News:

"Wings and a Prayer [L-E]"
Congratulations OfferedToEros & Random for completing your RP!

Main Menu

Paranormal

Started by Kate, October 09, 2009, 11:25:22 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Avi

I have a feeling this discussion has moved into realms which I cannot speak intelligently about.  However, I would just like to add my two cents, if I may.  I would like to think of myself as a rational person.  I look for logical reasons for phenomena, ie. if my house creaks in the night, I don't immediately go "Oh my gosh, IT'S A GHOST!!! *spaz*"  More often than not, most "paranormal" phenomena can be chalked up to natural, logical events which we just don't perceive at the time.  For example, pipes expanding or contracting because of temperature can lead to sounds of tapping or banging in the walls, or a faulty valve can cause a faucet to turn on by itself. 

However, there are instances in which there is simply no logical explanation for what occurs.  I have had a personal experience involving the movement of an object in my grandparents' house, and to this day, I still cannot find any reason for why it did so, and neither can anyone else in my family who experienced it with me.  I will be the first person to point out a logical explanation for something, if there is one.  However, to paraphrase Sherlock Holmes, when all logical explanations have been exhausted, the last explanation, no matter how odd, must be true.  For me, I'm a believer with a skeptical outlook.  I don't take things at face value.  Show me tangible proof of it, then I might listen to you.  Hearsay and personal experiences are not enough to prove the paranormal.
Your reality doesn't apply to me...

Kate

#51

Logical explanation

Person 1 : "20 minutes ago it wasn't there that means we are not alone"
Person 2 : "Your mean some non-human entity made it ? That isn't logical, its more like wind or strange electromagnetic fiends of the earth or something or some force science hasn't discovered yet

Person 1:"Science has discovered it - here it is ... new force ? Yes that on another intelligence.

Person 2: "20 minutes ? Why should I beleive such a claim ? It may have been there before but with false-memories you may not have "seen it" when you looked 20 minutes ago ... your recall of it being there or not 20 minutes ago isnt science man it isn't proof"

Person 1: "Is you experiencing it here with me now proof its here now ? Lets take a photo and walk away in case its a local effect on our brains ... Hmm the photo shows it...

Could the view of the photo be re-triggering a hypnotic suggested false-memory again and we just see what we want to see where really the photo is blank... or something "

Person 2: "Well we could put the photo through tests to see if its really showing us what we
think it is ... like ask others or put it through machines that test it and stuff ...

Person 1: But would we beleive what they say or what they show us is real ? It could be the same hypnotic effect making us experience this ... also fooling what we read on the machines or what we hear when we ask others opinions .. when they are REALLY telling us something different, we could have convinced ourselves its real dude."

Person 2: So what sense do we trust is true ?

Person 1: What do you have faith in being true ...

Person 2: I have faith in science man.

Person 1: You mean you have recall of an experience that science explained
and you adopted it as a method for explaining your experiences ..

Person 2: Um Yeah.

Person 1: But your trust of that recall ... this "science thing" is a memory of that being true  ... a memory not proven by science ! It could be THOSE memorys of science working ... were false ones...

Person 2: But there were so many of them ...

Person 1: Where is the proof of that man ?

Person 2: Hmm... your right... I guess its my perspective I trust - and I look for reasons to justify it which for some reason ... I feel are reasons that should be valued by others ... weird.

Person 1: IF we are victums of some Hypnosis or effect or not ... couldn't reality be what we experience as real ? that is real to us ? Does anything else matter ? We could be in a coma halucinating all of our lives and its just one big dream right ? So ... nothing can prove something is real - but what we .... experience ... is something science tries to explain, sometimes it fails, when it does we call such experiences not normal.

..... Paranormal Experiences.

Do they exist ? Some beleive they do and take photos to prove it to others when they can ... like photos of crop circles (that are still there ... physical .. "proof" to those trusting certain senses)

That is as strong a proof as one can hope for.... other than a paranormal experience themselves.

Kurzyk

Paranormal? The best answer I could give is I don't know.

There is still so much to existence we don't understand. A true scientist would respond with 'I don't know.' and continue through scientific method, to plod their way using the tools available to them with mathematics, observation and an open mind as their guide.

We could argue back and forth about its existence, and there are arguments for and against. From a scientific standpoint, the paranormal falls under pseudo-science, because any attempts at fitting paranormal activity into scientific method hasn't been conclusive and in some cases results were fraudulent.

But any scientist worth their merit would always keep an open mind. Science is not about establishment thinking, but about asking questions and refining as new information becomes available. As long as we move forward properly, with scientific method, then anything is possible.

