Monthly Spotlight: Ghosts!

Experts' Advice to Ghost Hunting:

• Budget for travel
• Hunt on the ghost's time
  • ie Nighttime
• Bring a trigger object
  • Know the history of the place and of the haunting, and bring something the spirit can relate to.
• Be Childlike
  • More along the lines of being open-minded and ready for anything
• Document evidence
• Engage all senses
• Use a paranormal perspective
  • Ghosts could have died suddenly/tragically and may want to get their story out
  • Not all ghosts will be nice and sweet; some may be angry or sad, just like humans
• Understand the risks
  • Some ghosts can follow you home
  • Provocation can bring danger

How to Become a Real-Life Ghost Hunter:

1. Learn about paranormal phenomena
2. Start packing an investigation tool kit (see tools below)
3. Interview the client/property owner before starting
4. Research the location(s)
5. NEVER investigate alone
   1. Most investigative places are abandoned, and getting injured happens frequently
6. Rally a team of experts
7. Don't wear your Ghostbusters outfit
   1. You'll look dumb unless it's Halloween
8. Mind your manners
   1. If there are negative spirits, the last thing you need is to pick a fight with something you can't see
   2. Also, you are on someone else's property, so don't be mean.
9. Don't forget to go to the logical explanations first
10. Get to know your ghost by researching them

Devices to try:

• Electromagnetic Field Detector (EMF)
  • Measures electromagnetic fields sent out by faulty wires and radio waves, but investigators insist the meter can also detect spirits. 
• Temperature Gun
  • Measure the air for the cold spots that, ghost stories say, mark haunted sites.
• Night Vision Camera(s)
  • and normal cameras if you're investigating during the day
• Motion Detectors
• Walkie Talkies
  • For multiple investigators
• Holy Water
  • Water that has been blessed by a holy person
• Digital Recorder

• Paranormal facts exist
• Ghosts come out at night
• There is no physical evidence of Bigfoot
• False: only old buildings are haunted
• Paranormal fascination has gone on for centuries
• Skeptics and believers can get along
• Paranormal activity can be good for business
• It's said Anne Boleyn still wanders the Tower of London
• Some say that Benjamin Franklin visited the Philosophical Society in Philadelphia
• Apparently, Abraham Lincoln had residency in the White House
  • At least according to the staff during Franklin D. Roosevelt's reign
• Some paranormal experiences are easily explainable, based on faulty activity in the brain.
  • Reports of poltergeists invisibly moving objects seem to be consistent with damage to certain regions of the right hemisphere that are responsible for visual processing
• Out-of-body experiences, meanwhile, are now accepted neurological phenomena, while certain visual illusions could confound the healthy brain and create mythical beings.
• Psychologists studying religion have long suspected that a belief in the paranormal can be a kind of shield from the even harsher truths of the world. 
  • The idea is that when something unexpected happens – a death, natural disaster, or job loss – the brain scrambles around for answers, looking for meaning in the chaos.
• Paranormal believers were more likely to see some kind of intention behind the movements – as if the shapes were playing a game of “tag”– and this was reflected in greater brain activity in the regions normally associated with “theory of mind” and understanding others’ motives. 
• People who believe in the supernatural are more likely to see hidden faces in everyday photos
  • Paranormal believers are more likely to imagine that they have seen a walking figure in random light displays.

Information gathered from BBC, History, and Travel