Do You Believe In Ghosts?

[Lightkeeper]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Those things that go bump in the night? About one-third of people believe they could be ghosts.


Misty Conrad, her daughter, Arial Conrad and son Taylor Conrad fled their house because weird things happened.

And nearly one out of four, 23 percent, say they've actually seen a ghost or felt its presence, finds a pre-Halloween poll by The Associated Press and Ipsos.

One is Misty Conrad, who says she fled her rented home in Syracuse, Indiana, after her daughter began talking to an unseen girl named Nicole and neighbors said children had been murdered in the house. That was after the TV and lights began flicking on at night.

"It kind of creeped you out," Conrad, 40, of Hampton, Virginia, recalled this week. "I needed to get us out." What to do if your house has ghosts

About one out of five people, 19 percent, say they accept the existence of spells or witchcraft. Nearly half, 48 percent, believe in extrasensory perception, or ESP.

The most likely candidates for ghostly visits include single people, Catholics and those who never attend religious services. By 31 percent to 18 percent, more liberals than conservatives report seeing a specter.

Those who dismissed the existence of ghosts include Morris Swadener, 66, a Navy retiree from Kingston, Washington.

He says he shot one with his rifle when he was a child.

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"I woke up in the middle of the night and saw a white ghost in my closet," he said. "I discovered I'd put a hole in my brand new white shirt. My mother and father were not amused."

Three in 10 have awakened sensing a strange presence in the room. For whatever it says about matrimony, singles are more likely than married people to say so.

Fourteen percent -- mostly men and lower-income people -- say they have seen a UFO. Among them is Danny Eskanos, 44, an attorney in Palm Harbor, Florida, who says as a Colorado teenager he watched a bright light dart across the sky, making abrupt stops and turns.

"I knew a little about airplanes and helicopters, and it was not that," he said. "It's one of those things that sticks in your mind."

Spells and witchcraft are more readily believed by urban dwellers, minorities and lower-earning people.

Those who find credibility in ESP are more likely to be better educated and white -- 51 percent of college graduates compared to 37 percent with a high school diploma or less, about the same proportion by which white believers outnumber minorities.

Overall, the 48 percent who accept ESP is less than the 66 percent who gave that answer to a similar 1996 Newsweek question.

One in five say they are at least somewhat superstitious, with young men, minorities, and the less educated more likely to go out of their way to seek luck. Twenty-six percent of urban residents -- twice the rate of those from rural areas -- said they are superstitious, while single men were more superstitious than unmarried women, 31 percent to 17 percent.

The most admitted-to superstition, by 17 percent, was finding a four-leaf clover. Thirteen percent dread walking under a ladder or the groom seeing his bride before their wedding, while slightly smaller numbers named black cats, breaking mirrors, opening umbrellas indoors, Friday the 13th or the number 13.

Generally, women were more superstitious than men about four-leaf clovers, breaking mirrors or grooms prematurely seeing brides. Democrats were more superstitious than Republicans over opening umbrellas indoors, while liberals were more superstitious than conservatives over four-leaf clovers, grooms seeing brides and umbrellas.

Then there's Jack Van Geldern, a computer programmer from Riverside, Connecticut. Now 51, Van Geldern is among the 5 percent who say they have seen a monster in the closet -- or in his case, a monster's face he spotted on the wall of his room as a child.

"It was so terrifying I couldn't move," he said. "Needless to say I survived the event and never saw it again."

The poll, conducted October 16-18, involved telephone interviews with 1,013 adults and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/wayof....ap/index.html

Do you believe in ghosts? Do you have any ghost stories?

[Rev. Kelly]

I believe in ghosts and have been seeing them since a child. The first ghosts I saw were a Confederate army that would march through my bedroom. My father built a house on a civil war battlefield.

[evangelicalhumanist]

Not for a moment do I believe in ghosts.

As usual, it will be noted that I "can't prove that ghosts don't exist," and with the usual understanding that therefore they do. I'll just let that pass, along with all the other things that I can't prove don't exist -- like invisible pink unicorns, leprechauns and fairies at the bottom of my garden.

A house elf would be useful, though...

[vivamis123]

I personally don't believe in Ghosts (any more), but....I know that they do exist for those that believe in them. I myself have believed in them and have seen them.

I don't think it is a question if they exist or not, but if one believes or not.

I think that we as humans can't comprehend what we are capable of creating with our mind and I am not limiting this statement to fairies, ghost, spirits and visions but also in the physical: Illness/disease, suffering, separation, death, loss and lack of any kind. To him that is seeing and experiencing these things it is very real.

[wwwdlhow27]

I, for one, don't remember ever seeing a ghost and if I should, I hope I may react without too much surprise.

[metis]

Originally Posted by Lightkeeper

Do you believe in ghosts? Do you have any ghost stories?

