A physicist explains ghosts in our digital reality

Buzz off pad.

 

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In an effort to lift this thread into the realms of actual discussion:

I seem to be like Russ, an Engineer (by education, anyway) who has been on numerous "ghost hunts", including Craig-Y-Nos, supposedly the most haunted castle in Wales.
Can I prove I was there, that I went on the hunts? Well, if they have kept booking records for the past 10 or so years then perhaps, but otherwise no, no more than you can prove what you were doing 10+ years ago on any given day.
But if you insist on having "proof" that I was there before you'll accept the anecdotal evidence, then we can discount ghosts out of hand from here on out, since there is currently no proof that they exist. No proof, therefore we can dismiss the anecdotal evidence, right?

Anyhoo - now that we've gotten past the nonsense of requesting proof before someone can offer up their anecdotes:

The "tour guides" at each place were the official investigators and seemed quite genuine in their attempts to seek out ghosts, but in our party of ten (at Craig-Y-Nos) there were zero sightings. The unfortunate thing was that every draft, every creak of old floorboards etc, was made out by the investigators to be a possible "paranormal" event.
And this was true in the other locations as well.
The one thing they had in common, however, was that they all try to play on your hypervigilance in dark and often claustrophobic rooms, where the brain starts interpreting what is effectively audio and visual "noise" as being far more than it is in an effort to detect (and thus avoid) threats.
This was the closest any such ghost-hunt could get to having us think we could see/hear things - which was set off when one in the party accidentally stubbed their toe and squealed. The tour-guide was actually intending to document that as a "physical encounter", but my friend in question assured her that she genuinely just missed the step and stubbed her toe.
But while it was all good natured enough, and we weren't there to disrespect their hunting efforts, the disappointing thing to us was that their stock response to the notion that they really just played on the hypervigilance of the tour party was with the "well, you can't prove that it's not ghosts!" type of line.
So there they were trying to prove ghosts exist, and their stock approach was that it would be considered a ghost until proven otherwise. They were hunting with the assumption of existence, yet unwilling/unable to discount more rational explanations for what they discovered.
I.e. they were simply not scientific in their approach, irrespective of how much technical equipment they had. (Using technical equipment does not make the approach scientific!)

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Well said.

 

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Tour guides

Is this just for laughs.......party of ten ......just for laughs .

Let me gather my breath.........................................for infinity, Laughing to hard .

Please sir party of ten to see a ghost. Gather round people, may I take your order.

One or more ghosts coming up.

Can't stop the humor.

Thanks guys enjoyed the laugh.

PS: I'll remember this for years.

 

Hmmm........................sure.

 

So the second forumite to inform you that they have had experience and some research into ghosts/goblins, haunted houses etc and because their summary does not align with your own gullibility, you again deride their experience.

Once again, you have failed to answer some relevant questions'........

[1] how much investigation and research have you done into Bigfoot, the supernatural and other non scientific concepts and beliefs?
[2]Please supply proof of any of these claims of your research.
[3] what qualifications do you have to [1] do this research, [2] Interpret the data correctly, and [3] Do it in an unbiased scientific fashion as per the scientific method.

Question 2 is based on the same question that you saw as warranted and that you posed to Russ.
Are you going to answer them?

 

Buzz off pad.

 

Apologies if you find my choice of words humourous.
None of us were "professional" ghost-hunters, nor do it as a hobby. The places we went to were locations were a team of researchers have been long-term, and part of the way they fund their research is to give people tours around the location, explain their work, relate some of their experiences, and also give us experience of how they do their work - i.e. we sat in on some of their efforts.
Yes, there was a party of ten of us, and yes, we were a group on a tour of the site, of their workings, and we thus had a guide - who I have called a "tour guide" (note the quote-marks I used to suggest that this is merely a word to approximate) - who was also one of the researchers.

What would you have called the researcher who guided us around the site and gave us insight into the work they do?

The fact that all you could do was mock without any attempt to explain why you consider the comments humourous, i.e. what the issues are with what I had said, unfortunately merely goes to reinforce what others have been saying about you, despite this being a concerted effort to get this discussion moving again from the depths of dung into which it had fallen.

So, are you intending to have a discussion, or should the thread be cesspooled?

 

Discussion

But not by tour guide tours.

 

You refuse to answer the questions?

 

So you dismiss anecdotes of research/ghost-hunts because we have learnt about it from the researchers rather than us being the researchers ourselves?

Seems you don't want a discussion at all, then.

 

You refuse to let Russ and myself have a rational discussion.

Again Buzz Off pad, the discussion between me and Russ is not of your concern or business.

 

Russ has as much problems with your claims as I do. And as much objections to your trolling as I and others have.
Refusing to answer legitimate questions just confirms exactly what you are on about and what you are here for.

 

I'm sure Russ is not a child needing your mature guiding hand.

Buzz off pady.

 

Since this is your discussion, you're going to have to turn it to a reasonable path. Seeing your trollish response to Sarkus doesn't make me think you are interested in one and confirms my decision not to bother with the effort of typing my experiences.

 

So lets define " reasonable " . since that is the foundation of our discussion. On this thread.

Reasonable is drawn from experience. By others

And your foundation of reasonable is drawn from....? For this thread, Russ.

 

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/reasonable

 

I see or read

What is reasonable related to this thread though Russ ? By you.

 

Coherent, focused, pointed, thoughtful, logical, honest, not dismissive, etc.

Everything your response to Sarkus was not. Frankly, the post makes me wonder if you are drunk or otherwise impaired.