This site has been fairly inactive, and I have run out of things to contribute for the time being, as life issues are intruding on my research time. Effective Sept 5, 2011, the site will revert to http://hauntedhomes.wordpress.com. I may do a few edits and continue to offer the information as a free PDF download or something. Check back later!
Please update your links accordingly.
http://hauntedhomes.wordpress.com
I’m doing some research on paranormal phenomena that are not necessarily related to haunts – telekinesis, remote viewing, ESP, and the like. I may be expanding this material into more of a book-length manuscript at some point.
So… what areas interest you? Which phenomena would you like to read more about? Please drop me a comment.
Thanks!
Do weird things happen to you early in the morning before you get out of bed?
Symptoms?
The distinct sensation that somebody is in your room or in your house.
Conversations with people that are not there.
Feelings of dread or even imminent danger.
Heavy pressure on the chest as if being suffocated or drowning.
Out-of-body (or similar) feelings or experiences.
Well the list goes on, with reported problems worldwide. Check the article on the Wikipedia for more details.
If you’ve been sleeping in a nice, deep, happy REM sleep – please know that your body does not wake up all at the same time. The brain can wake up from sleep before the rest of the body does. This leaves the door wide open for odd things to happen. These events (hallucinations) may range from dreamlike episodes to something far more demonic-seeming. You may hear noises, sense movement in the room, or nearly anything else. It is just as easy to have ‘visits’ from Aunt Margaret, your guardian angel, Elvis, or a demon.
In this state, the brain is a little bit euphoric. It is high on blood sugar because you’ve been resting and your body is ready for another day. It is awake and alert but disconnected from your body because that deeper part of your brain is still sleeping.
When you stop to think about it, this state is somewhat trance-like. It is in these trance-like states that Edgar Cayce did his famous readings a century ago. Cayce would recline on a sofa and went nearly to sleep. As he drifted off to sleep his assistant would present him with a question, which he would answer. While Cayce did his readings while going TO sleep, and sleep paralysis is more narrowly defined as a problem arousing FROM sleep, I think the state of the brain is at least similar in either case.
It is in a similar trance-like state that many religious groups claim to have divine ecstacy and are able to talk with spirits or their gods. From whirling dervishes to voodoo priests, the names and methods vary but the results are the same – achieving a trance so that the mystical can happen.
It is not too much of a stretch to say that some researchers believe that sleep paralysis explains many of the abduction stories we hear about in the UFO literature for the past 50 years.
The flip side, obviously, is that if your guardian angel were to visit you, it might be most easily done when you are in a state of sleep paralysis. Whether it is a psychological cause or a psychological effect is open for discussion since science has no way to determine if there is anything truly paranormal going on around us anyway. Just realize that your own mind can play tricks on you!
So what can you do if you think this may be the source for your ‘haunting’? See a sleep disorder clinic. They can do some tests and have you over for a fun sleepover. Well, maybe not so fun – I really don’t know. But you won’t know for sure what is going on unless you give it a try.
… unless you took the picture yourself.
This video (in a YouTube channel you might want to subscribe to) shows you just how easy it is to make up evidence using a camera.
This is not to say that some photographs may have actual evidence, but between tricks inside the camera and tricks in software like Photoshop, you really have to be careful.
Sadly, they don’t make a film that just shows the ghosts.
* warning: cat story ahead *
This is a tale of two cats, Tuxedo and Gidget. Tuxedo was a neutered, male black and white cat that I adopted at about 10 weeks old from a semi-feral litter. He was the floor traffic director around the house, the playtime toy timer, and otherwise kind of a control freak when it came to Gidget. He often hissed at her for no reason, swatted at her, and generally wanted her to go away.
Gidget is a neutered (formerly feral) 3 year old tabby. She never really paid attention to Tux other than to stay out of his way. Even if he swatted her and hissed, she shrugged it off.
I suspect the tension started because Gidget found herself inside just a few short weeks before she came into season for the first time. Tux tried his best to take care of the situation, but he came up missing some important bits of equipment. I saw this frustrate him a couple of times, and if I recall correctly, that’s when the swatting started. I got Gidget fixed as soon as I could afford it, but Tux had already had enough.
