously based on urban legends. And I'd concluded this by the time I was tenish.
I also have in possession one ghost photo (taken by me) that could not be explained in normal means and one I've seen first hand. One by digital camera: checking six photos pre- and post-this photo there is no chance of accidental exposure this way. Using my admittedly limited skill I checked out the original camera and photo on photoshop. It was still evident on the camera, no matter how I tried to explain it away.
Thing is, nothing was there bar my brother (and you can see the double exposure from the previous photo of where he was so it wasn't him) and my Mum saw it irst and scared the hell out of everyone else.
So I will concede that the majority of ghot sighting are fake or imagined. But here's the thing: every year there are probably two billion sightings. Now generally 98% can be explained somehow - hoax, accident, trick of the eye, whatever.
There's still that 2% though. And 2% of two billion (UK billion) is a lot.
Back in Y7 (eleven) me, another Y7 friend and a Y8 friend (twelve) were discussing ghosts.
We came to the conclusion that every second is its own indidvidual universe - a literal bubble of time - so that people who see ghosts are actually seeing snippets of time. Naturally, the bubbles can be as big as whatever event is recorded.The occurence was then categorised from the 'ghost' being unaware and carrying out its own actions each time - a simple recording.
One where actions change according to the events happening is a broken bubble where both bubbles know something is wrong.
Ones where the 'ghost' is trying to interact with a specific person is subconciously or deliberately (in their own time) trying to reach said experiencer are called deliberates for obvious reasons. This is a successful attempt to break their 'time bubble' for a pre-determined reason. This explains the typical 'visit from a loved one who died recently'. These are obviously stronger and more repeated the closer to their death this happens.
We then hypothesised that time bubbles were recorded because of a certain tendency of the environment being able to physically record and replay these occurences - we didn't have the vocabulary then, but we called it pyschic earth or 'something to do with magnetic things'.
All this in about half an hour max. Not bad eh? Considering that we were young and not very experienced at this sort of thing.

UFOs:
Life exists somewhere else. COnsidering the size of things of mathematical principalities.
Whether it's intelligent, as advanced as we are or more is doubtful. Even more so is thatthey would travel millions of light years to etch grafitti into crops and abduct people for no reason is rather foolish. Especially cow mutilations and what not.
One more statistic: in I don't know, let's say 100 years there've been 500 million (not entirely sure, but somewhere in the hundreds of millions) sghtings of 'UFOs'. 95% are easily disproved. The remaining 5% are more . . . confusing. Call it secret technology making up another 3% just because. So 2% truly unknown that not one single person can explain.

These statistics you keep citing '2%/3%' of all these cases can't be explained by any living person'. Where are you getting these from as that's one hell of a claim you're making? I'd like to see some serious examples here, or else we may have to write it down as one of the 72.4% of all statistics that are made-up on the spot:smallwink:


Psychic stuff:
Only 10% of the brain is used. Fact. What's the other 90% for? Say half that is like junk DNA and no longer useful. Still 45% left.
Complete myth with no scientific basis whatsoever. It's actually the exact opposite of a fact, it's just a misunderstanding that's been repeated so often everyone thinks it's true.


A lot of the time it's because of loneliness. We don't want to be alone. We want more than one world makes it easier to be.
Pratchett helps when you think of that. Humans have two sets of eyes. One is always closed to hide the truth. We're always a bit insane.
Umm, no humans have one pair of eyes. Count them if you want.


But there are sections of my brain I consider more 'paranormal' than others - mostly the hindbrain because it's where the monkey is. (Oh Pratchett my explainatron)
Why?



I'm not well versed in heads, brains and headology to explain it but when people have 'pyschic flashes' they tend to point to a certain part of their brain and say it came from there.
Not evidence, unless they've been hooked-up to a machine which measures brain activity. The brain has no capacity to feel touch or pain so any feeling of 'where it came from' are unlikely to be more than guesswork.

[WalkingTarget]

Only 10% of the brain is used. Fact. What's the other 90% for?

A lot of the brain mass (possibly up to a 10 to 1 ratio) is made of glial cells rather than neurons.

From wikipedia: "The four main functions of glial (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glial_cells) cells are to surround neurons and hold them in place, to supply nutrients and oxygen to neurons, to insulate one neuron from another, and to destroy pathogens and remove dead neurons."

Maybe 90% of the brain is structural. These cells aren't supposed to be doing any "thinking" or whatever. It's like saying that only 10% (or some other small amount) of our skeleton is doing anything because the calcified parts aren't producing blood cells like the marrow is.

edit - ack, like triple ninja'd there.

[Shadowcaller]

Ach, my apologies.
Can I amend that to: there are parts of the brain which have 'less common' uses and are not used for that specific purpose as often.
Even if I exhibit 'pyschic powers' according to friend I say it comes from a certain spot that hops around depending on my 'psychic' activty.
Admittedly a lot is bull, trying to see if they really believe me. But correct. How did I know what was on TV???
I point to the part of my head where memory is associated and say pyschic.

But there are sections of my brain I consider more 'paranormal' than others - mostly the hindbrain because it's where the monkey is. (Oh Pratchett my explainatron)

I'm not well versed in heads, brains and headology to explain it but when people have 'pyschic flashes' they tend to point to a certain part of their brain and say it came from there.
Not so much 10% only used; but a different way to use the 100%. Is that a better way to explain it?

Well I guess so, we don't use our whole brain at the same time of course.
Different parts at different times depending on the situation.
But that some parts of our brains have some kind of "mystical" uses are hard to belive since most of the brain is just structual.

Edit: Ninjad...

[CurlyKitGirl]

Umm, no humans have one pair of eyes. Count them if you want. Metaphor clearly doesn't work on you does it? Pratchett metaphor. Read the Tiffany books and you'll understand.


