Johnny Rotten

I don't know what is it you're trying to ask if you're going to shoot down the very purported evidence that you seek. While Wilson and Hawes' methods are pretty loose, their aims are genuine. Ghost Hunters is the documenting of a paranormal investigation group that already existed before the show came on.

That said, I'm not surprised that they pretty much never get anything conclusive. They're never at any given site for more than two days. Alleged paranormal manifestations can lay dormant for weeks and even months in some cases. If TAPS really wanted a challenge, they'd stay in one location for like a month solid. But of course, if they don't get anything, people stop watching the show. So TAPS has to settle for ambiguous EVP, some EMF fluctuations, and maybe an odd-looking photograph or video clip. The show's format doesn't let them dig below the surface of any alleged haunting. They also rarely return to the same location.

There's also the question of how the (purported) manifestation occurs. If you're familiar with the holographic universe model, then a lot of paranormal phenomena becomes plausible. Your mind's eye can detect things that a scientific instrument cannot, and vice versa. The very nature of tangibility becomes more complex.

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Zeraph

You guys (the adamant non-believers) aren't even considering our viewpoints. So this is hopefully my last post in this thread cause I'm sick of arguing with a brick wall.

Your gasping disbelief is just as great as my own to you saying thoughts, dreams, emotions, etc. aren't real. They so clearly are, they strongly effect the world around us and I just cannot grasp how anyone can't see that. In fact, now I feel quite sorry for you

KnifeMissile

If you read my posts, you'll see that I did consider them. That I'm unmoved by your arguments says more about your arguments than it does about me!

Your response here is pathetic. Again, that dreams exist is real but the content in them is not. The novel Nineteen Eighty-Four impacted society and is referenced to this very day as relevant. Does that make it non-fiction?

Zeraph

You realize something can be real *and* fiction right?

No, you really didn't consider my points. Those (I hesitate to even call them arguments) points were to try to show lasereth how difficult it is to define reality and what's "real". They were not meant as stand alone points to prove the existence of ghosts. I never even said I could prove it, or that it's possible.

You come in here in the middle of a conversation, ignore the flow, and attack me personally by trying to prove my posts didn't prove the existence of ghosts. Well no shit sherlock. Maybe if you read my responses in context you wouldn't see them as so pathetic instead of being a dick about it. You're clearly taking this way more seriously than anyone else here. I don't know who put the stick up your ass about this subject but it wasn't me. Go find that person and beat each other up if it makes you feel better and try to have some decency for people on the tfp or get the fuck out.

FuglyStick

Fascinating. Some people will allow for the "possibility" of the supernatural, but are adamant about atheism. And the arguments they use to accept the "possibility" of the supernatural are the very arguments they mock when the discussion involves deity.

I don't believe in either, but I'm willing to accept that there are phenomena beyond the understanding of science.

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The_Jazz

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grooverut

This show exists to make money. The best way to increase ratings is to find conclusive proof. So why isn't the show taking your advice? Why isn't the show staying in one location for months and revisiting old locations? I think it is because it would be a waste of time. They are charlatans.

MSD

I'll accept that there are many things beyond the current repertoire of scientific knowledge. What we appear to be dealing with here is a non-falsifiable proposition, which makes the discussion nearly pointless. My scientific approach views ghosts as phenomena that violate conservation of energy and thermodynamics. It's like anything not strictly scientific -- if something can't be proven, the minimum I ask is that someone proposes a mechanism of action by which it could exist.

robot_parade

'Ghosts' aren't real. Period. Any more than faeries, pixies, dragons, etc.

Not real.

Until they're proven real, anyway. No reason to believe in ghosts any more than any other fantasy without proof. And there are a lot of fantasies out there.

filtherton

Why would anyone assume that the existence of something depends on arbitrary definitions of proof?