Tux has been sick for the past couple of years, slowly losing a battle with cardiomyopathy – probably due to feline leukemia. He finally passed away on Friday, Dec 11 this year – only 7 years old. I buried him in the yard right after I got home from work that day.
It was kind of a relief that Tux was finally gone, in a way. It’s hard watching a someone – human or not – struggle.
The next day I was feeding Gidget (about 4:30pm), and for a treat – hey let’s have some tuna fish! I took some of my food to the table while Gidget went face down into her plate. I’ve never seen her go more than 5 feet from a plate of tuna – no matter what may happen to distract her. She’s an absolutely greedy little pig at dinner.
On my way back to the kitchen from the table, I was teasing her, asking if she missed Tux. Yeah, I wasn’t expecting a reply… But, I felt a rush of something like vertigo, and a tingling around my legs. Gidget looked up, and bugged out across the front room and dashed upstairs in about five steps. She hid. I took some food up that was eaten later, but I still don’t know where she hid that night. I saw her briefly once, around 11pm and she had quietly come up onto my bed by 3am.
I did not see or hear anything. No evidence to dissect, and no way to repeat the experiment exactly. Just… odd. So I have to admit that I may be one notch less skeptical about animal entities. To be honest, I would have dismissed it completely if I had not had an odd sensation at the exact time Gidget got spooked. Cats, like people, are not always predictable. So what if she decided to eat dinner later? Would I have really noticed anything?
This takes me back a year. I did an investigation last winter for the sister of a friend. They reported a lot of dog-like shadows especially outside, activity around the doggie door, and a visible white dog apparition in the hallway. Well, I couldn’t duplicate the dog-like shadows. I didn’t see any apparitions. I tracked some of the doggie door noises to some stuff getting blown around by the airflow when the furnace kicked on. There were other issues reported as well, but I wasn’t finding anything resembling evidence. I left it as an incomplete investigation, and their activity died down over the spring / summer.
Now I’m not so sure about all of that. I know something happened right here, but even if I had some evidence, would it really prove anything? I didn’t really doubt the possibility of an animal presence, but I’ve certainly not experienced one for myself until now.
Comments? What similar stories do you have to tell?
I woke up around 3:00 AM this morning. I was waiting to drift off to sleep again, but I became suddenly aware of what sounded like a woman screaming outside. The neighbors have loud discussions from time to time but this sounded more… urgent? It was high-pitched like a wail of pain.
I listened a bit more, trying to wake up and get my bearings. I heard something similar again, but it sounded like it could be children playing instead of a woman screaming. I tried to just ignore it, but the sound came again from outside – definitely a woman screaming this time. And then it didn’t stop.
I got out of bed and stood a moment. I followed the direction of the screams to the window. I looked outside and everything was still as far as I could see in any direction. It was freezing, so it wouldn’t have been children. Was it a murder? Should I call the police?
Then the cat woke up, yawned, and sneezed explosively. Then she looked at me as if it were somehow my fault. The sounds from outside simultaneously completely vanished.
I tell this story of a cat’s whistling snore because it has to do with the ‘witching hour’. The ‘witching hour’ goes by many names, but it runs from roughly 2am to 4am for most folks working a normal day shift job. This is the time when your body is starting to release lots of glucose back into the bloodstream so that you have energy to burn when you wake up.
This is the time of day when your body isn’t done sleeping yet, and your brain is halfway high on sugar. It makes for great dreams, but it can also be easy to make mistakes in your perception when you wake up suddenly from a deep sleep. I sometimes think sleep researchers must have a fascinating job, because given the right circumstances anybody can wake up having had a conversation with either grandma, Gabriel, a demon, or Elvis. Or maybe even some random grey alien?
Many paranormal experiences are reported during this time of day. It can be especially troubling for people with other sleep disorders. I’m not suggesting that all reports of phenomena at certain times of day should be automatically tossed to the trash. However, it stands to reason that a careful investigator will take an approach that includes human factors into account. These human factors are many, and include psychological, pharmaceutical, and even hormones and in this case, blood glucose levels.
