You're a stranger...
Bit of background first: in my younger days, I read everything I could find in the way of parapsychology, UFOlogy, and other para-sciences. I've let my interest lapse, but I still have a shitload of case studies, dissections of events, critical analyses etc. half-remembered in this skull. Combine what facts I can remember with a big fuckoff internet connection and my ability to make Google my whimpering little bitch, and I have access to it all... {insert evil laugh here }. So, let's crack on.
Ghosts
I don't believe in any of it.
I do acknowledge weird shite happens, alright, with no known way to fake it (cf. Rosenheim Poltergeist: auto-translated from German. Good luck making sense of it.) and I don't totally discount them the way I do 'God' - but I do totally discount life after death, lost souls, etc. I have serious problems with the recorded emotions ("stone tapes") explanations, too; Occam's Razor does some damage to it as a theory, which is never a good sign. There are many, many, many cases one can point to that have been discredited (a sample or two further down) and very few that completely hold up (in fact, the Rosenheim Poltergeist case is about the only one I can think of that I'll acknowledge immediately as inexplicable).
People are very suggestible (cf. Bowmen of Agincourt) and a lot of people have so much invested in there being something that they're willing to gloss over any logical holes they can ignore (cf. some problems with Borley Rectory, faked fairies). This is not a criticism of any believers, this is a tendency we all share, and a serious problem of paranormal study (indeed, any scientific study). So, basically, I have loads of facts but no theories, precisely the same as the pros, and I don't even have an institute!
(",)
Ghosts
I don't believe in any of it.
I do acknowledge weird shite happens, alright, with no known way to fake it (cf. Rosenheim Poltergeist: auto-translated from German. Good luck making sense of it.) and I don't totally discount them the way I do 'God' - but I do totally discount life after death, lost souls, etc. I have serious problems with the recorded emotions ("stone tapes") explanations, too; Occam's Razor does some damage to it as a theory, which is never a good sign. There are many, many, many cases one can point to that have been discredited (a sample or two further down) and very few that completely hold up (in fact, the Rosenheim Poltergeist case is about the only one I can think of that I'll acknowledge immediately as inexplicable).
People are very suggestible (cf. Bowmen of Agincourt) and a lot of people have so much invested in there being something that they're willing to gloss over any logical holes they can ignore (cf. some problems with Borley Rectory, faked fairies). This is not a criticism of any believers, this is a tendency we all share, and a serious problem of paranormal study (indeed, any scientific study). So, basically, I have loads of facts but no theories, precisely the same as the pros, and I don't even have an institute!
(",)