Every fact that has been "proven" with "evidence" was true prior to being "proven" with "evidence."

biznatch

Well, I don't believe in God, or any form of religion, and a lot of people believe in something they've never seen or heard. It bothers me to some extent, but I think that there's not many ways out of it, as most people will share their parents' beliefs, IMO.

It's kind of the same thing. Some people have told me they've seen ghosts, and I don't know quite what to reply. I haven't experienced it, and I don't want to call them a liar. It's just a case of someone "knowing" that X is true, while others "knowing" that Y is true. Arguing over it seems a bit futile.
Now I do have a problem with people getting suckered out of their money because of these things by psychics and other things, but it's their life, after all.

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MSD

The Scientific community's consensus is that proof should be something that is verifiable and repeatable. This standard has stood the test of time. When evidence cannot be verified, its authenticity is suspect. If an observation cannot be made again and an observation to the contrary of what is claimed can be repeated, then the original observation must be discarded as error. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence.

filtherton

I don't disagree with you, Mr. SD.

It's just that the only instances where scientific standards of evidence have any sway are instances where they've been applied.

I think there is a tendency to attemp to extend the application of the scientific method, something that only functions with regards to specific sets of data, to more general phenomena for which there isn't even agreement on what constitutes data.

The scientific method only applies when it can be applied. Even in ghost-related instances where it can be applied, it doesn't really say anything about whether ghosts actually exist or not.

Really, the scientific method is irrelevant here. Someday it might not be.

ametc

To prove the existence of ghosts and the paranormal would take an actual science to study into it. Right now that's what we're doing.. but since it's only been recently accepted by the mainstream as a worthwhile effort we are still in the early stages of forming a basis for the science. Just like every other science... especially psychology.. there's no way of truly proving something. Everything "proven" will always actually be a theory. So, even if ghosts are proven, how are we able to truly know they exist?

I feel that eventually there will be some explanation for why ghosts exist (fake or not) that most everyone will accept as fact... but we don't know enough about ghosts right now to even come up with something like that.

Johnny Rotten

Every show exists to make money. I already explained why it might be hazardous to stay in one place for too long. They use a shotgun method instead, and get shallow findings. They believe in ghosts. You don't. That doesn't make them "charlatans."

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n0nsensical

We still know very little about how the human mind works, and we can only control it in very crude ways. Ghosts appear to be the result of some kind of electromagnetic interference with the brain's normal operation. But we really have no clue how electromagnetism works in the brain, all we know is that it exists and vaguely how it is transmitted between cells. It is very hard to measure this stuff and analyze it even in animal models. And animals can't tell you whether they just saw a ghost.

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Nisses

vanblah: thanks for educating me. I'd never heard about the Bicameralism theory so far... It makes alot of sense from what I've gathered so far on the intarwebz. Definitly going to be looking out for Jaynes' book.
I don't find it that difficult to wrap my head around it though. Ancient texts always seemed to lack something when I read them. This pinpoints exactly what I was missing.

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tiger777

I've never seen a ghost, but 98% of people if they were me would think they had. What does this mean? It shows how easily it is for people to be duped and for something that doesn't exist to get spread.

When I was asleep one night I had sleep paralysis and i opened my eyes I was in my living room, I could see it physically this wasn't a "dream" so to speak yet it wasn't not a dream at the same time. Basically there are times in sleep paralysis for example where you're not awake nor asleep but sort of in between, so you can see hallucinations, in other words your mind's eye so to speak merges with what you can visually see in real life. So I saw what many would chalk up to being a ghost, but there's no reason to believe it to be so considering the circumstances. I saw a woman who was maybe 40 yrs old who I don't believe I had ever seen before in my life. Situations like this where we are asleep or were just asleep where potentially we can hallucinate images because we're still asleep but for some reason our eyes are open because we're in a hyper aware state while still being in a dream state should not be taken seriously, in terms of putting stock into it's validity of what you see being a ghost.

