Well this topic is pretty straight forward. Do you believe in ghosts (earthbound spirits)? I've felt a few strange things and have various other experiences told to me by people who are very trustworthy. Also the Ghosthunters TV show provides interesting food for thought.

I would like to hear your opinions.

Yes I do, & I've seen a couple too

Hmm...hard to say yes or no, but I always feel like I'm being followed when I'm in a dark hallway :( idk if that helps you or not :)

Yes, my X haunts me all the time.

Without putting a name to 'them' or whatever you wish to call these entities ... yes, I do.

I find it hard to accept that a person's energy and being just stops upon leaving this particular world.

On a gruesome note, people that have been decapitated ... brain functions were still recorded for about 15 seconds after the fact.

Yes I do, and do I have a story to tell to prove it...forgive the following novel length:

When I was about 10 and living in Mililani, Hawaii...my dad had a picture (a charcoal) from when he was stationed in Germany. The picture was a profile of a girl who looked EXACTLY like my profile...only this pic was a good 200 or more years old. It was in the guest room. My grandma came to Hawaii for a 2 week visit, and to try to shorten this from a novel...one day she and I were in the bedroom and all of a sudden, the door and windows slammed shut, it got rather chilly and a dent formed on the bed next to us. A moment later, my grandma started choking...saying that someone was choking her. For some weird and unexplained reason, I jumped off the bed, grabbed the picture and threw it in the closet then slammed the closet door. Suddenly the choking stopped and the room warmed up.

This is one of 2 times this picture did something. It was finally moved behind a poster in a frame and we never had problems again. I don't know if the picture is still in the family or got lost with our many military moves. But it is freaky and very true. So yes, I definately believe in ghosts.

creepy :(

Yes I do and He is called Holy.

definately do.. i have many experiences i can tell.. i have a couple in my house... one is a little boy who only turns up when something is going to happen.. there is one that every few nights will go from the hallway to the kitchen... plus a few other lost souls... a couple of years ago my Grandmother in England died, I was woken up and she was there, saying goodbye.. i knew the exact time she died, and it wasnt a dream, my sister and a cousin (who lives over here) had exactly the same thing... but I'm always being haunted... some are nice and some are just plain annoying... and where i work some are just evil...

Not really. I don't see any scientific reason why our concious would be able to continue to exist after the brain has ceased to function. However I am willing to accept that there may be a scientific explanation that is currently beyond our understanding. One thing I always wonder when it comes to beliefs in the afterlife is, does this include other speciies besides humans? For example, does anyone beleive in ghost whales or dolphins, ghost monkeys etc. or claim to have experienced them? I think I recall a story about a ghost dog once, but I would say this story would be related more to the human that the dog was associated with. Ideas which elevate humans beyond all other species (ie the concept that we are the only species with a "soul") always make me somewhat sceptical.

Interesting idea Sam.

Too often we never make that leap beyond our own, and I would agree here, typical egocentric mental paradigm.

As far as being elevated above other animals or species, well ... that one is easy. Just ask Lauren's dog about priorities and 'nap' time and perhaps, the lack of opposable digits.

A little more serious ... for your consideration as to the 'how' an entity may perpetuate itself, I offer up the First Law of Thermodynamics: "Energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed. The total amount of energy and matter in the Universe remains constant, merely changing from one form to another."

Ergo, my statement; "I find it hard to accept that a person's energy and being just stops upon leaving this particular world."

Is a thought, or conciousness, really a tangible energy force though? In scientific terms?

On an emotional level, although I don't find the idea that our conciousness may one day simply cease to exist comforting, I find it less disturbing than the idea that it exists eternally... surely we would all go mad after so many millenia, knowing that it will literally never end.

Hmm, considering a synapse or two is fired in the process of 'thought,' and relying on the fact that an electroencephalogram (EEG) detects and records patterns of electrical activity ... I would think that it is safe to say that some energy was produced.

As far as your thoughts on existing eternally ... well, it just might take me that long to figure out the rule(s) for "The Game." :P

But isn't thought a result of that energy, rather than actually being the energy itself? And doesn't that energy last only for a moment? If so, then we would produce a "ghost" each time we have a thought, would we not, as the thought lasts only for a moment and is then gone (or, if your idea was correct, transformed into another form of energy). Don't take this too seriously though, I'm just theorising (in a rather non-sciency way).

