Running On Fumes

Not necessarily the most auspicious start to a week, but hey, you gotta start somewhere, right? Speaking of running ragged, lets talk about the Raggedy Man (or the Tatterdemalion, if you prefer).

The Raggedy Man is the closest thing to a cautionary tale that those in the distant past had about "Stranger Danger". Depicted as living only a hair above the level of a transient, "the Rag and Bone Man" was the colloquialism used to describe a person who collected scrap metal, bone, and fabric to sell back to others: the modern analog could be those homeless who spend their time collecting recyclables to make enough money for food. Now, in and of itself, that doesn't sound too bad. But keeping in mind that he quietly travelled from town to town in search of his wares, and also didn't have a whole lot to lose (and the inherent anonymity of a social outcast), -and- the fact that children went missing all the time, it was easy to see that the majority attracted quite a bit of suspicion. Tie that to stories of certain Rag Men who somehow were consistently able to make lively incomes from the vast quantities of bone they were able to sell, seemingly from out of nowhere...

Thus was born one of the first "door-to-door" serial killer stories. As far as bogeymen went, there was definitely a division between reality and fantasy in that there were many legitimate, trusted Rag-And-Bone Men (and in fact, with the global recession really starting to set in, the profession is making a comeback, believe it or not) to contrast with the dark killers that some were rumored to be. Supernaturally, there wasn't a whole lot going on for them, and physically they tended to be fairly unremarkable excepting that they were usually very gaunt and lithe (from their hard living), had faces that were usually vague and forgettable, and that they were exceedingly hard to kill due to enduring a lifetime of scavenging. Sort of like a skinny Jason Vorhees, if you will. However, while there wasn't anything directly paranormal about them, if there were indeed a few who travelled around murdering those when they thought they could get away with it (and, to be honest, it seems like a perfect profession for at least one or two to have engaged in it), then there remains a distinct possibility that a couple of dark Rag Men may have created many unfortunate situations (i.e., ripe for paranormal residuals) in far-off wild places that are begging for further investigation...maybe it's time to follow the dancing lights after all? :P

 

Weak Sauce

I know, I shouldn't be taking time off from just catching up to where I should be anyways, but hey, whatcha gonna do about it? However, in place of an actual substantial update I give you the following, one of my absolute favorite songs (which, considering the source material, is at least tangentially related to the basic premise of the blog):

 

Poultry Guys

Poltergeists (German for "knocking ghosts") are another class of spirit that seem to be found the world over under a variety of different names, though rather than going into the distinctions between different "types" of poltergeists, I'd like to focus on their shared abilities, as well as one very interesting point about them.

Poltergeists, by their most simplified definition, are entities that have the ability to make noises and move objects around independent of any observable external force. Usually the phenomena manifests quite suddenly, with often with no provocation on the part of the inhabitants of the affected dwelling, and tends to last between the space of a few hours to a few years at sporadic intervals of quiet and activity. While the phenomena can be mischevious-seeming at times, as there have been numerous reports of objects being tossed at individuals residing in a house afflicted with poltergeist activity, it is worth noting that for the most part the activity seems "dumb", that is to say there is no rhyme or reason to the actions it takes, and most objects that impact individuals seem to be projected with only enough force to make contact, and not nearly enough to hurt someone. However, this last point has two major caveats: one, that there have been rare cases of violent poltergeists that actively harmed those in their vicinity with forcefully thrown objects, scratches, beatings, etc (however, while this has been reported, it is in the -wildly- vast minority), and two, that most houses with a poltergeist tend to have a "center" of the activity, not necessarily a focal point or target of the phenomena, but someone who seems to always be present when the activity happens. Usually, this happened to be a child in the midst of adolscence, leading many to claim that poltergeists are actually subconscious manifestations of telekinesis by those "centers", their existence usually reasoned as an outlet for their feelings of agression, alientation, and other teenage angsty-wangsty issues.

Now, the big thing worth noting that I had no idea about until recently...supposedly lending support to the psychokinesis theory, a group of paranormal researchers in the 1970s were able to create an "artificial poltergeist" named Philip. See, what they did was make up a name and backstory for a fictional person, and by collectively meditating and visualizing the spirit, were able to supposedly make a table tilt and knocks to be heard in response to questions, with the questions answered as a person with the given backstory would answer them. Even more curious is that the table movement and rapping was supposedly caught on film, and that other parapsychological groups were able to replicate the same effects with different backstories and therefore different "artifical poltergeists". So the story goes that the original group continued to try and meditate with the intent of getting an actual apparition to appear, but upon finding themselves unable to, the project was abandoned.

A couple of questions pop out at me on hearing this. The biggest, though, is while it's an interesting story, why was the work discontinued? It may be that seeing an apparition would have been much more convincing an effect that just hearing knocks, and maybe I'm just being naive, but if I could reliably cause knocks to sound in response to questions without physical movement on my part, I'd be pretty damn excited with even that. So for me, the whole story should be taken with a Buick-sized grain of salt, but still, an interesting little story all the same...

 

Little Light

Will-O-the-Wisps, corpse candles/lights, ignis fatuus, corposant, jack-o-lanterns, fetch candles/lights, earth/ghost/witch lights...all these are names for basically the same phenomena, that of floating lights with no discernible source or carrier. However, while there are a multitude of names for this phenomena, there actually tend to be certain trends observable across the different names, and those trends form the meat of our discussion today.

So, what is the general meaning attributed to such phenomena? Well, this seems to fall into two major camps. One is that it's a phenomena that forecasts death at a given location, with the type of death warned of being dependent on the color or number of the lights. Usually the death forecast is that of the viewer or the viewer's loved ones, with small blue lights indicating a child's death, larger white lights for that of an adult, and a number of lights for a mass death, thought there have also been reports of lights in most other imaginable colors. It is important to note that in this particular framework, the lights in and of themselves are not sentient and therefore not inherently moral or malevolent, they are simply an impassive warning of a fate yet to pass. In this manner, while they are indeed unexplained phenomena, many attributed their viewing as a sort of divine intervention that allowed them to say their goodbyes to any affected. Also worth noting is the virtual impossibility of arguing with or avoiding this sort of phenomena (this sort also tend to be called the corpse/fetch candles/lights), as again, they are merely warnings and not direct enablers or participants in the fate of the viewer.

The second main school of thought holds that the lights are ghosts themselves, but the intent of these beings varies from culture to culture...though the general consensus is that it is wise to stay away (in fact, "ignis fatuus" literally means "foolish fire", named such after those who'd chase after it). Basically, the intent of the entities falls into two sub-categories. The first, and most benign -and- rare, is that of "unfinished business". In this case, the ghost is helplessly trying to signal any passerby to a particular area in the hope of them completing whatever task keeps them from crossing over. The most usual occurrence in this camp is that of a death in some far-flung area quite distant from the trappings of society (possibly also involving bringing a murderer to justice, if such a death wasn't accidental), and the entity's need for a proper burial for their remains, and according to some legends, they may possibly even reward the one who helps them by directing them to a treasure afterwards...though getting to the light in the first place can prove quite a challenge, as usually the terrain the first victim died in had to be a requisite level of treacherous to have caused them to die unexpectedly in the first place, so the task is not without risk.

