There's A Ghost At My Place Of Employment

by finallysomepride 151 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  daniel-p

  FF, very interesting.

  Here's an example from my in-laws: My BIL and MIL are both supersticious JWs. They used to like going on drives together. One times they took a drive through the woods, heading to a coastal town. On the way, they saw an old lumber mill town red school house. The red school house is a museum, but is closed most of the time. They stopped and looked into the windows and saw that inside it looked like it did 100 years ago, with all the desks set up with pencils and paper on them and the chalk board with math problems on it, etc. It was almost as if one day they just closed the school house, walked out, locked the door, and never went back in (I've seen it and can testify to this perception). At some point they both got a "creepy feeling", so they left and walked back to the car. As they drove away, a flock of vultures began flying over their car, and they saw the vultures fly above the car for an indeterminate distance down the highway.

  Every time they tell this story, they tell it together, and the vultures get more and more menacing, until finally, they are swooping down and attacking the car. The last time my BIL told the story the vultures followed them for about 20 miles.

  This same BIL can tell when a storm is going to throw lightning, and swears a primal connection with electrical disturbances.
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  daniel-p

  If I believe myself to be a wonderful spirit medium, I think this would probably be my reality. If I believe nothing supernatural exists, then I will never find proof of the supernatural because the world caters to my belief.

  Suspending belief that something does or does not exist does not preclude an objective reality.
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  Sirona

  But I didn't say that daniel.

  I said...if I believed that nothing exists.

  That is different from- "if I made no decision either way and was open to whatever happened"

  There is a chasm between being open and observing objectively and being closed and thinking "there is nothing".

  What I'm trying to say is, wouldn't our belief shape our reality? If we think "there is nothing" there will BE nothing. If we think "ghosts exist" then they WILL exist. ???

  x
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  Finally-Free

  Every time they tell this story, they tell it together, and the vultures get more and more menacing, until finally, they are swooping down and attacking the car.

  Ah, kind of like the proverbial fish story where the fish is larger each time the story is told.

  "do we create our own reality"?

  Sometimes I wonder. I had a friend in the 1970s-80s who was a fantastic liar. He used to tell girls abour our "exploits" in order to "impress" them. He's start out telling the truth, and begin embellishing, and then outright lying, fascinating them with tales of blood and gore that never happened. I didn't complain because for some reason we always ended up getting laid. My point though, is that after several years of this he turned to me one day when we were alone and asked, "did it really happen that way?" He told his lies so many times he no longer knew truth from fiction.

  W
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  daniel-p

  What I'm trying to say is, wouldn't our belief shape our reality? If we think "there is nothing" there will BE nothing. If we think "ghosts exist" then they WILL exist. ???

  This has been an ongoing philisophical topic for hundreds of years. You'd probably do well to read into phenomenology, which is a from of rigorous inquiry that dispenses with requirements of rational objectivism as employed by modernist thinkers. Or rather, it can be described as objectivism within ones' own frame of reference or experience, a discovery of being itself, rather than the discovery and explanation of just things. Start with Heideggers "Being and Time," then on to Husserl's writings.

  However, what you posit is more radical... that our experience literally changes the world. This is physically impossible, since we are all undeniably living in the same world. For your theory to be true, we would have to each be living in a seperate universe, but somehow have our physical existences overlapping... that too, is a high proposition, and I don't think the tenets of basic subjectivism are near enough to support it.
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  Sirona

  Interesting suggestions Daniel. I will read up on those things when I get chance. I'm in the middle of a Psychology assignment right now! (argh!)

  I don't posit that our experience changes the world. Rather our thoughts change the world.

  x
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  Judge Dread

  This is what I think: If ghosts do exist, why is there not one shred of objective, verifiable, repeatable evidence proving so? Why is there ONLY testomonial evidence?

  There ARE photographs, videos, recordings of evp's, but skeptics like to fall back on "they were doctored".

  Judge Dread
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  daniel-p

  I don't posit that our experience changes the world. Rather our thoughts change the world.

  But doesn't experience also include our thoughts? In fact, isn't our experience chiefly comprised of our thoughts?

  ...

  And about your class: Phenomenology is really the nexus between psychology and philosophy...
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  daniel-p

  This is what I think: If ghosts do exist, why is there not one shred of objective, verifiable, repeatable evidence proving so? Why is there ONLY testomonial evidence?

  There ARE photographs, videos, recordings of evp's, but skeptics like to fall back on "they were doctored".

  Judge Dread

  Are you referring to videos I can find on Youtube?

  Are there any recordings, videos, etc. that have been produced by honest researchers (and not quacks or hoax creators), that have been independently verified? Has anything ever been recorded in a controlled setting, and thus having precluded any tampering with the scene? I don't think these are too big to ask, considering the extraordinary claims.

  Of course, if people want to absolutely believe in the supernatural, no critical question is ever legitimate.
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  Judge Dread

  Are you referring to videos I can find on Youtube?

  No. There are websites you can find that deal with the things I mentioned.

  Of course, if people want to absolutely believe in the supernatural, no critical question is ever legitimate.

  For people who absolutely do not want to believe, their is no legitimate evidence.

  From my own experience, and obviously from other's experiences, these events happen whenever they happen.

  Maybe you should go with the Ghost Hunters, or some group like that, on one of their investigations and see for yourself.

  Judge Dread