I know people who for instance attribute their shirt you know when it is caught on your pants and it falls down, they think they're being tugged at by a ghost. Or they misplace something and find it somehwere else and thin ka ghost moved it. Or they see a shadow or hear a noise at night and think they saw a ghost. I think they're letting their imagination get carried away and conjuring up grand stories and buying into it based on prior beliefs.

Johnny Rotten

Oh yeah, there's all kinds of things that can freak people out but can be conventionally explained. What you just described, for example, is a subset of hypnagogia. Sleep deprivation can also cause vivid hallucinations, as well as side effects of medication and recreational drug use. Then there's mental illness and brain damage. A sufficiently strong electromagnetic field, such as produced by a large circuit box, can also generate the sensation of uneasiness, feeling watched, and even seeing things out of the corner of your eye.

So whenever something freaky happens to you, it's good to have a list of explanations to handle the situation.

What's interesting about hypnagogia is that, while the manifestations are really just being projected from inside your mind, they can give you insight into your personal state of affairs, in the same way as a psychotropic drug.

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filtherton

I just want to point out that there isn't necessarily anything scientific about having a stock supply of "reasonable" answers.

The need for ghosts to not exist can be just as irrational as the need for ghosts to exist.

Jozrael

There are contests with ridiculously large cash prizes to anyone who can prove anything even remotely supernatural.

Can you tell the future? Prove it. Got some ghosts up in your attic? Prove it. Can you levitate objects without using otherwise scientifically explained principles? Prove it.

The first time someone -proves- one of these things, they are going to be a very, very rich person. And the next day the scientific community will implode (mild exaggeration, just new areas of study will be created).

Until then, I don't believe in a whit of supernatural activity. My spiritual beliefs are entirely unrelated. I choose to believe in some creative force because I can think of no better explanation for the creation of the universe, and I choose to believe in an afterlife simply because I prefer the outlook on life that it gives me. That's pretty much my only two unscientific thoughts. Anything else has to buck up and face science :P

Deltona Couple

OK. Let me try a different concept to see if this can give you maybe a little insight. Do you believe that love exists? I know I do. Can I bring you PHYSICAL evidence of love? Can I show you a picture of love? No I can't. Does that mean then that love does not exist?

Ghosts, entities, paranormal contacts are all classifiable as something that is not what we normally experience in a physical world. I can FEEL love, that feeling i get in my stomach when I see my wife after she has been visiting family for a few days. I cant take a picture of it, but it is there. I have had a few abnormal encounters in my life. A figure I have seen standing at the foot of my bed when I was a child. Having a conversation with my best friend one afternoon when I find out later that evening that he died in a car accident the day before. I can't explain it. I can't PROVE it. But I know in my heart that they are real and exist. Now if someone were there WITH me, would THEY have seen my friend? I don't know. Maybe not, maybe it was only meant for me to see? I can't explain that part.

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Lasereth

Love is liking someone a lot and having an emotional attachment to them which can be scientifically measured. Butterflies in your stomach are explainable with science (they're actually neurotransmitters and neurons in your stomach that have learned to react to certain people/events). You can't compare an attraction and emotional attachment to someone to seeing a ghost. That is comparing a feeling to an event.

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vanblah

Caveat: I am not saying that people who have experienced ghosts or other unexplainable phenomena are insane.

Who is to say that seeing a ghost is an event? Also, just because something is a feeling doesn't mean it's NOT an event. Those butterflies, the heart racing and the feeling of euphoria caused by "love" are events.

Paranoid schizophrenics have auditory hallucinations that are incredibly real (to them). In fact, surgeons have induced auditory hallucinations in non-schizophrenic people. These people are certain that their "dead mother," or someone is talking to them; or they hear music or whispering ... whatever.

I have had sleep-paralysis and awakened to a "presence in my room" and auditory hallucinations--my memories of these events are that it was very real and actually happening. In my opinion (memories notwithstanding), this is all taking place in my brain. Someone else may not feel the same way.

