Whether you believe in ghosts or not, isn’t it fun to think that a spirit might be hovering near you right now? Wait—you’re in the bathroom? Eww…well, maybe not.
BOO!
Ghosts are as popular as ever—just look at hit television shows such as Medium and Ghost Whisperer, countless accounts of “real-life” hauntings on cable TV, and the steady stream of scary movies from Hollywood. In nearly every U.S. city, you can take a ghost tour or hire a team of “ghost hunters” to investigate your attic. In fact, a 2007 Associated Press poll reported that 34% of Americans believe in ghosts and 23% say they’ve seen one. Are all these people crazy? Or are ghosts real? If so, where’s the evidence? We’ll tell you everything you need to know to hold your own in this spirited debate.
Any phenomenon that can’t be neatly explained by science is deemed paranormal. Those who study this field are called parapsychologists, but it’s not something you can get a degree in at your local university. Most “ghost hunters” don’t consider themselves parapsychologists, calling themselves paranormal investigators instead. Here are a few of the supernatural things they look for.
• Spirit: From the Latin spiritus (“breath”), this is a blanket term for any discarnate being, one that lacks a physical body. There are many forms that a spirit can theoretically take on.
• Ghost: A person (or animal) who is no longer living, but exists nonetheless, just not in the physical realm.
• Entity: Any disembodied consciousness that can be classified as a ghost. The two terms are often used interchangeably, along with phantasm, phantom, wraith, spook, sprite, and specter.
• Apparition: How a ghost appears visually. It can manifest in many different forms, from a “full-bodied” apparition to a mist to what are called “shadow people”—small, dark masses that take on a loosely human form. (Interestingly, ghosts rarely appear as a white sheet with two eyeholes.)
If all U.S. ships that serve as memorials were a separate navy, it would be the world’s third largest.
• Orb: A self-illuminated ball of light that travels through the air with some kind of intent. There are several theories as to exactly what they are—many people think of them as simple spirit forms.
• Poltergeist: The German word for “noisy ghost,” this phenomenon is believed to throw objects, bang on walls, and slam doors. Poltergeists are often believed to be connected to adolescent females (perhaps it’s all the hormones).
• Residual haunting: If a person performed a specific act over and over during life—such as putting wood into a stove—it can leave a psychic impression that plays over and over, like a tape recording. In a residual haunting, the ghost doesn’t realize it’s dead; it just keeps performing its task obliviously. (Sometimes, in reports of ghosts walking through walls, the original blueprints of the building reveal that a door once stood there.)
• Intelligent haunting: If the ghost crosses in front of you and you say “Hello,” and it stops and looks at you, that’s an intelligent haunting—a dead person that interacts with you.
In the 1970s, Dietrich Dörner, a German psychologist, introduced the “Psi-Theory,” the idea that combinations of behaviors and emotions create “Psi energy,” also called psychic energy, which Dörner claimed can exist separate from the body. This theory was later promoted by Loyd Auerbach, one of today’s leading parapsychologists. He believes that after someone dies, their Psi energy can remain intact.
According to Auerbach, some causes of death are more conducive to keeping that energy intact: A sudden, violent end is one way. Another possibility is that people who die with nagging, unfinished business are more likely to “hold” that thought and spend the afterlife trying to finish it. Yet no matter what led to the death, a disembodied energy field is very faint by modern measuring devices. But it can theoretically last for years, even centuries.
According to parapsychologists, a ghost either consciously or unconsciously remembers what he or she looked like, and some choose how they will appear to the living. The theory goes that your Psi energy contains information about you, including how you look and the clothes you wear. Ghosts whose Psi energy is still intact after death probably hold on to some of that information.
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But ghosts aren’t necessarily shaped like humans. Here’s what one ghost looked like, according to what Auerbach says the ghost actually told him:
A deceased woman who was in constant communication with a young boy (and seen by others, as it happens) said that as far as she knew, she was a ball of energy, of consciousness, though she also said she really didn’t know that “ball” was the right word, since she felt kind of formless. How she pictured herself was how others perceived her—she noted that she was more or less connecting mind-to-mind to the boy (and others), and projecting the idea of her form, clothing, and her voice to him.
Again, it’s all about energy, say parapsychologists. Spirits gain strength by drawing energy from electromagnetic fields (EMFs), or concentrations of charged particles in the air. These can be either natural or man-made—emitted by, among other things, electrical appliances, copper wiring, and static in the air on a stormy night. Paranormal investigators have also discovered that reports of ghost activity are more abundant in areas that have high concentrations of limestone, copper, chalk, iron, and rushing water. Why? They act like batteries and create strong EMFs.
