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[MrWiggles]

Once last year, while in bed, I found I was awakened, at first it felt simply like I was having trouble sleeping, but I slow started feeling more and more uncomfortable, eventually I was practically paralyzed and a rush of voices went by me.

Couldn't understand a word. The tone wasn't quite angry, sad, urgent, but rather quite emotionless. Or perhaps my ability to judge tone was impaired by my freight.

Sounds like lucid sleeping to a tee. Everything matches. Samee thing gets used by supposed aducted tees, who experience similar things.

[Cthulhu]

I've had that twice when fully awake.  Radio static and a rush of garbled human speech coming from right behind my head.

Fully awake as in walking around.

[MrWiggles]

I've had that twice when fully awake.  Radio static and a rush of garbled human speech coming from right behind my head.

Fully awake as in walking around.

Then see a neurologist.

[Cthulhu]

I have, for other reasons, nothing wrong with mah braenz.

[Muz]

Creaking doors, moving tables, and hearing someone in your head seems a little tame, lol. I mean things like (group) possessions. There's a spear in my other house which is supposedly possessed by the spirits of my ancestors. Babies near it act like they're playing with someone, although, a few of them were really afraid of it.

There's stories about group possessions. There's someone I know who claims that a friend suddenly said "Set the bowl properly." He started repeating the same thing over and over, they thought he was messing with them, so they ignored him. He suddenly passed out, and another in the group said "Set the bowl properly." The guys freaked out and looked around for bowl. Turns out that the first guy to get possessed kicked a bowl with an offering some way back. The story's from a former skeptic.

How does it explain people winning the lottery right after they claim a spirit gave them the winning numbers?

It's all stories, but so are stories about robberies and snatch thieves. It's questionable, but if even half of them are true, there's some strong enough evidence right there.

If you have an explanation why, by all means say so. It could be that the very belief of ghosts makes you more susceptible to "possession". I mean, heck, typing this alone at 1.30 AM gives me an odd feeling that something's about to possess me suddenly. Could that explain ghosts jumping from one person to another, or group possessions? Regardless of culture, we all felt some odd, instinctive fear from playing Silent Hill.

I find this funny (entertaining), because you are talking about an inherently insubstantial being; they have no energy stores, no body, no brain. This means that you are incredibly more powerful than they are. Such a being could only possess you if you wanted it to happen badly, or you were absolutely sure it would happen.

Heh, interestingly, last night I couldn't sleep because of fear from this. I felt some presence wrestling with my sanity, as if trying to get control over me. Whether possession or just plain insanity, it was fucking scary. I ended up fighting the feeling off the whole night. It's not simply "letting them possess". It's like fighting the urge to stay paralyzed, trying not to go hysterical or berserk. Could be the ideomotor effect to a much stronger degree.

But being through it, I think there's a lot more control over you if you believe in it. Exorcisms seem to involve strengthening the resolve of whoever's involved, regardless of how they're performed. I wouldn't call those beings harmless. I'd compare whatever they are to parasites, physically weak, hard to detect, impossible to squash, but going to weak parts of the body.

People around here treat them like parasites too. They're convinced that there's something out there, but unsure what it is or how to get rid of them.

[Jude]

I've had that twice when fully awake.  Radio static and a rush of garbled human speech coming from right behind my head.

Fully awake as in walking around.

Maybe you have some piece of metal in your head/teeth that's picking up radio signals

[MrWiggles]

Creaking doors, moving tables, and hearing someone in your head seems a little tame, lol. I mean things like (group) possessions. There's a spear in my other house which is supposedly possessed by the spirits of my ancestors. Babies near it act like they're playing with someone, although, a few of them were really afraid of it.

There's stories about group possessions. There's someone I know who claims that a friend suddenly said "Set the bowl properly." He started repeating the same thing over and over, they thought he was messing with them, so they ignored him. He suddenly passed out, and another in the group said "Set the bowl properly." The guys freaked out and looked around for bowl. Turns out that the first guy to get possessed kicked a bowl with an offering some way back. The story's from a former skeptic.

Anecdotal evidence is equally worthless no matter who says it. In fact there studies that show even trained persons, such as law enforcement our proven to be crappy eye witness. 

A lot of ghost stuff is ancetotal tales are impossible to explain way, as we don't have all the details. We don't know what been omitted, we don't know whats been changed. We don't know the numerous other minute details that may help with an explanations. And if we couple this with how our brain readily tricks us in what it thinks its perceiving, on how malleable out memory is then anecdotal evidence becomes even weaker.

