Do you have any paranormal experineces?

[fredd bear]

"All those who claim they have paranormal experiences are wrong because paranormal experience does exist only in the brain and not in real world."

A pretty bold statement. How do you happen to know that? Proof please; You have just made a positive claim. That attracts the burden of proof.


My position; I don't believe in the paranormal either, due to the lack of credible evidence. I don't claim to know, because I can't prove a negative proposition. By all means try, you'll be really famous.

Dogmatic beliefs make easy targets. You may have noticed how Christian apologist here are so thoroughly and so consistently demolished. The only thing spoiling the fun is that tend to be too dogmatic, too ignorant or too stupid to understand when they've been trounced.

[EgoDeath]

"This is also, of course, operating under the assumption that we are willing to take people's words at face value."

Of course everyone lies, it's just a matter of degree.

Simplest explanation is that most people are reasonably honest in what they report. EG , I suspect that at least some alien abductees believe they were abducted by aliens. I also think human beings are gullible, hence the stunning saturation of various religious beliefs, containing the most fatuous nonsense. You don't need to look further than this forum and its resident Christian dills.

The simplest explanation is not necessarily that people are being honest in what they report when specific reports are insanely extraordinary compared to every day reality. I mean, we're not talking about flipping a coin and watching it land on its side; saying a dining room table split in half in a violent burst is a pretty outrageous claim. I have no reason to believe that the "simple explanation" is that this person is being honest in reporting this. It could be that they're honest and truly believe what they're saying, or it could very simply be an attempt to get attention... or they could have financial motivations. Who knows?

When your claims are far outside of what normal reality shows us, I have no reason to believe that the "simplest explanation" is that they're being honest. It doesn't mean I have real reason to believe they're lying, either, but it's an option. Much more so than if Cathy tells me she saw Cindy at the grocery store 20 years ago on the same day at the same time in the same aisle, or some other mundane coincidence.

If you told me you saw a lion on the highway on the way home from work, I'm not likely to say, "Where is your evidence so I can verify this experience?!" - because even though this is an odd occurrence, it's known to happen. But if you tell me something happened that I've NEVER heard of before, there's nothing saying I have to just take your word for it - you could just be full of shit!

I have no idea of Jung's motivations. From reading his autobiography, he seemed to be sincere, but deluded about some things.

The magician Houdini spent years exposing fake mediums .( he desperately wanted to contact his mum.) We even see 'real' psychics on TV. As I said, people are gullible. They want to believe the woo; reality is often far less interesting, and, at base far more frightening .EG Life after death, and paradise is far more comforting (for many) than the notion that death is the end of personal existence. The comparison is often made with a dreamless sleep. That sounds fine to me; death is not an experience. However, dying often is, and I admit to being terrified of THAT.

I go to a mens group. Ages range from late 50's to 85. This week, we lost another member .Our friend was 81, had a stroke at home, with his family, around, and died. A very likeable guy, we will all miss him. A common comment after expressing sorrow, was "the lucky bastard!"--not for him the slow physical decline and death by inches of dementia, in a strange place. (nursing home) I should be so lucky.

Sorry to hear about your friend.

I have, at times, questioned the reality of my own memories. I had undiagnosed (unspoken of, really) psychiatric issues during my formative years, and there is a small part of me that wonders if I was hallucinating. I had experienced two instances of auditory hallucinations during those years, and once, a delusion.  I don’t think it’s likely that both instances were full-on hallucinations, but I suppose I can never effectively rule it out.

The fact that you're even willing to consider that maybe your perception was altered or flawed by some sort of momentary mental deficiency or defect tells me a lot about your adherence to logic and rational thought - versus that of someone who claims their senses are SPOT ON! There's NO WAY I was dreaming when I saw that ghost! There's ABSOLUTELY NO WAY I was asleep when I got abducted by aliens!

Those are the people I'm intensely skeptical of - even if they really do believe what they're saying, when they're SO rock solid that there is no way they could be off or wrong, I'm very skeptical of their stories and probably MORE likely to believe they didn't actually happen.

[viocjit]

"All those who claim they have paranormal experiences are wrong because paranormal experience does exist only in the brain and not in real world."

A pretty bold statement. How do you  happen to know that?  Proof please;  You have just made a positive claim. That attracts the burden of proof.


My position; I don't believe in the paranormal either, due to the  lack of credible evidence. I don't claim to know, because I can't prove a negative  proposition.  By all means try,  you'll be really famous.

Dogmatic beliefs make easy targets.  You may have noticed how  Christian  apologist here are so thoroughly and so consistently demolished. The only thing spoiling the fun is that tend to be too dogmatic, too ignorant or too  stupid to understand  when they've been trounced.

Even if I can't prove paranormal doesn't exist I'm sure paranormal isn't real.
This is only my opinion and a opinion is only an opinion until proven true or false.

[EgoDeath]

"All those who claim they have paranormal experiences are wrong because paranormal experience does exist only in the brain and not in real world."

A pretty bold statement. How do you  happen to know that?  Proof please;  You have just made a positive claim. That attracts the burden of proof.


My position; I don't believe in the paranormal either, due to the  lack of credible evidence. I don't claim to know, because I can't prove a negative  proposition.  By all means try,  you'll be really famous.

