Shining my flashlight in front of me, then behind, all I can see in either direction is the endless stone ribbon of the Great Wall. I’m freezing my ass off up here. It’s the middle of winter in Jiankou, China, and the wind is whipping up over the crumbling ramparts, making my crew and me fairly miserable. My feet slip and slide on icy cobblestones that have been wholly neglected for the last five hundred years.
The Great Wall of China is a construction effort without equal, a monumental barrier designed to close off the entire northern frontier of China from Manchurian and Mongol invaders. It is the single largest man-made object in the world, stretching for more than 3,100 miles. The top of the wall is wide enough that ten men could march along it shoulder to shoulder. Regularly spaced multilevel guard towers interrupt the span and were once fully garrisoned with soldiers.
Though the project required generations to plan and execute, from where I’m standing, the placement of this particular section seems utterly ill-conceived. Where the original builders encountered natural obstacles in the form of jagged mountains, rather than, “Oh, I don’t know, go around,” they simply built over them, undeterred by topography (or the laws of physics, it seems). The result is an improbable stone line that zigzags up and down like a General Motors stock graph. This part of the wall is so unnaturally steep that it’s referred to as “Eagle Flies Facing Upward.” With the way I keep slipping, though, it’ll soon be renamed “Josh Falls Facing Downward.” The area is incredibly dangerous and has been closed to the public entirely.
As haunting stories go, this one is pretty straightforward. It has been estimated that as many as a million people died building the Great Wall of China; many of their bodies were reportedly interred in the stonework itself. Locals have attested to visions of phantom soldiers as well as a malevolent energy that possesses people to jump to their deaths. Add the fact that several visitors have died mysteriously, and you’ve got a compelling story on your hands.
Eventually, we make our way into the highest guard tower that locals believe is paranormally active. The shelter of the tower interior cuts the wind and feels comparatively warm. We wander through a few empty stone rooms, peering out through arrow slits at encroaching fog. Walking around the central chamber, I feel Evan’s hand on my back. This isn’t uncommon, since at night we wear large backpacks with cameras strapped to them, and every hour they need to be tended to. I assume that Evan is changing out a tape as he jostles me around. I quietly ask what he’s doing and shudder when I hear an answer from twenty feet away. I spin around and, sure enough, he’s nowhere near me. Nobody is near me. I suddenly feel sick. I’ve just been touched by nothingness.
My good friends Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson from Ghost Hunters tell new investigators that they will be “hit, punched, grabbed, slapped, and pushed” by things they can’t see. The idea being that if you hunt for ghosts long enough, one of them will eventually reach out and smack you. But even though I’ve experienced the same phenomenon that they so often describe, I remain an entrenched paranormal skeptic. That’s probably a good thing. Like Jason and Grant, I don’t think every creak and moan is a ghost. If I did, I’d have the same investigative acumen as Shaggy from Scooby-Doo.
Why am I a skeptic? Well, let’s talk about the problem first and then the promise. There are a number of pretty staggering assumptions we have to make as paranormal explorers. The first assumption, of course, is that there are ghosts. Or at least there might be. We’re ostensibly looking for some sort of entity or presence that is able, on some level, to manifest itself in the physical world.
The next assumption we make is that ghosts mainly come out at night. People ask me all the time why we only conduct paranormal investigations after the sun goes down. The answer is simple. Statistically, more ghost sightings are reported after dark. This is a good thing, too, since it makes for better television. Nobody wants to watch me hunt for ghosts at Pompeii at three in the afternoon while an Italian guy sells gelato in the background. But as to whether there actually is more paranormal activity at night is certainly up for debate.
We make further assumptions through the use of a variety of equipment. We use thermal imagers in the field because there’s a school of thought that states if ghosts are able to manifest themselves, they must emit some sort of energy or heat. But again, this theory is backed by precious little evidence. We use audio recorders to conduct EVP sessions. “EVP” stands for electronic voice phenomena. These are background recordings that, when amplified, are supposed to reveal paranormal speech. Thomas Edison first proposed the use of sensitive audio recording equipment to capture these sounds from the beyond in a Scientific American article. In the one hundred years since, the technique has been widely used. The results can be compelling but are largely open to interpretation.
