What exactly are ghosts?

[Donna K.]

How they "use" energy? I'll be back (read in terminator voice. )

Where'd you go?

 

[Debi]

Where'd you go?

OOPS! lol

OK, energy. Everything is energy. Science has now shown we can influence that energy by our thoughts. I see no reason why a spirit/entity could not do the same.

 

[Mrs Cooper]

As some of you might recall from my introduction post the other week, I'm convinced that I've encountered some kind of supernatural experience in my life, and more than once. I'm becoming more and more convinced by the existence of spirits. But I'm not naturally a "believer", and I have quite a rational mind. So I was wondering if anyone more experienced than me could actually give me a bit of a grounding in ghosts, and what exactly they are.

I don't mean "dead people". I've got that part. But... how are they around us? 1. I've heard them described as energy. Does that mean they will eventually just fizzle out? No energy that I know can sustain itself forever.

2. How can they make noise, like voices, when they have no vocal chords? No physical body through which to make that sound?

3. What about 'ectoplasm'? Is that just a work of fiction, or is there genuine evidence for that?

Sorry that this is a lot of questions, but I'm the kind of person who really likes to know how things work, so my belief in ghosts is really bugging me when I can't explain even the basics to myself!

Everyone has their own views on these things so here are mine. I put numbers in your quote to address your questions.

1. Since spirits are a special kind of energy, they are contained in a bubble of sorts. So the soul maintains cohesion like a body. Energy cannot be destroyed so there is no fizzling out.

2. Making sound is a matter of matter. In other words the world of energy on the other side of the veil must learn how to make itself dense enough to affect the world of matter. But to do so requires a lot more energy than ghosts find readily available. So this is why just before a paranormal event, a room will grow cold. It’s a spirit literally harvesting heat energy in order to affect matter which it can’t normally do. Also the 5 second rule. On many different ghost shows for the last couple decades I’ve noticed one similarity. Whenever a person asks a ghost to knock or manifest, there’s always a pause of 5 seconds. I think that’s the ghost taking time to gather energy in order to pull it off.

3. There seems to be documentation of ectoplasm throughout recorded history. My best theory here is that it is a byproduct of #2 above in that when pure energy tries to become matter, the closest approach is plasma. So remembering that the states of energy/matter range from solid at the most dense, to liquid to gas & finally plasma.... then, one would presume, pure energy which is what ghosts are. So ectoplasm might be the residue of a ghost trying a novice hand at trying to affect the material world?

 

[WitchAndShaman]

Everyone has their own views on these things so here are mine. I put numbers in your quote to address your questions.

1. Since spirits are a special kind of energy, they are contained in a bubble of sorts. So the soul maintains cohesion like a body. Energy cannot be destroyed so there is no fizzling out.

2. Making sound is a matter of matter. In other words the world of energy on the other side of the veil must learn how to make itself dense enough to affect the world of matter. But to do so requires a lot more energy than ghosts find readily available. So this is why just before a paranormal event, a room will grow cold. It’s a spirit literally harvesting heat energy in order to affect matter which it can’t normally do. Also the 5 second rule. On many different ghost shows for the last couple decades I’ve noticed one similarity. Whenever a person asks a ghost to knock or manifest, there’s always a pause of 5 seconds. I think that’s the ghost taking time to gather energy in order to pull it off.

3. There seems to be documentation of ectoplasm throughout recorded history. My best theory here is that it is a byproduct of #2 above in that when pure energy tries to become matter, the closest approach is plasma. So remembering that the states of energy/matter range from solid at the most dense, to liquid to gas & finally plasma.... then, one would presume, pure energy which is what ghosts are. So ectoplasm might be the residue of a ghost trying a novice hand at trying to affect the material world?

Mrs C,

I’m going to challenge you with a (nearly rhetorical) question relevant to your second point. I’m asking you this question not because I have heard you make the claim which sets up my question; I’m asking you because I know that you are one of the people up to the discussion so please be willing to debate if appropriate.

So I’ve heard several times that, without material vocal chords, ghosts/spirits can’t typically vocalize. Hence we hear them through playbacks of recorded electronic EVPs instead.

So relevant to rapping/knocking responses, how is it that these same ghosts/spirits can “hear” our requests for yes/no responses if they don’t have material ears?

My proposed answer is that most personal communications with ghosts/spirits - sightings, ear-based perceptions of voices, etc., actually happen psychically. Our personal (not recorded) experiences of mutual communication are happening on a psychic level. The living see the non-livings’ ghost/spirit form psychically; and, the non-living “hear” the livings’ questions and other requests for responses psychically.

