Paranormal experiences

[Jimmy Recard]

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, three different cars have parked in the same spot at work. Each day at almost exactly 9am, the alarm on each car went off.

One of the owners reckons it's paranormal. I think it's one of two things:

A) a weird phenomenon like the sun hitting the glass in a certain way and refracting and confusing the sensors

B) older cars (the youngest of the three is a 55 plate) having imperfect electrics and coincidentally doing that


99% of me leans towards B

[Efbe]

Disastrous said:

That's not how science works at all.

Yes it is. It's exactly how it works. Find an explanation, try to disprove it. Until disproven it's a theory.
Come up with something untestable and how can you disprove it? enter Dark Matter.

Nanook said:

It reads like you're suggesting that science sometimes doesn't make sense, therefore the spirit world/ghosts/whatever must be real.

But that doesn't make sense.

Why does one thing being incorrect make something else unrelated correct or incorrect?

I am not(just) saying science is sometimes incorrect. I am saying that most of the working theories we have are still so incredibly young, that from our brief time of dealing with theories we can be fairly certain they will be found to be incorrect. Most likely most of what we know as a truth is incorrect, or seriously flawed at any rate. We can't actually fully explain time, energy, mass(if different), movement or why my goddamn coffee is too cold now.

Our scientific community works so tirelessly to prove star trek correct, yet so hard to prove every idea and experience of every civilisation for as long as humans could talk incorrect.
We (scientists) belittle the vast majority of humans that have ever lived, whilst we revel in being so clever with our theories that(history tells me) will be invariable incorrect anyway.

[Disastrous]

Efbe said:

Disastrous said:

That's not how science works at all.

Yes it is. It's exactly how it works. Find an explanation, try to disprove it. Until disproven it's a theory.
Come up with something untestable and how can you disprove it? enter Dark Matter.

Nanook said:

It reads like you're suggesting that science sometimes doesn't make sense, therefore the spirit world/ghosts/whatever must be real.

But that doesn't make sense.

Why does one thing being incorrect make something else unrelated correct or incorrect?

I am not(just) saying science is sometimes incorrect. I am saying that most of the working theories we have are still so incredibly young, that from our brief time of dealing with theories we can be fairly certain they will be found to be incorrect. Most likely most of what we know as a truth is incorrect, or seriously flawed at any rate. We can't actually fully explain time, energy, mass(if different), movement or why my goddamn coffee is too cold now.

Our scientific community works so tirelessly to prove star trek correct, yet so hard to prove every idea and experience of every civilisation for as long as humans could talk incorrect.
We (scientists) belittle the vast majority of humans that have ever lived, whilst we revel in being so clever with our theories that(history tells me) will be invariable incorrect anyway.

You really have it quite wrong.

It's more like:

Observe phenomena
Devise theory to explain it
Test theory
Test again
Get peers to review it
Test again
Publish theory
Theory is accepted for now
Find something unexplainable that doesn't fit theory
Start again

It's a learning process. Of course there's more to discover but you would have to agree that the rate of discovery has slowed down in the last century. This tells us that science is getting better. We may yet discover something that throws a lot of what we think we know out of whack. But only when it's measurable and provable. The it will be accepted as fact going forward until such time as we discover something more.

You have a chip on your shoulder about science I think.

[Efbe]

Jimmy Recard said:

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, three different cars have parked in the same spot at work. Each day at almost exactly 9am, the alarm on each car went off.

One of the owners reckons it's paranormal. I think it's one of two things:

A) a weird phenomenon like the sun hitting the glass in a certain way and refracting and confusing the sensors

B) older cars (the youngest of the three is a 55 plate) having imperfect electrics and coincidentally doing that


99% of me leans towards B

My coffee is getting colder in front of me. But my calculations for why it is getting colder give a slower rate of cooling than I am seeing. Is it...