This isn't to say those that spout out experiences with ghosties, are lying. They probably aren't. They aren't telling willful untruths, and as odd as this may sound can probably pass a polygraph test. All it means, that they believe it happen to them. That however, doesn't mean that it did.

And some one inability to explain what happen to you, isn't proof that it indeed happen. There isn't enough information to make a creditable determination into the validity of the claimant.

We can however, still say that it probably wasn't a ghost, since ghost arent proven to exist. As none existent things, cannot cause events.

In my opinion, the brain is an amazing, wonderful, and horrifically flawed contraption. It evolved to deal with stimuli in a complex way that did not get it killed; this is very broad. There are all kinds of errors and failures they will perpetuate themselves and get worse until the ones involved die because of it.
 People seem to have this standing belief that they always know what is going on in their own mind. In reality, you could know what might be going on a handful of times in your life. There is a saying in psychology that "If our brains were simple enough for us to understand, our brains we be so simple would couldn't understand them." (~ Lyall Watson [!= mind you]) What this all means is that your perceptions are highly fallible, especially in regards to reduced or uncertain stimuli. Ghosts and demons really could be ghosts and demons; machinations of your subconscious that represent things you feel or think in some way. You feelings about a person who died could come together into synthetic stimuli, your feelings about death in some place can do the same. When you know there is something wrong with you in relation to society, that feeling could manifest as some imp that follows you everywhere.

If you have an explanation why, by all means say so. It could be that the very belief of ghosts makes you more susceptible to "possession". I mean, heck, typing this alone at 1.30 AM gives me an odd feeling that something's about to possess me suddenly. Could that explain ghosts jumping from one person to another, or group possessions? Regardless of culture, we all felt some odd, instinctive fear from playing Silent Hill.

I find this funny (entertaining), because you are talking about an inherently insubstantial being; they have no energy stores, no body, no brain. This means that you are incredibly more powerful than they are. Such a being could only possess you if you wanted it to happen badly, or you were absolutely sure it would happen.

Heh, interestingly, last night I couldn't sleep because of fear from this. I felt some presence wrestling with my sanity, as if trying to get control over me. Whether possession or just plain insanity, it was fucking scary. I ended up fighting the feeling off the whole night. It's not simply "letting them possess". It's like fighting the urge to stay paralyzed, trying not to go hysterical or berserk. Could be the ideomotor effect to a much stronger degree.

But being through it, I think there's a lot more control over you if you believe in it. Exorcisms seem to involve strengthening the resolve of whoever's involved, regardless of how they're performed. I wouldn't call those beings harmless. I'd compare whatever they are to parasites, physically weak, hard to detect, impossible to squash, but going to weak parts of the body.

People around here treat them like parasites too. They're convinced that there's something out there, but unsure what it is or how to get rid of them.

Exorcism are scary ordeals that cause death and pain and suffering more then they do cures. http://whatstheharm.net/exorcisms.html

It has no proven benefit, and historical examinations would show they were trying to treat mental illness or life style choices. Exorcism, at its best is just a waste of time, at its worse, causes death permeant disability, and jail sentences for those involved.

Group possession, can be caused by the power of suggestion, the power of suggestion can be  awe streaking in its persuasion ability. Salem Witch trails, is prescribe to this affect. An entire town.

[A Dwarven Smokeologist]

Just reading this stuff makes me feel uneasy, paranoid and makes my eyes water.

I'm curious about this process now, my eyes leak as well when reading this stuff and I get a sick feeling in my body.

I've personally never seen any thing that I haven't been able to attribute to my eyes just playing tricks. Most of my family and friends claim to have "seen" something at one point or another that they thought was a ghost / evil / spirit.

I don't think I've ever heard any one say they saw a spirit or ghost of happiness that made their day and brought warmth into their minds.

Mostly I just hold judgment as I'm not sure and maybe I like the mystery and fear from time to time.

[MrWiggles]

Just reading this stuff makes me feel uneasy, paranoid and makes my eyes water.

I'm curious about this process now, my eyes leak as well when reading this stuff and I get a sick feeling in my body.

I've personally never seen any thing that I haven't been able to attribute to my eyes just playing tricks. Most of my family and friends claim to have "seen" something at one point or another that they thought was a ghost / evil / spirit.

I don't think I've ever heard any one say they saw a spirit or ghost of happiness that made their day and brought warmth into their minds.

Mostly I just hold judgment as I'm not sure and maybe I like the mystery and fear from time to time.

