Do you believe in them?

[cdhall]

After what?

(They don't mention what he does AFTER either....)

Don C.

Thanks Don.

But who is they and he? Do you mean the Bible doesn't mention what Lazarus does while he's dead?

[johnmiic]

I had friends who lived in a haunted apartment in Brooklyn. Broke their lease and practically their necks getting out of there. Stuff flying off shelves, furniture rearranged in the middle of the night, and apparitions.

Oh yeah? Where in Brooklyn? That sounds like a great place to investigate!

[Sandman9580]

Ahhhhh - makes so much more sense now! It sounded like that - but I've never heard 'psychic' used that way.

Yeah, I should have used the word "mental" instead. I had a lapse in my "psyche" which precluded a moment of "mental" clarity. Maybe I figured the meaning would be made clear by the context, but re-reading what I wrote, I think even the context got a little muddled there by the end.

That Kubrick anecdote was great, I've never heard that before either.

I'm trying to find where I read that now. But definitely check out the book "Kubrick: The Definitive Edition" by Michel Ciment, if you haven't already. I've had it on my shelf forever but I just recently pulled it down and have been reading portions of it. Lots of interviews with Kubrick and his collaborators (including Diane Johnson, his co-writer on The Shining), and it's surprising to me how open and candid he and they were in discussing his movies and thought processes. (Also check out Scott's 2001 thread.) I'm beginning to think Kubrick was a more straight-forward and direct "conceptualizer" than I thought he was, and that his strong preference for a detached, ambiguous style just sort of obscured that.

[Joe90]

Don,

I had to Google and I found these 3 examples of resurrections in the Hebrew text so I guess these 3 plus Jesus and Lazarus make 5?

Six, actually...

Peter raises the widow named Tabitha from the dead in Acts of the Apostles.

[jimsmegos]

Having to chirp in on this one due to personal and professional experiences I gotta say I believe there is "something" that does indeed cause the bumps in the night that is by most definitions unexplainable. But I think the modern view of paranormal phenomena and all of the TV shows out there have actually watered down actual encounters. Knowing first hand the pressures of a weekly television program I find it really hard to believe that every week these guys and gals are actually capturing something of any substance. Sure many months are involved in the production process of a 13 week run but still the odds of being that "lucky" are astronomical.

As far as what all of these TV ghost hunters have set as a standard when it comes to proof of the paranormal (notice how most have steered away from calling it life after death) I really think that the things captured as far as orbs and strange light anomalies are more to do with technological advancements. For example, if you use a very modern 10 megapixel camera you are less apt to capture these orbs or streaks of light. But with that said I don't immediately write off "orbs" as dust either. It's all about context for me. But even then I'm not going to call it a ghost in a traditional sense. Honestly for all the average joe knows the light phenomena type things could really be the ability for humans to simply capture naturally occurring phenomena that simply couldn't be seen before. If you think about it my argument makes a bit of sense considering both radio and television wave lengths and signals. They have always been there but we as a species didn't know how to tap into it until the 20h century and make it practical.

Now with all of that said, I am still intrigued with EVP records. Having captured a few of these other worldly voices myself I gotta say it's pretty chilling. Especially when the things recorded are in context to the things going on around you at that moment. One example that still gives me the creeps occurred back 2002. I had recently purchased a new miniDV camera and decided to try it out with a buddy of mine at an old Negro/ Indian Slave cemetery. What's more interesting about the location is that I actually had no prior knowledge of the location itself but had heard of a "harbinger of doom" spirit that would be seen from time to time crossing the street at the location of the cemetery. That story in a nutshell falls into your standard vanishing hitch hiker urban legend but the truly skin crawling part came after my friend and I went out to the location...

New camera, new tape. Walking around, taking video of the sparse and withered tombstones. The place is very barren and hardly noticeable with the exception of a sign that denotes the history of the spot. Anyway, we walked around shot the video, went home thought nothing more of it. Fast forward two months. For the heck of it I extracted the audio off of the clip using Cool Edit Pro 2 mainly because I hadn't done that before. Just seemed like a neat feature to play with. While looking at the wave pattern on the screen I noticed an out of place looking part in the line not more tahn two seconds before I shut the camera off.

The part looked almost like a flat line compared to all of the other ambient noise in the clip. I play it back at that point and I promise you on everything I hold to be Holy and True that a female's voice can be heard clear as a bell saying "Help Me". My skin immediately began to crawl and the hairs stood up on the back of my neck. I was so blown away by this odd discovery that I actually caught my neighbor who was getting home from work and sat him down and said "What do you hear?" I didn't lead him and didn't give him a clue as to what I was talking about but the look on his face when the voice came across the speakers was priceless. He let out an expletive and split. He was genuinely freaked out and not even knowing the back story.

For the record Jesse and I both are dudes with normal "dude" voices. And I assure that neither of us have the capability of sounding like even the most masculine female. Anyway I'll shut up now but I promise you that is an absolutely true story. Sadly the clip has been lost over the span of the past 8 years and that does suck. But in all matter of fact-ness I have no reason to lie to any of you and I'm the first person in the room to smell out a kook.

[jimsmegos]

On a lighter note after my long rant, here's some more fun stuff featuring ghosts and such... http://www.jimsmegos.com/eebumps.php

[Brazoo]

Hey Jim - I was waiting for you to chime in!

I've talked to you a few times on here - and here's the thing, I don't for a second think that you're a liar or kook (though I guess one has to expect that EVERYONE on a Mego forum is going to be slightly kooky in their own little way) - but I just don't get it.

You also come across as a really bright guy and you have tons of experience with audio and camera equipment.