A) my calculation is probably wrong

B) my calculations are correct, if I add in a new theory in which particles are being generated as my coffee cools that are interacting with the cooling coffee particles(for ease of explanation). These new particles cannot be measured because of the way they are spinning, (which is fortunate for someone's funding) but we are sure they are spinning the other way, as when we try to measure then, they change what they are, which though impossible for other theories, must be what is happening, because how else would these particles become entangled and so cool down my coffee quicker than I had expected.*

Answer A is for 99% of the world, Answer B if you consider yourself a scientist... Until next Tuesday when we attribute this phenomenon to a new type of mass from another dimension that I saw on star trek once.

*explanation butchered/shortened for reading pleasure and brevity

[Disastrous]

Efbe said:

My coffee is getting colder in front of me. But my calculations for why it is getting colder give a slower rate of cooling than I am seeing. Is it...

A) my calculation is probably wrong

B) my calculations are correct, if I add in a new theory in which particles are being generated as my coffee cools that are interacting with the cooling coffee particles(for ease of explanation). These new particles cannot be measured because of the way they are spinning, (which is fortunate for someone's funding) but we are sure they are spinning the other way, as when we try to measure then, they change what they are, which though impossible for other theories, must be what is happening, because how else would these particles become entangled and so cool down my coffee quicker than I had expected.*

Answer A is for 99% of the world, Answer B if you consider yourself a scientist... Until next Tuesday when we attribute this phenomenon to a new type of mass from another dimension that I saw on star trek once.

*explanation butchered/shortened for reading pleasure and brevity

You realise that B is also A?

[smn159]

So to recap then... Science works to further advance our understanding of the world. It cannot yet explain everything, but it it advances incrementally. It works largely by theorising and then experimenting to either prove of disprove that theory.

Science tells us that Humans have evolved to attribute meaning and intention to inanimate objects, so faces appear in the clouds / the gods cause the weather.

However - because science can't explain absolutely everything, this means that ghosts definitely exist. Anyone who suggests otherwise is arrogant and closed minded. Some on here are 'special' in that they are tuned into the spirit world whereas others are not. They didn't choose this and are level headed on other matters. But if only the rest of us had seen and experienced the things that they have they would understand. Although there is absolutely no evidence, it seems certain that buildings can replay fragments of time, particularly if 'dark things' have happened there.

Spirits can get trapped between this world and the next - but to visit us takes it out of them somewhat and so they don't bother much.

Anyone offering a plausible explanation for any of this is a 'smart arse'. The believers keep their views to themselves now because everyone that they know ridicules them, but more fool the unbelievers - they'll all be in for a shock when they die, right?

Hmmm...

[Efbe]

smn159 said:

patronising stuff

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

And I mean a proper theory, one using particles, quantum processing, the components of other crazy theories that we decide to believe in because scientists tell us so. But maybe one we have evidence for, rather than a lack of evidence against (which is what I see when we talk of many of the biggest new theories)

Or would you dismiss this as being ridiculous too?

[boobles]

Jimmy Recard said:

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, three different cars have parked in the same spot at work. Each day at almost exactly 9am, the alarm on each car went off.

One of the owners reckons it's paranormal. I think it's one of two things:

A) a weird phenomenon like the sun hitting the glass in a certain way and refracting and confusing the sensors

B) older cars (the youngest of the three is a 55 plate) having imperfect electrics and coincidentally doing that


99% of me leans towards B

Or C - Somebody playing silly buggers.

[smn159]

Efbe said:

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

Well a theory proves nothing of course, it's just an attempt to construct a premise to explain things, which is then tested to either prove or disprove it. The difference between believers and scientists of course is that believers are content with their theories, however half baked, and have no interest in proving or disproving them. The goal of science is to explain and it likes nothing better than to disprove a currently accepted theory, since that leads to new understanding.

Experimental proof would be great of course - do you know of any?

Oh, and apologies if you found that patronising. Which part did I misrepresent?

[ofcorsa]

As I understand it to prove the existence of ghosts and their ability to interact with us, you would need to disprove the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Given these laws explain and predict much of the behavior of our universe, It seems very unlikely.

[blindswelledrat]

Efbe said:

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

Speaking for myself, I would be delighted.
Naturally I wouldn't understand a word of it, but provided enough scientist agreed with the theory then why wouldn't I?