Knowing they don't exist doesn't stop me from enjoying a good ghost story, or a scary game. I actually don't play fatal frame or silent hill, as they can scare the fuck out of me.

Getting emotionally charge over the subject, just shows an underlying emotional attachment you have to the subject.

Its not terribly mystical. Peeples get emotionally charged from seeing their own wedding. Peeples get emotional from seeing pictures of lost loved ones. It doesn't rely a sense of factuality. As in because I feel this, those events or subject is based in reality. Peeples get choked over reading fictional characters. In tombstone, I cried when doc holiday died. Bad example, he was real. I got teary when Wall*E was in his death scence, a freaken robot, an adorable one but completely fictitious.


Ghost are an inherently beautiful idea. It must be truly old concept, older then being a hooker, old. The meme probably has its original before we were homo sapiens, maybe as far back as homo eretus.

[Muz]

Exorcism are scary ordeals that cause death and pain and suffering more then they do cures. http://whatstheharm.net/exorcisms.html

It has no proven benefit, and historical examinations would show they were trying to treat mental illness or life style choices. Exorcism, at its best is just a waste of time, at its worse, causes death permeant disability, and jail sentences for those involved.

I've yet to see a single person getting hurt from an exorcism. If someone is dying, obviously they're doing it wrong Most exorcists don't even charge for services. On the other hand, I've seen people who would otherwise be completely insane getting 'cured'. Real or not, it appears to help.

[MrWiggles]

Exorcism are scary ordeals that cause death and pain and suffering more then they do cures. http://whatstheharm.net/exorcisms.html

It has no proven benefit, and historical examinations would show they were trying to treat mental illness or life style choices. Exorcism, at its best is just a waste of time, at its worse, causes death permeant disability, and jail sentences for those involved.

I've yet to see a single person getting hurt from an exorcism. If someone is dying, obviously they're doing it wrong Most exorcists don't even charge for services. On the other hand, I've seen people who would otherwise be completely insane getting 'cured'. Real or not, it appears to help.

Did you not click the spiffy link? Those were just the ones reported in news paper. And inserting they're doing it wrong is none sense, there are no prescribe excorism techniques. I can do CPR wrong, and I can do the heimlich maneuver wrong. As they are proven techniques with proven results.

We can find hundreds of excorism rituals, all being equally worthless and dangerous. All of them being based on magical thinking. Like releasing the souls from their physical body, or shoveling castrol oil down the mouth, or flogging with whips until raw and bloodily. The unfun way to use whips.

The studies that have been done, have shown no benefits. And completely insane, isn't a diagnose terminology. Just mucky muck. What did a psychologist, or a neurologist diagnose him as?

We also can't over look, self deception, believing that it help forces you to see that it is helping. And once again, we have no idea, about the details being omitted, changed or subtle nuances that could offer an actual context for the event.

[dragnar]

I am a very logical person, and have a hard time believing anything supernatural, ghosts in particular. My thoughts go like this: 1. If ghosts exist, why is there no indisputable proof? has not a single scientist ever become a ghost? 2. If a person could live on after death, why the heck would they waste eternity scaring people? and 3. if even a very small fraction of the people who died became ghosts, the entire world would be massively haunted.

Even apart from Occam's razor, there are just too many things about ghosts that don't add up.

[Morrigi]

I am a very logical person, and have a hard time believing anything supernatural, ghosts in particular. My thoughts go like this: 1. If ghosts exist, why is there no indisputable proof? has not a single scientist ever become a ghost? 2. If a person could live on after death, why the heck would they waste eternity scaring people? and 3. if even a very small fraction of the people who died became ghosts, the entire world would be massively haunted.

Even apart from Occam's razor, there are just too many things about ghosts that don't add up.

Well, for 2, maybe they get bored with the afterlife...

[Muz]

Did you not click the spiffy link? Those were just the ones reported in news paper. And inserting they're doing it wrong is none sense, there are no prescribe excorism techniques. I can do CPR wrong, and I can do the heimlich maneuver wrong. As they are proven techniques with proven results.

We can find hundreds of excorism rituals, all being equally worthless and dangerous. All of them being based on magical thinking. Like releasing the souls from their physical body, or shoveling castrol oil down the mouth, or flogging with whips until raw and bloodily. The unfun way to use whips.

The studies that have been done, have shown no benefits. And completely insane, isn't a diagnose terminology. Just mucky muck. What did a psychologist, or a neurologist diagnose him as?

We also can't over look, self deception, believing that it help forces you to see that it is helping. And once again, we have no idea, about the details being omitted, changed or subtle nuances that could offer an actual context for the event.