I can't prove that it wasn't real any more than someone else can prove that it was. This is how I feel about ghosts (among other things). Is it possible that it's all taking place in the person's head due to some chemical reaction? Sure. Is it possible that it is actually taking place "in the real world?" Sure. Why not? Until I (or anyone else) can prove without a doubt one way or the other--I'm open. Everything else is just opinion.

roachboy

i love the oed.

this is the story of the word ghost.

there's a reason for this beyond the fact that i think this is cool.
ok well maybe there isn't really, but we'll proceed anyway.

ghost is related to geist or spirit, but mostly to the negative/scary connotations of it--it's a kind of inversion of the notion of spirit or soul--so where spirit or soul was maybe higher and more universal (associated with the god-function) ghost is more lower (death) and particular/singular (you give up the ghost, but once upon a time what giving up the ghost referred to was the departure of the soul from it's meat puppet)....so ghost ends up a particularity. made over in the form of a noun, ghost becomes a kind of object, even though if you think about it, it's an anti-object. nonetheless, the characteristics of an object (repeatable essence or set of features that repeat autonomously, much in the way, say, that rock-ness is not entirely dependent on the perception of a social subject) are imputed to "ghost" across the category that has come to be assigned to it.

what "science" in the dilletante sense that it's been thrown around in this thread does is to conflate the properties of category in general with the properties of particular categories---so now "ghost" is an object that can be subjected to whatever arbitrary assemblage of pseudo-scientific statements you feel aesthetically compelled to bring to bear on the question of "proof".

you can track this stuff through the fabulous map that is the oed definition...the binaries, the separations, the rendering-discrete, the associations--the history of the word-object or word-machine "ghost"....

the assumptions that enframe the word-machine also enframe the modes of asking questions about--well what, really? the word-machine as collapsed into a phenomena or the phenomena? it's impossible to say, really, because for the "science" that's been tossed about here, there's no distinction.

o the fun and excitement to be had from the oed....

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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vanblah

One of the great things about the OED is how it allows for the way words change. It's the same thing that makes the English language great ... words can change as ideas and knowledge change. The OED tries to keep up with the language where other dictionaries go out-of-date fairly quickly (you mean "bad" can also mean "good?" ... section IV, definition 12 of the word "bad" in the OED; interestingly it's been in use like this since the late 1800's. And here I thought it was Michael Jackson who made it popular )

It's a great tool for semanticists and I love the fact that I work at a place that has a subscription to it.

Are we now going to talk about what the OP meant by the word ghost? Would it be wrong of me to infer what the OP meant? I was thinking that we could just use the following interpretation of the word: 8. a. The soul of a deceased person, spoken of as appearing in a visible form, or otherwise manifesting its presence, to the living. (Now the prevailing sense.). The last part of definition 8a is what brought about my inference I'm sure: now the prevailing sense.

However, I'm an atheist so I don't believe that ghosts exist because I don't believe humans have souls. That doesn't mean I can't be proven wrong at some point.

rb: can you elaborate on your post or at least clarify? Your writing style, while sometimes elegant, makes it difficult [for me] to follow your line of thought.

roachboy

o--what i was trying to say is basically that "ghost" has come to designate a type of object and that "science" investigates that object.
behind that, there's a confusion of what nouns like "ghost" to do enframe (delimit as an object, say, at the level of a signified) and the phenomena (the referent)...

the rest of it is a short sequence of riffs based on the oed material, so the splits and separations you can see that shape how ghost currently operates.

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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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Iliftrocks

So ghost isn't a real thing? Or maybe we can get a definition of "real" that satisfies that ghosts are provably "real".

The truth is that science does not prove that a thing does not exist, simply because of lack of physical evidence. The science does bear out the probability that if it can't be proven, then it most likely doesn't happen, or has been misinterpreted.

All you anti-science people look up what human beings accomplished in the hundred or so thousands of years prior to the scientific method being adopted, and compare that to the very "real" accomplishments of humanity in the hundreds of years since its application. All those ethnic traditions got us was rocks, sticks, mud huts, a quick death, and slavery. Thanks Traditions!!!!