Throughout your last few posts I completely get what you are driving at and it is a reasonable argument, but I think you miss the point that there is nothing that remotely suggests the reality of the spiritual world other than 'eyewitness' accounts from a tiny percentage of the population, almost all of which can be explained away with far more likely theories.
Many people on this thread (maybe you?) assume that us cynical ones are so closed minded that everything is irrelevant. It really isn't the case. I am open minded about most things but I will never assume anything is a possibility unless something vaguely credible makes it seem possible just on sheer probability.
In other words, why on earth would I believe in the possibility of ghosts if there was not one single piece of evidence suggesting their existence?

Edited by blindswelledrat on Friday 6th January 11:57

[Boring_Chris]

As someone, somewhere, on the Internet once said; in the age where just about everyone has a smartphone with a camera; WHERE'S ALL THE UFO'S GONE?!

EDIT. for the more eagle eyed here, yes I did post a bit of a mystery surrounding a 'UFO' earlier in this thread. STILL SCIENCE, THOUGH!

[Baz Tench]

smn159 said:

Well a theory proves nothing of course, it's just an attempt to construct a premise to explain things, which is then tested to either prove or disprove it. The difference between believers and scientists of course is that believers are content with their theories, however half baked, and have no interest in proving or disproving them. The goal of science is to explain and it likes nothing better than to disprove a currently accepted theory, since that leads to new understanding.

Experimental proof would be great of course - do you know of any?

Oh, and apologies if you found that patronising. Which part did I misrepresent?

Good post.

I've enjoyed both sides of the discussion for the last couple of pages, now that the 'it's all rubbish' comments have calmed down.

I admit to enjoying my experiences, but if they are absolutely, beyond any doubt explained away by science, I would be happy to accept it. But for now, I don't think they have been, I honestly don't.

[Boring_Chris]

boobles said:

Jimmy Recard said:

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, three different cars have parked in the same spot at work. Each day at almost exactly 9am, the alarm on each car went off.

One of the owners reckons it's paranormal. I think it's one of two things:

A) a weird phenomenon like the sun hitting the glass in a certain way and refracting and confusing the sensors

B) older cars (the youngest of the three is a 55 plate) having imperfect electrics and coincidentally doing that


99% of me leans towards B

Or C - Somebody playing silly buggers.

Must be ghosts. Must be.

[Jinx]

Boring_Chris said:

As someone, somewhere, on the Internet once said; in the age where just about everyone has a smartphone with a camera; WHERE'S ALL THE UFO'S GONE?!

EDIT. for the more eagle eyed here, yes I did post a bit of a mystery surrounding a 'UFO' earlier in this thread. STILL SCIENCE, THOUGH!

Cloaked against digital photography - only poor quality silver halide crystals can capture the images......

[Efbe]

blindswelledrat said:

Efbe said:

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

Speaking for myself, I would be delighted.
Naturally I wouldn't understand a word of it, but provided enough scientist agreed with the theory then why wouldn't I?

Throughout your last few posts I completely get what you are driving at and it is a reasonable argument, but I think you miss the point that there is nothing that remotely suggests the reality of the spiritual world other than 'eyewitness' accounts from a tiny percentage of the population, almost all of which can be explained away with far more likely theories.
Many people on this thread (maybe you?) assume that us cynical ones are so closed minded that everything is irrelevant. It really isn't the case. I am open minded about most things but I will never assume anything is a possibility unless something vaguely credible makes it seem possible just on sheer probability.
In other words, why on earth would I believe in the possibility of ghosts if there was not one single piece of evidence suggesting their existence?

Edited by blindswelledrat on Friday 6th January 11:57

I am incredibly cynical as well, but I tend to play devil's advocate a lot with my own perceptions of things as well as others.
Experience has taught me that generally new theories turn out to be wrong, and (completely unrelated) there is a bloody good reason a random wire is in my 67 mustang that I think shouldn't be there, I will just discover out why a few months after I have removed it and am wondering why it isn't shifting gears so well any more.