Why?
Because I'm a seventeen year old girl who, although she tries doesn't have an adequate vocabulary or sophisticated enough lexis to explain things. The monkey is the primal part of the brain: run away from things that growl and have pointy teeth for example.
He is a good wordsmith who can explain things that can be understood by Joe Commoner.



Not evidence, unless they've been hooked-up to a machine which measures brain activity. The brain has no capacity to feel touch or pain so any feeling of 'where it came from' are unlikely to be more than guesswork.
If someone stares at you long enough you feel it.
That's a 'sixth sense'. You're aware of something you can't 'see' or touch. Or how about that old saying, 'I feel it in my water'?
You try explaining something you shouldn't know when it's a guess or hunch or you feel it's right for some reason. I point to somewhere and say something.

[Mx.Silver]

Metaphor clearly doesn't work on you does it? Pratchett metaphor. Read the Tiffany books and you'll understand.
Actually, he uses the metaphors 'sight' rather than eyes, specifically second sight being the one everyone uses which filters everything through preconceived conceptions and first sight (common to witches) being used to see how things really are.



Because I'm a seventeen year old girl who, although she tries doesn't have an adequate vocabulary or sophisticated enough lexis to explain things. The monkey is the primal part of the brain: run away from things that growl and have pointy teeth for example.
I mean why do you consider some parts of your brain more 'paranormal' than others? What special qualities do these parts have that others don't?




If someone stares at you long enough you feel it.
Evidence?


That's a 'sixth sense'. You're aware of something you can't 'see' or touch. Or how about that old saying, 'I feel it in my water'?
You try explaining something you shouldn't know when it's a guess or hunch or you feel it's right for some reason. I point to somewhere and say something.

This still doesn't give any indication that there 'psychic flashes' are from that area of the brain.

[Shadowcaller]

Because I'm a seventeen year old girl who, although she tries doesn't have an adequate vocabulary or sophisticated enough lexis to explain things. The monkey is the primal part of the brain: run away from things that growl and have pointy teeth for example.
He is a good wordsmith who can explain things that can be understood by Joe Commoner.

Don't worry about your inner vocabulary, I have English as my second language and I manage to make myself understand quite well on the forum (I think at least:smalleek:)


If someone stares at you long enough you feel it. That's a 'sixth sense'. You're aware of something you can't 'see' or touch. Or how about that old saying, 'I feel it in my water'?
You try explaining something you shouldn't know when it's a guess or hunch or you feel it's right for some reason. I point to somewhere and say something.

Well lets say you sit on a bus reading and there is someone staring at you.
Now your eyes are focused on the words in the book but you can still unconsciously see the man at the edge of your vision but since your eyes are not focused on him you are not aware that he is staring at you.
But as soon as your brain (still unconsciously) is being aware that that person is staring you will notice it.
At the same can be said about a person that is behind you, you can hear him breath or move but we easily confuse this with some kind of "super-sense" since its all unconsciously.
We would not "feel" if a person would look at us through a hidden surveillance camera since the camera don't breath or move and we would not "feel" a person that is looking at us from a large distance either.
This "sense" is nothing more then our own normal senses like hearing and seeing that works unconsciously.

[Tom_Violence]

Ah, chalk up yet another reason why one should be very careful about writing 'Fact.' after a sentence. Any sentence.


Well lets say you sit on a bus reading and there is someone staring at you.
Now your eyes are focused on the words in the book but you can still unconsciously see the man at the edge of your vision but since your eyes are not focused on him you are not aware that he is staring at you.
But as soon as your brain (still unconsciously) is being aware that that person is staring you will notice it.
At the same can be said about a person that is behind you, you can hear him breath or move but we easily confuse this with some kind of "super-sense" since its all unconsciously.
We would not "feel" if a person would look at us through a hidden surveillance camera since the camera don't breath or move and we would not "feel" a person that is looking at us from a large distance either.
This "sense" is nothing more then our own normal senses like hearing and seeing that works unconsciously.

I think this brings up an interesting question for the entire debate. Just as the person who believes in paranormal activity cannot be readily argued against due to the wonderful fall-back of "ah, but your science just can't detect this stuff!", so those that rely on explanations of human psychology have a similiar response. Instead their's is "ah, but no matter what you may think its just something in your brain playing tricks on you!" Clearly, a Post Modernist can have a frigging field day with this stuff. Sadly, my opinion of Post Modernists cannot be safely put into words here. :smalltongue:

Anyway, it never hurts to get a new perspective on things. Given that our knowledge of human psychology is by no means perfect (though based on a more accepted method than what most paranormalists opt for, I dare say, but merely one possible method among many), its difficult to absolutely refute a lot of this stuff. Still though, the burden of proof is doubtless with them that have seen things.

[Aereshaa_the_2nd]

Ghosts, Aliens, anything that is claimed to defy physics:
If it defies basic physics, I'm not gonna believe it. Aliens defy physics because It would take a LOT of energy to transport anything from the nearest planet capable of supporting intelligent life to earth, at any speed that would get them there before the earth was destroyed. Frankly I think that a lot of ufo sightings are experimental planes, helicopters or rockets. Or the people are just having hallucinations from drugs/mental illness/being hit on the head.

Werewolves, Vampires, Angels, Demons, any anthropomorphic animals:
No. Just no. It is impossible to breed animals with humans, the human body rejects animal limbs, and if you made wings from wood and leather or whatever, you would need the strength of horses to flap fast enough. Werewolves must be exaggerated reports of attacks by vicious wolf packs or big dogs. Vampires are defamatory reports of barons, or possibly of simple murderers who happen to be insane enough to drink blood. Incubi: "Oh, yeah, I was raped in my sleep by a demon, yeah, I wasn't cheating on you!"