Who knows maybe Einstein's belief in 'Spinoza's god' will prove to be how things are and that maybe thought/consciousness is connected to reality on quantum levels such that manifestations like telekinesis, telepathy and all that stuff becomes possible.

Maybe a thousand years from now as we're flying around in energy states, we'll look back at the 'primitive' days of the 21st century and wonder how they survived without the technology and scientific advances of the year 3010.

*laughs* Who knows. But hey, take a lighter back to the 12th century and see how quickly people think its supernatural or paranormal. He lights fire from his hands! He must be a witch! Burn him!

MercyfulFate

I fully believe paranormal things happen, and it irks me when people dismiss it and say it's not even possible.

Silk

It is not down to me that it does not exist, it is down to you to prove to me that it does.

Pumpkin Seeds

Not sure how that rule comes about.

Kate

#56
Silk ... remember science's role is to explain reality.

Its not a ghosts role to usher science updating itself so itself can be proven
real to the majority of the scientific community - it MIGHt be but science is the one claiming it explains reality (until a universal theory of everything is found and proven - effectively nothing is proven by science ... all there are are growing sets of phenomena that can be explained by science)

this forum is not for one side to convince the other is right but if it was
Then perhaps silk its up to you to prove to us that they are not real.

Are not "valid" experiences, that crop circles are made by man (even though they have no footsteps leading towards them or away and are made in 20 minutes ... and even the weaving within a "plain area" is ridiculously complex, oh and the storks are hit with something like microwave energy that makes them buckle in a certain way ... and that it changes the soil and electromagnetic properties of the area (which phyiscal tools can show to be generally "true" - if one trusts their own tests ... and do not lump the tests themselves as "under the effect of delusional memories").

Kate

(If it was my role to prove to silk and J that they do exist)...

I would go with crop circles.

Silk

So because something doesn't currently have a explanation means that it was done by something paranormal? Contradiction much

Unknown cause = Paranormal
I cannot explain something = therefore I can explain it.

The reason why you have to prove its true is because there is currently no proof of paranormal events, just unexplained ones, all your doing is changing "unknown occurrence" with "Paranormal"

Remember that a UFO does not necessarily mean alien spaceship its just a unknown flying object, its name is alot more diverse than people give credit for.

Kate

i think the disagreement you and i share silk is that one on definitions.

Some beleive that the ufo phenomena is not due to anything other than something already explained by current science.

Some beleive they are real (ie not strange cloud formations) but do not beleive they are aliens.

Some beleive they are aliens.

Paranormal I beleive is something that the majority of the scientific culture believes is not true.

Some UFO's = Aliens is something that most of science does not agree with formally (they may privately but being so formally is killing their own career).

Same with "ghost" = "disembodied intellect abilties"  (not necessarily by one that is dead).

Remote viewing = Not true abilities to the current stream of science.

Same with crop circles = act of alien intelligence (Not true abilities to the current stream of science)

Will science theroy's expand to explain ALL of this ?

Perhaps... but phenomena that science beleives is due to psychic abilities or intelligent alien minds = Paranormal

This is diffierent to unknown cause = paranormal.

If you go home and find your TV not working - you have an unknown cause, it may be due to a
electical fault, a fuse, something mundane... all signs prove that its likely due to something science can easily explain - no need for paranormal stuff.

IF you go home and see your TV unplugged from the wall but it has a white dot in the middle, ok ... weird but capacitors do exist, stored energy exists in the tv, some magnetic field fluctuations could trigger some power to discharge to illuminate the light without power from the mains ... fair enough.

If you go home and see your TV unplugged from the wall and showing the face of something
that has eyes which seem to be following you.... then it starts trying to talk to you.... hmm ok
you may be experiencing a delusion and it could be a memory mis-firing or some psychotic effect.

If three others claim the same to an external party and they didn't talk before hand, or if another says it happened to them BEFORE you told them it happened to you to anyone ...
then ... then you start thinking that perhaps .. perhaps ... what is MORE likely now is a cause that is ...

Para-normal.





Cythieus

Let's not forget, things in science often seem stranger than the idea of some paranormal stuff. Quantum Physics for instance is pretty crazy and if you were to tell some people what can happen with sub atomic particles, they might call you crazy.

Kate

like "spooky action at a distance"... in the quantum world.

Para-normal causes IS "the normal".

Avi

Paranormal:  Outside normal.  Technically, if I was walking down the street and all of a sudden, a giant duck float rolled by, I could call that a paranormal experience.  ;)
Your reality doesn't apply to me...