Now for the other, more common sub-category. This sort is particularly malevolent and insidious, with the "nicest" of them causing travelers to become incredibly and hopelessly lost. More often than not, these lights are quite hypnotizing to look upon, overpowering the will of lesser individuals and leading them to their deaths. These entities are reasoned to be sinners that were for whatever reason denied entrance into heaven or hell, and are thus stuck on earth for all eternity, and that the boredom of such a fate has led them to treat us "fleshies" as playthings by tormenting us until such a time passes with which they get bored, at which point they end the "game" and consequently, the victim's life. It is worth noting that while there are supposedly a variety of ways to avoid and repel the spirits of this class, there are no direct ways to fight them.

As far as natural explanations go, these lights are usually reasoned to be fireflies or the ignition of swamp/carrion gas, but their occurrence across cultures with the same relative explanations leads one to wonder if there isn't something more to the tale of the mysterious lights...

 

Bad Ideas, Day 2: The Negative Ion Gun!

So, on a kick from my last posting, I'd like to continue the trend by offering another weird idea to the Wild Wild Webs as to how to unprovedly protect against/magnify the powers of ghostly happenings. Now, as far as my dumbed down version of the theory goes, paranormal activity is also accompanied by a positive ionic field of varying levels. Putting aside the very important point of whether "ionic fields" are actually bullsh-t or not,let's pretend that they aren't. According to current ionic theory, positive ions are, as they say in the academic community, "hella bad" for you, causing anything from general feelings of malaise and depression on up to suicidal ideation and actions or even death (though supposedly only in massive, theoretical or apocryphal amounts), while negative ions do good things, like lighten one's mood and sterilize the immediate environment. And while I could geek out and use positive ions as a link to the old tales of ghosts causing people to despair, age, or die due to "fright", that's not the point of this post. Let's talk tech-y (get it? Cause it's like "let's talk turkey", but with "tech-y"...fine, whatever).

My new idea kinda came to me as I was researching negative ion generators, with the intent of placing one in a hairdryer and using it as a "Negative Ion Projector", to counteract any dastardly positive ions I may come across during my adventures. Well, while I found negative ion schematics online, I also found that there is a thriving market on ionic hairdryers already...and I'm not too big a man to admit that finding this out sorta killed my enthusiasm to build one (as I said in the intro to this blog, I am a self-admitted hipster). So while I was closing all my open tabs in a positively forlorn manner, I found this little gem. I think that this picture could say more than I ever could...

On second thought, maybe not. Basically, this guy provided schematics to create a show-based static shocker to shock his friends. However, what I see is a personal negative ion field generator, and one that could be used as a potential shield against the negative effects of the potential positive ions associated with different forms of paranormal occurences...or maybe this is just me geeking out and trying to go all James Bond, Ghost Hunter. Of course, being that I have no real background in electronics, I have no idea what would happen if a positive ionic field happened to make contact with a negatively charged object like this, or if you'd even want to be in the same time zone when it happened...

 

EMF Theory, a.k.a. The Idiots Guide to Stun-Gunning a Ghost

So, I had a crazy idea today, and I wanted to share it with you, my steadfast readers. The basic theory is thus; supernatural activity is usually accompanied by EMF activity. That's the most basic summarization of one of the currently dominating theories in paranormal research, with some of the controversy cut out of the equation (some claim the phenomena observed are actually caused by the EMF fluctuations, but we'll leave the hypothesis at the more reasonable correlationary association). Anyways, EMF fluctuations/spikes/whatever are supposed to happen when things like poltergeist activities, apparitions, and phantom noises happen, so my question is what happens if you have an already existing EMF spike around when the fluctuations begin? Or also, if you let the fluctuations start, then trigger a massive spike?

Keeping in mind that I was a psych major that mostly kept to his own subject and gained most of his knowledge of physics from either a) Mythbusters, Bill Nye the Science Guy, or Mr Wizard, or b) listening to his physics-geek friends talk about "hypothetically awesome" tricks they should "totally pull sometime" while they were black-out hammered at a party (what can I say, U of A was a Party League school)...my idea is basically this: what if you trigger a stun gun before or during the phenomena? To be honest, because I don't have one, I couldn't say whether the stun gun would actually even cause an EMF spike, though my research into the topic (thanks Google) seems to indicate that it probably would (again, odd that there's no definitive answer to this). However, would a stun gun trigger an increase in noticeable phenomena? Would it cause any burgeoning phenomena to disperse? In my mind, I'd liken it to giving air to a candle, but whether it's enough air to cause the candle to blow brighter or to extinguish it entirely remains unsolved in my mind...you guys have any ideas?

The Next Episode...

So, I'm going to admit that the next two weeks worth of entries are actually backdated, and that I'm composing them all in one sitting on the night of February 25th. In my defense, I had an exceedingly rough last two weeks, but to those who care for such things as punctuality, I offer my sincerest condolences. That said, let's jump in.

This entry pertains to something that I've heard about but never really understood. In this case, I'll use the traditional Book of Shadows as my example, but really, you could use any supposed text that educates or elucidates in the supposed art of spellcraft. For those of you who aren't familiar with them, a Book of Shadows is the common term used to describe a coven of practicing witches' written record, usually including recipes for potions, rituals for any given spell, and general transcriptions of various feats of derring do.

Now, my question may be completely asinine, and if it is, feel free to let me know in the comments below. However, I'm pretty flummoxed by one simple point: WHY WOULD YOU EVER G-DDAMN WRITE STUFF LIKE THIS OUT? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that it a bad idea to write anything based on content alone, I think that everyone should have access to (and actively partake in) the means to write whatever they'd like privately. But this is a group-based, group-sourced, group-available text which supposedly gives the users of it a great deal of power that most don't have access to.

Assuming it works/magic is real, my main problems come down to the ability of multiple people to use it. Number one, do you trust all of your co-workers/classmates/fellow religion observers? While they may share the same values as you at a basic level, that in no way means you agree with them a hundred percent. So what's to say they won't use their equally-to-yours granted powers to do things you wouldn't agree with? Or worse yet, to screw you over? Next, would you want anyone to be able to contribute equally? I see Wikipedia written all over this, and trust me, the scenario in my imagination is fairly benign:

"Sister Mary, I'm reading over Sister Gertrude's recipe for a potion of perceptiveness, and it says I need to obtain essence of butfur. What's a butfur?"

"IT'S FER POOPIN', HAW HAW! PWNED."