Cryptids:
I find these very plausible, especially the kraken, and things like trolls and dwarfs. For the kraken, I remind you that squids and octopuses of gigantic size DO exist, and probably ones at the scale of a ship, too. Therefore, a fishing vessel, in other words a big meal with a crunchy outside, would make a good meal for one of these. For trolls, consider that we lived alongside the neanderthals for quite some time, and that they had traits we associate with trolls: stronger, stupider, walk with a stoop, low brow, jutting out mouth. Although we currently think that they died out a long time ago, I think that given that there was no mass-extinction event, and genocide usually has quite a few survivors, a few could have survived until the early days of the romans. Chances are, cryptid monsters, stuff from bygone epochs, could easily survive in someplace. I mean, look at coelacanths!

EDIT: I don't like the idea of psychology on any level higher than 'You're friggin nuts'. I prefer easy explanations like 'you're nuts' 'you're lying' 'you were drunk' 'you were higher than a satellite' or 'you're gullible' to any complicated psychology stuff.

[Serpentine]

Thoroughly discredited by the scientific community.


Every theory he proposes has more plausible, human based explanations.

heck, the fact that the alternative explanations are human based makes them more plausible to begin with...

Take the Nazca lines. VD believed them to have been made by aliens as a sort of giant airport.

Disregarding the question of why advanced aliens would need dirt marking sto land their super advanced aircraft with, let us answer the question of whether or not it is possible for humans to construct the Nazca lines.

The answer is yes; researchers such as Joe Nickell of the University of Kentucky, have reproduced, without aerial supervision, the figures using the technology available to the Nazca people of the time.

At the sites of the Nazca lines, even, there have been found remains of rope, stakes, and other primitive pieces of tools and equipment.

Thus we conclude that it was ancient man who build the Nazca lines, not aliens - or at least, if aliens did do it, then they used the same primitive technology that the Indians had available back then.Yeah, I know. I was mostly just asking because I wanted to mention the woman who studied the Nazca lines for decades. When she heard of Von Daniken's theory that they were "alien runways", she didn't ridicule him or dismiss the whole alien idea or anything. She simply said, "I'm afraid their ships would sink in the sand...". Underneath the black rocks on the surface (the moving around of which is how the lines were built), is deep, soft, white sand. It wouldn't be able to hold a huge spaceship. For your own interest, I recommend Crash Go the Chariots - An Alternative to Chariots of the Gods, by Clifford Wilson. I haven't read Chariots of the Gods (I wanted to, for an assignment, but couldn't find it), but I have read this. All very sensible. So far as I can tell, it goes through and picks out every single major point made by Von Daniken and exposes a whooooole lot of bad research.

The scientific method also pees on the electric fence a second time to make sure it wasn't a fluke.Yep. In fact, it would get scores of different people on different types of electric fences in different environmental conditions peeing on them at different times of day under varying weather conditions. What's your point?

I can't say with 100% certainty that there's been a verified case of tribes existing in perfect isolation from other tribes/populations. Perhaps the best case could be Aboriginal Australians - been there 60 000 years (help Serpie!) isolated pretty much for all of it bar 300 years. Now I know that tribes interact so we'll call it Australian legned now rather than individual tribes. Autralians have things which are clearly variants of the three above.(Hi Curly! ^_^) They got here between something like 45,000 and 75,000 years ago, but there would have been some crossover for a while. I'm not sure how closely linked the people of northern Queensland are too those of Papua New Guinea, but it seems as though they were cut off from the Maori for some time. Anyway, don't forget about the Devil Dog (in Night Creatures, I think. One of the black ones, anyway) - a dingo man who sleeps under the sand until a bird calls, when it awakens and goes on a murderous rampage until driven back under the sand to sleep. Some similarities to werewolves. I'd actually really like to do my PhD on these sorts of things (specifically: Why are these various things found all over the world?), but I don't know whether I'll be able to :smallfrown:

Ghosts I'm undecided on. My sister said once that she thought our grandfather was still around, and would hold doors open for her. I can accept that there's something going on, but people coming back from the dead as whispy pale things to go around spooking people? Meh. As my... one of my parents, I forget which, said, "If you were dead and in the afterlife, would you want to come all the way back just to have to talk to that tit Edwards?"

[Ganurath]

Yep. In fact, it would get scores of different people on different types of electric fences in different environmental conditions peeing on them at different times of day under varying weather conditions. What's your point?That there's a point where ignorance actually is bliss, and knowledge actually is folly. Putting one's mind, body, and friendships in danger to gain knowledge that, if valid, contradicts our comprehension of reality? Would you go that far?

[Solo]

Your detect sarcasm meter is broken.

Anyways, as demonstrated on Myth Busters, scientists would model a dummy's urination system to that of a humans then line up a ton of tests with said dummies.


That there's a point where ignorance actually is bliss, and knowledge actually is folly.

If only Galileo has your spirit!

[Tempest Fennac]

In regards to vampires, a lot of those ledgends may have been started by members of the Eastern European aristocracy becoming so inbred that they invented an inherited disease which produced some vampire-like symptoms, suchj as an aversion to sunlight and bleeding gums (I think). I've seen some sources claim that up to 20% or so of UFO sightings haven't been sloved yet (I don't know where the book in question is, so I can't check the souce, though). Other sources have claimed that around 2 or 3% of sightings are never solved.

[Illiterate Scribe]

I've seen some sources claim that up to 20% or so of UFO sightings haven't been sloved yet (I don't know where the book in question is, so I can't check the souce, though). Other sources have claimed that around 2 or 3% of sightings are never solved.

[Citation Needed]

[Ganurath]

If only Galileo has your spirit!Eh, at least you do. Or did you not realize the part of the post you cut out was the real meat of what I was saying?

[Tempest Fennac]

I know that, IS. As I said, I don't know where the book is, but I'll try to find it later.

[Solo]

Eh, at least you do. Or did you not realize the part of the post you cut out was the real meat of what I was saying?

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Look, there is simply no proof that spirits and things exist, so to not explore that field out of fear of things that don't exist is frankly irrational.