You know that orbs can look identical to anomalies using flash photography - and orbs (as far as I know) didn't exist before flash photography was invented, and they're not seen unless they're recorded - so isn't it more logical to assume that all orbs are just artifacts of the equipment? To me if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

[stevenlore]

I may not have seen a ghost, but I don't doubt their existance. I have met and know quite a few people who have seen or experienced paranormal phenonena to make me quite conviced.

[jimsmegos]

Hey Jim - I was waiting for you to chime in!

I've talked to you a few times on here - and here's the thing, I don't for a second think that you're a liar or kook (though I guess one has to expect that EVERYONE on a Mego forum is going to be slightly kooky in their own little way) - but I just don't get it.

You also come across as a really bright guy and you have tons of experience with audio and camera equipment.

You know that orbs can look identical to anomalies using flash photography - and orbs (as far as I know) didn't exist before flash photography was invented, and they're not seen unless they're recorded - so isn't it more logical to assume that all orbs are just artifacts of the equipment? To me if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

I get your point and it's actually mine too, I think we're just wording it different. The only things that's had me a little puzzled is when certain things happen in context to a given moment/ situation. That's when it just makes me wonder, not so much about the ghost aspect but the what the root cause could be something not fully explained. But in the end I do believe it is a matter of opinion regardless. Unless of course when we croak we all end up chatting on the Mego Orbs forum in the next life

[Adam West]

I always thought it was weird how many people believe in God and an afterlife but insist spooks don't exist.

I think I am already repeating what someone else has stated but from a religious point of view ghosts (meaning the spirits of deceased human beings don't exist). However, spirits do exist and are either in the form of angels or demons.

Anyone can google Christian beliefs on ghosts and the answers are pretty consistent.

I admit, it does sound like a strange concept but I try to look at things from a big picture. If I don't believe in ghosts and they do exist, what harm is it to me? However, if I don't believe in God and He does exist...well you get the picture.

[Brazoo]

Adam West and Mikey01 - for me personally I HOPE to make the distinction between questioning things people believe based on what I understand the facts to show using our knowledge of science, and questioning what people believe as part of their personal faith or religion. I certainly respect everyone's intelligence and feelings in that respect and I hope I'm able to get that across.

[Brazoo]

I get your point and it's actually mine too, I think we're just wording it different. The only things that's had me a little puzzled is when certain things happen in context to a given moment/ situation. That's when it just makes me wonder, not so much about the ghost aspect but the what the root cause could be something not fully explained. But in the end I do believe it is a matter of opinion regardless. Unless of course when we croak we all end up chatting on the Mego Orbs forum in the next life

Yeah - I totally know you understand these things, and that's why you're opinion is so interesting to me. I usually talk to people who believe in ghosts who don't understand these technical things, but you have HUGE technical background - so your opinion is more interesting to me.

With EVP is kinda the same as orbs to me. Because electronic equipment can pick up radio signals that seems like that's a very likely cause of the phenomena. I don't get why ghosts would speak on radio frequencies, but I get that strange interference occurs - so that makes sense to me. I know you understand that explanation, and I know you've probably got a lot more experience dealing with radio interference than I do - so I have to admit, it's confusing to me that you don't have the same conclusion, but I mean that in a way I hope doesn't insult you.

Anyway - as I've tried to explain before - I totally respect your beliefs and your intelligence even if we might disagree on methodology and interpretations. I have a lot of fun watching your ghost shows - and I wish I lived closer so I could check out an investigation with you guys because I've always wanted to see one in real life.

[Brazoo]

Yeah, I should have used the word "mental" instead. I had a lapse in my "psyche" which precluded a moment of "mental" clarity. Maybe I figured the meaning would be made clear by the context, but re-reading what I wrote, I think even the context got a little muddled there by the end.

Ha - no worries - I thought it was a great post, which is why I got confused at the end.

I'm trying to find where I read that now. But definitely check out the book "Kubrick: The Definitive Edition" by Michel Ciment, if you haven't already. I've had it on my shelf forever but I just recently pulled it down and have been reading portions of it. Lots of interviews with Kubrick and his collaborators (including Diane Johnson, his co-writer on The Shining), and it's surprising to me how open and candid he and they were in discussing his movies and thought processes. (Also check out Scott's 2001 thread.) I'm beginning to think Kubrick was a more straight-forward and direct "conceptualizer" than I thought he was, and that his strong preference for a detached, ambiguous style just sort of obscured that.

Thanks - I'm going to check out the Ciment book for sure - it sounds awesome.

I think I know what you mean. Along similar lines I think most people though that Kubrick only made movies for himself and didn't care as much about his audience - if anything all the information we've been getting about Kubrick's process shows he was deeply concerned about audience reaction and the popularity of his work.

Maybe if I have time I'll add something to that 2001 thread. It's one of my favorite movies for sure, and I watch it about once a year.

[johnmiic]

Jim,

These little episodes of Explorations & Encounters are really good. Seems to me you could ditch the Ogre characters tho. Yout narrator is very efective and I don't think you need a mascot to show where you are travelling to.

Also, if you have a video production co. why don't you tape an up-coming Mego Meet and release a DVD of it?

[jimsmegos]

Jim,

These little episodes of Explorations & Encounters are really good. Seems to me you could ditch the Ogre characters tho. Yout narrator is very efective and I don't think you need a mascot to show where you are travelling to.

Also, if you have a video production co. why don't you tape an up-coming Mego Meet and release a DVD of it?

Thanks for the props. The Odie character was actually created as an "Easter egg" to myself. If you notice the overall theme of my rants when it comes to all these TV ghost hunters you'll notice I think they all take themselves far too seriously hence the birth of "Odie and Zipper". Plus I thought it would be fun to create something cute for a t-shirt.

I would LOVE to tape a Mego Meet. If I can get to next year's that will definitely have to happen with free copies of the final cut for all forum members.