So yeah, there's that. Also, the unfiltered nature of the contents of the book also seems a little ill-thought out. That is to say, the books supposedly describe everything from the virtually useless minutia of the coven to the incredibly overpowering spells and what-have-you, the contents of the book can be likened to listing the recipe for oatmeal cookies next to that of an atomic bomb. Which is to say, bad news, especially if you're allowing anyone from a day-one initiate to a day-four-million senile to have access to it...

I dunno, I could just be acting obtuse. But am I the only one who's wondered that?

Jurassic Parks and Rec

So, where were we? Ah yes, dinosaurs! Let's crack into a couple of examples, shall we? Mr. Wikipedia, if you please?

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Most reports of allegedly surviving dinosaurs come from African rain forests in the Congo Basin and the rain forests of South America, although others include those from Australia and Scotland.

 

 

• Emela-ntouka, allegedly a living ceratopsian.
  
• Kasai rex, allegedly a living theropod.
  
• Mbielu-Mbielu-Mbielu, claimed to be a living stegosaur.
  
• Mokele-mbembe, claimed to be a living sauropod.
  
• Muhuru, allegedly a living ankylosaur.
  
• Nguma-monene, allegedly a living Spinosaurus.
  
• Ngoubou, allegedly a living Styracosaurus.
  
• Other Mesozoic reptiles such as the winged pterosaurs have been reported as well.
  
• Kongamato, hypothesised to be a living Rhamphorhynchus.
  
• Mahamba, hypothesised to be a freshwater mosasaur.
  

Just for reference, Mokele-mbembe is by -far- the most "well-known" (or infamously still at large) out of all those listed. Also, I think it's somewhat unusual that out of all of these, almost half (Mokele-mbembe, Emela-ntouka, Mbielu-mbielu-mbielu, and Nguma-monene) come from the same rough area, the Likouala region of the Congo. All I'm saying is it's not the only time things have gotten a bit weird down there...maybe they have a King Kong situation up ins? All the same, for as far fetched as the the idea of living dinosaurs may sound, stranger things have happened, so maybe it's too early to discount it quite yet.

 

 

Land of the Lost

 

How goes it, Earthlings? Today we're going to start a two part discussion about a very unusual trend in cryptozoology, that of the living dinosaur.

So what is a "living dinosaur", exactly? Well, at it's simplest, it's the idea that a resident reptile (or species of reptiles) from a bygone age has somehow remained undetected until modern times. A good example of this in practice would be the popular hypothesis that the Loch Ness Monster is supposedly a plesiosaur (or family of them) and survived the mass extinction event because it was able to camp out underwater for long enough. Any creature that could prove the idea in and of itself would basically be considered one of the Holy Grails of cryptozoology, as the discovery of the possibility of a dinosaur surviving through to modern times would basically open up the creature catalog of the entire fossil record to possible discovery. Think kind of like the Ark of the Covenant, minus this.

Anyways, where did this idea even come from and get started? Good question. Actually, the idea itself started getting circulated quite early, as the identification and reconstruction of dinosaurs started all sorts of imaginations as to the similarities between them and the hitherto firmly-in-the-camp-of-the-mythical dragons of legend. Once that germ of an idea began to spread, combined with the occasional "living fossil" finds such as the coelacanth and our reconstructed records of forgotten fauna expanded, it became easier and easier to justify the inclusion of "dinosaurs" as a viable hypothesis to explain sightings of unusual or mysterious creatures. Bigfoot, Champ, Ron Paul...all became possible examples of something unexpectedly surviving until modern times.

So, if the theory is so widespread, why don't we have any examples of it actually occurring? Well, nature, mostly. You see, the theory in and of itself is kind of a reach, even for cryptozoologists. See, if we look through the fossil record, you can damn well find almost anything that you can imagine, so one can always use it as an alternative hypothesis. Also, the likelihood of even a small herd of dinosaurs surviving undetected while still being able to have enough food to continue to flourish in incredibly small, even in the (few) areas that have little to no human habitation/traffic. Lastly, even if one of these wonder-herds did exist, nobody seems to take into account the fact that these things would have had thousands of years to evolve into completely new creatures. But still, the idea is an attractive one at least at the romantic level, so it persists to this day.

Aaaand that's it for today. Friday I'll go into specific famous and not-so famous examples of supposedly still-living dinosaurs. Take it easy!

 

Distant Hope

 So I was thinking today could be more of a history lesson than a paranormal essay, even though it has some tangential importance to paranormal investigations, it has even more influence on the very course of history and the exploration of the globe. Of course, I speak of Prester John.

Prester John was a legendary figure that was claimed to have kingdom first located in the Middle East, then the Orient, then back to India, then finally somewhere in Africa. As the tale goes, John was a descendant of one of the three Magi (Wise Men) who attended the baby Jesus' birth. Being rich in both resources and spirit, his realm was purported to be a place where the incredible was the norm, and his subjects lived in happiness and contentment. More intriguing than all of that, however, was one simple fact that had explorers trying to seek him out for over 500 years: he and the entirety of his kingdom were devout Christians.

While it seems a minor detail here, to understand the extraordinary impact that had you have to put yourself in the shoes of a European explorer between 1100 and 1800: you're considering going out for a jaunt that may or may not end with your death. At the very least, it will probably take the majority of your lifetime to get somewhere new, and even upon getting there, there is a very good chance that you will -not- be coming back with more wealth than you could possibly dream of. You're thinking of hitting South America because you've heard that El Dorado has awesome 2-for-1 shooters nights mandated for the entire nation and becaus the wings are f-ing bomb, but Spain and Portugal are being complete d-bags about it. But wait...your friend Chad-ington Blake-buryson just told you about this totally legit kingdom somewhere on your side of the Atlantic, and the dude running it is totes chill! The best part is it's like El Dorado, but with all the bro-skis worshipping the same God as you!

I dunno why I lapsed into Frat-Speak, but the point remains, Prester John's kingdom was widely considered a very rich, well-outfitted outpost or resupply area that one could look forwards to, in addition to the said area being a bastion of familiar culture, which was an invaluable bonus to the oft-harried and alienated explorers. One could liken it to an oasis in a desert, except where most oases could only be used for a moment and had to be moved on from, this oasis could be considered a respectable, self-sufficient endpoint if one wanted to. Anyways, Prester John's legend spread throughout Europe, culminating in many ridiculous situations such as the Prester John Letter Hoax, or the fact he was used as an excuse to start the second Crusades, or the fact that when the emperor of Ethiopia made contact with Europe that he was continuously referred to as "Prester John" (so much so that he actually called a couple of people out on it, letting them know that he was never referred to as "Prester John" by his people or anyone else up until that meeting, for that matter), but as an abstraction, a place that was always quested towards but never reached, it served as a well-believed carrot-on-a-stick for generation upon generation of explorers, and helped shape the world as we know it in incredibly sweeping ways.