 

[Knockoff]

Call it anything you like but I observe a few of the ghost type problems around the house that I've lived in for more than 50 years but the problems began later in life. Very annoying. I've considered buying that electronic device to monitor the house but in the end I won't do anything about it except complain and talk about annoying problems like some of those described on the site and other sites. All well known to people. I can make more drawings and paintings like ones posted in the Cryptozoology forum. A journal in pictures.

 

[Mrs Cooper]

Mrs C,

I’m going to challenge you with a (nearly rhetorical) question relevant to your second point. I’m asking you this question not because I have heard you make the claim which sets up my question; I’m asking you because I know that you are one of the people up to the discussion so please be willing to debate if appropriate.

So I’ve heard several times that, without material vocal chords, ghosts/spirits can’t typically vocalize. Hence we hear them through playbacks of recorded electronic EVPs instead.

So relevant to rapping/knocking responses, how is it that these same ghosts/spirits can “hear” our requests for yes/no responses if they don’t have material ears?

My proposed answer is that most personal communications with ghosts/spirits - sightings, ear-based perceptions of voices, etc., actually happen psychically. Our personal (not recorded) experiences of mutual communication are happening on a psychic level. The living see the non-livings’ ghost/spirit form psychically; and, the non-living “hear” the livings’ questions and other requests for responses psychically.

My father heard his newly dead brother calling to him in his cabin one day when he was alone, without any evp devices etc. so the ghost was manipulating sound. Sound waves are waves of energy. Or so I’ve been told.

How ghosts can hear may be a form of omnipresent direct perception of energy as it hits their spirit/energy bubble. Sounds included. Near death accounts are full of spirits hovering over rooms & able to see & perceive everything within a complete sphere around themselves. Hard for us to understand when we perceive things linearly moment by moment.

They also report that time is different. Definitely fascinating stuff to ponder. Maybe that’s why ghosts can haunt a place for centuries, when for them it may not feel like that long?

It could be that we only see ghosts psychically. But when you have multiple people seeing the same apparition at the same time, that theory gets a little more tricky. I’d be tempted to say they all fell suddenly into the same trance. But when my son & I recently saw an apparition on a roadway we were animated, talking & listening to loud music, snacking & all that non trance stuff. But then wham. We both saw the same thing. I wrote about it elsewhere so I won’t belabor it here.

That’s what makes websites like this interesting. The physics behind haunting is a fascinating mystery open for debate.

 

[ozentity]

My father heard his newly dead brother calling to him in his cabin one day when he was alone, without any evp devices etc. so the ghost was manipulating sound. Sound waves are waves of energy. Or so I’ve been told.

How ghosts can hear may be a form of omnipresent direct perception of energy as it hits their spirit/energy bubble. Sounds included. Near death accounts are full of spirits hovering over rooms & able to see & perceive everything within a complete sphere around themselves. Hard for us to understand when we perceive things linearly moment by moment.

They also report that time is different. Definitely fascinating stuff to ponder. Maybe that’s why ghosts can haunt a place for centuries, when for them it may not feel like that long?

It could be that we only see ghosts psychically. But when you have multiple people seeing the same apparition at the same time, that theory gets a little more tricky. I’d be tempted to say they all fell suddenly into the same trance. But when my son & I recently saw an apparition on a roadway we were animated, talking & listening to loud music, snacking & all that non trance stuff. But then wham. We both saw the same thing. I wrote about it elsewhere so I won’t belabor it here.

That’s what makes websites like this interesting. The physics behind haunting is a fascinating mystery open for debate.

My young brother spoke to me after he died, even though it sounded like a voice it was psychically ,maybe your dads brother was too.You and your son saw the apparition because you are probably both open and aware people and they usually do surprise you.

 

[WitchAndShaman]

My father heard his newly dead brother calling to him in his cabin one day when he was alone,

I’ve posted here too that I once heard my recently deceased Father clearly call my name when I was alone.

Maybe ghosts/spirits get to keep their lips...hope so, then I might be able to get a kiss from my Dear Dad too.

 

[WitchAndShaman]

And, when I refer to psychical communications between the living and the non-living ( or even amongst living entities), I am of course open to the possiblility that communication is happening via some kind of energy force. Which then implies too that the non-living could be manipulating energy.

It is completely possible that our spirits are completely unlike any thing science has ever seen before...maybe spirit isn’t essentially energy but a wholly separate fantastical thing.

 

[Paulm]

So I’ve heard several times that, without material vocal chords, ghosts/spirits can’t typically vocalize.
.

birds don't have vocal chords....technically. they do have a substitute but no actual vocal chords, yet some can learn to "talk"...they use what they have.
can ghosts see?, they have no physical eyes...can they think without a physical brain?...do they really exist without a physical body.....if the answer is NO to these questions then we have come to the conclusion ghosts don't exist......I think theories, (if this can even be called that) like this are basically useless without us even knowing in the least how this works....
I guess it falls back on the philosophy of "I think, therefore I am"