I'll side with science. It's not real for me, without some proof. Very real proof, based on empirical evidence, and the scientific method.....

We know that people have these experiences, we just don't know why yet. Ta da

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filtherton

Who is anti-science?

If anything, this thread is full of people whose knowledge of science is far outweighed by a desire to justify their skepticism.

Lasereth

I am fully willing to accept and even admit that this is what is actually going on. But what you just wrote is an argument against ghosts and paranormal activity. If it's all just made up in your head from sleep paralysis and hallucinations and schizophrenia, then it is nothing more than that -- made up shit in your head.

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vanblah

I am not arguing for nor am I arguing against the physical existence of ghosts. I am giving my thoughts--not even opinions really; just thoughts--on one way in which ghosts can be explained. I know you weren't really addressing me directly with your statement but I wanted to clarify my opinion again.

I also want to reiterate that believing in ghosts and the paranormal doesn't necessarily mean that a person is schizophrenic or has any other form of mental illness.

I do have first-hand (second-hand?) experience with schizophrenia ... my grandmother was diagnosed paranoid-schizophrenic when I was a kid. She heard the voice of god and saw the devil and angels and spoke very matter-of-factly about it. When I was older and not totally scared of asking questions about it we had some conversations. I wish I'd talked to her more. This is part of what my thoughts on the subject are based on. That and the book I mentioned in an earlier post.

Also, just because I don't believe in ghosts doesn't mean that another person has to believe the same thing. It's quite possible that I am wrong. Maybe, it's that part of the brain that actually picks up on ghosts that is being stimulated during these paranormal experiences and it's not a hallucination at all.

dippin

Anyone here ever read "the Dragon in my Garage" by Carl Sagan? Seems to be relevant here.
Carl Sagan: The Dragon In My Garage

filtherton

I believe that there was an invisible dragon in Carl Sagan's hair.

500 years ago, "The Dragon in My Garage" would have applied to any number of assertions that we presently accept as scientific fact, probably including nearly all of the assertions Sagan explained in his Cosmos series.

It is a parable about believing in things without "evidence." But everybody believes in things without "evidence". Even scientists. Anyone who currently believes in a unified field theory, or string theory, or any particular school of economic thought believes in things without "evidence".

roachboy

folk used to think that worms generated spontaneously from cheese and other food.
it was an observable connection so a reasonable inference.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

KnifeMissile

I would go even further and say that the need for ghosts to not exist is just as irrational as the need for ghosts to exist. This, however, has no relevance to the question of whether ghosts exist or not. They don't. I have as much confidence in this as I do that dinosaurs no longer exist. This has nothing to do with my needs but, rather, a lack of any credible evidence.

---------- Post added at 11:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:39 PM ----------

Is this a compelling argument to you?

First of all, ghosts are typically depicted as physical entities whenever stories of their appearance are told to us. You can see them and hear them. They sometimes move things. These are all physical actions and thus they are, by definition, physical. I find it hilarious that people have tried the "you observe them with your mind" approach to ghosts. Without specific knowledge, this reduces ghosts to personal hallucinations or delusions...

I think you have a very narrow view on what other people consider evidence. No one can take a picture of an atom but there's plenty of evidence that they're there! The same thing can't be honestly said of ghosts...

What you feel in your heart is not compelling evidence...

filtherton

Things either exist or they do not and either way they do so with complete disregard for the existence of credible evidence.

I choose to have confidence when that confidence is justified. The lack of credible evidence supporting the existence of ghosts says nothing about whether they exist. Now, if someone were to demonstrate credible evidence that ghosts don't exist, well, that would be a different story.

dippin

I don't know whether Carl Sagan was a logical positivist or not.

But this parable can just as easily be read as a pragmatic text (and I mean pragmatic not in the every day sense of the word, but in the sense of Peirce-Latour-Habermas).