From Out Of The Ashes...

So, when one thinks of the phoenix, you usually think of one of three things: the decent basketball team, the ridiculously ill-fitting-with-it's-surroundings retirement megapolis, or the Western mythological warhorse of a mystical bird that symbolizes eternal life through it's reported combustion and rebirth through it's own ashes. Being that you're a regular reader of the blog (hopefully), I'm going to assume you're familiar with it, but if not, here's somewhere to get a good overview...

That said, here's an analog that I was -not- aware of...the Chinese Phoenix. While so-called, it's not so much like a phoenix as it is an amalgam of many different animals and portrayed as the King of the Birds, or avian ideal in Chinese culture. Used more as a symbol of luck, balance, and prosperity, the Fenghuang actually struck me as having more than a passing similarity to another Western beastie, the Cockatrice. Which itself is related to a variety of other petrifying creatures, such as this, this and this.

Anyways, the point of this post is currently lost on even the author, but I'll end this somewhat link-heavy and disjointed entry by saying that I was at the very least surprised that there was anything like an Eastern analog to the concept of the Phoenix, even if it turned out that the Chinese Phoenix moniker was of mostly Western invention as well. Also, this.

Odds-On Favorite

So, I promised that I'd get into a bit of opinion-tossing on psychic phenomena today, and I plan to. But as a preface, I'd just like to make two things plain; first, that I really have nothing to back up my beliefs (I guess at that point, it wouldn't really be a belief-system so much as just faith) and second, that I don't expect you to agree with me. That all said, let's dig in.

I already mentioned a while back that I'm pretty agnostic about the concept of the afterlife and paranormal phenomena as a whole. Do I believe it's possible that either or both of these things exist? Yeah, why not. Am I sure about those beliefs? No way. But while I may be aggravatingly ambivalent about a couple of the foundation areas of parapsychology, one thing I believe and have always believed in is luck. I simply think luck exists. I know that statistically, it shouldn't. I also know that may determinists/deeply religious would argue that there's no such thing as luck, just divine will. But, human logic and attributions aside, however irrational a belief it may be, I have it. I think that regardless of where you think it comes from or how subjectively constructed it is, every person has a certain level of luck in any given situation, luck being defined as the ability to have larger than normal probabilities of a positive or desired outcome in that given situation. I also think that this level of luck in a specific situation tends to carry over into other similarly-structured situations. Like different areas of aptitude or knowledge, some people are luckier at certain things than others...like one may be luckier at financial gambles, whereas another is better at socio-political risks, where yet another takes on physical chances with a fearless demeanor...

I sort of conceptualize it like this: all actions with multiple outcomes have a certain level of probability associated with each of those outcomes. In certain philosophical and (if I remember correctly) physics frameworks, all of these outcomes occur in parallel universes, leading to the idea of divergent realities, where everything is the same to one point, then the paths diverge around the different resolutions to that situation. So, if every action has multiple outcomes (because let's face it, "meteor to the face" is always a possibility), then those who have luck have the ability to "nudge" a decision in their favor, basically altering reality around them. The stronger the level of luck, the more ridiculous the level of probability shifting they can undertake with a reasonable level of increased odds...some things will always be out of reach, but the luckier you are, the greater the spectrum of possibilities open up to create that "positive outcome", relatively speaking.

So what does this have to do with psychics, magicians, and/or the paranormal? Well, looking at luck as a simple probability-boosting field, then maybe it stands to reason that many of the proclaimed psychics and magicians aren't exercising arcane art so much as just a natural ability of "luck" in a specific area or set of areas. Divinatory oracles may not speak to gods so much as have a higher than statistically reasonable level of luck in predicting events, though they reason their abilities come from divine sources. Magicians that can control the weather and move objects over distances without touching them just have incredible innate powers of probability shifting, sometimes to the extent of flying in the face of the laws of physics.

Now, most of this was just getting some mind-babble on the interwebs, and for the most part, is purely speculatory. The only thing I really believe in is luck as a concept and a part of our reality...and I wouldn't really hold it against anyone else to disbelieve that, though. It was, as I said at the beginning, a sort of leap of faith, and like all faith, some make the jump, others don't. But whether or not you believe in luck, I still wish it in abundance to you all the same :)

The Phenomenist: Apports and Asports

So another component of paranormal phenomena which hasn't received a whole lot attention in the blog yet is that of the psychic.  Which really is a damn shame, when you think about it, as some of the richest and most unusual reports fall into that arena, which is why I plan on rectifying that immediately. Next entry I'll talk a little bit more about psychic phenomena in general and a theory I cooked up having to do with it, but for today we'll get our feet wet with a little review of two commonly reported (relative to other psychic phenomena) occurrences that are attributed to psychic mechanisms, the instances of Apports and Asports.

Put simply, an Apport is the appearance of an object or living thing out of thin air and an Asport is the reverse, or its disappearance. Some paranormal researchers reason that the people able to apport and asport objects are in fact mentally disintegrating the object in one place and reintegrating it in another. Others claim that the psychics have no control over the objects they choose to bring to them, while others claim they indeed have the ability to specify exact items that they can target with this ability. Still others believe the psychic is actually constructing the item without the deconstruction of a replica item or vice versa, meaning that they would truly be creating "something from nothing" (thanks to the laws of thermodynamics, this last position has mostly fallen out of style). The ability to "conjure" things into or out of existence without any reasonable explanation has long been a purported power of many different self-proclaimed psychics, magicians, and holy men and reached it's overall peak in reportings in the late 1800's, coinciding with the height of the popularity of mediums and seances. At that time, a series of investigations into the field began, with the vast majority of the claimed psychics being revealed as fraudulent, leading to the decline in popularity of seances and the practitioners/facilitators thereof. However, there are still to this day scattered reportings of the otherwise inexplicable appearance of small objects in situations where such things should not occur.

Case Files: The Cheshire Dog, pt. 2

So, you got to see what I saw. Here's how I responded.

 

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Hey everybody!

 

So...I have a couple more random thoughts in no particular order to toss into the conversation, so here we go...!

 

1. The discomfort associated with the memory by the original/main subject of the phenomena...why? Is this due to how the subject ended up rationalizing the experiences, or possibly the negative feelings she associated from her social support at the time rubbing off enough on her to negatively reinforce the topic as a whole? Or did something bad happen after the dog started to appear? I'd be curious to hear -why- she dislikes talking about it...

 

2. I understand everyone has a different eye for details, and it may just be me, but mentioning a "buried treasure" seems somewhat incongruous, and I'd like to know more whether the mentioning of that particular point was just coincidental or if there was something behind that. Did she get the feeling like the dog was guarding something? Or was it just a flavor detail?