Dogmatic beliefs make easy targets.  You may have noticed how  Christian  apologist here are so thoroughly and so consistently demolished. The only thing spoiling the fun is that tend to be too dogmatic, too ignorant or too  stupid to understand  when they've been trounced.

Even if I can't prove paranormal doesn't exist I'm sure paranormal isn't real.
This is only my opinion and a opinion is only an opinion until proven true or false.

Even though I'd consider myself to be leaning very hard towards your position, I still think plenty of people, sometimes very rational, skeptical people, really do experience things that are strange and seemingly unexplained. I DO think these things MUST have a natural, rational explanation, but nonetheless, plenty of people still experience them and seem to have no immediate, rational explanation.

That's mainly why I made this thread. Even though I don't really believe in the paranormal or supernatural, I love hearing about supposed "paranormal experiences," because it's pretty cool and kind of spooks me out.

I like being spooked

[viocjit]

Even if I can't prove paranormal doesn't exist I'm sure paranormal isn't real.
This is only my opinion and a opinion is only an opinion until proven true or false.

Even though I'd consider myself to be leaning very hard towards your position, I still think plenty of people, sometimes very rational, skeptical people, really do experience things that are strange and seemingly unexplained. I DO think these things MUST have a natural, rational explanation, but nonetheless, plenty of people still experience them and seem to have no immediate, rational explanation.

That's mainly why I made this thread. Even though I don't really believe in the paranormal or supernatural, I love hearing about supposed "paranormal experiences," because it's pretty cool and kind of spooks me out.

I like being spooked

OK !

Your profile say you're an Itheist.
I know what is an Atheist but I have no idea about what is an Itheist.

[EgoDeath]

OK !

Your profile say you're an Itheist.
I know what is an Atheist but I have no idea about what is an Itheist.

Itheism is essentially atheism, with an emphasis on individuality. Basically, the only "god" I consider worthy of worship in this universe is myself; I control my reality and decide my destiny.

It's just a cool way of saying I'm an atheist. Sort of like how some people choose to describe themselves as "apatheists" or "antitheists."

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I talk to dead people. Nearly every night.

[viocjit]

I talk to dead people. Nearly every night.

Excellent joke ! 

[Mister Agenda]

As a child of about eight lying in bed awake (or at least so I thought), I heard what I assumed to be my mother coming up the hall and opening the gate to my bedroom (no door, just a gate to keep my toddler sister out), as she often checked on me before going to bed herself. I pretended to be asleep, intending to surprise her. I felt her (I assumed) touch my arm lightly, her hand was cold. I opened my eyes and sat up to give her a surprise hug, but there was no one there. I was so terrified that I was unable to scream, and hid under my covers.

The most reasonable explanation I can think of now is night terrors, but I vividly remember being wide awake. I suppose it could have been a series of misunderstood sensory inputs, culminating with a big spider or something landing on my arm. My primary hypothesis for many years though was that it was a ghost or similar, despite a trailer being a dubious place for a haunting.

[Yonadav]

I once played a great 'paranormal' prank on a bunch of strangers in one of the most fantastic places to do it. I was visiting the ruins of Chitzen Itza on the Yucatan Peninsula in southern Mexico. I had been there before. This time I was looking at things more carefully to find things that I hadn't noticed before. One of the structures is called 'The Observatory'. At one side of its tower, there was a pile of rubble that made the top of the tower accessible to someone who was willing to climb up the rubble. There were some orange caution flags in the ground around the rubble, and a couple of signs that cautioned about the danger of loose rubble. But there was no sign that prohibited climbing up the rubble. And it wasn't roped off, or anything.

I shrugged and went climbing up the rubble. No one took notice of me doing that. On top of the Observatory, I saw an opening. Curious, I crouched down and entered it with my small penlight. Always take a little penlight with you, when exploring ruins! I was elated to discover that was an inner passageway with a strange sort of staircase. There was not room to stand in the passageway. I crawled down the 'stairs' which had really long runs and shallow rises. It was more like a stepped ramp than stairs. A short way down the passage opened up to the part of the Observatory that tourists enter. I had noticed this opening before, and had wondered what it was. And now I was crouched down inside of the opening, looking out at the tourists below me! The opening was about 7 feet above the floor where tourists enter the observatory. So everyone sees this opening, but no one can see the staircase inside of it that leads to the top of the observatory.

I retreated a few feet away from the opening before anyone saw me. I started to moan softly. My moans could be heard coming out of the opening by the tourists. I would moan for a few seconds, and hear people reacting to it. Then I stayed silent for about 30 seconds and moaned again. I did this a few times. The tourists were pretty excited. After a couple of minutes of this, I couldn't resisst anymore. I had to see their faces. I crawled to the opening and looked out. The chamber was absolutely packed with tourists, all staring up at the opening excitedly. It was so funny!

And then a guide started yelling at me to get down from there. So I crawled back up the stairs and climbed down the rubble. I wasn't in trouble, but the guides that were nearby weren't very amused. Personally, I'm just really happy to have experienced that mysterious passageway that tourists never get to see. It made me feel like Indiana Jones.