Just plain weird

For those of you who come to our website through the home page you will have noticed that things have changed around here. All for the better, I might add…

A decision has been reached that conducting regular paranormal investigations isn’t something that will benefit the aims of our organisation in the long run and so we have adapted our website into a resource for rational information about ghosts, hauntings and paranormal phenomena.

We also have several experiments currently in the planning stages that are being designed to test some of the stranger theories spread through the paranormal research field under controlled conditions to see if they really work like we’re told they do.

Danger! Danger! Biased investigation!

As somebody who used to fully believe in life after death and the existence of ghosts I can understand how easy it is to accidently introduce these beliefs into a paranormal investigation without realising you are doing so.

There seems to be some general confusion about how involving your personal beliefs into a paranormal investigation an be a problem, people often question ‘What’s the harm?’ and don’t understand were I am coming from with my thoughts on this.

Basically, I think people need to step back and asses what it is that we are dealing with; ghosts – something for which there is no proof. Sure! Many people have witnesses things that convince them personally that ghosts are real and it’s their right to be convinced in this manner. However there is a difference between you believing what you do because you have been convinced and entering a location as a paranormal investigator to study the supposed haunting at that location.

I’m not claiming that those who believe in ghosts shouldn’t investigate but what I am saying is that people who hold a belief in ghosts, spirituality, an afterlife or whatever is it that they choose to believe should not allow this belief to have an effect on the investigation.

Science of scams: Ouija board

I thought it was worth sharing this interesting video from the Science of scams team regarding the science behind why the glass moves during an ouija board session.

The same can be said for the glass used during a glass divination session, and the ideomotor response is the cause behind such tools of divination as dowsing rods and crystals too.

A typical response that I often come across from people who believe that ouija boards, or even glass divination or the other methods I mentioned work is that some times the movement or the glass/rods/crystals can be explained through the ideomotor response – but other times it cannot.

However, we have to look at this claim logically.

Anybody who is taking their research seriously and anyone thinking rationally will be using occams razor as a way to sum up the information they are presented with.

The idea that some cases of a glass moving can be explained by the ideomotor response but some cannot is a flawed way of thinking and could be classed as confirmation bias of that persons beliefs about the ouija board.

What we know for a fact is that involutary muscular movement causes the glass used in an ouija board session to move. Therefore, when trying to explain why the glass moved in a ouija board session we cannot rule this possibility out and, as it a more likely explination that say – a ghost moved the glass for which there is no proof, it is the one we have to go with. Simples.

Make sure you check out other videos from the Science of Scams team via their Youtube Channel. They rock.

The white tower

I just heard a story about the ghosts that supposedly haunt the Tower of London and the surrounding buildings and I was particularly amused by the story of one of the custody guards of The white tower who paused on his rounds, sat down on a nearby ledge, removed his shoe and began to massage his painful foot. Suddenly, from behind him a mysterious and eerie voice said “There’s only you and I here’” and the guard replied with “Well, let me get my bloody shoe on and there’ll only be you!”

He never did find out who the voice belonged to, apparently. How brilliant is that little tale?

Infrasound: haunting you?

The study of infra-sound is also known as infrasonics, covering sounds from the lower limit of human hearing (about 16 hertz) down to 0.001 hertz.

Infra-sound is interesting because it is known to have the ability to cover long distances and get around obstacles with little or no dissipation.

There are numerous ways in which Infra-sound can be produced, some of these include tornadoes, volcanic explosions, earthquakes, waves on the seas, lightning discharges, strong winds, Animals such as elephants and whales also use infra-sound to communicate over long distances or as weapons to repel foes.

As mentioned above, earthquakes can produce large amounts of infra-sound and occur in distinct stages. Long before the final breaking release of built up earth tensions, there are numerous precursory shocks. These deep shocks produce strong infrasonic impulses up to the Earths surface.

Certain animals can actually hear infrasonic precursors. Precursory shocks are silent, being inaudible in humans. Animals however, react strongly to the sudden surface assault of infrasonic shocks by attempting escape from the area.

It is a well known fact that Infra-sound is undetectable by human ear because it is sound with a frequency too low to be detected. However, numerous studies into Infra-sound have produced some interesting results that show Humans are reacting to infra-sound in other ways without actually realising it.

danger! danger! misinformation!

You would think that anyone claiming to be rational and skeptical in their approach to investigation would be unlikely to spread misinformation and, if anything, they would fight misinformation being spread by the less rational people out there.

However the sad reality is that some people who do claim to be rational and skeptical in their approach to their research do promote misinformation and sometimes don’t even realise it. This is a scary truth.

If somebody claims to be credible – or pretends to be if they believe it will made them seem more professional – and they start talking about ideas that seem scientific and factual then people will assume that they know exactly what they are talking about, and that the ideas these people are promoting are true.

It’s bad enough in the paranormal research field when people who don’t have an ounce of common sense or rationalism in them spread misinformation – yet, these people who typically hold some sort of bias due to belief promote such pseudo-theories that are easy to spot. “Orbs are paranormal”, “ouija boards are evil”, “ghosts use our energy” – all of which can be read about on our ‘Fact vs. fiction’ page.

Ghost stereotypes?

It’s quite evident when one reads some books aimed at those with an interest in the paranormal – or even if you visit websites about the paranormal/ghost phenomena that there appears to be a trend to stereotype the kinds of ghosts that haunt our homes and buildings.

If you ever read a paranormal book/website you’ll probably be provided with a lot of information about the different types of ghosts, their characteristics and behavours.

‘Doppleganger’, ‘Poltergeist’, ‘Shadow ghost’, ‘grey lady’ – These are just some of the ‘types’ of ghosts, apparently

These classification seem to be just more information that is copied down in a parrot fashion by ghost hunting teams who cannot be bothered to conduct any proper research for themselves – it almost appears as though people who display such information about ghost stereotypes just read it, take it as a fact without even looking into the information for validity, and then copy and paste it into their website.

The truth is that no ghost/spirit – call it what you will, has ever been documented in a controlled condition. There is no documented evidence that suggests that ghosts exist. So ask yourself, if there is no documented evidence that ghosts do exist – how can these ghost hunters class ghosts into different types?

Corn exchange ghost?

October 19th ‘07 saw The Wiltshire Times report on a photograph taken by Devizes based historian John Girvan at ‘The Corn Exchange’ in which Mr Girvain claims the photograph showed the biggest spirit orb he had ever captured in his history of leading ghost walks and ghost tours.

The article and photo can be found online >>here<<

W.P.R always find it interesting when such stories reach the papers and we felt compelled to look into this story further.

The interesting thing about this story is that Kevin Murray, the services manager at the town council which owns and operates the Corn Exchange, said employees had not reported any ghostly goings on at the Corn Exchange and from what we can find there is nothing that suggests the Corn Exchange has had any history of a haunting.