So, if you’re trying to find a paranormal group to help you investigate a haunting, and you are asked some strangely personal questions, it may be a sign of a really good investigator, rather than somebody out for a joy ride hunting ghosts in your house. Answer the questions as honestly as you can, and perhaps in the process you’ll learn something about yourself. It’s not that the investigator doesn’t believe you. They are just trying to find out the facts, which hopefully leads to the truth.
I don’t deny paranormal stuff happens. Some things will happen that have absolutely no explanation, and these might be paranormal events. I, for one, would rather have some facts that tell me something about myself than a lot of guesswork about spirits or manifestations that may or may not be there – or a confirmation of something ‘paranormal’ from an investigator who didn’t bother investigating.
The GhostDivas aired a 90+ minute interview with former Ghost Hunters investigator Donna LaCroix. The original podcast (SRNLive.com) is available, or there is a 10 minute digest of the high points that is up on YouTube. Warning – some language may not be appropriate for church ladies or children.
In the podcast you’ll find out a lot more about life as a member of TAPS, the fact that fishing line is on the checklist of things to pack for an investigation, and that it definitely IS A SHOW. In fact they now have a ‘staging crew’ to set up the (always cheaper and more blatant) effects that they are capturing as ‘evidence’.
If you are basing your own paranormal investigations on their methods, it just adds to the argument that you’re wasting your time with junk science.
EVPs are electronic voice phenomena. These are the spooky sounds that might be somebody trying to communicate by either speaking into the microphone of an audio recorder, speaking to an investigator, or directly impacting the audio recording process. In either case, the ‘voice’ is not heard by the humans near the equipment.
The downside of EVPs is that there is no control for this process. Most of North America is covered with electronic signals – cell phone communications, emergency response service radio calls, garage door openers, microwave transmissions, TV, radio, short wave radio, and whatever else is floating around in the electronic spectrum.
How do we know that the alleged EVP is not one of those other sources that just happened to interfere with the equipment? We don’t. Even two identical devices placed near each other may not give the same result, and that’s just with normal reception. Two audio recorders may be used in an investigation, but let’s say that the entity only speaks to one of them. Is that a proof of paranormal? Not really. Broadcast waves are fickle enough in general that any one of a number of random effects might eventually be observed even in controlled settings.
In order to try to screen out radio station broadcasts, microwave communications, television signals (and whatever else is floating around in the air electronically) one current idea is to put the audio recording devices in a Faraday cage. This is a metal cage that is hopefully big enough to let a ghost in, but the metal structure will keep the radio waves bouncing off – away from the audio recording equipment. Some investigators are using microwave ovens for this, but I’m a little dubious of this since I would think the ovens would be tuned only to keep the microwave range of signals inside, not necessarily to screen out other broadcast frequencies (AM, FM, TV, and so on).
Hey, but if ghosts are energy, wouldn’t they be kept out of the Faraday cage too? Maybe. Maybe not? We don’t know. But we know for sure that the radio spectrum is full of contamination that can get into your audio recordings and make you think you’re having a conversation – when you’re not.
The other trick some investigators are using is to modify a scanning radio so that it continually scans its frequency range (AM and FM signals). The theory is that the entity can select bits of signals as the radio scans by them, and let those bits of audio through to communicate. If you insist, you can look up ‘ghost box’ on youtube.com.
What you end up with is what I call an audio version of the fabled Rorschach test. You see, those visual ink blot tests let the viewer project onto them whatever comes to mind since the inkblots are designed to be neutral. With these radio samples, the listener can project onto them whatever ghostly communication they feel a need for – without any further proof being required of course.
The next step in this evolving idea is what you see in those videos of guys putting their ghost box in the microwave and having a ‘discussion’ with somebody by listening to the words clipped through when the scanner pauses. Well, that rules out the Faraday cage idea for microwaves then, doesn’t it? If radio contamination is getting in, it isn’t a Faraday cage. And finally, how are we supposed to know which words are really important in whatever might be coming through? Ah, it’s what we think might be important.