No. But I cannot categorically claim that they don't exist either. How would I know?

With the hypothetical possibility of parallel universes, according to physicists, it might be possible that we might perceive a "ghost" whereas it could be another being from a parallel universe that has briefly entered our "dimension". The movie "The Mothman Prophecies", which was based on a true story, seeming implies as such.

Shalom,
Vern

[aged hippy]

I once had a brief conversation with two men who - on the balance of evidence - almost certainly didn't exist.
I certainly heard and saw them and had the conversation - i know this as certainly as i know that i'm sitting here typing. It was just a normal, run-of-the-mill event, with nothing special about it - until shortly afterwards.

Whether they were ghosts or something else which can be explained in another way - i have no idea.


Other than this can't say that i've actually seen a ghost, although i've spoken with apparently well-balanced people who claim to have done so or who claim to have experienced and/or heard things which apparently were'nt "real" - experiences which on later discussion with other people were identified as having happened to them, also.

I voted "Not Sure" - because i'm not.... there could be alternative explanations to these phenomena, explanations which themselves raise further questions.


Peace, Love, & Light

[Maheen]

We as Muslims believe besides us Humans there is another creation of Allah called JINNS (Genie) they are created from smokeless fire.

They can time travel & are shape shifters. They also have the power to make themselves invisible.

The Koran tells us that they too will be judged on the Judgement day by Allah.
There are all kinds of these Jinns, some good & some bad.

They too have different religious beliefs & The Prophet sent to them was Solomon, the son of Prophet David.

These jinns built the Sacred Mosque in Jerusalem called Al-Aqsa.
(This mosque is sacred to Muslims,Jews & Christians).

These Jinns live side by side with us on this planet & our homes too.

I live in a huge house and we have seen or heard them almost on daily basis.

Also the Islamic Faith teaches us that once a human dies his/her spirit leaves Earth and resides in a state called " Alam a Barzakh " kind of a limbo.
Barzakh is a state where the soul will rest till the day of Judgement.
The dead never return back to earth.

Hence i do not believe there are ghosts. Its surely these Jinns who sometimes deceive humans ........... some of them do that too. (that is to deceive humans)
Its them who make sounds, are visible as visions & move stuff around the house.

If you need to know more please feel free to ask.

Much love,

Maheen

[Scolaí]

I moved in to a former Presbyterian Manse. The house is now 100 years old. Dion Fortune wrote many years ago that parish houses are commonly more haunted than others. I'm inclined to agree:

• About 2 weeks after moving in, I was reading in my library when I heard a loud knocking in the hall. It was late at night, and the sound startled me. I rose from the lounge I was on and went to investigate. I stood in the hall listening; the sound came again, this time from the dining room. I went to the dining room only to hear the sound in the parlor one room away. I went to the parlor and heard the sound back in the dining room. Back to the dining room, now the sound is in the hall again. Out to the hall, the sound is upstairs. I give up the chase, tell the entity that I'm done playing. The sound stops.
• My wife awoke in the middle of the night to see a child standing on my side of the bed. Thinking it was one of our own, she sat up and asked what the matter was. When she did, the form vanished.
• I was asleep on my couch and awoke in the middle of the night only to see a dark form standing over me. It disappeared as soon as I moved to sit up.
• My son awoke in the middle of the night and decided that he was going to sleep on our floor. When he opened the door to our room, he saw a child standing at my wife's side of the bed. He cried out and ran across the room as the apparition vanished.
• Our family had just returned from being out of the house all day. My older daughter ran ahead into the house for a potty emergency. My wife was carrying our younger son; my older son was with them. I was trailing behind after pulling our sleeping toddler out of her car seat. When I came in, my wife and 3 older children were standing in the hall. My wife and sons had heard a child call for "mommy" from upstairs. Thinking it was my older daughter in the upstairs bathroom, my wife called back. About that time, my older daughter came out of the downstairs bathroom. She said she did not call for anyone, yet the voice was heard audibly by my wife and both sons.
• My wife was brushing her hair in preparation to take a shower. She was looking in the mirror and saw a little blond head go bobbing along behind her. When she spun around, there was no one else in the room. She grabbed her towel and ran back into our room with the classic "you look like you've just seen a ghost" look on her face.
• My wife and I were talking in our library. I was sitting on the lounge and she was on a nearby couch. To my left about 4 feet away was an alcove bookshelf (an archway with a window between two bookshelves that faced one another). In my peripheral vision, I saw a book fly from the shelf and land about 4 feet away. My wife saw the same thing, except she was looking directly at it.

We've seen shadows move up and down the halls, had objects inexplicably move around, we've photographed moving and stationary orbs in the house. So, yes. I do believe in ghosts.

[Lightkeeper]

Thank you for sharing this. Are you still in the house?