[Closed] Our (level headed) MD saw a "ghost" last week!

miketually - Member
You knew what I meant
[b]I know what you meant, but there's no evidence for it so it's not any more valid a belief than believing that God is a 6'2" man living on a distant planet called Koleb.[/b]

too many wanna be scientists on here
There are lots of actual scientists on here.

POSTED 1 HOUR AGO # REPORT-POST

I never said there was any evidence! 🙄
The thing is your trying to tell me your right? As are all the scientist types on here, you cannot explain what is known with what is unknown.

Junkyard - lazarus
too many wanna be scientists on here
hat is up there with being told you are logical and rational - I cannot imagine why anyone would try and use this as an insult.

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No insults meant, thing is your coming across as more insulting with your patronising.

I never said there was any evidence!
The thing is your trying to tell me your right? As are all the scientist types on here, you cannot explain what is known with what is unknown.

Science admits that there are things that are unknown and then tries to uncover what they are - if we knew everything, research scientists would be out of a job. What science doesn't do is fill in the gaps with wishful thinking.

Religion and 'spirituality' are attempts to fill in the gaps without evidence.

[url=

scientists are doing[/url].

miketually - Member
What scientists are doing.

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So basically, he doesn't have a clue!
Yeah great example of a scientist. 🙄
But at least he's being honest which I like.

Sounds like Tucker needs to grow up and get a grip tbh.

So basically, he doesn't have a clue!
Yeah great example of a scientist.

He is an excellent example of a scientist. He doesn't know, so he tries to find out rather than just making up something that feels nice and warm and fuzzy and being content with that, or believing in whatever god(s) his parents happened to believe in.

Science isn't about knowing things, it's about trying to find things out.

miketually - Member
So basically, he doesn't have a clue!
Yeah great example of a scientist.
He is an excellent example of a scientist. He doesn't know, so he tries to find out rather than just making up something that feels nice and warm and fuzzy and being content with that, or believing in whatever god(s) his parents happened to believe in.

POSTED 46 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

Fair do

No insults meant, thing is your coming across as more insulting with your patronising.

Junkyard - lazarus
No insults meant, thing is your coming across as more insulting with your patronising.

Who knew wanna be scientist was not a dig
PS more insulting contradicts you somewhat as it implies you are also insulting just that I am more so - I think it may also prove the patronising comment
POSTED 32 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

Oh dear...you win then 🙄

[img] [/img]

It's extremely difficult (actually, nigh on impossible for me), to not be patronising (bordering on downright rude and dismissive)

That's your failing then isn't it.

Nobody forces you to be rude

you could just ignore it.

But you choose not to.

Trouble with keeping an open mind, is people keep chucking rubbish into it.
Organic, your photo is excellent, I had to zoom in and out several times to really get what I thought I was seeing. Very clever, very subtle, I love it! 😀

allmountainventure - Member
I heard a dead cat once... yeah I know, an effing cat!. The sound came from the table where it died although its body was about 50m away, outside, on the opposite side of the house. My mate heard it too and jumped up saying "what was that", never did tell him about the cat though, so how did we both hear the same thing? No drink or drugs involved, no sleep deprivation and so on... just a plain old table where a cat died half hour before my mate came round... Would love some one to explain it... preferebly not with some thing equally bizzare, like I was staring down a wormhole.

deadlydarcy - Member
Are you being rude and dismissive calling someone a keyboard warrior ?
No.

You were perfectly happy using it in a rude and dismissive fashion to a not entirely serious post of mine, a little while back...

Yes, you deserved it. You were being a keyboard warrior. As you often are.

Night.

Of course there are ghosts/spirits/whatever you want to call them ...

The reasons scientists do not want to know because:

1. It is pointless because dead people are dead. i.e. carbon.
2. Can't change the past.
3. It is a research into the intangible.
4. Most religions distort the facts. i.e. creationists.
5. Funding - not material research hence can't convert into cash.
6. Fixated on material future.
7. Too vast an area to research i.e. not narrow enough to be defined.
8. etc ...

🙄

The reasons scientists do not want to know because:

There is no evidence?

jam bo - Member

The reasons scientists do not want to know because:

There is no evidence?

Nope. No interest due to above reasons.

Steps in research ...

Topic/interest etc -> research -> evidence -> research -> evidence -> research -> ... chicken and eggs -> bored -> new topic/interest -> research -> evidence -> research -> evidence -> research -> ... chicken and eggs ... make money ... bored ... New topic etc ...

I'm going to start my argument strongly by paraphrasing "Thor" 😉

Science to primitive cultures often looks like magic.

Smart, intelligent and in my eyes totally trustworthy people I know have told me about there experiences with ghosts and déjà vu. On ocassion I have heard about things before they happened. Unfortunately they did not include the lottery nos.

I would like to think that I have a strongly scientific mind. I have no problem reconciling these with science. There is still stuff out there we can't explain. To me that's awesome! One day we will be able to explain and it'll be fascinating to find out what the scientific explanation is.