Putting one's mind, body, and friendships in danger to gain knowledge that, if valid, contradicts our comprehension of reality? Would you go that far?
Pierre and Marie Curie. That is all.

[Tom_Violence]

Pierre and Marie Curie. That is all.

Or, indeed, Galileo again. To turn down an obvious opportuinity to further one's knowledge of such a hotly debated phenomenon seems at best to be a tremendously unnecessary form of Conservatism, or at worst to be a cop-out. Basically, most reasonable people will probably assume that there's a lot more to it than meets the eye. My opinion is that its often much nicer to sit back and comfortably assume that one has magical powers than to go any further with it and risk losing that, and communities based around such things are unsurprisingly insular for just such a reason.

[Don Julio Anejo]

In regards to psychology explanations, I actually have a few things.

One is the concept of collective unconscious - that is, the idea of every person having certain information already preprogrammed into them through DNA. Best evidence that exists for it is that 1. infants already know basic laws of physics (please don't make me quote sources in APA format, I get enough of that at school but I'll find the research papers for this and other stuff if someone asks) and Noam Chomsky work on language that shows all languages are fundamentally similar (for example, all languages have words, they are nouns/verbs/pronouns/other parts of speech, words form sentences... different endings (suffixes) change the meaning of words in similar ways... etc). The only difference between say English and Swahili is the order in which words usually form sentences.

We also have coding that lets us distinguish emotions regardless of culture, we instinctively know that a big animal showing its teeth is scary, especially if it's growling and it has fangs, etcetera.

What this means? It means that we share a lot of common concepts. Which means it's quite possible that every culture makes up fundamentally the same monsters such as werewolves, vampires and demons because we're afraid of the same things. Because if you look at it objectively, what's so scary about a werewolf except from it being a giant wolf? Wouldn't a giant wolf be scary enough on its own? Well, unlike a regular giant wolf, it's a lot more difficult to hunt down a werewolf, or even find out who it is. Because it's disguised as one of us. Which is what we're afraid of - one of us being a monster (for example, that nice man who lives down the street and pays you to mow his lawn) and not the giant wolf in itself.

Of course it's just as possible that werewolves and vampires really DO exist and our modern scientifically-minded society TELLS us that they don't exist so most people assume they don't exist and call everyone who does crazy/stupid/high on drugs.

As for paranormal stuff? Just because we can't scientifically prove it isn't there doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't exist. Heck, until 1522 (when Magellan's expedition returned to Spain) we didn't even know for sure that the earth was round, all we had to go on were mathematical models. But it didn't mean the earth was flat because everyone believed it was, it just meant we didn't have the technology to confirm it was round. I'm not saying ghosts and the like exist, I'm just saying that at this point they very well might.

PS: a very, very large percentage of UFOs on photographs are caused by little pieces of dust in the lens or near the film/sensor of a camera. Any photographer who's been shooting long enough will have their share of flying saucers.

PPS: again, just because it would take too much energy for aliens to come to Earth doesn't mean it's not possible. Because we're doing calculations based on OUR methods of space travel (in effect, horribly inefficient rockets in one form of another). Doesn't mean that there isn't an easier way to do it that no-one's thought of yet.

[Solo]

One is the concept of collective unconscious - that is, the idea of every person having certain information already preprogrammed into them through DNA. Best evidence that exists for it is that 1. infants already know basic laws of physics (please don't make me quote sources in APA format, I get enough of that at school but I'll find the research papers for this and other stuff if someone asks)
Well, babies know that solid objects can't go through other solid objects and basic things like that, probably from observing solid objects not going through other solid objects...



As for paranormal stuff? Just because we can't scientifically prove it isn't there doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't exist. Heck, until 1522 (when Magellan's expedition returned to Spain) we didn't even know for sure that the earth was round,
Bad example. The ancient Greeks knew the Earth was round centuries before Magellan.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Well, babies know that solid objects can't go through other solid objects and basic things like that, probably from observing solid objects not going through other solid objects...
The experiment done included infants about three months old. But the thing is that they wouldn't be able to learn this from observation (or at least they would have very little time to do so) because babies have very poor eyesight at birth and it takes several months to get to the same level as healthy adult sight. When born they can barely distinguish shapes more than a foot or so away from them.

Bad example. The ancient Greeks knew the Earth was round centuries before Magellan.
As I said, mathematical models. While Eratosthenes (sp?) did calculate the Earth's circumference to around 40,000 kilometers (he was off by only around 500km), it was a MATHEMATICAL model. He used the distance of a shadow given off by a stick in two different places to figure out how big of an angle (think sectors in a circle) separates the two cities and multiplied it by the distance between them (one was directly south from another), but no CONCRETE, OBSERVABLE proof was given. From the perspective of most people he just measured a couple of shadows and gave a couple of numbers. And even then he already made the assumption that the earth was round without offering any proof for it - a big no-no in science.

[Solo]

Actually, didn't the Greeks also observe the shape of the shadow of the earth when it eclipsed the moon, and the fact that a ship sailing off would disappear from bottom up rather than gradually grow smaller, and use that information as supporting evidence for the round earth theory?

[Mx.Silver]

Actually, didn't the Greeks also observe the shape of the shadow of the earth when it eclipsed the moon, and the fact that a ship sailing off would disappear from bottom up rather than gradually grow smaller, and use that information as supporting evidence for the round earth theory?

From what I'm given to understand, yes. Some Greek philosophers also postulated that the earth orbited the sun and suggested the existence of atoms, although neither proved very popular.

[The Rose Dragon]

Bad example. The ancient Greeks knew the Earth was round centuries before Magellan.

Hell, the Egyptians calculated the radius of the Earth centuries before Magellan.

