I don't know that I have ever experienced anything that I can say is paranormal.

[rational experiences]

As human history.

The man human biological.
The woman human biological.

Animals biological.
Nature's garden on which our human life depends biological.

Natural planet natural heavens place human.

No phenomena says father mother adult memory. Human.

Babies sperm man's chemical biology inheritance to be adult again.
Babies ovary woman's chemical biology Inheritance to be adult again.

We use parent memory always. Proven by themed I'm reincarnated DNA type body human mind re living.

Advised..not phenomena it's natural causes.

Man theories machine design. He manifests it out of earths mass. Position phenomena....even uses machines to study it phenomena...as proof he caused it by being a man human.

Yet he's not phenomena he invented it abstractly.

Man humans says I'm the inventor God of phenomena as I altered natural law.

It's his man's baby brother to father lifes confession.

As non sexual man...young adult man theoried manifested machine was his confession.

Never got to be a baby man father as he killed of life...about 33 years man average.

As we live human...old humans survive about age 100. So the wisdom of an aged human says we should all live to age 100.

A human is a human as a human reasons in a displaced wise hierarchy.

Great grand parents wise humans once taught us. As humans. Humans several generations biology human before us. Aren't monkeys.

A human says looking at the monkey life says only lesser biology types existed before me. As the human. I am a human the human in laws.

Today the monkey living with me is still less than me. My great grandparents human says so...old humans living before me.

Egotist young man usurped natural wisdom.

As any advice is given as one living human to another you ought to heed just humans advice.

Human advice for humans as human law for humans about humans involve no phenomena to think abstractly about from your owned being. Human.

Warned whilst we all live warning the warning.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

I have not had any crazy dramatic experience myself, but I am a believer beyond reasonable doubt from the mountain of anecdotal experiences I have heard after considering their quantity, quality and consistency. It's just my analysis of all the facts all things considered.

About the best I can say is there are many things I cannot explain, but I wonder that many of them may have reasonable explanations based on what we already know or they might be explainable from some new discovery about our minds or physics. I can't claim that it doesn't exist and I have had experiences that some would call paranormal, but I just don't know.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

The lights sound exactly like what I saw but it was 45 years ago so the memory is fuzzy.

Oddly, that would be about as long ago as it was when I saw that light. Hmmm.

 

[Stevicus]

My father passed away in 1987. From the time just after his death until my mother sold the house in 2004, several guests in my family home who had never met my father asked who the man they saw in the house was. The descriptions they provided all matched my father including his favorite white tee shirts and similar age he was at the time of his death. I have been intrigued by this, but I cannot say that there isn't a reasonable explanation and that it must mean the spirit or ghost of my father was roaming around our house after his death. I sort of hoped not, since I entertained in my bedroom while I was living there after his death and that was a show I wouldn't want him to catch.

I can't say that the death of my father did not come up in conversation with the guests or that they did not see pictures of my father. I don't know if the guests were prone to suggestibility. Not much I can say except to report the unusual occurrence. Most of these guests did not know each other either.

Wow, that does seem to defy any real explanation. I don't disbelieve people who say they saw something, but there's no way I can possibly know what, exactly, they saw.

 

[George-ananda]

About the best I can say is there are many things I cannot explain, but I wonder that many of them may have reasonable explanations based on what we already know or they might be explainable from some new discovery about our minds or physics. I can't claim that it doesn't exist and I have had experiences that some would call paranormal, but I just don't know.

Well at some point I have to believe the so-called paranormal exists. Any explanation for all things I have heard would require some new dramatic understandings. Maybe that's one way how the paranormal can sort of be defined as 'things requiring new dramatic upgrades to our understanding'.

 

[We Never Know]

I have had strange experiences in my life, but I have no way to know that those I cannot explain did not have an ordinary explanation.

I can't declare that the paranormal doesn't exist, but is everything that is inexplicable, evidence of the paranormal?

How much of what I have experienced was just me and how I felt or thought?

Any thoughts on this?

Have you experienced or seen any miracles?

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Well at some point I have to believe the so-called paranormal exists. Any explanation for all things I have heard would require some new dramatic understandings. Maybe that's one way how the paranormal can sort of be defined as 'things requiring new dramatic upgrades to our understanding'.

That's an interesting way to put it. You don't think that we have a lot left to learn and some of that knowledge might explain things that we think are paranormal now?

I think many of the discoveries over the last 200 years have been pretty dramatic and required new perspectives to understand it. I think your definition expresses hope.

Some things have to be taken on faith and no explanation may ever be forthcoming.

 

[Stevicus]

I'm sure your friend was talking about Zak Bagan's Haunted Museum (see here). I've heard that people are actually required to sign a legal waiver before they're allowed to go into the museum. I'd love to go there, but I'm afraid I'd be overwhelmed by the spirits there, and some of them I was told are very negative. I've been told that it isn't a pleasant experience for people like me, so I'm not going.