Ever heard of cold spots? Those are created when a spirit draws heat energy from the air. A room can be 65°F, except for one small area where the temperature is 30° colder. When a spirit obtains enough energy, it can manifest into an apparition, control the air around it, and even move objects, talk, sing, or make footsteps. There are even accounts of ghosts recreating smells like cigarette smoke, flowers, blood, and perfume.
All these ghostly theories, say skeptics, are just that—theoretical. What concerns skeptics the most is when parapsychologists, ghost hunters, psychics, and laypeople talk about ghosts as if they’re real, even though they offer no scientific proof to back it up. One of the world’s most famous skeptics, James Randi, is a former stage magician who once relied on illusions to entertain, so he knows what it takes to fool people. To prove his point, Randi formed a foundation that sponsors the “One Million Dollar Challenge.” Paid for by donations from scientific and charitable trusts, the prize of $1 million will be awarded to anyone who can prove the existence of the paranormal (ESP or ghosts) in a laboratory setting. “Our $1 million is safe,” maintains Randi. “Believers will insist on believing despite the evidence no matter how strong that is.” He says that skeptics aren’t necessarily out to prove that ghosts don’t exist—their goal is to curb the rampant lack of critical thinking among the people who say they do.
Auerbach is one of Randi’s strongest critics…and vice versa. According to Auerbach, no one has won the prize because there’s no possible way of matching Randi’s strict guidelines. Ghosts don’t operate on cue, says Auerbach, and they don’t follow people to labs (mostly).
A 14th-century English theologian and philosopher named William of Ockham said that when you’re trying to solve a mystery, you first have to “shave off” any unlikely assumptions. That leaves you with the simplest explanation—which is usually the correct one. As it relates to the paranormal, skeptics use what became known as “Occam’s razor” to mean, “If you hear howling in the night, the simplest explanation is that it was the wind.”
“Well, it cuts both ways,” says Michael Schmicker, author of Best Evidence—an Investigative Reporter’s Three-Year Quest to Uncover the Best Scientific Evidence for ESP, Psychokinesis, and Ghosts. “If a million people report a ghost, Occam’s razor says that ghosts probably exist. Based on the evidence we have—ghost sightings, deathbed visions, near-death experiences, historical reports from various cultures and eras—Occam’s razor says that consciousness does survive death.” That said, skeptics cite numerous simple explanations for phenomena that believers attribute to ghosts:
• Physiological: A medical condition known as phantom limb afflicts amputees who can “feel” a missing appendage, proving that the brain is capable of creating a reality that does not exist in actual life. Joe Nickell, a senior research fellow for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, says that people create “false realities” all the time. For example, many who claim they’ve seen ghosts often report feeling paralyzed when they wake up and see the apparition in the middle of the night. “This is just sleep paralysis,” he says. Also referred to as a “waking dream,” this occurs when the body is asleep, which causes the paralysis, but the brain is teetering between sleep and consciousness.
People who sense a “presence” in an empty room perceive it as the opposite sex 90% of the time.
• Environmental: Temperature and humidity fluctuations cause houses to settle and creak. High EMFs caused by faulty wiring can cause nausea and hallucinations. Mix in low-frequency sound waves, such as the buzz of a fluorescent light, and that can cause people to hear unusual things. The flickering lights themselves cause eye strain and fatigue. These factors, say skeptics, lead to most “sightings.”
In a 2007 case in China, two brothers found a great bargain—a five-story house for $6,500, reduced from $34,000. Why? Strange, ghostly noises echoed through the home, scaring out the previous owners, and the ones before them, going back 10 years. The brothers traced the noises to a pipe and then to an underground stream. The “ghosts” turned out to be catfish splashing. The brothers sold the house for $133,000.
• Psychological: Either due to wishful thinking or for more nefarious reasons (such as TV ratings), most “hauntings” are fabricated by the witnesses themselves. Nickell concludes his article with, “I’ve investigated haunted houses, inns, theatres, graveyards, lighthouses, castles, old jails, and even office buildings. And I’ve never once found a paranormal explanation.”
But then a curious thing happens when you go to the comments section following Nickell’s article, which ran on MSNBC’s news site during Halloween 2009: You find post after post saying, “That’s BS; me and my brother saw a ghost at the same time for 20 whole seconds!”—or, “Don’t tell me I didn’t watch my remote control fly across the room by itself!” And dozens more.
Despite what the skeptics say, ghost hunters aren’t going to stop hunting for ghosts. For their story, float on over to page 174.
Orcas (killer whales), when traveling in groups, breathe in unison.