 

3. Large and wavy fur would indicate a large likelihood of a herding or hunting dog, if I recall my dog show assistant experience at all correctly, though probably more likely herding. They're both known for their unusual intelligence, as well as being pretty aces at athletic feats...though if we could get a better ID on the breed we may have more traits to go on. Either way, this probably wasn't a "stupid dog", which leads me to my next point...

 

4. Bachelor lived there. 1930s. Any background on Señor Richy-Britches or a history of his pets (if he had any)? Seems like it'd make sense for him to have one, given the time and social climate, and (BIG jump on this line of logic) if he was a bachelor and died as such, then his only constant, deepest emotional contact would be his faithful hound. Also, a better idea as to the layout of the house and which rooms were which might also give insight into the issue, which I personally see as a toss-up between two off-the-cuff-completely-not-based-on-anything-other-than-an-educated-guess theories (assuming the manifestation of the phenomena was not explainable by conventional means [which seems difficult, as I imagine trying to reconcile a ghostly Cheshire Dog with reality isn't the easiest thing to do]): either a) she resemble(s/d) someone who abused/killed the dog in life, and he always manifests with the terror/hatred he felt towards the original or b) the "master" still dwells there (as a spiritual manifestation) and the dog feels she is getting too close to him and is attempting to protect him from the intruder. I personally lean more towards the second, from the note about her noticing the footsteps when no one else did (at least initially) as well as the fact she saw it often in her room, which I'm thinking may have actually been originally the master's room or possibly the "pet room". So, if that were the case, then it stands to reason that she'd be pretty high on the spectral dog's doo-doo list, so to speak. Keep in mind, that was all based on a -large- number of logical assumptions which are more than likely wrong, so I broker no offense to anyone saying that they think those are ludicrous working theories :P

 

5. Like YYYYY and ZZZZZ said, memory loss or "blanking" after a traumatic or logically irreconcilable event is quite common. I probably wouldn't call it amnesia per say, since I bet you dollars to donuts that she probably could tell you other events that happened in her life at that time, she simply denied the experience at such a basic level that it ceased to be a conscious memory, so as to allow her to put some distance between herself and the worldview-warping memory. There's a wide range of responses, from direct confrontation, to avoidance (as the primary subject appears to be exhibiting), to denial (conscious or subconscious), to amnesia, to fugue, to PTSD, to gosh knows how many different mental aberrances and abnormalities. To make a bad joke/analogy, pretend the mind is a baby...if Patrick Swayze taught us anything, it was to never put it in a corner, which it seems the "dog" forced it into in a manner of speaking. A relatively benign corner, but one all the same. Anyways, million dollar question: why mention it now? Was it the friend's mother's inexplicable experiencing of the basement noises that jogged her memory back to that spot?

 

6. As far as other weird notes and errata about the story as it stands...Ghost Dog: a movie starring Forrest Whittaker, if I remember from my Blockbuster video days. But, lots of occasions in tales for animals to become ghosts that appear with malevolence, both in an abused or protector setting, but also to occasionally warn of ill-fortune yet to come (doubtful, since there was ample time for that to happen and it doesn't seem like it did, and multiple manifestations don't usually occur). Also tales of playful animal spirits (though highly unusual for them to be playful with anyone outside their immediate family at the time of death, and also doubtful due to the palpable malevolence felt during each event). Lastly, in European and Middle Eastern countries, the sacrificing of animals and subsequent haunting of the premises where the ritual was done at is/was quite common, but actually as a form of good luck, if I'm not mistaken...but yeah, none of the other types of spiritual animals seem to match the simultaneously occurring aura of hostility.

 

Anyhoo, fun story, I'd be curious to see what happens next. Take care!

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And there you have it, a glimpse into my world. Have a good weekend!

 

 

Case Files: The Cheshire Dog, pt. 1

So a week or two ago, everyone in my paranormal research group received an email from one of our member, who received an email from a friend asking if she had any opinions about something that happened to her earlier in her life. I thought it was relatively interesting, so I copied a transcript of the email (it already had the names edited out, but even if it hadn't I would've, and I also removed a couple of specific geographical landmarks as well) with the intent of showing you the sorts of things we get asked to look into. Next entry on the blog will be my analysis of the story...

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It happened when we were 11 or 12 years old and afterwards we didn't mention it to each other again until we were over 40. At that point I wanted to confirm that it really had happened as I remembered it, so I finally asked XXXXX if she remembered "the dog." She said yes and confirmed that she remembered what I remembered, but the discussion made her very uncomfortable. Out of respect for her feelings, I can't make the story public, but I would like to tell you about it and see if you have any ideas about what it might mean.

XXXXX and I have been best friends since second grade and we grew up on the same street. She lived in a beautiful house that was built by a wealthy bachelor in the 1930s. He supposedly hid a stash of money somewhere in the house, but nobody ever found it. I loved her house. It was much fancier than mine and was surrounded by gardens and a filbert orchard. XXXXX loved the house too, but always said that there was sometimes something scary in it. She was afraid to be home alone and said that when she was alone she heard heavy footsteps on the basement stairs. Her parents laughed off her fears and told her she was imagining it. (Her elderly mother still lives in the house and for decades insisted that nothing was wrong with the house. A few months ago, XXXXX's  mom reported that she had locked herself in the bathroom because she heard banging in the basement and the sound of footsteps on the basement stairs. She assumed somebody had broken in, but later found no evidence of that.) That's the background to my story. XXXXX grew up in a house that frightened her, a house where she heard noises and occasionally saw things.

XXXXX was a believer. I wasn't. I tend to prefer rational, scientific explanations for things. I would entertain the notion of ghosts the way I entertain notions of vampires and werewolves. I love to get a chill up my spine from contemplating other-worldly beings and hearing stories, but I didn't really believe they existed. XXXXX and I brought very different mindsets to our shared experience. 

When we were 11 or 12, XXXXX told me that she had started seeing what she called a ghost dog. The first time she saw him was in the middle of the night. She woke up and in a shaft of moonlight, she saw a dog materialize next to her bed. It was a large dog with wavy black fur. He was sitting on his haunches, leaning forward, looking at her intently. It drew back its lips and exposed its teeth, as if it were snarling, but it was absolutely silent. As she stared at the dog, he disappeared. He frightened her. She said that she saw him many nights and was having trouble sleeping. 

Her house was surrounded by filbert orchards and we spent a lot of time playing among the trees. XXXXX said that the ghost dog had started appearing to her in the orchard. It always happened close to sunset. She insisted that she didn't walk around a corner and see him and he didn't jump out from behind a tree, the way a real dog might. He appeared and disappeared while she was watching. He always was in the same position and he always snarled silently before disappearing.

XXXXX's parents thought she was making it up and didn't want to hear any stories about ghosts. I was the only person she could tell. I listened sympathetically and said it sounded scary, but the truth was that I was just as skeptical about ghosts as her parents were. I didn't think she was making it up. I knew she was really frightened, but I figured she had psyched herself into it. I thought she had a recurring nightmare about the dog showing up in her bedroom at night and that she was so jittery that she was imagining she saw the dog in the orchard. That she jumped and ran at the sight of a stump, or something. I was in no way predisposed to see it myself.