[Serpentine]

That there's a point where ignorance actually is bliss, and knowledge actually is folly. Putting one's mind, body, and friendships in danger to gain knowledge that, if valid, contradicts our comprehension of reality? Would you go that far?:smallconfused:
Science is about coming to an understanding of reality. If it turns out that what we've got so far is wrong, well, so be it. Science is allowed to be wrong. It has a long, proud history of being wrong. With every theory that's discarded as false, the list of possible truths is reduced by one. It also has a long, proud (and sometimes not-so-proud) history of making great sacrifices for great discoveries.
If your only contribution to a discussion is that you "can't discuss it", you're not contributing anything at all. There's no real purpose that I can see, except maybe to attract antagonism, and no possible result except the digression of the discussion.

[CurlyKitGirl]

@Don Julio Angejo: thank you! That's what I was trying to explain (and poorly). You can probably explain so many related/similar myths/paranormal happenings all over the world because of collective conciousness or whatever.

@Serpie: cheers! Now with some of her Australian myths I can rip one out right now,
Blak dog?!?
Britian so, like, totally has blak dogs too!!! It's like, so awesum, I bet they're real!!1 How else could this happen?????

Explanation: who isn't afraid of a freakin' enormous black dog looming out of you from a dark empty space and has glowy eyes because of the fire/light around you?


Poltergeists now; they intrigue me. I'd like like for them to be real for the hilarity of it.

And the way people go over the top because of some curse or haunting.
The Winchester House anyone? Wife of the man who invented them 9type of gun) was haunted by 'the souls of all who were killed by her husbands' weapons' and would either kill her/drive her insane or your standard haunting reasons. And the only way to make sure they didn't was to keep rebuilding and renovating her house because it would confuse the ghosts and get them lost.

[Don Julio Anejo]

I'd like to introduce another concept from psychology - confirmation bias. It can be described in one sentence - we look for information that supports our beliefs and disregard any information that doesn't. Generally, most people do it without even realizing, unless they specifically try to be objective or they know about it and consciously try to avoid doing it.

What this means? If you think you might be a little bit psychic, chances are you will remember all the times you were right about something happening (i.e. phone call, someone at the door, etc), but since not being right has no significance (it doesn't support your beliefs nor is it in any way interesting), you don't remember it.

It's also applicable to ancient theories - the Greeks theorized a lot of stuff. Very hard not to considering they had a great many philosophers and they supported their work (unlike say, the middle ages where any research was done underground). However, we only tend to notice things they were right about like the atoms, earth moving around the sun, etc. Someone studying classical philosophers would probably have a pretty good idea about what the Greeks theorized (including stuff that later turned out to be complete load of crap), but most of us aren't scholars studying Greek philosophy.

Therefore, we only know about the things they got right because they are pretty well publicized these days.

2Solo: hm, never knew about that... Thanks, I'll go read up on it.

About the Earth's circumference - calculating something isn't giving definite proof, it's making a theory that has to be confirmed or disproved. The Greeks proposed a theory, however it was Magellan who confirmed it. That's what I'm trying to say. Because for example we already have a working theory for time travel. However we still believe it to be impossible mainly because there's no way we can confirm it because currently nothing can move at the speeds close enough to go to the future.

[Solo]

The Winchester House anyone? Wife of the man who invented them 9type of gun) was haunted by 'the souls of all who were killed by her husbands' weapons' and would either kill her/drive her insane or your standard haunting reasons. And the only way to make sure they didn't was to keep rebuilding and renovating her house because it would confuse the ghosts and get them lost.

Uh, no.

I've been there. It's not haunted; Sarah Winchester was just nuts and thought she was haunted. Nothing paranormal happens in the Winchester house, as far as the guide told me.

And the Winchesters invented a lot more than just one rifle.

[Serpentine]

Hee, I love the Winchester House story! :smallbiggrin: I'm going to go see it some day.
Oh Solo. She was just telling the story, not saying she believed it :smallsigh: She also meantioned "weapons", with absolutely no implication that she thought he made only one. The company was, after all, called "Winchester Repeating Arms Company". 'course, if she was nuts, who's to say that it wasn't just the ghosts of people killed by that one famous rifle?
'parrently there was a massive earthquake when she was sleeping in one of the rooms. She thought the ghosts had found her, so she boarded it up and never used it again.

Don: Good explaination of that phenomena.

[reorith]

eh you've seen one spooky house, you've seen them all

[Ganurath]

:smallconfused:
Science is about coming to an understanding of reality. If it turns out that what we've got so far is wrong, well, so be it. Science is allowed to be wrong. It has a long, proud history of being wrong. With every theory that's discarded as false, the list of possible truths is reduced by one. It also has a long, proud (and sometimes not-so-proud) history of making great sacrifices for great discoveries.Science is indeed about coming to an understanding of reality, proving and disproving. However, what if reality is defined by the cumulative unconcious perceptions of sentient minds? It would explain a lot of the material discussed in this thread, as well as other more mundane things like placebo. Although I do respect the pursuit of truth, it is because of this possibility that I cannot agree with with a behavior that causes an entropy of potential.

[Don Julio Anejo]

Science is indeed about coming to an understanding of reality, proving and disproving. However, what if reality is defined by the cumulative unconcious perceptions of sentient minds?
Welcome to the Matrix, Mister Anderson.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Science is indeed about coming to an understanding of reality, proving and disproving. However, what if reality is defined by the cumulative unconcious perceptions of sentient minds? It would explain a lot of the material discussed in this thread, as well as other more mundane things like placebo. Although I do respect the pursuit of truth, it is because of this possibility that I cannot agree with with a behavior that causes an entropy of potential.

Well, there is Godel's Incompleteness Theorem, but still.


Hee, I love the Winchester House story! :smallbiggrin: I'm going to go see it some day.
Oh Solo. She was just telling the story, not saying she believed it :smallsigh: She also meantioned "weapons", with absolutely no implication that she thought he made only one. The company was, after all, called "Winchester Repeating Arms Company". 'course, if she was nuts, who's to say that it wasn't just the ghosts of people killed by that one famous rifle?