Whoa ... 'k, now we are getting to the deep end of the pool.

My point Sam was to introduce the concept of energy as a cumulative measure, summing the energy that was created over the lifetime of an individual's thoughts and mental processes.

And that that 'number' may be large enough to appeal to our logical side to consider that it just does not simply dissipate with an individual's passing.

Hope that isn't too too sciency for you. (I kid, I jest ... I try to fluster. :P)

Hmmm... I see your point, but... the idea that thoughts could be transferred into another form of matter which accumulates over a lifetime to then coalesce into some form of sentient being seems unlikely to me... besides, most ghost reportings tend to concur that the "spirit" takes on the form, and the personality traits, that the person had at or shortly before their death. So I would say the most likely path of events, if your theory of thoughts transformed to energy is correct, is that the thoughts strongest in the persons mind at the time of their passing is what takes form and becomes the ghost. If we are to accept the common concept of what a ghost is, these thoughts would generally involve regret/unfinished business, perhaps so obsessive that they have enough presence/energy to take form. How does that sound? *shrugs* Personally to me it still sounds a bit touchy-feely to have a sound scientific basis.

Hmmm… *jumps into the deep end of the pool*

I do believe, both because I had the exact same experience as Jacqueline had, and because there was no other logical explanations for some of the things that went on @ my boarding school. Strangely enough, the weirdest things happened either out in the open or on the upper floors of the buildings. For a long time my roommates and I believed that somebody else had the key to our room and was playing tricks on us, but we had the lock changed 3 times, and still, we'd get back and the lights that we had left off would be on, the radio would be on a diff station, other small things like that. As time went on, and the radio started changing stations while we were IN the room, it became a little harder to believe it was one of our fellow residents!

My sister passed away nealy 7 years from breast cancer. She was in Hospice by then & the night she passed away, Gary, myself, my brother Mike & my sister-in-law Mary were there. This Hospice, in Cinn. was very nice & they had nice furniture in the rooms & a CD player in Alice's room, playing soft music. The lights were dimmed, but not dark & I was sitting at Alice's head, on the right side of her bed, & Gary was stanging directly across Alice's bed from me. There was a small table between myself & Mary, & my brother sat at the foot of Alice's bed, on the left. I was looking down & all of a sudden I noticed the room had turned gold, the color of antique coins. I glanced up & I could still the light of the room, but overlaying it was this gold color, very thin, like a film. I glanced down the length of my sisters bed & there at the foot of her bed, stood my deceased parents, one on each side. They never looked at any of us, just steadily watched my sister. My dad had been dead for 5 years & my mother for 4 years. Then, they gradually faded from sight, the gold color faded from the room, & Alice passed over an hour later. To this day, I believe my sister's soul went then, with my parents, & the fact that I was able to see my parents waiting there to take her over to the other side....that was a gift from God. That was to show me that she was in a better place, with people who loved her, & I shouldn't grieve so badly.
So yes, I believe.

if anyone here watches southpark this is a quote from the episode titled "The Biggest Douche in the Universe" its about John Edwards (Crossing Over with John Edward in which he claims that he communicates with the deceased)

Stan- "You see, I learned something today. At first I thought you were all stupid, listening to this douche's advice, but now I understand that you're all here because you're scared. You're scared of death and he offers you some kind of understanding. You all want to believe in it so much, I know you do. You find comfort in the thought that your loved ones are floating around trying to talk to you, but think about it: Is that really what you want? To just be floating around after you die, having to talk to this asshole?We need to recognize this stuff for what it is: magic tricks. Because whatever's really going on in life and in death is much more amazing than this douche."

i think stan has summed this subject up quite nicely, do we really want to be floating around when were dead trying to communicate with the living.. i sure as hell dont.

I think the popular concept of a ghost who retains contact with the living is that it has some issue to resolve, and can't pass on to the "real" afterlife or nether world or whatever it might be until it "fixes" the unresolved issue. (I'm not suggesting this is so, just that it is the popular conception).