Yes, that's it. She just mentioned it this morning, and I already forgot the name. My brain doesn't work as well as it used to.

Did your grandfather ever claim to speak to spirits as well? I'm curious to know if he considered himself to be a medium, and if he did, what was the extent of his mediumship. And for the record, it is not uncommon for people close to death to be visited by a deceased loved one before they pass away themselves or to be visited by a loved one shortly after they pass away. Both incidences can happen.

He didn't really talk about it much. I don't think he really considered himself a medium, or if he did, it wasn't really discussed much. He just seemed to view it as an unexplainable oddity; he didn't know why he was seeing these things and didn't think there was anything he could do about it. There was one instance when my grandmother and grandfather both said they heard the voice of my grandmother's dead sister calling out and saying that she couldn't find her other sister (who was also deceased). They didn't say anything about speaking to the spirit, or nothing in terms of any kind of conversation, since it apparently ended abruptly and only just the one time.

 

[Quintessence]

I can't declare that the paranormal doesn't exist, but is everything that is inexplicable, evidence of the paranormal?

Ultimately, how you map things onto the territory is up to how you want to draw the map.

Something I've observed is that "paranormal" as a concept tends to crop up where the prevailing religion in a culture is blinded in some way to certain types of religious experiences or practices. Because these experiences and practices aren't part of the usual framework - but they still nonetheless happen or are practiced - they get shunted under some other labeling system like "paranormal" or "occult."

I probably take this perspective because many phenomena quaintly referenced as "paranormal" are already incorporated into the foundations of my religious practices and not viewed as "paranormal." It's just part of my religion. But as these things are part of a religion, they are not understood in a secularized or Christianized context which means "speaking with the dead" in Paganism probably doesn't look like the seance you might be imagining.

 

[George-ananda]

That's an interesting way to put it. You don't think that we have a lot left to learn and some of that knowledge might explain things that we think are paranormal now?

I think many of the discoveries over the last 200 years have been pretty dramatic and required new perspectives to understand it. I think your definition expresses hope.

Some things have to be taken on faith and no explanation may ever be forthcoming.

Maybe I wasn't clear. I was trying to say that the paranormal can be thought of as the normal not yet understood by current science.

Ghosts for example I believe are real and eventually can be understood by future science.

I'm arguing against the notion that the paranormal is something 'magical' that can never be explained by science. If it's real, it's natural.

 

[JDMS]

All my weird experiences have been something happening that was unexplainable with the information I had/have. There's no evidence for me to consider at all. That's why I've never been able to attribute them to the work of something paranormal. I have no more evidence to believe a ghost yanked the door out of my hand then I do that the handle on the other side got caught on something that wasn't apparent when I checked, for whatever reason. I still wonder what caused the couple incidents I've had, though.

 

[YoursTrue]

I predicted you would post that.

No I didn't.

I got the same impression, that the poster misunderstood or misrepresented you, so I'm glad you corrected that.

 

[Heyo]

It appeared too high up in the sky to have been a helicopter and didn't flutter like you would expect one to even while hovering. It wasn't a plane that I know of, since it was stationary for 15 minutes or so.

When you look at a plane that is flying away from you it seems to hover (while moving fast).

 

[Heyo]

To elaborate, I am thinking paranormal as ESP, telekinesis, speaking to the dead, seeing ghosts, demons, haunted houses, poltergeists, predicting the future, bending spoons, sounds for no apparent reason, etc.

I think you are mixing up categories here. There are the things that defy explanation (like ghosts) and things that are looking for an explanation (like ESP). Academic work is done to describe the phenomenology of ESP and first attempts at explanatory hypothesis have been published. (Morph(ogenet)ic fields, Sheldrake.)
I'm not so sure on which side of the fringe border those people reside. Very rare events have a tendency to be called non existent, like ball lightning, which was denied to exist by the science community until the anecdotes kept piling up and eventually reproduced in the lab.

 

[rational experiences]

All humans exist first.

Science says biology human parents. Same parent in human species for everyone.

Biology human medical science only correct science. Said for human preservation.

No theists.

Reason as baby man micro sperm ovary consciousness became the human theist.

Sperm ovary in two parents ownership no baby says his theories machine are fake.

As he built manifested a machine himself as the first state body of phenomena.

O earth mass no machine.
Heavens above gas water spirit with light natural.

No machine anywhere.

Phenomena believed. Origin mind biology human original consciousness bio human heavenly attacked. By his use the machine.

Man only designed.

Proof gas sky is blue no clouds.

Clouds burning smoking rolling caused reaction cooling image is smoke.

