Doris Bither case

[Hankenhunter]

10 hours ago, psyche101 said:

You've got to get kidding me. What are you, 8 years old or something?

Love your reaction. Thanks for posting.

[esoteric_toad]

Paranormal research and UFOlogy both share something in common (cryptozoology as well). As technology becomes more available, more accurate, more precise it seems evidence for both becomes less and less convincing. The only cases that get brought up are from, mostly, pre-internet, pre-inexpensive surveillance, pre-readily available HD video recording. Instead cases involve immeasurable evidence, feelings, emotions, psychics. Things that cannot be verified or measured in any scientific way. It would seem there would be more evidence that would be harder to explain away but instead it seems there is the opposite.

[papageorge1]

46 minutes ago, esoteric_toad said:

Paranormal research and UFOlogy both share something in common (cryptozoology as well). As technology becomes more available, more accurate, more precise it seems evidence for both becomes less and less convincing. 

That's an opinion I don't share. With internet sharing I am finding the case for the paranormal has become overwhelming. 

49 minutes ago, esoteric_toad said:

The only cases that get brought up are from, mostly, pre-internet, pre-inexpensive surveillance, pre-readily available HD video recording. 

I know for a fact that is not true.

[esoteric_toad]

1 hour ago, papageorge1 said:

That's an opinion I don't share. With internet sharing I am finding the case for the paranormal has become overwhelming. 

I know for a fact that is not true.

This story for example. No real evidence. When everything is distilled down it is just a story. 

Regarding other cases, they should be on their own topic posts. 

The bar for evidence is obviously different for different folks. Personally I prefer the scientific version of evidence, not something that fulfills some ambiguous personal level of evidence.

[XenoFish]

1 hour ago, papageorge1 said:

That's an opinion I don't share. With internet sharing I am finding the case for the paranormal has become overwhelming. 

I know for a fact that is not true.

How many of these stories are true?

How many have shown concrete evidence?

By all means pick the strongest case and share it with us. 

[papageorge1]

11 minutes ago, esoteric_toad said:

This story for example. No real evidence. When everything is distilled down it is just a story. 

Regarding other cases, they should be on their own topic posts. 

The bar for evidence is obviously different for different folks. Personally I prefer the scientific version of evidence, not something that fulfills some ambiguous personal level of evidence.

I consider people's testimony as evidence (not proof). A quantity, quality and consistency of such evidence can affect my worldview.

[esoteric_toad]

30 minutes ago, papageorge1 said:

I consider people's testimony as evidence (not proof). A quantity, quality and consistency of such evidence can affect my worldview.

This is an example of ambiguous personal evidence I was referring to. This is belief, not evidence. This is what religious faith is. There is nothing inherently wrong with that unless you expect it to be accepted as scientifically factual.

[psyche101]

9 hours ago, papageorge1 said:

So, your theory is they would just make up a very high sounding number? Or what? Or perhaps this is just one of many paranormal events but gets more retold because of the witness count as people like to hear there were witnesses? Hmm...

The question I have posted that certainly indicates something is bit true here from the start 

The quality of this evidence is pure garbage. There's the house, explain how 24 people fit in one bedroom there. Where they putting people on shoulders? 

There no quality to that evidence. It doesn't make sense. 

9 hours ago, papageorge1 said:

I see no logical response there to my point: Heavy drinking can't produce paranormal phenomena observable to others!  

 

Because you are an enemy of reason. You don't deploy logic, it is a stranger to you.

Drinking. Ghosts.

No drinking. No Ghosts.

Is that not easy enough for you to fathom?

[psyche101]

4 hours ago, Hankenhunter said:

Love your reaction. Thanks for posting.

Yours thinking of someone else. I don't play the imaginary friend game.

[papageorge1]

16 minutes ago, psyche101 said:Drinking. Ghosts.

No drinking. No Ghosts.

Is that not easy enough for you to fathom?

Wait....the witnesses In all the events weren’t all drunk! That was my point.

[psyche101]

Just now, papageorge1 said:

Wait....the witnesses In all the events weren’t all drunk! That was my point.