Some would argue that 'why' is a better way of approaching the question that 'why not'. Burden of proof, etc.

[ghost_warlock]

Science is indeed about coming to an understanding of reality, proving and disproving.

Well, science is about disproving vs. failing to disprove something. When scientists fail to disprove something after numerous trials you can generally assume that it's fact so long as those trials stand up to scrutiny by other scientists that they're measuring what is claimed to be measured, the measurements are accurate, and the tests can be repeated independently. Science has a long and glorious history of revealing truth by proving things wrong.


However, what if reality is defined by the cumulative unconcious perceptions of sentient minds?

No. There is no evidence to suggest this is the case. As for evidence to suggest this is not the case, think of all the times that the majority opinion on reality turned out to be dead wrong. Many discovered facts about the universe are counter-intuitive (against what people would assume without thinking deeply about the issue). Example: the earth revolves around the sun. From the readily observable environment on earth, the collective unconscious for thousands of years could only assume that the sun is a small orb of fire that circumnavigates the earth daily.


Although I do respect the pursuit of truth, it is because of this possibility that I cannot agree with with a behavior that causes an entropy of potential.

Are you saying that you disagree with ideas that impose limits on possibility simply because they limit what's possible? Just because something is technically possible, it does not also follow that it is probable. If so, unfortunately, the laws of the universe do not kowtow to our emotional well-being. Truth will remain truth regardless of our emotional attachment to a false idea. An idea or opinion may make us feel good or safe, but it does not mean that the idea or opinion is true. In every instance, I have preferred to stand with the truth and face the consequences rather than living under a security blanket and dwelling on what could be, but is not. Of course, I say this on a internet message board dedicated to a fantasy-based webcomic! :smallbiggrin: I guess it's nice to play pretend every once in a while. :smallredface:

Or, are you just saying that you don't think scientists (or other people) should risk their well-being to test their hypotheses? Here, I agree, we need to rely on your cost-analysis; learn not to make silly, harmful choices for ourselves. Unfortunately, there is no way to arrive at an objective value for the potentiality of a life but I'd like to think that the sacrifices great men and women have made to advance science have been more than made up for by those whose lives they enriched by their selfless pursuit of truth.

Anyway...my views on the paranormal:

UFO's - intelligent alien lifeforms may have existed in the past/exist now/one day exist, but they are unlikely in the extreme to ever come into contact with, or even discover the presence of, humans while we exist.
Vampires - not real, even if they only fed once a month (unlikely), they would quickly overpopulate their food source and become extinct.
Werewolves - regrettably, not real because shape-shifting on the scale required for a werewolf would be structurally/energetically impossible.
Ghosts - not real, violate far too many laws of physics; for instance an incorporeal being would not be able to simultaneously move (except as gravity dictates) and also ignore solid barriers because both of these tasks involve friction - a ghost would have to be able to selectively turn off it's ability to have friction (absurd) in order to pass through a solid surface, but by doing so it would become unable to move forward!
Cryptids - need to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. The Loch Ness monster, bigfoot, and other popular cases are unlikely because of the heavily populated nature of their assumed territory. Mountain lions are also extremely shy and elusive but anecdotal evidence (poop and tracks) can be easily found and modern technology makes it difficult for even these creatures to hide if they're being tracked by a well-outfitted crew. With the amount of technology and man-hours dumped into looking for Nessie, she more than likely would have been discovered if she actually existed. Others are probably more or less likely depending on circumstances. In general, if it's a large predatory creature that haunts populated areas we'd have discovered it and if it uses shapeshifting or something like that to hide for detection it's more than likely not real because magic is not real (see werewolves, above, for shapeshifting).
Psychic Abilities - No more than the most circumstantial or questionable evidence has ever been found to suggest these are real phenomenon. The James Randi Educational Foundation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Randi_Educational_Foundation) is offering a $1,000,000 prize to anyone who can demonstrate evidence of these phenomenon under conditions agreed upon by both parties (scientifically testable). Nobody has ever claimed the prize money.

[Solo]

'course, if she was nuts, who's to say that it wasn't just the ghosts of people killed by that one famous rifle?
Perhaps a dialogue will demonstrate why I find that scenario hard to swallow.


"Hello brother Spring Doe Who Runs in the Summer! I have just been shot by a pale face!"

"Brother, that is horrible! You must enact your revenge from beyond the grave at once!"

"Yes, I shall proceed to have my spirit haunt the pale face responsible for my unfortunate death!"

"No, brother, you are doing it wrong! You must not haunt the pale face that shot you, but instead haunt the wife of the man who invented the rifle that the pale face used to shoot you!"

"Verily! By haunting the widow who had nothing to do with my death other than by having married the man who invented the gun that was used by the pale face to shoot me, I shall surely have my just and deserved revenge! I shall be off to make life miserable for her at once by making her mentally unsound!"

"Good show, brother! You shall surely teach pale face women not to marry men who design weapons, lets the deceased spirits of those killed by the weapons her husband designed come to haunt her as opposed to haunting those who had a more direct involvement in their deaths! I wish you the best of luck in avenging your untimely demise."


Also, how come other weapon designers (and their families) did not suffer any ill effects from the ghosts of people killed by their weapons?

John Moses Browning, Samuel Colt, Horace Smith, Daniel B. Wesson, Paul Mauser, Mickhail Kalashnikov, Sergei Simonov, Dieudonne Saive, and John C. Garand designed some of the world's most popular firearms, which were used in many conflicts and no doubt killed millions, yet not one of them suffered from hauntings by the spirits of people killed with their weapons.

It seems far, far more probable to conclude that Sara Winchester was as batty at the Bat Cave as opposed to having actually been haunted, since the alternative raises the issue of why other weapons designers were not troubled.