Orch-OR (Hameroff/ Penrose) is a theory with some traction around the soul. completely with some highly regarded scientists to explain it. I'll let you google it so I do not seem to be swaying arguments one way or the other.
It may be good science, or may be rubbish with the sole purpose of getting funding. I won't make any judgements on it here.

going back to your post, not to be too argumentative, but my point is that we cannot actually explain away any of this, because our own explanations are based on something we do not fully understand. How can I say I can see something, if I do not understand how I am seeing, either of how my brain is able to function, of whether the light travelling from/to the object is doing in a way I can explain, or that the object is indeed an object, and then what I am able to see is all there actually is, and I am not immeasurably limited by not being able to see other dimensions/forms of matter/energy/forces etc.

The central point to spiritualism, ghosts, spirits, mediums, etc etc is the soul, or consciousness, and the possibility of it not being linked to what we know as our physical bodies/brains. Should Orch-OR be correct and the fundamental being of your consciousness not mechanical, and able to be separated from the body, surviving death, even for a matter of moments. Then this changes the possibilities of what the soul is/does.

As a side note, I was watching the series westworld last night, portraying the move of robots towards consciousness. I quite liked Ford's line in there that there is no distinction between machine and men, just another point on the spectrum. Unfortunately I don't think this is borne out in the scientific analysis of our brains, the workings of which are still as yet unexplained. However I would like it if it was true, that our brain is just a really complex calculator.

Edited by Efbe on Friday 6th January 13:18

[alock]

Efbe said:

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

And I mean a proper theory, one using particles, quantum processing, the components of other crazy theories that we decide to believe in because scientists tell us so. But maybe one we have evidence for, rather than a lack of evidence against (which is what I see when we talk of many of the biggest new theories)

Or would you dismiss this as being ridiculous too?

I assume you realise that many on here have high-level education and qualifications in what you call "crazy theories"? Particles down to atomic level are just A-level physics. Subatomic particles and the maths surrounding them are BSc physics. I spent hundreds of hours during my degree studying quantum physics. I almost did an entire PhD on quantum computing. Your language seems to imply you don't think anyone actually understand this stuff?

I would download the paper and try and understand it myself just as I do with many other scientific papers. I would also hunt out the opinions of respected scientists in the relevant fields. This is the scientific process. How much I choose to accept or question is based on whether it actually effects my day-to-day life. Isn't this what everyone should do with fundamental new discoveries?

The Many Worlds Interpretation is a good example. We studied it during my degree. I wrote an essay on it that was marked at 96%. The majority of the scientific community seem to favor it. And yet I just cannot believe it. This is my own gut instinct overriding everything else.

Whether I believe in a paper that proved the 'soul' is irrelevant. The paper would establish areas of discussion instead of just someone saying "I believe". It would certainly raise the quality of these threads!

[southendpier]

alock said:

Efbe said:

So if science provides us a theory to prove the soul and it persisting after death you would be happy?

And I mean a proper theory, one using particles, quantum processing, the components of other crazy theories that we decide to believe in because scientists tell us so. But maybe one we have evidence for, rather than a lack of evidence against (which is what I see when we talk of many of the biggest new theories)

Or would you dismiss this as being ridiculous too?

I assume you realise that many on here have high-level education and qualifications....

The Many Worlds Interpretation is a good example. We studied it during my degree. I wrote an essay on it that was marked at 96%. T

Show off.

In another universe someone like you got 100%.

[Einion Yrth]

alock said:

The Many Worlds Interpretation is a good example.<...> The majority of the scientific community seem to favor it. And yet I just cannot believe it.

I'm a lot happier with it than I am Copenhagen.

[HarryW]

boobles said:

Jimmy Recard said:

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, three different cars have parked in the same spot at work. Each day at almost exactly 9am, the alarm on each car went off.

One of the owners reckons it's paranormal. I think it's one of two things:

A) a weird phenomenon like the sun hitting the glass in a certain way and refracting and confusing the sensors

B) older cars (the youngest of the three is a 55 plate) having imperfect electrics and coincidentally doing that


99% of me leans towards B

Or C - Somebody playing silly buggers.

Or D a TVR thunders past that spot at the same time every day on his commute....