I'd agree with you completely about some parts being bad. Except for the part where you say "Some exorcisms are very bad, therefore all exorcism is bad". I've seen plenty of good come from it. I'd believe that "some are very bad, some are good". Just because you haven't seen any good from it, doesn't mean that it doesn't work elsewhere. It's like traditional medicine or cooking, there's no "proven" way to do it, but a lot of people are getting the results right. If people in your country think that licking poisonous toads works as traditional medicine, that's what I'd call "doing it wrong"

1. If ghosts exist, why is there no indisputable proof? has not a single scientist ever become a ghost? 2. If a person could live on after death, why the heck would they waste eternity scaring people? and 3. if even a very small fraction of the people who died became ghosts, the entire world would be massively haunted.

1. If they become ghosts, how do they change back? It's pretty hard to track a ghost scientifically, though, because there's no way to actually expect what to detect. Some people look for cold spots and energy, and they find some in 'haunted locations'. It was on TV for a while, then ratings dropped because nobody wants to watch a show for an hour, only to find a false alarm. There were a few with very strong movement of energy, though. Weak evidence, but a start.
2. Eh, from what I get, most don't. They just stay quiet. Some have intense hate, some have ego, some have intense love. I think it makes sense that they're very weak, so it takes a lot of work, or group effort for them to haunt anyone.
3. That's a good question. I think that many just pass on after a while, hence why it's strongest in graveyards and hospitals, where there's a steady supply of recently dead.

Just giving answers. I'm not going to try convincing, because I don't know the answers myself.

[MrWiggles]

Did you not click the spiffy link? Those were just the ones reported in news paper. And inserting they're doing it wrong is none sense, there are no prescribe excorism techniques. I can do CPR wrong, and I can do the heimlich maneuver wrong. As they are proven techniques with proven results.

We can find hundreds of excorism rituals, all being equally worthless and dangerous. All of them being based on magical thinking. Like releasing the souls from their physical body, or shoveling castrol oil down the mouth, or flogging with whips until raw and bloodily. The unfun way to use whips.

The studies that have been done, have shown no benefits. And completely insane, isn't a diagnose terminology. Just mucky muck. What did a psychologist, or a neurologist diagnose him as?

We also can't over look, self deception, believing that it help forces you to see that it is helping. And once again, we have no idea, about the details being omitted, changed or subtle nuances that could offer an actual context for the event.

I'd agree with you completely about some parts being bad. Except for the part where you say "Some exorcisms are very bad, therefore all exorcism is bad". I've seen plenty of good come from it. I'd believe that "some are very bad, some are good". Just because you haven't seen any good from it, doesn't mean that it doesn't work elsewhere. It's like traditional medicine or cooking, there's no "proven" way to do it, but a lot of people are getting the results right. If people in your country think that licking poisonous toads works as traditional medicine, that's what I'd call "doing it wrong"

Exorcism, at its best is just a waste of time, at its worse, causes death, permeant disability, and jail sentences for those involved.

And yes, there are proven practices of medicine. It allowed for our life span to increase to where it is now, its why you don't worry about polio, whooping cough, wild small pox, or TB. Why the mortality rate of pregnancy is no longer 50 percent. Its why we can drink our water with equal to no concern. Its why when an arm gets broken, it wont heal mangled. Its why cancer, and aids are no longer death sentences. Its why H1N1 won't be nother Spanish Flu. The last viral infection that killed more then world war two.

And yes, there are proven methods of cooking. Its why we can always bake a yellow cake. Its why we can always cook pork and not worry about flat worms. Its why restaurants can always churn out food. Its why mcdonalds can serve billions, and billions. Its why there are cooking schools through the world. Its why we have a food channel.

And both of these have wrong ways of performing them. Cook food wrong, it becomes no longer palatable, causing stomach ache and food poisoning. And for some food it can cause death. For medicine, you'll die or not recover as well.

Also, the wording tradition is nonsensical. If its medicine, then its medicine. Its not like we have traditional automobiles or traditional airplanes or a traditional guns. If its a gun, its a gun. If its a car its a car.

With calling it traditional (or choose your preferred prefix, there a few of them.), its trying to place it in its own category so it doesn't have to play with the actual rules.

Its not like the rules for Medical Academia is hard. Its only have one; Proven Effectiveness. If it follows that rule, suddenly its just medicine.

Also, could you tell me what else I've experience by chance? I wasn't aware I conveyed my personal experience with exorcism.