However, what if reality is defined by the cumulative unconcious perceptions of sentient minds?
Then my girlfriend would be head mistress of my harem.

[Ganurath]

No. There is no evidence to suggest this is the case. As for evidence to suggest this is not the case, think of all the times that the majority opinion on reality turned out to be dead wrong. Many discovered facts about the universe are counter-intuitive (against what people would assume without thinking deeply about the issue). Example: the earth revolves around the sun. From the readily observable environment on earth, the collective unconscious for thousands of years could only assume that the sun is a small orb of fire that circumnavigates the earth daily.That problem is also addressed by how there can be existence before sentient life, and how ghosts play into the equation: Those departed and those yet born also contribute to the network of universal consensus, although those living are most prominent. As I've been told, there are more people alive today than there have ever been throughout human history. Imagine how many humans there will be in addition to that in a few generations that will present convictions contradicting prior errors such as a flat world versus a round world.

Even if I am wrong though, there are instances when "Nothing ventured, nothing gained" goes too far. (http://www.lhcountdown.com/)

[Solo]

Even if I am wrong though, there are instances when "Nothing ventured, nothing gained" goes too far. (http://www.lhcountdown.com/)

Your not helping yourself with that post.

Look, the particle collider is not going to make a black hole that destroys the earth.

Although the Standard Model of particle physics predicts that LHC energies are far too low to create black holes, some extensions of the Standard Model posit the existence of extra spatial dimensions, in which it would be possible to create micro black holes at the LHC at a rate on the order of one per second. According to the standard calculations these are harmless because they would quickly decay by Hawking radiation.

Citation (http://cerncourier.com/cws/article/cern/29199)

I'm sorry, but you've swallowed a load of bad science.

Your concern is akin to that of the Army officers who were worried that the nuclear fission bomb would continue splitting atoms until all the atoms on earth were split in a massive nuclear chain reaction.

In conclusion, Morbo says SCIENCE DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!

[reorith]

you lhc doomsayers act like the world wouldn't be better as neutronium.

[ghost_warlock]

That problem is also addressed by how there can be existence before sentient life, and how ghosts play into the equation: Those departed and those yet born also contribute to the network of universal consensus, although those living are most prominent. As I've been told, there are more people alive today than there have ever been throughout human history. Imagine how many humans there will be in addition to that in a few generations that will present convictions contradicting prior errors such as a flat world versus a round world.


Um, there's kind of a math problem there...if you count people who don't exist yet as adding to the collective, then the possibility that there's more people around today than ever before has already been taken into account before these people were born. The number of beings to ever exist is a finite constant. By these rules, the way everything is put together was pre-determined before anyone existed (since everyone was still in a state of pre-existence) and then there'd just be no changing it once they did exist because, at the beginning, everyone would perceive exactly the same thing because they were part of the most massive majority collective concensus to ever...exist(?)...until everyone was dead and no longer existed (at which point there'd really be no point in changing anything since everone who could possibly perceive it had already ceased to exist)! Essentially, the only perceptions that would matter would be the massive consensus of everyone before they existed and then again after everyone ceased to exist. I'll call this the Unconsciousness Model.

Also, what's so special about sentient (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentient) life in this scenario? I assume you mean sapiant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapience) or self-aware (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-awareness) life. Even creatures that aren't self-aware also make perceptions about the world that they need to do their business, whether it's hunting, finding a safe place to sleep, avoiding a predator, moving toward light, hibernating during the winter, using the moon to navigate at night, or any other of the millions of thing critters do. Since they also depend upon the same reality, why wouldn't their perceptions feed into the collective consciousness shaping that reality? If they do feed into the collective, then humans are likely never going to make a dent in the way the collective consciousness constructs reality because about 90% of the creatures to ever exist were extinct before humans even stepped onto the scene (admittedly, this figure only applies to Earth). In this scenario, assuming that these creatures' perceptions are also counted before they technically exist, you'd again run into the problem where reality is shaped before anything exists because of the massive concensus of not-yet-existing beings. This is the Unconsciousness+ Model.

Another issue with the both models is that they don't explain why people are not born with complete unconscious knowledge of the universe leftover from their period of non-existence as the collective. Since the unconscious of every member of the collective counts before, during, and after existence individuals never truly leave the collective. You have to add in X-event that erases the unconscious memory of each individual as it begins existence. We've all had the experience, upon learning something new, that this information isn't new, just something we'd forgotten and are remembering. (Right, or am I crazy...? :smalleek:). However, without the X-event, wouldn't every 'learning' experience would be essentially like this as we dredge up millions of unconscious memories?

In the alternative model, the Mental Map Model, human (or any other kind of) unconscious thought does not shape the world. Instead, the human unconscious constructs its own, flawed, mental map of reality as it discovers more about the world. Beings start off not knowing anything (or, hardly anything, since even infants have certain, unlearned, reflexes) about the world and proceed to go about acquiring information. When it discovers new information, it adds that information to the mental map of reality. When it discovers new information that contradicts old information, it has to choose between the information based on what seems to be a better explanation for the phenomenon. This can sometimes lead to drastic changes in the way the being views the world, but the world itself is not actually changed. Occasionally, instead of choosing between information, it will instead compartmentalize and operate at one time as if the original information is true and use the newer information at another.

I'd be applying Occam's razor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_Razor) at this point and just assume that the same laws operating in the universe right now are the same ones that have always applied and the Unconsciousness Model and Unconsciousness+ Model don't conform the evidence we have, are mostly untestable & unverifyable, are useless to make predictions about the world, and are ultimately unneccessary.

The Mental Map Model more closely fits the evidence, is perhaps a bit more testable and verifiable than the Unconsciousness Models (? experimental design isn't a strong point of mine), can be used to make predictions (upon acquiring new information that the world is round, and not flat as previously assumed, humans will adjust their mental map and operate thereafter as if the world were round), and ultimately the model most people assume is true. Maybe one day it will be falsified (I doubt it), but until that day it is simply the best (most useful and explanatory) model we have available.