Man changed reactive earth base heavens gas advices put own image into clouds mass. Humans not smoke.

 

[rational experiences]

I think you are mixing up categories here. There are the things that defy explanation (like ghosts) and things that are looking for an explanation (like ESP). Academic work is done to describe the phenomenology of ESP and first attempts at explanatory hypothesis have been published. (Morph(ogenet)ic fields, Sheldrake.)
I'm not so sure on which side of the fringe border those people reside. Very rare events have a tendency to be called non existent, like ball lightning, which was denied to exist by the science community until the anecdotes kept piling up and eventually reproduced in the lab.

First lightning exist first? No. Correct advice about ball lightning...manifested.

 

[rational experiences]

Or scientist just men produce ball lightning as man's science.

You then should be using it as electricity right where you said you invented it. Just by man's thinking ability and man's built designs.

Nowhere else as it's man's science want only. Exact. Man by science.

 

[exchemist]

I have had strange experiences in my life, but I have no way to know that those I cannot explain did not have an ordinary explanation.

I can't declare that the paranormal doesn't exist, but is everything that is inexplicable, evidence of the paranormal?

How much of what I have experienced was just me and how I felt or thought?

Any thoughts on this?

The closest to this I can recall was once witnessing ball lightning after a lightning strike, in a tank farm at an oil refinery where I worked. I think since that time ball lightning has become scientifically accepted, though still not understood.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

Someone related to me a story about a blender in a building they were using that started all on its own. They were convinced that it was a paranormal phenomenon. I was just curious, how one eliminates all the potential possibilities, like a faulty switch or a power surge and can go straight to concluding the paranormal.

I don't want this to be a thread denying the paranormal, but rather why that is the conclusion above all others.

Speaking for myself as a paranormal investigator, I wouldn't immediately classify the kind of event you described as paranormal. Even if I sense the presence of a spirit, I don't always assume that it is paranormal. As a medium, though, I have the benefit of being able to see and hear spirits, so if I witness a spirit causing a paranormal event, I am aware of it. I will, however, make an effort to debunk the incident and document it using my equipment in order to establish that it was indeed paranormal. If there are other investigators and observers, especially skeptics, then I'll also make an effort to debunk and document the incident in order to prove that it's authentic.

Frankly, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is for a serious paranormal investigator to make absolutely certain that their evidence of the paranormal is authentic and cannot be legitimately debunked by skeptics. In my opinion, a serious and seasoned paranormal investigator will never leave their potential paranormal evidence (recorded videos and pictures of spirits, EVP recordings) wide open for skeptics to harshly rip it all apart. I don't think it's a wise or productive strategy for any serious paranormal investigator. To be honest, I'm my own worst critic when it comes to the potential evidence of the paranormal that I collect, because my objective when analyzing the evidence is to try and debunk it so that I may authenticate it. I'm very serious about authenticating my evidence.

I also allow other seasoned investigators and even skeptics that I know and trust to thoroughly analyze the potential evidence of the paranormal that I collect during an investigation. I never take any pictures I take or videos I record at face value, despite my abilities relating to the paranormal. If I'm conducting an EVP session, then I make sure that the people around me hear what I hear via the Spirit Box. I've asked the other people around me, "What did you hear?" rather than repeating what I heard myself. I could tell them that I audibly heard the spirits speaking directly to me because of my abilities, but that isn't sufficient evidence for the skeptics in the crowd. If I show other people the pictures I've taken at a haunted location, I don't tell them what I see but rather ask them what they see. I don't try to influence how other people interpret my evidence. In addition, before I enter into a location that is believed to be haunted, I'll ask the people I'm with to not tell me anything about the place and any experiences they have had there. I don't want to be influenced. I prefer to go into a location with a clear mind so that I can be certain that what I sense there as a medium is real.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Maybe I wasn't clear. I was trying to say that the paranormal can be thought of as the normal not yet understood by current science.

Ghosts for example I believe are real and eventually can be understood by future science.

I'm arguing against the notion that the paranormal is something 'magical' that can never be explained by science. If it's real, it's natural.

I do not think you were unclear. I think I misunderstood what you were saying.

Many things that were formerly considered as paranormal or associated with the paranormal have been shown to have natural reasons for their occurrence. For instance, we understand lightning much better than our ancient ancestors and all the evidence indicates it is a natural process. Disease is another phenomenon now recognized as being derived from natural causes.

I do not know what to think of ghosts. They are commonly reported. I have never seen one to my knowledge. I am more interested to know how one knows something is a ghost and not something else. What is the process that eliminates other possibilities or do people tend to go straight to ghost without consideration of anything else?

Witchcraft being more a practice of ethnobotany than of casting spells that take control of people.

There may be some things that defy explanation by science for the fact that they are difficult to observe or to set up experiments to study.