I find it really sad that some people in the name of science dismiss everything they're uncomfortable about there is still a whole lot we haven't been able to figure out yet, there is no reason to close your mind.

I think human perception is definitely involved in the ghost stories and déjà vu above. I think one of the ways this could be explained is in M-theory, where time is not linear and there are more dimensions than we perceive. But I only have an amateur knowledge of this and I look forward to some Einstein in the future linking it all together.

Chewkw, how come you know so much about science and how it works?

Oh for God's sake, get on with the ghost stories will you?

5. Funding - not material research hence can't convert into cash.

I would think ghosts would get US Deparment of Defence research grants, if they thought they existed.

7. Too vast an area to research i.e. not narrow enough to be defined.

Like climate change?

There are lots of actual scientists on here.

Awesome I'm not sure I qualify quite yet though, not got a PhD yet so I'm not a 'proper' scientist. Getting there.

There's a Noble prize for the scientist that proves ghosts exist, so there is a good reason to look for them. Unfortunately, there's no evidence to show anything exists. I'd love them to exist, but I'm not holding my breathe.

Indeed fame and riches would await anyone who had proof/evidence
They have been trying since at least the 18 th C to do this and still cannot produce any evidence but we have uncovered many tricks and charlatans

Read into thsi failure what you will as to whether you should still keep an open mind

I'm going to start my argument strongly by paraphrasing "Thor"

Science to primitive cultures often looks like magic.

Thought that was Arthur C Clarke's (apparently not so) famous quote "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." But he was an author, not a scientist, so I'm not sure his opinion is reliable 😉 But there again I don't think he wrote any ghost stories...

not got a PhD yet so I'm not a 'proper' scientist.

I only [i]teach[/i] science, so that probably means I'm not a proper scientist either 🙂

I think I know a way round the PhD problem, one of my friends when waiting to get a PhD place ended up buying a centrifuge, a microscope and spectroscope and half a tonne of laboratory equipment and ended up getting published! If I can do that, I think I can call myself a 'proper' scientist. I'll see if I can find the papers.

Thought that was Arthur C Clarke's

Definitely was but I thought Thor has more cred these days 😉

It is interesting though. Science on the whole is about degrees of certainty.

It is highly likely that man made climate change is real (>99% certain?) but it is not 100%. That high degree of certainty and impact means that any rational person should take it seriously and do something about it.

Ghosts - cultural evidence and from those that I have met suggests that there is something going on. Hard data is difficult to obtain. We know that our mind's perception is limited and that there is a lot more going on in the world (time being non-linear, extra dimensions, etc...)

Probability of ghosts existing.... ??

Probably higher than the existence of the flying spaghetti monster.

To me it's not in the impossible box but not in the ">99%" certain" box.

To me it's not in the impossible box but not in the ">99%" certain" box.

To me, it's in the <0.1% box, along with Russell's teapot, the FSM, leprechauns, Zeus, etc.

There's a Noble prize for the scientist that proves ghosts exist

EDIT: The Noble prize is awarded by the American Society of Civil Engineers, for a paper published by someone under the age of 35 (the only criteria I can quickly find). I call BS on that post above.

The Noble prize is awarded by the American Society of Civil Engineers, for a paper published by someone under the age of 35 (the only criteria I can quickly find). I call BS on that post above.

So how did Higgs win it then he's not under 35 by a long way, have you checked all the Noble Prize lists?

Noble Prize

Nobel Prize

Oh! 😳

I haven't added up [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prizes_for_evidence_of_the_paranormal ]the list of prizes for proving supernatural events[/url] but it'd seem like a slam dunk for some research if anyone had a chance of claiming them.

have you checked all the Noble Prize lists?

Yep 🙂

[url= http://www.asce.org/Content.aspx?id=17405 ]Noble Prize Past Award Winners[/url]

I haven't added up the list of prizes for proving supernatural events but it'd seem like a slam dunk for some research if anyone had a chance of claiming them.

But it depends on the evidence being easily obtainable. Similar prizes for say discovering the Higgs Boson would not be claimed unless they were substantial enough to cover the outlay to build a Hadron collidier.

There is clearly some sort of phenomena happening, we have yet to build the theory or the tools to build a repeatable experiment.

There is clearly some sort of phenomena happening, we have yet to build the theory or the tools to build a repeatable experiment.

Yes, as explained earlier....your brain is ****ing with you.

We have built the theory and the tools to test this in repeatable experiments.

Similar prizes for say discovering the Higgs Boson would not be claimed unless they were substantial enough to cover the outlay to build a Hadron collidier.

Uhhh. I believe the Hadron Collider was built using government grants, if governments thought there was something to "ghosts" being real then I'm sure as I stated earlier...that the US DoD would have their dirty fingers in the pie.

There is clearly some sort of phenomena happening, we have yet to build the theory or the tools to build a repeatable experiment.

Or the alternative hypothesis that there is nothing happening that cannot be explained by current theory and tools.

In the previous pages we've had claims of an allegedly perfectly repeatable event relating to books flying off a shelf. Don't think we're talking LHC money to put up another shelf in the house are we?