Boy, I do carry on, don't I? :smallredface:

[Serpentine]

Perhaps a dialogue will demonstrate why I find that scenario hard to swallow.:smallsigh:
I recommend you read over what was said again. Absolutely no one who has said anything at all on this topic has claimed to believe it at all in the freaking least. You can stop preaching to the converted now.

[endoperez]

Boy, I do carry on, don't I?


But that was AWESOME! I think most paranormal theories could be trumped the same way, if they ever became theories instead of wild claims with no evidence behind them. I don't know if any pro-paraists bother to read your post, but I loved it!

That was like reading Dresden Codak (http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_031.htm). "I cast Occam's Razor and dispel your Unconsciousness Model." :D

[Gaelbert]

To get me to believe something, you have to do a few things.

First, in any case involving purely eyewitnesses, make sure none of them were lying. This is rather hard to do. People lie. A lot.

Second, we must figure out of they really saw what they think they saw; as any psychology student will tell you, eyewitnesses tend to modify their memory of an event after the fact. (Citation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyewitness_identification#Rapid_Decline_of_Eyewitn ess_Memory))

Third, we must look for physical evidence. There is no physical evidence in this case, though the car passengers were stricken with some sort of illness. It may have been radiation poisoning, but the guy in the article notes that it could have also been from chemical contamination.

So ultimately, inconclusive. I am not convinced.

I realize this was posted a long time ago, but... but... look! A bird!

Do you believe I am human? If so, then why?
You have no eye witnesses. You have no ability to conclusively prove that I am not a computer or whatever, and that I am a human. In cases like these, Occam's Razor can be used to help prove something. The simplest explanation is that I am a human that is typing this on a computer, and therefore most people take that for granted, although they lack any actual ability to prove it. Bleh. I just keep repeating myself.

Aliens: I believe that it is arrogant of us to assume that we are, always were, and always will be the sole planet with life. With all the possibilities and planets, the odds are, I believe, highly in favor of other life giving planets with life forms of their own. Whether they choose to visit us or not is a different question. People bring up the tremendous amount of energy required to travel the vast distances of space. I am reminded of a short story, by Harry Turtledove, I believe, where species on other planets develop technology on a completely different path than our own. By our standards the aliens were primitive, but they possessed technology to travel much, much more efficiently than ourselves. (The story went along the lines of this: Fuzzy teddy bear aliens in primitive but still advanced spaceships come to our solar system, see a lack of a certain type of emissions and decide we are primitive. They decide to conquer us, and land in L.A. and attempt to cause destruction using their swords. They are promptly killed, and their spaceship investigated.)
I believe that the search for aliens on other planets is flawed by the assumption that the extraterrestrials would be of the same structure or composition of us. When we look for aliens, we look on planets that have conditions that could support life similar to our own. I realize that this is because if we do assume they are different, we would have nothing specific to look for, and we need to start somewhere, but I still...

The Supernatural: I don't think humans will ever learn all there is to know. Ever. I don't think it will, or even can be done. Therefore, what we do not understand will be labeled as the supernatural, and will continue to be labeled that.

Tempest Fennac: While for the most part I agree with you, it seems like most of the sources you mention are either biased or just flat out wrong. Authors realize that sensationalism sells, and write accordingly. Make sure that the books you cite aren't actively out to prove something, because then the research and information will be slanted accordingly.
And that goes for the opposite as well. If one goes out to prove that something does not exist, you close your mind to alternate possibilities. Open minds are a virtue, not a flaw.

Hmm. I know I have more stuff to say, but I can't quite think of it off hand.

[Solo]

You have no eye witnesses. You have no ability to conclusively prove that I am not a computer or whatever, and that I am a human. In cases like these, Occam's Razor can be used to help prove something. The simplest explanation is that I am a human that is typing this on a computer, and therefore most people take that for granted, although they lack any actual ability to prove it.

I believe that you are a pan-dimensional gargelblaster.

[Gaelbert]

I believe that you are a pan-dimensional gargelblaster.

Beeblebrox's Gambit is a failure. All that is left is more misery to be had.
(I think I got that right.)

[Solo]

Beeblebrox's Gambit is a failure. All that is left is more misery to be had.
(I think I got that right.)

Bah, misery. Don't you talk to me about misery... what would you know about it?

[Mx.Silver]

Whether they choose to visit us or not is a different question. People bring up the tremendous amount of energy required to travel the vast distances of space. I am reminded of a short story, by Harry Turtledove, I believe, where species on other planets develop technology on a completely different path than our own. By our standards the aliens were primitive, but they possessed technology to travel much, much more efficiently than ourselves. (The story went along the lines of this: Fuzzy teddy bear aliens in primitive but still advanced spaceships come to our solar system, see a lack of a certain type of emissions and decide we are primitive. They decide to conquer us, and land in L.A. and attempt to cause destruction using their swords. They are promptly killed, and their spaceship investigated.)
Actually, no one's made that much of an issue about the energy cost. The real issue is the amount of time it would take to make such a journey.


If one goes out to prove that something does not exist, you close your mind to alternate possibilities. Open minds are a virtue, not a flaw.
But if keep your mind too open your brain falls out, and all that's left is postmodernism :smalltongue:
Seriously though, challenging each new hypothesis is pretty much how science works. No one sets-out to disprove something, but any extraordinary claim (read: just about every paranormal phenomena mentioned so far) requires a lot of hard evidence before it should be accepted as a viable possibility.
That said phenomena could be the result of a group of highly trained, specially equipped ninja poodles is also a possibility although I doubt anyone could take it seriously if they tried. However, it has about the same level of hard evidence as alien abductions and whatnot, so is anyone who rejects Ninja Poodle Theory© guilty of being narrow-minded?