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New England Ghost Hunters Talk Case Histories


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I see that a lot of high tech equipment is used in your investigations. Have you caught any apparitions on camera? With so much equipment and video surveillance, why do we still have nothing that even comes close to proving the existence of ghosts? A RAW file type image would go a long way.

Also, I like how you listed what you don't use. I must say that adds to your credibility since what's listed there is pretty much garbage.
 
I'm sorry, but, I have a huge problem with EVPs. Judging from what I have seen on the various TV shows, It appears as though one could easily "interpret" just about anything from these static noises. I have yet to hear what I consider to be a crisp, clear indisputable recording of someone, "on the other side," speaking. Have you? Convince me.
 
Do you think there is a chance that scientifically motivated "amateur" case studies (like hauntings or cryptid sightings) will ever be recognized by mainstream scientists?

Do you think there is a "paradigm shift" for ghosts from being what might be called mankind's oldest myth to becoming "everyday" fact?

If ghosts were established as fact, would that mean that survival of consciousness is proven?

Can there be such a thing as absolute proof for the paranormal or can all EVPs / footage of light anomalies / anomalous measurements etc. ultimately be explained away as pareidolia, misinterpretation or even hoaxes?

Do you have recordings of events that you would count as proof or at least convincing evidence? If so, how do you try to make certain they can't easily be refuted?

What is the approximate percentage of true anomalies in the overall number of cases you investigate? How many would be misinterpretations or people with psychological rather than paranormal problems? Has any "customer" ever tried to fake evidence or mislead you in your investigation?

Do you have many "customers" who could be called especially credible or down-to-earth, like police officers, firefighters, officials etc.? What do they report?
 
The short answer is no. I personally would love to see a ghost for myself, PI-NE approach investigations of the paranormal from a 'skeptical' point of view. There are members in this group that believe in ghost, cryptozoological creatures and aliens. As director i feel its my job to be skeptical. We also don't believe in hunting ghost. We like to try and find answers to issues people report to us. We Investigate ghost.monsters (cryptozoology) and yes even UFO reports. I wouldn't be in this field if i didn't "want to believe" but, As long as i have been investigating, i haven't seen anything that i would call "proof" I like EVPs, but like someone on here said, they can be anything! I have never heard a direct answer to questions i have asked...well there was this one time i asked if the entity knew it has "passed" away, on the play back there was what we call a class A EVP replying..I'm still breathing... very slow dawn out response, but you can hear it clearly, sadly i was with another group that i had a falling out with back in 2001. I know that sounds "convenient" but i'm still working on getting that clip.

I will try and answer all questions, but due to my job, i dont get online much.
 
Yes Jeff, welcome.

It has been pointed out numerous times that EVP usually occurs with pretty low-quality recorders. There seems to be a deliberate choice being made in not getting good quality equipment.
It does seem very telling to me that the answer may lie in something mundane and technical but I keep an open mind due to reports of EVP that seem to suggest some sort of intelligence or knowledge behind the voices.

On the subject of whether mainstream science will ever recognise paranormal events, I have been thinking for some time that as with quantum physics, where you cannot know everything about a particle because the act of measuring it affects the result, perhaps the paranormal is hard-wired in the universe to be unprovable?

There may be some unknown universal law that dictates you cannot prove a paranormal event because the act of trying to do so, prevents it happening? What say you all?
 
@ Jeff Stewart: Very cool of you to drop by. I'm looking forward to the show.

We do have a few paranormal investigation groups here in Germany, too, and they all take a similar stance of basic skepticism. Some even say they are only out to disprove alleged paranormal claims. Which I think is a little dishonest, because why bother to investigate at all if you're convinced that there is nothing there to investigate. I guess it's a pretext to not look like kooks (as I said before, admitting to an interest in this stuff is not a good idea around here). Funny thing is, they have been getting the occasional hard-to-explain evidence, too, like class A EVPs, direct sounds, light anomalies, personal experiences etc.

@goggs: that's a theory. But I'd say it might not so much be a natural law but something intelligent that is actively trying to avoid being detected officially. I sense a trickster in the woodwork...
 
@Polter - maybe that could be it (trickster).

Do these groups in Germany publish at all? If so, do they publish in english? You have mentioned before how paranormal topics and UFOs in particular are treated in Germany. I have the same thought about why would anyone go to the bother of actually investigating paranormal subjects if you don't believe they exist at all.
It would be the same as me looking for evidence to disprove Santa Claus. Why bother? I am so convinced Santa does not exist I would think any effort to prove it so a complete waste of time?
 
Yup. That's why I think it's just a pretext in order to not look foolish to the overly skeptic and dismissive "public opinion". Debunking might be the group's mantra, but if you talk to individuals, they are mostly quite open-minded. Most of them are really looking for evidence of something paranormal going on. I guess one could call that "undercover" research. :D

Our groups "publish" mainly in that they have websites with articles, reports, podcasts and videos. I didn't find anything in English, though. Here are some links:

Startseite / News
Paranormal Nord
Ghosthunter Germany | Ghosthunter Deutschland
Paranormal-Saar.de
Paranormal-West-Ghosthunter • Paranormal-West-Ghosthunter

I guess from the fact that the last updates on some of these sites seem to date back to 2011 one could deduce that the ghosthunter "hype" is already dying down (none of this is really considered to be of any significance officially, so this movement has never been too visible either, only in interested circles). Although there are investigators who are really doing it with scientific interest, there are a lot of "hipsters" involved who have already turned to some other trend.

A while ago I was registered on one of their forums but there was so much in-fighting going on between groups and often arguments between skeptics and believers in the same group, that I quit real fast. I chatted and posted with some very credible guys that had had really incredible own experiences and thus were very inclined towards paranormal theories, but their arguments were mostly subdued by skeptics who hadn't experienced anything themselves but who knew exactly that it was all infrasound, pareidolia etc.

@goggs: thinking about that time on the forum there, I remembered chatting with an alleged "experiencer" who I judged by his posts and chatting to be quite intelligent, non-deceptive and down-to-earth. He related something that reminds me of your story of the old lady seemingly disappearing.

He typed that he had been staying over night with a friend who had moved into the apartment some months before. In the morning, he entered the bathroom and there was an old woman just standing there. He quickly said sorry and left, assuming that the friend's grandmother was visiting or something. He didn't notice anything unusal about her appearance, but of course he had only seen her for a split second. When he later asked where the old woman had gone to, his friend assured him that there was no one in the apartment except for the two of them. He (the friend) made jokes about there being a ghost in his apartment, because although he himself had never seen anything, several guests who had been staying there overnight, had reported seeing an old woman, too.

Of course, just another anecdote and not very convincing, I guess. But still.
 
What does your team think about the role of EMF readings in investigation and have you ever had a case where you think that some of phenomena that clients reported was due to high, man-made EMF frequencies in the area (i.e. power lines, nearby transformers etc.)?
 
goggsmackay said:
There may be some unknown universal law that dictates you cannot prove a paranormal event because the act of trying to do so, prevents it happening? What say you all?
Click to expand...

In some other show, I heard Lloyd Auerbach say that if you want the phenomena to stop, bring in a parapsychologist. Sounds to me kinda like the observer problem theorized by Heisenberg. The problem is, to me, that implies that there is really some intelligence behind these haunting phenomena (which I think are often more than just people fooling themselves, faking evidence or trying to get attention). Not just a physical law but a reacting consciousness.
 
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