As such, no assumption about the progress of science is necessary, and no assumption about the existence of an objective truth. And so the point is not that one shouldnt believe that there is a dragon in the garage or not, but that such discussion is useless as it doesn't help understand or explain any relevant phenomena.

---------- Post added at 08:35 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:33 PM ----------

Isn't that precisely what Sagan used to say?

KnifeMissile

This is rather disingenuous in so many ways...

None of the "assertions that we presently accept as scientific fact" can be compared to "The Dragon in My Garage." The dragon in Carl Sagan's garage had no evidence to support it. Scientific theories, almost by definition, have evidence to support them. Certainly the ones we earnestly believe in have strong evidence to support them...

None of what we presently accept as scientific fact was even thought of 500 years ago. It's difficult to think of anything people of 500 years ago got right. The parable of Carl Sagan's dragon would have helped them a great deal!

If you're suggesting that if the people of 500 years ago adopted "The Dragon in My Garage" and we had a time machine and went back and told them of all the scientific things we believe that they would disbelieve us, that's only somewhat true. It's definitely false if we could tell them the whole story and use our current technology to demonstrate the principles to them. It's only arguably true if we were restricted to using their technology to demonstrate what we currently believe. Either way, it's irrelevant to the parable of Carl Sagan's dragon.

It's pointless to believe things without evidence even if they happen to be true. There are many different approaches to see why this is the case. Most pragmatically, most of the ideas people will concoct will be false and it's worth throwing out all the stupid ideas even if a couple gems get thrown out. You'll surely pick them up again with evidential reasoning. More philosophically, if there's no evidence for something, how can its truth affect you? Once its truth can affect you, that effect will be evidence and you're right back to evidential discovery...

Can you expand on this? What do you mean?

At the very least, no one "believes" in, say, string theory the same way that, say, Christians believe in Christianity. Proponents of string theory don't think that it has got to be true and there's just no way in can be false no matter what anyone says. The same thing can't generally be said for Christianity nor many other beliefs...

---------- Post added at 01:23 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:07 AM ----------

It may surprise you to hear that I don't actually agree with this statement although I do agree with the sentiment of the latter part of your statement; that there is a shared reality that's external to ourselves...

I too choose to have confidence (although I do wonder if it is a choice) when that confidence is justified.

The lack of credible evidence does say something about whether ghosts exist. They may exist despite the lack of evidence but I don't find it likely.

Again, do you find it likely that there are still living dinosaurs on Earth? Are you still holding out for perpetual motion machines 'cause no one has proven that they don't exist?

filtherton

It would be disingenuous if I didn't mean it.

Speaking of irrelevance, what you wrote is irrelevant to what I wrote. I was just pointing out that sometimes "dragons" exist, even though there isn't evidence of their existence. Speaking of believing things without evidence, how about you presupposing the results of time travel?

Clearly it isn't. You just invented, without any evidence at all, an explanation for how people from the past would respond to our efforts to travel back in time and explain our current scientific theories. You seem to have found use for believing in something without evidence.

But this is assuming that people who "believe things without evidence" just pull things out of thin air. I would imagine that if a person believes in ghosts, they've probably based that belief on whatever evidence they have at hand.


Do you think physicists would spend time attempting to find that one theory to explain them all if they didn't think one existed? But why should it exist? There is no evidence that it exists (unless you count the wishy washy philosophical kind of evidence, in which case, there must be a god because Descartes said so).

Do you think that the large hadron collider will yield any sort of useful data? I know a lot of physicists do. I mean, I would hope that somebody thinks it won't be a dead end. Because that's an awful lot of money to spend.

Really, though. Why would anyone expect the LHC to not be a dead end? Dead ends happen all of the time.

The world is a very unscientific place. It has to be. Do you know how complicated it is to show scientifically, as in, here is some peer reviewable scientific evidence, that indoor smoking bans result in an increase in indoor air quality? You can't just be like "Well, it was all smokey in here before the ban, and now it isn't." I mean, you could, but it wouldn't mean anything.