And the 24 people that would never get into one room in that house? What's your point there?

Your not being logical at all are you. If 24 people could not fit in one room, how could they possibly be witnesses? 

That the alleged attacks only happen when drunk supports the theory of suggestibility mentioned earlier by another poster. 

Evidence leads away for the unexplainable the more one looks at it. Just like the pixie case you do foolishly championed to no avail. 

You just support the ridiculous to get attention.

[Hankenhunter]

16 hours ago, Piney said:

I've created intense attacks and watched the people re-enforcing each other and make it stronger. In this case you had a group, all with mental issues re-enforcing each other making it stronger. 

Most times people haunt themselves. If Doris wasn't mentally ill and wished it away instead of empowering it. It wouldn't of even went this far. 

The majority of people experiencing  paranormal events are perfectly normal, and in exellent mental health. Doris may have been off her rocker, but the witnesses weren't were they?

[Hankenhunter]

2 hours ago, esoteric_toad said:

This is an example of ambiguous personal evidence I was referring to. This is belief, not evidence. This is what religious faith is. There is nothing inherently wrong with that unless you expect it to be accepted as scientifically factual.

The ones who've experienced the paranormal really couldn't give two hoots for science fact,  when what they experienced is still far beyond science. All they are looking for is confirmation that they're not delusional. Because the disbelief thats exhibited. tends to happen when they speak about it. That seems to be changing though.

Edited July 19, 2020 by Hankenhunter

[psyche101]

1 hour ago, Hankenhunter said:

The ones who've experienced the paranormal really couldn't give two hoots for science fact

That's why they default to the paranormal. Sad really. Too hard basket to actually learn, so make stuff up and call it paranormal.

[Hankenhunter]

46 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

That's why they default to the paranormal. Sad really. Too hard basket to actually learn, so make stuff up and call it paranormal.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/brilliant-scientists-are-open-minded-about-paranormal-stuff-so-why-not-you/

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/02/there-is-a-paranormal-activity-lab-at-the-university-of-virginia/283584/

https://www.ed.ac.uk/ppls/psychology/prospective/postgraduate/research-programmes/research-interests/parapsychology

Edited July 19, 2020 by Hankenhunter

[esoteric_toad]

7 hours ago, Hankenhunter said:

The majority of people experiencing  paranormal events are perfectly normal, and in exellent mental health. Doris may have been off her rocker, but the witnesses weren't were they?

Witnesses are notoriously unreliable. Do a bit of research on witness testimony and it's flaws. Regardless of that ultimately they are just reports, stories. A frustrating as it may seem that is still not evidence. 

[Piney]

7 hours ago, Hankenhunter said:

The majority of people experiencing  paranormal events are perfectly normal, and in exellent mental health. Doris may have been off her rocker, but the witnesses weren't were they?

I'd imagine the children would have their own issues. 

[Alchopwn]

4 hours ago, Hankenhunter said:

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/brilliant-scientists-are-open-minded-about-paranormal-stuff-so-why-not-you/

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/02/there-is-a-paranormal-activity-lab-at-the-university-of-virginia/283584/

https://www.ed.ac.uk/ppls/psychology/prospective/postgraduate/research-programmes/research-interests/parapsychology

Isn't this in many ways the point of this forum?  Obviously there is a large impetus to provide consistent and mundane answers for events that do not immediately seem amenable to such explanations.  I mean, let's face facts, I suspect a goodly few supernatural events were happenstance effects of spontaneous stage magic caused by the unusual position of objects.  The picture is further muddied by the poor credulous folk who we might classify as the "superstitious" whose education simply isn't up to the task of solving mundane events that are a bit unusual and so they default to the supernatural at the slightest provocation. Then there are the deliberate hoaxters who prey on the superstitious, sometimes for sh*ts an giggles, sometimes for money.  (I have personally used stage magic to hoax friends, but then always revealed the trick.  One time I had a gf whose apartment had shonky wiring, and I figured out a pressure point that allowed me to make most of the lights in her entire flat "go disco" by shifting my weight on it, and she lost her **** for about 2 min before I laughed and showed her what was wrong, as an example.  Yes, I'm an axehole sometimes, but it was "gold").  For all that, we still have cases of things where there are intermittent effects that can't be explained... yet...  Should we entirely rule out the paranormal?  Well, no, it is fascinating, and there may well be something to these claims.  They have, after all, been around as long as humans have existed.   