Let’s say that an entity really does choose to communicate through a scanning radio. The entity would have to have simultaneous knowledge of multiple frequencies, predictive abilities about when the words it wants to use will be available, and the ability to stop the scanner on the frequency long enough (and at precisely the correct time) for the word to come forward. These are deceased humans trying to communicate? I certainly couldn’t do this even if I were given a script and a timeline to memorize in advance. Why should some random dead guy be able to do this when we cannot?
Ah, but what about those genuine-sounding EVPs where the breathless voices from beyond seem to answer our questions? I don’t know. Hey, I’m not ruling out the possibility of paranormal events legitimately happening! But it is far too easy to manipulate an audio recording to insert stuff in there. Unless I’m hearing it from the original device in a pre-downloaded state (or other controlled method) I’m going to be skeptical. Especially if it is on one of those TV shows. Those are SHOWS after all, right? It looks bad if they don’t find something, don’t you think?
Actually, I’d like to run a voice analysis on the EVPs on those shows and compare them to the staff members, sound guys, camera guys, and investigators who were present. You know? Just to be sure.
Here are two more conditions you need to be aware of if you believe you may be haunted.
First, a visual phenomena called Pareidolia. This is a psychological condition where vague visual impressions are perceived as significant. This is probably what’s really bothering people who think they see the face of Jesus in a tortilla, the Virgin Mary in wood panelling, rocks on Mars having faces, or even animal shapes in clouds or human gestures in punctuation =D.
Pareidolia is also the reason why Rorschach inkblot tests work. In a Rorschach test the person projects whatever is going on in his head onto the cards, which have been designed to not represent anything at all.
Secondly, are you being visited while you are sleeping?
If weird things are happening while you are in bed, the cause may be a form of sleep paralysis. Let’s say that you’ve been sleeping in a nice, deep, happy REM sleep. Sounds great! But, please know that your body does not wake up all at the same time. The brain can wake up from sleep before the rest of the body does. This leaves the door wide open for hallucinations, dream-like states with people in the room, and often an acute sense of danger. Some researchers believe that sleep paralysis explains many of the abduction stories we hear about in the UFO literature. It is just as easy to have ‘visits’ from Aunt Margaret, your guardian angel, or somebody far more sinister.
The flip side, obviously, is that if your guardian angel were to visit you, it might be most easily done when you are in a state of sleep paralysis. Whether it is a psychological cause or a psychological effect is a discussion point since science has no way to determine if there is anything truly paranormal going on around us anyway. Just realize that your own mind can play tricks on you!
Yes, the dictionary has a definition for ‘ghost’. That doesn’t mean that science would know exactly what to do with a ghost – even if it walked in the front door of NASA, volunteered, and didn’t dissipate.
The stories about ghosts are contradictory, but they follow similar themes.
Visual: Ghosts (or spirits or whatever they are) are alleged to appear as ‘shadow people’ or as apparitions. This means that whatever energy form(s) is there can either absorb or block photons (shadow people) or emit photons (apparitions). There is no known energy field or substance that can do anything of the sort, unless it is highly classified and belongs to the Department of Defense. And even at that possibility, it is more dense and heavier than air, and probably weighs many pounds.
Auditory: Ghosts are alleged to make noises like falling pans, clinking chains, slamming doors, voices (talking, singing, moans), or footsteps without actually moving any objects. Are they causing vibrations in the air or are they manipulating your hearing internally?
Thermal: Ghosts are alleged to be able to make cold spots or hot spots. Usually a source of energy has a tendency to create heat since most processes waste energy (why light bulbs get warm for instance). How do you make a cold spot in the middle of the room without a condenser?
Kinetic: Poltergeists are alleged to be able to throw physical objects, manipulate light switches, move chairs, interfere with electronic devices, or play with toys. This requires energy, but there is nothing detectable but the air itself. Can they really touch us, too?
So where is science supposed to start? It would be bad enough if ghosts only did ONE of these sets of things.
On the other hand, I think if ghosts are truly a form of ‘energy’ we should be planning on converting the old insane asylums into energy conversion/production facilities. Are ghosts a renewable energy source that we can tap into? Why not? Then they can either get to work keeping our lights on, or finish crossing over, already!
Don’t worry. I think crazy Uncle Harold is safe awhile longer from being used as a battery.
