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So, I'm going to type out a few segments of " The complete idiots guide to ghosts and hauntings " until my arm starts to fall off, it shall be fun.
Also, some of the stuff in the book makes me go " Wtf lassie " and bare in mind that this means actual paranormal stuff and not iliuisons that plague the mind, although some s**t could be explained that way in the book.



Part 1, The Great Beyond

" Tell us some ghost stories! Please? " I know that's what you want, so don't worry: There are plenty of spooky tales coming up. But, first, we should put the whole realm of ghostdom in context against the world in which these legends have evolved. In this part, we'll take a peak into the distant past to find out what ancient civilizations thought about survival after death and what they believed happens to us after we, well, bite the dust.
And, if our spirts do come back, in what form do they return?

Then we'll look at some of the first recorded ghost stories in western culture and how the early Christian Church reinterpreted them into doctrine. That's not to ignore the old wives' tales, superstitions, urban legends, and friendly folklore that have grown up about Phantoms.
Those pesky pranksters, the poltergeists, are here too.

So don't be frighted---Turn the page!

Is it a ghost or an Apparition?

Most people use the word ghost to mean any phantom object when what they really mean is the spirit of a deceased human being. In this book, I'll concentrate on the latter.

What's the difference, you ask? Much of the reported phenomena over the centuries has involved objects tat are not or were never human. For example, people have reported seeing spectral animals and ghost trains. They weren't human, and they certainly didn't have a soul or spirit ( as they're usually defined ) that could return from the dead.

So to avoid any confusion, Paranormal researchers prefer to use the more general word apparition to mean the visual appearance of a disembodied entity. This encompasses all types of phantoms, human or otherwise. For example, the appearance of an angel by your bedside would be an apparition, but you would never call it a ghost.

Now I realize that there are distinctions not normally made by people on the street, but to avoid confusion, as to what claims are actually being made, investigators feel it best to stick to the word '' Apparition '' unless you specifically mean a ghost.

Think of it this way, All ghosts are apparitions, but not all apparitions are ghosts.

To add to the confusion, here are just a few more synonyms for an apparition, all used colloquially to mean " ghost ":

* Essence * Presence * Spirit
* Manifestation * Shade * Spook
* Nightshade * Shadow * Vision
* Phantasm * Soul * Wraith
* Phantom * Spectre or Specter

And Poltergeists are another thing altogether. We'll take a special look at them in Chapter 5.

There are all sorts of ghosts, and they keep all sorts of schedules:

* Some have been sighted only once. For example, there's a documented case of the luminous ghost of a boy appearing in Corby Castle in Cumberland, England, on a single night ---September 8, 1824.


* They appear on a certain date or time of night. You'll read in Chapter 20 about a female ghost at Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, who appears at midnight every Friday the 13th.


* Some mark the anniversary of an event. A phantom hitchhiker most often appears on the anniversary of his or her own death ( see Chapter 4 )

* Many--the focus of this book--tend to take up residence at a particular place and are seen there with some frequency. They haunt a specific location.

In paranormal parlance, the person who sees the apparition is called the percipient. The apparition that's seen is called the agent. ( the term "agent" is especially used when referring to an apparition that deliberately makes itself visible, that wants to be seen, particularly if it's there to deliver some sort of message. )

Do You Believe?

In an October 1999 Gallup Poll, one out of three people surveyed said that they believe in ghosts---three times as many as in the 1970s.

But do ghosts really exist? Can they exist? For all those who say, absolutely not, no way, to both questions, consider these things everyone once knew to be absolutely, incontrovertibly true.

* The world is flat.

* The sun and the stars revolve around the Earth.

* The moon is made of green cheese

Yet all three have since been proven false. ( Well, we haven't explored the entire moon yet, but the chances of finding any Gruyère or Brie isn't every promising )

A good researcher carries a heavy dose of skepticism, but not cynicism. Perhaps all that's required is to be open to the possibility.

It's been said that those who believe in ghosts don't need hard evidence to prove it. Conversely, no amount of evidence would ever be enough to convince those who don't believe that ghosts exist.

But it's not a black-and-white issue. It's hard to separate the believers from the non-believers. Much of it with whether you believe that there's life , or any type of survival, after death.

For example, there are those who:

* Don't believe in survival after death. Therefore, the deceased couldn't possibly return as ghosts.

* Believe in survival after death, but they don't think that the deceased can return to the world of the living in the form of ghosts.

* Believe in survival after death, and the possibility that the deceased can return as ghosts.

And it's not even that simple. Many people who may or may not believe in life or survival after death believe in other spirits, such as angels and demons, that can make themselves look like humans, even though they're not the ghosts of human beings.

Then there are apparitions of the living ( people who are currently alive but not physically present ). In other words, while a person is still alive in one place, his or her " ghost double " appears somewhere else. But more about that in chapter 3.

And, of course, there are those literal folks who don't believe in anything: life after death, ghosts, heavenly spirits or demons. They may see or experience something paranormal, but they insist there must be a logical, natural explanation for it.

After Life, what's next?


Since the beginning of recorded time, and no doubt eons before that, people have wondered what happens to us when we die.
Don't you? Unless you subscribe without argument to a particular philosophy or religion, any and all answer to that eternal questions are theoretical at best. Why? Because no human being has ever died and returned to this mortal world with the memory to tell us, conclusively, what was on the other side--unless you know something I don't. But, there's been lots of conjecture as to what does happen when we bite the dust.

Woah. That helped a lot biggrin

Sounds like a s**t book:



Indeed that is not how scientists, at least, use the term supernatural. If "supernatural" meant anything "beyond the known forces of nature," then most everything that scientists research would be classified as supernatural. Great Red Spot on Jupiter? Scientists have no sure understanding why that's so persistent. Is it supernatural? No. Embryology, the study of how genes affect phenotypes? Very little is known about it. Is it supernatural? No.