Finally, we assume that ghosts like to hang out in places where death or great tragedy has transpired. We don’t hunt for ghosts at a Chuck E. Cheese’s. If this measure is a just one—if the dead congregate in places where life has been extinguished—then I’ve certainly been in a position to see ghosts. Over the course of my tenure on Destination Truth I’ve visited some of the world’s most tragic addresses. I’ve spent the night alone atop the desert fortress of Israel’s Masada, where nearly one thousand Jewish zealots committed suicide. I’ve wandered through the oldest coliseum of the Roman world at Pompeii. Within this stone girdle, untold numbers of people were put to death in unspeakable ways. I’ve walked the lonely shores of Easter Island, tempting powerful Polynesian spirits, and rapped one-on-one with King Tut himself in the deserts of Egypt. Hell, I’ve even looked for ghosts at the bottom of the ocean amidst the twisted wreckage and skeletal remains of a Japanese fleet from World War II. The point is, I’ve spent a lot of long nights investigating the Grim Reaper’s Greatest Hits. And still, I can’t say for certain if ghosts exist.
All of our assumptions speak to the larger problem: the methodology of paranormal research is largely experimental. This is probably going to be an unpopular statement to some die-hard fans, but looking for ghosts isn’t exactly scientific.
Take the great magician Harry Houdini, who was obsessed with the paranormal. As someone who plied his trade convincing audiences of his supernatural abilities, in the latter part of his career he devoted his time to debunking so-called spiritualists. He made a deal with his wife, Bess, that after his death, he would try, for ten years, to communicate from the other side. At yearly séances, Bess would work with mediums attempting to glean a code known only to Houdini and his wife. On October 31, 1936, the final séance was held on the roof of the Knickerbocker Hotel in Hollywood. The code remained unspoken and Bess Houdini reportedly said, “My last hope is gone. I now reverently turn out the light. It is finished. Good night, Harry!”
While we can’t really call Houdini’s method scientific, he gets points for trying to prove that the afterlife is real. But when it comes to ghosts, proof is hard to come by.
Hypothetical example: If, during the course of an investigation, the Ghost of Christmas Future walked out from a solid brick wall and waved a scythe and a bony finger at the camera while bolts of lightning shot out from under his hood, it would not constitute proof of anything. Nada. Zip. Not unless one could coax him to appear again and again. The real world of paranormal encounters has no such regularity. No Headless Horseman—the decapitated Hessian soldier who can be relied upon to appear nightly on a covered bridge. Without this, there can be no hard science.
Science involves gathering empirical and measurable evidence, forming hypotheses, and testing said hypotheses. There must be repeatable results in order to draw conclusions. Oh, and the testing has to be wholly objective and conducted in a controlled environment. Without a demonstrable connection to the other side that can be studied and written about in peer-reviewed journals, the pursuit of paranormal truth will always be marginalized by science.
So if our methods for seeking the truth behind paranormal claims are so experimental, why bother looking at all? Well, according to a recent CBS News poll, 48 percent of Americans believe in ghosts. That’s more people than those who support Darwin’s theory of evolution. And what’s more, one in five people believe that they have personally seen or been in the presence of a ghost. If we conclude that a legitimate ghost sighting would constitute proof of an afterlife, 20 percent of Americans would therefore have witnessed a miracle.
And isn’t that sort of a big deal? In the previously mentioned poll, a broader question revealed that a staggering 77 percent of people believe in some sort of life after death. And despite the fact that there’s a clear overlap between religion and the paranormal, television networks are loath to make God a part of the conversation. Heaven forbid that spirits and spirituality be uttered in the same breath.
So why avoid the connection? Quite simply, because it’s so immensely polarizing. A whopping 87 percent of people who believe in the afterlife believe that science will never prove if it exists. This statistical chasm is exactly why inquiries into the paranormal are vital. Faith and doubt have bubbled in the human mind since primitive tribes first worshipped animistic tokens and fertility idols. The search for ghosts is inescapably tied to the search for meaning, explanation, and divinity.
Irrefutable proof of the existence of spirits would rattle the foundations of our society. So, yes, it’s worth looking for them.
On Destination Truth, we may never prove the existence of ghosts. Without one of those smoking toasters from Ghostbusters, we certainly won’t be able to capture one.
But what we are doing is listening to those who have had compelling experiences and then trying to substantiate their claims or explain them as best we can. It’s not exactly science. But it does nag at science. Fierce debate and unconventional thinking have always underscored the history of scientific discovery. We’re simply contributing to the ongoing conversation.