[XenoFish]

45 minutes ago, Alchopwn said:

Should we entirely rule out the paranormal?

Yes.

Quote

 it is fascinating, and there may well be something to these claims. 

Doubtful. I find it less and less fascinating and more bs garbage.

Quote

They have, after all, been around as long as humans have existed.   

So has the human imagination, superstition, and paranoia.

[papageorge1]

15 hours ago, esoteric_toad said:

This is an example of ambiguous personal evidence I was referring to. This is belief, not evidence. This is what religious faith is. There is nothing inherently wrong with that unless you expect it to be accepted as scientifically factual.

To objectively consider a body of witness evidence is part of normal human reasoning in a case such as this.  

[Rlyeh]

On 7/18/2020 at 6:31 AM, papageorge1 said:

But the two dozen witnesses described in the OP makes me think an easy explain-away is not sufficient here.

Didn't years ago witnesses see leprechaun in a tree too?

[papageorge1]

6 minutes ago, Rlyeh said:

Didn't years ago witnesses see leprechaun in a tree too?

I’m not sure but quality of the reports is a consideration too. 

[esoteric_toad]

1 hour ago, papageorge1 said:

To objectively consider a body of witness evidence is part of normal human reasoning in a case such as this.  

Yet ultimately it is still proof of nothing. It is testimony. Even then how exactly was that information acquired? Did the witnesses interact with one another before their statements were taken? What were the witnesses beliefs before the the supposed event? An example of just how bad people are as witnesses:

According to the Innocence Project , 358 people who had been convicted and sentenced to death since 1989 have been exonerated through DNA evidence. Of these, 71% had been convicted through eyewitness misidentification and had served an average of 14 years in prison before exoneration. Of those false identifications, 41% involved cross-racial misidentifications (221 of the 358 people were African American). And 28% of the cases involved a false confession.

[papageorge1]

5 minutes ago, esoteric_toad said:

Yet ultimately it is still proof of nothing. It is testimony. Even then how exactly was that information acquired? Did the witnesses interact with one another before their statements were taken? What were the witnesses beliefs before the the supposed event? An example of just how bad people are as witnesses:

According to the Innocence Project , 358 people who had been convicted and sentenced to death since 1989 have been exonerated through DNA evidence. Of these, 71% had been convicted through eyewitness misidentification and had served an average of 14 years in prison before exoneration. Of those false identifications, 41% involved cross-racial misidentifications (221 of the 358 people were African American). And 28% of the cases involved a false confession.

I was aware of all that when I made my statement.

Much eyewitness evidence can be spot on correct too.

[Alchopwn]

10 hours ago, XenoFish said:

So has the human imagination, superstition, and paranoia.

As someone who has studied mental health, I would love to be able to say that I was as certain as yourself on all these matters.  In general people will hallucinate either sight or sound, but not both simultaneously during the way the brain is wired.  Many cryptid sightings feature both visual and auditory hallucination simultaneously, as described by eyewitnesses.  Now admittedly some are probably hoaxes, but all?  I mean, when someone potentially endangers their lucrative professional standing by going on record as having seen a cryptid, and gains nothing financially other than the ridicule of their peers, what do they gain other than a sense of martyrdom?  I am drawn to remind you of the time the French Academy used to tell the world that there were no rocks in the sky ergo rocks could not fall from the sky, and set about trying to prove that pranksters were firing nickel iron cannonballs randomly across Europe.  Just because you can't put something under a bell-jar doesn't mean it isn't real.  By the same token, it doesn't mean that it is real either.  I think we have an obligation to treat each claim on its merits and its evidence, and not stoop to merely dismissing everything. Surely?

Edited July 19, 2020 by Alchopwn