Our mothers had convinced us that if we walked home alone after dark we were likely to be murdered, so whenever XXXXX and I visited each other and had to walk home after dark, we'd split the risk. The host would walk halfway home with the guest, then we'd split up and head home separately. Share the risk. Confuse any homicidal pervert with two targets. One evening I was leaving XXXXX's house and, as per our agreement, she was going to walk halfway home with me. She had a long driveway that was edged by a laurel hedge so dense that nothing could have jumped out of it. (We had tried to build forts in it and couldn't penetrate it.) Exterior lights from the house and the garage illuminated the driveway. We walked out of her back door, came around the corner of the house and started up the driveway. All of a sudden a dog materialized in front of us. It was the dog XXXXX had described: large, with black wavy fur, sitting on his haunches. I remember that it carried a real aura of menace. XXXXX and I grabbed each other. I was too frightened to scream. The dog exposed its teeth in a silent snarl that resembled a grin.  As we were looking at it, it disappeared. It didn't leap away. It faded away. 

This is as much as I remember and over time, I started to question the memory. It defies sense. XXXXX and I didn't tell anybody. I didn't validate her story to her parents. Why not? Somehow I still walked home, but it's hard to believe I wasn't too scared to do so. I can't remember what happened next and XXXXX and I seemed to have an unspoken agreement never to mention the event to each other. It's funny. It still feels like a moral imperative. I am hard-wired not to talk to XXXXX about it, as if it would betray our friendship to do so. For 30 years I mulled over the memory and over time it bothered me more and more. I finally had to ask XXXXX if it really happened. She told me that it did, but she doesn't want to discuss it further and I'm left wondering about my post event amnesia. Maybe amnesia isn't right, but I can't recall any aftermath to the event. It's like it happened in a void and had no logical consequences.

Have you heard of an animal being a ghost?  A ghost who deliberately appears before someone and seems to aim his malevolence toward the person seeing him? And have you ever heard of the kind of amnesia I experienced after the event?

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END TRANSMISSION.

Lord and Master

Hey guys, quick heads up...while i really want to continue this amazingly prolific streak that I've kept going over the last five weeks, I feel like I need to pull it back a bit, so I'm going to reduce my output to only three a week rather than five. Hopefully that won't break too many hearts, but I'm thinking it's either this or risking burnout between this and "real life". 

Anyways, this entry is going to talk about an odd demon commonly known as Master Leonard, pictured on the right. Master Leonard, while being a demon of relatively little reknown in popular culture is supposedly one of the more influential demons in all of Hell. Specifically, he is the chief-master of ceremonies for all orgies, sabbaths, and black celebrations. In addition, he is the strongest sorcerer of all demonkind, leading to his being worshipped by practitioners of the black arts. His appearance is that of a man with three goat horns coming out of his head, a black face, and very "goatish" features overall. His overall demeanor is apparently very withdrawn and depressed, until a gathering occurs, at which point he becomes incredibly charismatic and outgoing. Outside of that, he specializes in transformation and shapeshifting into a variety of forms, which is fully in line with his capricious and tempestuous nature. As to any historically/religiously memetic reasons for his existence, it is postulated that he is the personification of one of the goats spoken of in Leviticus 16:8.

Faces of Death: Ankou

Somewhat morbid picture notwithstanding, the Ankou is a truly unusual entity in Brittanic folklore that takes the place of the normal death-incarnate of choice for the West, the Grim Reaper. While there are many different legends surrounding their creation (one of which I'll get into in a bit), there are a couple of standard features which are recognized by all who know of him; first, that while he is referred to as a singular entity, supposedly every parrish has their very own Ankou (supposedly the last dead person for each year must become the Ankou until the next year with it's unfortunate last-deceased). Another unique feature is that he rides in a rickety carriage with four gaunt horses and two ghostly attendants at his side. He is never seen without a scythe and dressed in all black, but unlike the Reaper, has a wide-brimmed hat and coat rather than a hooded robe. Also, contrary to the picture, no one has ever seen his face. The reason for this is that he wears his coat with the collar turned up and the hat set low, making it impossible to see within unless he wants you to. If, by some unlucky chance you should happen to see his face, then truly you're S.O.L., because that means you are dead and he's there to load you into his cart to take you away to the land of the dead.

As to his genesis, it is said that one evening a long time ago, a very cruel prince who loved to hunt for sport spotted an amazing specimen of a stag as well as a lone traveller nearby. Wanting sport, he issued a challenge to the traveller, stating that the first one to the stag would not only be recognized as the greater hunter, but also would be allowed to decide the loser's fate. Upon the gaunt stranger's acceptance, they both gave chase to the stag, who was truly the most difficult prey the prince had ever encountered, running for miles and miles. And try as he might, the prince found himself getting further and further behind, until he finally caught up with the stag...as it laid dead at the feet of the gaunt stranger who stood in front of it. Recognizing his defeat, the prince asked what the stranger would have of him, to which the stranger replied: "oh, you may have the stag...and all the world's dead as well", revealing himself as Death, from which none could escape, and thereby cursing the prince to the fate of becoming his chief hunter.

Anyways, it should go without saying, but if you're ever in Europe and see a rickety old wagon with four sickly horses drawing it and it's being driven by some guy dressed head to toe in old black clothing so that you can't see his face, best to play it safe and get the hell out of there :P

Hipster Crystal Guide: The Exciters

Okay pilgrims, last set of three, then onto a creature profile to finish out the week. This set are the wildcards, the ones that mainly just stir things up both for forces within and without the their owners. And unlike the last few days, no introductory messing around, we're gonna just get right down to it :)

Merlinite-I'm assuming that you probably already caught it from the stone's somewhat heavy-on-the-foreshadowing name, but this crystal is -all- about magic in all forms, including shamanistic, priestly, and alchemical sorts. It is supposed to boost any occurrences around it, for better or for ill.

Staurolite-The Fairy Cross! This is a very lucky stone, bringing not only protection and improving communication, it is also supposed to enhance white magic. Not that I plan to be learning anything in that way anytime soon, but my simplified reasoning is thus: if "black magic" is the bad stuff, then it stands to reason that the opposed color magic, "white magic", must be at the very least "not bad". And yes, I'm aware that's probably one of the more asinine statements I could make regarding logic, magic, or paranormal things in general, but hey, who's the one behind the keyboard?

Nebula Stone-Apparently, this one is the ultimate wildcard, as it's too new for anyone to know what it's capable of. Supposedly it is a stone of unification and oneness, allowing for profoundly extensive healing but also is supposed to allow you to "connect with infinity", whatever the hell that means. If nothing else, it is also the most uniformly expensive out of all the stones I researched.

