Mysterious Britain Forums - Do ghosts understand modern English?

matt.h

Joined : 30 Jan 2008
Posts : 107

Subject: Re: Do ghosts understand modern English? Fri 25 Apr 2008, 10:03 am

I think this is where some get confused - psychic experience doesn't = life after death, yet the popular cultural perception would have you believe as much. I think this is why many people wrongly see Derren Brown's performances as conclusive evidence that psychic powers do not exist.

mysteryshopper

Joined : 05 Feb 2008
Posts : 106

Subject: Re: Do ghosts understand modern English?

Fri 25 Apr 2008, 10:35 am

matt.h wrote:

I think this is where some get confused - psychic experience doesn't = life after death, yet the popular cultural perception would have you believe as much.

You've got me confused now! What kind of psychic experience are you talking about here? Psychics overall claim is to be able to gain information through various paranormal means. Many claim this happens through spirits, though not all. Some may use psychometry, tarot or dowsing, for instance.

Could you, perhaps, clarify what you mean please?

matt.h

Joined : 30 Jan 2008
Posts : 107

Subject: Re: Do ghosts understand modern English?

Fri 25 Apr 2008, 11:06 am

mysteryshopper wrote:

matt.h wrote:

I think this is where some get confused - psychic experience doesn't = life after death, yet the popular cultural perception would have you believe as much.

You've got me confused now! What kind of psychic experience are you talking about here? Psychics overall claim is to be able to gain information through various paranormal means. Many claim this happens through spirits, though not all. Some may use psychometry, tarot or dowsing, for instance.

Could you, perhaps, clarify what you mean please?

Okay... by "life after death" I mean the notion accepted by Spritiualists of a human living non-corporeally after the death of the body. Whilst some psychics may claim that it is the spirits of the dead that they contact with, other types of psychic experience - such as psychic questing - are not tied to this notion. It has been suggested that another possible cause is the collectiven conscious we were discussing elsewhere. Whilst this relies on survival of information after death, it does not hinge on a human itself living on after death.

mysteryshopper

Joined : 05 Feb 2008
Posts : 106

Subject: Re: Do ghosts understand modern English?

Fri 25 Apr 2008, 11:40 am

matt.h wrote:

It has been suggested that another possible cause is the collectiven conscious we were discussing elsewhere. Whilst this relies on survival of information after death, it does not hinge on a human itself living on after death.

Why does such information have to be in a 'collective conscious'? It is claimed that people using remote viewing simply see a place in the world. If information exists in any physical form in the world, could it not simply be accessed directly, perhaps from an obscure document?

The only real thing we know for certain about psychics is that they claim to obtain information that they didn't previously know. They may claim that it comes spirits or other sources but the evidence for that is nor more than 'a bloke told me he was talking to a spirit'. So the central questions for me are:

a) did the psychic really not know the information before (perhaps accessing a memory they didn't realise they possessed) and if not
b) did they deduce it / guess it (like Derren Brown says he does) or
c) obtain it by some paranormal method, as they claim?

matt.h

Joined : 30 Jan 2008
Posts : 107

Subject: Re: Do ghosts understand modern English?

Fri 25 Apr 2008, 12:47 pm

[quote="mysteryshopper"]

matt.h wrote:

It has been suggested that another possible cause is the collectiven conscious we were discussing elsewhere. Whilst this relies on survival of information after death, it does not hinge on a human itself living on after death.

Why does such information have to be in a 'collective conscious'? It is claimed that people using remote viewing simply see a place in the world. If information exists in any physical form in the world, could it not simply be accessed directly, perhaps from an obscure document?

quote]

It doesn't - I was just providing an example of a theory for psychic experience that didn't rely on life after death. I agree that with many apparently psychic experiences there may well be rational explanations such as a latent memory or plain fraud.