As far as John Edwards and other soothsayers (or whatever they are called) go, I have to accept that they have some ability that is beyond the understanding of most. I don't believe that is an ability to communicate with the dead though... perhaps some form of ESP (at least that would explain their apparant ability to know initimate details of the persons relationship with the deceased). I did see a TV show where they performed a test, the type where two people sit in seperate areas where they can't see each other and the second person has to try to select the symbol that the person in the other room is looking at (or somethinglike that, can't recall exactly). Ayway the point was that they had performed this test on John Edwards and the results were beyond something that could be called coincidental. I found this interesting since I don't think this test could be related to contacting spirits in any way (unless he was using a spirit to help him "cheat", which seems unlikely :-) it suggests at least that he has other abilities besides an ability to talk to dead people... or perhaps that his talent isn't talking to dead people at all, as I suggested earlier. Since I have done basically no research into the topic though, these are just thoughts and should not (as usual) be taken to seriously.

I have read these very compelling ideas, but for me...I cannot explain what happened or how or why. The charcoal was purchased in Germany...only because my dad thought it was pretty...yet it looked EXACTLY like me only it was 200ish years old. I witnessed the door slamming and the windows closing. At the time I lived in Hawaii, and it had been cold enough in that room to see my breath...THAT doesn't happen in Hawaii. I also saw the dent on the bed as if someone was there. Everything that happened was so random and weird...if it wasn't a ghost, then I cannot offer up an explaination of what happened.

Some things need not be explained.

I take some comfort in my own experiences that somewhat defy logical explanation. For me, it tells me that there is indeed more ... and perhaps more than what necessarily meets the eye. Simple.

On the serious side yes I do. I have seen and heard to many strange things in my life that I can't explain. Bumps in the night behind me when know one was there, whistling through the house and in the room that my father slept in many years ago. Shadows that cross the wall when there was nothing to cast them.
My parents have been dead for over 15 years and two woman in my life have described a woman they've seen in my house in a flannel night gown that looked like my mother. Who knows?

The other day, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a black cat jump on the bed. Now I DO have a black cat, but she is anti-social and NEVER EVER comes out of her room (except late at night to get rubs from her daddy). A few minutes after that I felt something nuzzle my hand. Now here is the weird part...earlier I had been talking to my father and we were remembering our various cats who had passed on...Pookie was a black Siamese who developed cancer in the mouth bones and we had the vet euthanize her before it got really painful for her. She used to nuzzle my hand at night.

So I ask, was pookie making a visit to say hello and that she is ok, or was my mind playing some freaky ass trick...? And no, I was not hopped up on any of my pain meds at the time...this was one of my few "sober" moments (lately those are getting to be few).

It is things like this that make me wonder.

Some thing was said on the Montel Williams show by a Psychic. She was talking to a woman who showed her a picture of a form. The form in the image looked like an angle. The darn image had wings which I was some what skeptical of. She said it was an angel and that they are all around us.

The woman asked her did the angel come down from heaven to see her son. She said, “Come down from heave? It is three feet from the floor and it is all around us”. Motel said “you mean heaven is here with us”? She said yes it is just a different plain of existence and that it is all around us we just can’t see it. She said we share the same space but in a different realm. She then said that they are all around us and as they are ghost in our world we are ghost in there’s.

Interesting concept; Think about us being ghost in there world Hmmmmm.

wow... strange to see so many people who actually "believe in ghosts"... I thought I was in the minority... apparently I'm not that special =/....

anywho... my perceptions as I perceive them are.... well... I have a few relationships with umm... I'll call them astral entities, because I think "ghosts" connotates that they are mischeivious and "evil"... although the ones that pick on me are rather mean-spirited, I think that the realm they exist on is the same as the angelic land prismmagic was talking about... that and I think there are TONS of other critters in that realm (sprites, faeries, hob-goblins, trolls, leprauchans and tons of others)...

although to be completely honest, I'm not totally certain that they are astral beings... to an extant I'll accept that they could be simply my imagination, or it could be me misperceiving the feelings/thoughts that come to me from others... .... I think the most likely scenario is that half the time it's astral entities, and half the time it's others thoughts/feelings.... ................. so yes... yes I do believe in ghosts =)....