Cythieus

Yeah I don't like to say that the Paranormal is necessarily Supernatural.

Avi

Quote from: Odin on October 14, 2009, 03:49:04 PM
Yeah I don't like to say that the Paranormal is necessarily Supernatural.

Yes, I classify ghosts, demons, exorcisms, etc. under "Supernatural", since supernatural means "Beyond the natural", which is a better definition than paranormal.
Your reality doesn't apply to me...

Kate

so remote viewing would be paranormal but not supernatural

Cythieus

Quote from: Kate on October 15, 2009, 03:11:51 AM
so remote viewing would be paranormal but not supernatural

It might depend on the source, if this guys Death and return to life caused it...it might be either.

MercyfulFate

Quote from: Silk on October 13, 2009, 05:48:56 PM
It is not down to me that it does not exist, it is down to you to prove to me that it does.

Problem is, even if something paranormal appeared right in front of most of the "lalala can't hear you!" skeptics, they would say it wasn't real, regardless.

There are numerous pictures, recording and videos of paranormal things that have not been debunked or disproved. The brown lady of Raynam Hall(Sp?) was one such picture for example. Or the Tombstone picture in the cemetery, etc.

However if you refuse to believe it can happen, nothing I could show you would matter. I've experienced some truly odd stuff, and had some strange audio recordings even that changed my mind on the subject years back.

Silk

Quote from: MercyfulFate on October 16, 2009, 12:36:53 PM
Problem is, even if something paranormal appeared right in front of most of the "lalala can't hear you!" skeptics, they would say it wasn't real, regardless.



Trust me hun, the skeptics have been on the receiving end of that for a long time when it comes to religous debates, but from this side any true open mided skeptic would take into regard any evidence given

Cythieus

Quote from: Silk on October 16, 2009, 05:41:20 PM
Trust me hun, the skeptics have been on the receiving end of that for a long time when it comes to religous debates, but from this side any true open mided skeptic would take into regard any evidence given

Two totally different things. Religion is about faith. But many people claim to have seen and met aliens or ghosts or other things, some of them with scientific explanations and they are met with that kind of skepticism.

Kate

the reason why religion appears with the paranormal is unlike mainstream science it attempts to acknowledge them as valid experiences and also attempts to explain them.

Silk

I do find it funny how you guys seem to think that science is openly discrediting the paranormal and supernatural, as if it doesn't fit into their littlebox of existence, when science would be more than Happy to hear about these events, IF there was some evidence that it happened, anecdotal evidence is not enough to sway the scientific community, which is normally the most anyone is able to bring up regarding these situations.

Science admits it does not have all the answers and will openly say it does not have a answer for X at this time. It is this sort of thing that tries to make the answers for themselves, which is ultimately detrimental to society, because we can and will not expand our understanding of the world if we just say "aw it was ghosts/aliens/god/flying spaghetti monster"
because we will be no closer to the real answer which is found by testing and evidence, we now know that earthquakes are caused by tectonic shifts and not the wrath of god.

We allways have to be careful in this day and age because with our level of technology its easier and easier to hoax such things like ghost sightings. If I was to put a loud booming voice in a Church's rigged up sound system and speak through it, how many people would think it is the word of god talking to them?

Kate

silk....

I see where your comming from ie science is interested in strange phenomena and is interested in the unexplained, however mainstream science doesn't like things that hint at the plausibility of existing phenomena implying aliens or disembodied intelligences.

There are things they can study - crop circles, yes some are hoaxes.

Some are not. Crop circles are linked with aliens culturally, being involved with them is almost suicide for the career of a scientist.

Silk

Investigating them is not career suicide, if there is reason to suspect there may be something behind them that is not explainable, its people jumping to the conclusion that crop circle = alien that is career suicide

Saerrael

#74
Quote from: Silk on October 17, 2009, 09:55:33 AM
Investigating them is not career suicide, if there is reason to suspect there may be something behind them that is not explainable, its people jumping to the conclusion that crop circle = alien that is career suicide

Personally, I do wonder. Would the world end if these were not made my aliens ? Oh, I don't mean the hoax ones, forgive me.. But why conclude that every crop circle is either a hoax or from alien origin?
And I have nothing against sceptics, nor science attempting to study that what is yet unexplained. More growth in knowledge should really be our goal, not bickering amongst ourselves if X is actually Y.
If science can live with the 'floaty people' and the floaty people can live with the sceptics attempting to either prove or pop the dreambubble, it would all be so much easier..