Hipster Crystal Guide: The Revelators

Hey there, fearless kids and cadets! Today we're going to talk about the next set of crystals, the ones that seem a bit more active in their abilities (shielding, deflection, and warding, which are al terms that assume "attacks" in the first place) than the last set, which were mostly passive (healing, communication, and purification). But before we get to that, let me delve into some more general background.

One could very easily ask, why would one use crystals when dealing with paranormal activity over other methods (assuming all had the same efficacy rate)? While everyone else's mileage may vary on it, my personal response would be this: most talismans, amulets, charms, and what-have-you that claim the ability to ward off the dead or spirits from beyond require a pre-requisite faith in whatever religion created/condones them to allow them to be effective. Regardless of what you may see in the movies, if you throw up a couple of sticks in the shape of a cross and you're a Muslim, then the religious power that imbues the object is lacking, and the protective capabilities of the object fall away, leaving you to get eaten by a more-than-likely Nosferatu-looking vampire (because you should be so lucky to get eaten by a hot one). So, if most wards and talismans need faith, does that make crystals any different? Well, not really. But being that I'm relatively heavy on my agnosticism (as of right now, anyways), I find it easier to carry around a couple of passive stones in my pocket than to pledge my faith in a deity. So that's why crystals.

That said, the contestants this evening are...

Aquamarine-Funnily enough, this happens to be my birthstone. Favoritism notwithstanding, this crystal is said to bring courage and calm to the wielder. A known harmonizer, this stone also brings light in times of darkness, in addition to being pretty good at shielding auras against attack. Lastly, it's said to improve focus in stressful situations.

Labradorite (Spectrolite)-Kinda unusual that one of the stones that made my "best of" list was named after a dog, huh? (That was sarcasm, I know it was named after the region of Labrador) This stone is recognized for being quite mystical, protecting it's owners through deflection of attacks on their aura. It is a stone that also brings light, but more in the spirit of enlightenment through initiation, improving the imagination, intuition, and psychic abilities of it's user.

Chiastolite (Andalusite)-Also known as the Cross Stone, this hot rock is a stone of protection through the warding of auras, preventing attacks from even being launched in the first place. It specializes in situations involving a life/death transition, and is also considered pretty awesome at dissolving illusions and preserving sanity. That said, it's also a natural analytical and creative-thinking strengthener.

Hipster Crystal Guide: The Harmonizers

 So, hopefully you feel refreshed after your quick celery break. That said, for day two of Crystal Week, we're going to focus on three stones that primarily deal with the properties of healing and purification. Before that though, a warning: I know crystals and vibrations and New Agey stuff isn't for everyone. That said, I feel this is just as viable a topic to cover as any of the other things I've talked about; I mean, once you're in psuedoscience at all, it really is the final frontier, so in for a penny, in for a pound.

Supposedly, crystals are supposed to have specific vibrational properties that allow them to align and manipulate other vibrations, such as in living beings by affecting their chakra flows and auras. As the logic goes, in the spirit-based world crystals have vast powers since it is theorized by practitioners of the Crystal Way (I don't actually know what it's called, I'm just going to call it that) that most effects that we experience are composed of these same vibrations. One could liken the crystals to fans, and spirits as smoke...being that we are tangible beings, we can feel the effect of the crystals by being near us, but since spirits lack tangibility, the crystals affect them much more. Or at least, that's how my grossly-over simplified analogy will stand, anyways.

Also, as a final note before we get onto the stones, all descriptions are paraphrased from The Crystal Bible, by Judy Hall. That said, let's present them, shall we?

Turquoise-A pretty common gemstone, turquoise is a great healing stone, both in body and spirit. It's been regarded as a protective stone by different civilizations, and is also useful in opening one up for communication with "spirit worlds". It also supposedly had a decent purification effect for "electromagnetic smog" and negative energy.

Angelite-A newish stone (at least to me, I'd never heard of it until researching all of this), Angelite is supposedly a stone of openness and peace. It primarily increases the user's awareness and perception, and helps attune them to other beings' fields. This allows other healing effects to be made much more powerful. It also is a strong bringer of positive energy, in addition to fostering truth and compassion.

Black Tourmaline (Schorl)-This bad boy was, without a doubt, the strongest of the purifying stones in the book. It's absolutely great at cleansing, purifying, and protecting against almost anything you can toss at it, including (and this is a somewhat rare claim for crystals) protection against psychic and spell attacks. Go figure. It also is supposed to promote healing and understanding.

Celery Man

New week, party people, and the theme for this one is going to be crystals and their properties. But because I feel a bit lazy and it's nice to throw a curve ball here and there, I'm going with something a bit different today, and tomorrow will return you to your regularly scheduled loosely-related weirdness. That said, take it away, Paul Rudd...

 

 

 

Food For Thought

Anyways, that's the week, folks. I asked quite a few questions and, regardless of what the original intention was, don't really seem to be any closer to a codification system for the things I may encounter in the field here soon enough. However, I think that even coming up with the right questions to ask at all is the first step to even being able to wrap ones head around something new like this. I remember a linguistics teacher mentioning once how difficult it was to turn people onto the beauty and diversity of language, because if a society doesn't have a word for something it makes it next to impossible for someone within that society to try and conceive of it, which thereby makes trying to open your mind a much more difficult prospect than one would expect. Anyways, I'd like to think that by even trying to think of these paranormal phenomenons as something beyond "ghost story" and instead look at them as something that -can- be classified (or at least attempt to classify them), that in and of itself it the first step to maybe opening up the concept of a "ghost" in a way that hasn't been looked at in such a way. And yes, I don't have so much hubris as to think that I'm the first to ask these questions, but dang it, cut me some slack. o\One has to be able to run to the nearest Circle K before they can run a marathon, right? :P

Chiaroscuro (The Dynamics of Good and Evil)

Now, yesterday I opened up a small can of worms by briefly touching on the topic of possession. I'm going to get a bit further into that today, and if for some reason my reasoning or ultimate conclusions strike you as somewhat blasphemic, I apologize in advance. Anyways, possessions. What about them? Well, for starters, I think that the very concept of them are complete bull. OH SNAP! Yeah, I said it. I believe in the power of human belief and rationalization, and I also believe that the people so "possessed" are completely and utterly under the belief that they have no control over themselves, making the end result virtually identical to what we as a species believe "possession" to be. So how can I believe in the effects but not the concept? Easy. I simply believe that there is the ability to be given a spark of a feeling or idea, and depending on the sort of person you are, your own psyche does the rest. Like hypnosis, if you will. Certain individuals are highly suggestible, and thereby susceptible to hypnosis. And I bet you dollars to donuts that those same people would be (or depending on the situations, are) also more likely to run the risk of being "possessed" if the situation happens to have that as a risk. So, do I believe in human creativity and the occasional "mad lapse"? Sure. Do I believe in possession? No. Do I believe in the possibility of a supernatural phenomena being able to transfer impressions and feelings into other living beings? Maybe, but I find that alot easier to swallow than possession, so lets run with that. That being said, I propose the next major question that we ask in these cases is:

If established as empathic, where does the entity/phenomenon range between highly empathic (possessive) and neutral (doesn't transmit any feelings outside of those normally associated with inexplicable events)?