Or the alternative hypothesis that there is nothing happening that cannot be explained by current theory and tools.

Well that certainly fits the bill in some cases - probably most especially when charlatans are at work trying to con people.

However there are just some cases that just cannot be easily dismissed. The book in the link below is a good example - it could be easily dismissed except it happened to a leading neurosurgeon who was able to look at all the usual explanations for what he went through. The guy certainly isn't crazy and, I'd argue knows more about the human brain than anyone posting in this thread.

[url=Proof of Heaven] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Proof-Heaven-Neurosurgeons-Journey-Afterlife/dp/0749958790/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381756893&sr=8-1&keywords=proof+of+heaven [/url]

Then there are cases of mysterious disappearances such as those covered by this book:

[url=Missing 411] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Missing-411-Western-United-States-Canada/dp/1466216298/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1381757233&sr=8-1&keywords=missing+411 [/url]

Again, very well researched. Both of these are easy to dismiss until you read them and realise the extent to which the authors know their subjects and are backed up by credible witnesses/professionals.

Scepticism is healthy but an open mind that there are still things out there that science can't yet explain is healthy too. After all science is littered with over turned theories that at one time or another were thought credible. Even the wackier ones like expanding Earth theory only got properly demolished in the past 50 years once better technology could be used to measure plate tectonics.

Proof of Heaven? Seems like he missed one theory out of his book :-

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/proof-of-heaven/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-near-death-experience-isnt-proof-heaven

Maybe 'Proof' is a bit strong, eh. Remember books can be published by anyone, journals only tend to publish papers that have been through some sort of review (note - this doesn't necessarily make them correct either).

I think any scientist would love to be the first to [b]prove[/b] that there is some sort of supernatural force - whether they're physicists, biologists, psychologists... whatever. The founding of an entire new branch of science would be an epic achievement - but it doesn't seem to be at the forefront of research.

That's not because they don't have open enquiring minds - science isn't about meekly accepting the work of those that have gone before, but about checking it, challenging it, finding holes in it, and trying to fill those holes. The bigger the hole in previous work, the greater the challenge.

Remember the kerfuffle when someone thought they'd found evidence of faster than light travel? Were they ridiculed because they disproved Einstein? No, they published their data and asked everyone to check what they were seeing. Why would they behave any differently if they, for instance, found evidence a new plane of existence or a telekinetic force?

ETA - for those who say that the area of the paranormal doesn't fit in with current science I'd suggest you take a look at psychological research into the consciousness. Lots of difficult questions remaining to be answered there - [url= http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/Articles/psych01.htm ]here's a primer[/url] from a psychologist who incidentally spent a while studying [url= http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/journalism/NS2000.html ]parapsychology[/url]

There's a Noble prize for the scientist that proves ghosts exist
Citation needed
EDIT: The Noble prize is awarded by the American Society of Civil Engineers, for a paper published by someone under the age of 35 (the only criteria I can quickly find). I call BS on that post above.

I think you are well aware of what was meant - do either organisation given awards to pedants?

There is clearly some sort of phenomena happening,

Many folk report the presence of god in their lifes for example
Some claim to be able to feel magnetism. Some can read your aura. just because some folk claim it is so does not make it real.

However there are just some cases that just cannot be easily dismissed

but an open mind that there are still things out there that science can't yet explain is healthy too.

After all science is littered with over turned theories that at one time or another were thought credible.

Even the wackier ones like expanding Earth theory only got properly demolished in the past 50 years once better technology could be used to measure plate tectonics.

However there are just some cases that just cannot be easily dismissed. The book in the link below is a good example - it could be easily dismissed except it happened to a leading neurosurgeon who was able to look at all the usual explanations for what he went through. The guy certainly isn't crazy and, I'd argue knows more about the human brain than anyone posting in this thread.

I tell you what explains that. First off, he's a surgeon and therefore a ****. Secondly, he suffered massive brain damage and consequently lost the plot - real scientists have been known to lose the plot as well and believe in bollocks. The infamous one being Peter Duesberg.

TA - for those who say that the area of the paranormal doesn't fit in with current science I'd suggest you take a look at psychological research into the consciousness. Lots of difficult questions remaining to be answered there - here's a primer from a psychologist who incidentally spent a while studying parapsychology

There are much better primers than that now, blindsight is a hell of a lot better understood than it was back in 2001. (I believe)

I think you are well aware of what was meant - do either organisation given awards to pedants?

Either? Neither the American Institute of Civil Engineers, nor the Nobel Foundation seem to do a prize for ghostbusting so it's still cobblers regardless of which was intended.

However, whether they give awards to pedants is hard to answer without investigating all the winners. It seems that they don't give awards for pedantry, but whether any of those who won awards for other things were also pedants is not easily judged. Certainly, I can't see anything that says that people who are pedants are disqualified, so it is quite likely that they do, or certainly could, give awards to pedants.

btw

I think you are well aware of what was meant - do either organisation give[s]n[/s] awards to pedants?

FTFY. You're welcome.