I don't think that you're in a position to speak on behalf of all string theorists or all Christians. Do you have any evidence to support these claims?

The "unlikeliness" that you refer to here is more philosophy than anything else. It certainly has nothing to do with probability. Probability is irrelevant here. What's your population? The set of all universes? What is the probability that we find ourselves in one where ghosts exist?

You don't need to like to wikipedia like I'm some sort of twat. There is very little evidence correlating the ability to be condescending with the ability to properly form a coherent thought.

In any case, if you think that these are important and illustrative questions then you need to redirect your focus.

I don't care if dinosaurs are still living on earth. Dinosaur is an arbitrary term-- is Pluto a planet? If someone discovered a dinosaur would we call them dinosaurs? You need to be more precise than a wikipedia article. Is there even consensus among the relevant experts as to the precise definition of the term dinosaur?

Do you think that the laws of thermodynamics are absolute? Seems like they probably are, but, you know, there isn't any actual evidence that they are. I know it's pretty easy to trick yourself into thinking that the fact that you've never known something to be false is evidence that it is always true.

KnifeMissile

What I was pointing out is that "dragons" didn't exist. While it's certainly possible to postulate something that is true but have no evidence for at the time, your example of 500 years ago doesn't appear to be a good one. It's hard to think of something that was theorized 500 years ago that ended up being correct by our understanding. This is the disingenuous part of your post.

A better example might be plate techtonics, which was ridiculed at the time for lack of evidence only to later be confirmed correct. Even then, I would contend that non-acceptance of the theory was the right thing to do at the time, minus the ridicule...

My presuppositions on time travel weren't stated without evidence. It's my theory based on what I know of the history of the time and what I know of people. I certainly could have qualified it more and I don't think I'm absolutely right, despite what my confidence might suggest to you...

It depends on what you mean by "use." In retrospect, you can always find a "use" for baseless assertions in a broad sense, such as entertainment. What I mean is a more narrow and utilitarian "use," such as making testable predictions...

Well, some of them do pull things out of "thin air" but I will grant that there are people who feel compelled to believe through personal experience so I should probably qualify what I'm saying here.

People's reasons for believing in ghosts aren't as conclusive as their belief in them. There's never any trace of them, there's no known mechanism for them and the experience can never be shared. The idea is absurd on the surface and there's nothing substantiating it underneath...

I don't doubt that the world is an unscientific place. I certainly don't use science to determine every facet of my life. However, there are some claims that are scientific including the existence of certain things. Some of them are debatable while other don't appear to be so. I don't think it's unreasonable to demand scientific evidence for ghosts and dismiss the idea if there isn't any.

Things can and are pursued by hope. Two of the four forces of nature have been unified and it would be nice if the others were too so why not try? One can believe that it's possible and try to do so without believing that it has got to be so. The Hadron collider could very well be a dead end and I think people recognize that, although it can be argued that no new discoveries by the LHC will be, itself, revealing...

I can't speak for all individuals but I can speak about their shared doctrines. There are official tenets that we may speak about for both disciplines...

It's certainly not about probability in the strictest sense of the term but we may estimate likelihoods in realms that are not innumerable. If my three year old tells me that she didn't mark up the wall with the crayon in her hand, I find that unlikely...

Do you honestly think that my linking wikipedia is condescending? Why? I always thought it was useful. Do a post search on me to see how far this practice goes. Are you looking to be insulted?

Dinosaur is not that arbitrary a term. There are traits that would unambiguously categorize something as being a dinosaur and it would be an understatement to say that finding a living specimen would be a big deal...

There is strong evidence that the laws of thermodynamics are absolutely true. Of course, this doesn't mean that they are absolutely true but, as you say, it really seems that way!

By now, it seems difficult to see exactly where we disagree. I'm starting to think it may be the semantic issue of what constitutes "evidence" or what makes for good reasons for the confidence of assertions...