Next, let's talk morality. Man, we love to romanticize these stories, don't we? The good guy, the bad guy, the doomed guy, the tragic guy, the lover, the fighter, the coward, the blighter. We have so many archetypes present in the legends and tales, to try and help them conform to our sense of order in some way, to make them make sense in at least some small part. And while that attitude is completely understandable, it's inherently flawed. Seriously though, do we even want to try and pretend we know that a spirit by any definition knows/cares about "right" and "wrong" as we know it? They/it would be on a completely different plane of existence, and we want to try and enforce logic on that? I put it to you that there's no such thing as "good" and "evil" when it comes to the paranormal, only the effects of the presence:

Is the paranormal presence negative, positive, or neutral in aspect (is their overall effect on their surroundings one of darkness and decay, improving, or simply maintaining its surroundings)?

Again, these questions are to try and push past the idea of a ghost as a story and instead look at them as a testable, categorical phenomenon.

Something Wicked

So, yesterday I promised to get into the operationalization of what exactly consisted of a "haunting". In this case, I think a two part question is in order, just to try and drill down to the basics of what (general) elements are involved. The first bit is deceptively simple, and again, can be culled from most stories but is almost never stated outright:

What senses/forces are being manipulated in an inexplicable way?

 

This simple question alone allows one to straight up start classifying exactly what one is dealing with. Does it manipulate sound, by banging and slamming things (but never visibly)? Does it manipulate sight, by appearing as a shadowy figure or translucent being? Does it manipulate touch, by causing things to be visibly picked up and moved or by grabbing occupants of the property? That differentiation right there makes a huge difference in the sorts of patterns one sees reoccur throughout stories  and experiences. Also, while we're on the subject, I think that overall, there are five sorts of manipulations that can occur (from what I've read so far, anyways): sound, sight (a.k.a., a spectre), touch (also known as a poltergeist), environmental (including temperature control, taste, smell, and other physical factors), and empathic (those that cause intense feelings and [as I'll argue about tomorrow] possessions). I think that covers most of the bases, especially since each category of manifestation doesn't necessarily preclude any other category, but then we need to have the followup question depending on what categories it falls into:

 

If sound, are they abiotic (obviously created by non-living components, like chains clanking or doors slamming) or biotic sounds (those needing a living organism to cause, like footsteps, or whispering, or screaming)?

 

If touch, is the movement tracked while being in the same room with the moving objects, or is it only noticed after the inhabitants come into the area in question (do they see it happen or does weird stuff occur only when they're not in the room)?

 

If sight, is the shape humanoid or not? And regardless of that answer, is it luminous, shadowed, translucent, or normal-appearing? 

If environmental, is it small-scale or large-scale (in this case, is the experience confined to a restricted area or does the experiencer feel completely transported to another place and time)?

 

If empathic, what is the severity of the feelings felt (does the feeling feel like a vague impression, or is it severe enough to cause the experiencer to actually commit specific acts)?

 

So, with a basic question and a followup question as to specific parameters defining the phenomenon, we've basically summed up three quarters of almost every ghost story out there. Not that the "fluff" is unnecessary, building a comprehensive account of the happenings is important. But honestly, don't you think it would make things so much easier to just be able to discuss these things in more concrete terms rather than "you had to be there, but let me tell you what happened as best I can from beginning to end"...

What's In a Haunting?

In our first installment, let's discuss what the most basic aspects of a haunting are. Namely, the focus of the haunting, and the apparent reactivity of the haunting to outside stimuli.

 

Now, we'll get to the actual operationalization of a "haunting" tomorrow, but for today, let's just assume a haunting is a series of scientifically-inexplicable events that seem to share a common denominator of some sort. And that common denominator should be the first thing every investigator asks themselves:

 

What is the phenomena apparently linked to? Is it object, person, or location-linked?

 

This first descriptor seems highly overlooked as a major classification point, in my opinion. At most, it's a detail or footnote, never warranting an actual, careful classification overall. But I think this detail is quite important, seeing as most hauntings I've ever heard of are location-based, but there are a few that seem to follow objects and even fewer that follow people. That would indicate there are exceptions to the "rule" of location-based haunting, meaning that there exists some discriminating characteristics inherent to the genesis of the haunting itself...why/how would it bond to an ambulatory object or entity, or manifest itself in a stationary or mobile manner? This is a question that any working hypothesis of how ghosts operate should be able to answer. But enough of that, onto question two:

 

Does the phenomena appear to have a measurable stimulus response, in that it's behavior changes upon (independent) changes in the environment?

 

I was originally going to summarize this one as intelligent vs. unintelligent, but I realized this is a misnomer. If we are truly talking about apparitions as a scientific possibility, then we need to also accept that we have no way to gauge their logic, intelligence, morality, or anything of the sort...you could basically argue the same thing of trying to ascribe intelligence to a collection of lichen (if you believe in the non-intelligent "spiritual energy" angle) or an extraterrestrial (if you believe in the "independent visitor from beyond the veil" idea, where they retain shadows of their former feelings and faculties). In either case, they are so far outside of what we could consider a normal life form and the rules that govern one that I think we need to establish sentience before trying to determine intelligence. And the quickest way to determine that is to see if you can influence it. Can you make it more violent by playing a certain kind of music of yelling in an angry manner? Can you calm it by cowering or patting your grandmother's urn? If you can't then it's basically a force of nature, which doesn't mean it's not worth studying, it's just not worth trying to anthropomorphize a damn tornado.  If you can, then maybe we can start trying to treat it as something -possibly- more intelligent.

Parsimonious Blues

So, for this week I figured we could start talking turkey about one of the bigger topics in the paranormal investigation field, the classification of ghosts. Or, as I see it, the lack of classification. See, it seems like every story is just a jumble of experiences all thrown together in such a way that is supposed to make each ghost seem unique, like it's the only one of its kind in the world. Bee Ess. If one is truly trying to prove the existence of ghosts as a scientific fact (like most good little "believers" purport to), then lets start treating them as a real, testable scientific phenomena, such as light or sound. Let's actually construct a working hypothesis rather than trying to make the hypothesis some vague, untestable, nebulous crap that never really gets accepted in the wider body of literature.

 

What does that mean for us, then? Well, all this week we're going to ask a bunch of questions. From the next week on, I'll occasionally splash a little science article or finding in here and there, and what the ramifications of such a development could mean to paranormal investigations as a whole. Sound good? Cool, lets begin.