Are ghosts real?

[confused2]

Much as I enjoy a challenge - I can't be bothered to waste any further time on you. Have a nice life.

[Syne]

^ Every post of yours is a complete waste of time. Why you bother at all is anyone's guess.

[Leigha]

I think that some claims of the paranormal while seemingly sincere, are inaccurate. People who believe in ghosts are basing it all on personal experience, so it would be very difficult if not impossible, to apply a non-paranormal explanation to the paranormal (without being a witness alongside the claimant). And then, there is the problem of intentional hoaxes.

For me, what are ghosts? Why would they exist? If they're spirits of the dead, why are they lurking around the living? How can they appear out of nowhere? If people claim to see and hear ghosts, then we should be able to apply science to prove their existence. But, currently, there is no scientific evidence to support the hypothesis that ghosts exist, independent of the person claiming to have had had the experience.

Even Ouija boards have been debunked.

https://www.vox.com/2016/10/29/13301590/...tor-effect

All that said, it can still be fun to take in a haunted house or cemetery tour on Halloween, which is only two months away. <_< Often, we become hyper-aware of what's around us, when we tell ourselves that we're about to enter a supposed haunted house. Maybe we enjoy being scared? lol

There is a haunted restaurant about an hour from me, a friend of mine toured it and said she felt ''cold spots'' throughout the tour. She left convinced that while it might not have been a ghost, it was certainly something unusual. All in her head?

[Magical Realist]

I believe in ghosts, not because they make sense, but because so many people have experiences with them. I really would prefer they didn't exist as objective conscious beings, and some hauntings appear to be residual in nature where ghosts are mere holographic projections of past events. That some people become trapped in some kind of limbo between here and the afterlife, living out their obsessions and fears and yearnings, doesn't say alot for the afterlife, at least one spent haunting a location for years. Maybe they have some karmic debt they need to pay before moving on towards the light. I don't know. As with many other mysteries of the universe I remain blissfully agnostic, dwelling in the misty zone between reality and impossibility.

[Syne]

I believe in ghosts, not because they make sense, but because so many people have experiences with them.

Same should be true of god then. Way more people have experienced god in some way to make them believers (~80% of the entire world).

[Magical Realist]

I believe in ghosts, not because they make sense, but because so many people have experiences with them.

Same should be true of god then. Way more people have experienced god in some way to make them believers (~80% of the entire world).

Thing is you have to believe in God already to experience him/it, which is a sort of internal state of love and repentance and awe to an image in your brain. God is not ever experienced as an objective being outside of you. Ghosts are. They make themselves known thru the 5 senses as well as thru emotions. And you don't have to believe in ghosts to experience them. They have physical effects on the environment unlike God who moves you like a beloved song playing in your head.

[Syne]

Same should be true of god then. Way more people have experienced god in some way to make them believers (~80% of the entire world).

Thing is you have to believe in God already to experience him/it, which is a sort of internal state of love and repentance and awe to an image in your brain. God is not ever experienced as an objective being outside of you. Ghosts are. They make themselves known thru the 5 senses as well as thru emotions. And you don't have to believe in ghosts to experience them. They have physical effects on the environment unlike God who moves you like a beloved song playing in your head.

That doesn't follow. Neither from your own argument, that claims god has to reveal itself first:

But isn't that what he does--reveal himself so we can make a rational and informed decision.

Nor from the fact that people generally do not believe in things they have not, in some way, experienced. If ghosts were objective experiences, we'd all already agree that they were real. News flash, we do not. I don't believe in ghosts, and guess what, I've never experienced one. So in my experience belief is a prerequisite for ghosts. I didn't always believe in god, but what I've seen in the world convinced me god exists. I've seen its effects on the environment. And not just spooky meaningless stuff that people jump at in the dark.

[Leigha]

I believe in ghosts, not because they make sense, but because so many people have experiences with them.

Same should be true of god then. Way more people have experienced god in some way to make them believers (~80% of the entire world).

Thing is you have to believe in God already to experience him/it, which is a sort of internal state of love and repentance and awe to an image in your brain. God is not ever experienced as an objective being outside of you. Ghosts are. They make themselves known thru the 5 senses as well as thru emotions. And you don't have to believe in ghosts to experience them. They have physical effects on the environment unlike God who moves you like a beloved song playing in your head.

[Emphasis in bold by me]

So, would that mean in your opinion, that ghosts aren't supernatural, they're ...natural? Scientific reasoning can't ''explain'' any claimed paranormal phenomena (so that would fit the definition of ''supernatural''), but your post has me wondering what you believe.

[Syne]

"Objective" would be within the realm of science, so there's a contradiction in that description.

[Magical Realist]

So, would that mean in your opinion, that ghosts aren't supernatural, they're ...natural?

If we include under nature all phenomena that manifests physically, then yes ghosts are natural and part of the cosmos. They are objectively real beings no less than minds and souls are.