ghosts

[eclectic]

Just an interesting thought that occurred to future-hubby last night. There was an ad. for a scary film (at which f-h had to cover his eyes until it was over) and he asked if a fear of ghosts was an in-built thing or culturally constructed. We figured it must be cultural, as they don't exist. Then we discussed the scary fact that we both know several people that we otherwise respect who have SEEN ghosts. But then I SAW santa - in sillouette form with his reindeer etc - once when I was 5...

[davo]

If we were told from birth ghosts were a sign of good luck and were totally good 'spirits' etc that would help you and give you good luck for the next month, do you think our perceptions of them would be different? ;)

[GUDLUSS]

From Uncyclopedia article "Christian logic", section "The Gaping Holes"
Some christian logic is rather acceptable however it is always let down by 'The Gaping hole syndrome' meaning when it is safe to assume, that there is a christian belief that is feasible, unfortunately there is a Christian belief that is not. For example, Christian logic states, there are no such thing as ghosts. Feasible. This is because we all go to this cloudy place with God or you go to a burny place with Satan.Not so feasible.

[GenericBox]

I think seeing / believing / fearing ghosts is hard-wired into our brains. I think it is seperate from religion, because although religion calms our fear of death, Ghosts fulfil our fear of the dark (unknown, absence of light, any metaphorical meaning for dark pretty much covers it). Ghost belief / fear does not require a religion to exist, but it does require a fear of death, so although in some ways its a precursor of religion, it still relies on the fundemental fear of religions.

I say fear of the dark, because our brain tries to process what it can with whatever information it is fed. It will literally make up stuff to fill in the gaps.

I don't think its really cultural, because almost every culture has ghost stories (be it spirits, "ghosts", whatever), but that it is built in. Its imagination at its worst.
The ruffling of the curtain on a seemingly still night, the croaks of wood and the clatter of piping, the gym ball rolling out of the spare room, down my hall, and bumping into my photo cabinet (As you can imagine, I slept with the lights on that night), but as it turns out, theres explanations for them all, but at the time - our brain doesn't know that, so makes stuff up. How could the gym ball roll out of my spare room, a good 10-20 metres down my hall, and bump into my photo cabinet? Well apparently I left the spare room window open, a storm was coming, the wind picked up, I had just recently used it so it was already sitting in the doorway facing the hall, and away it went.

Its just your brain being the sadistic, fear inducing bastard that it is.

[eclectic]

I think seeing / believing / fearing ghosts is hard-wired into our brains. I think it is seperate from religion, because although religion calms our fear of death, Ghosts fulfil our fear of the dark (unknown, absence of light, any metaphorical meaning for dark pretty much covers it). Ghost belief / fear does not require a religion to exist, but it does require a fear of death, so although in some ways its a precursor of religion, it still relies on the fundemental fear of religions.

I say fear of the dark, because our brain tries to process what it can with whatever information it is fed. It will literally make up stuff to fill in the gaps.

I don't think its really cultural, because almost every culture has ghost stories (be it spirits, "ghosts", whatever), but that it is built in. Its imagination at its worst.
The ruffling of the curtain on a seemingly still night, the croaks of wood and the clatter of piping, the gym ball rolling out of the spare room, down my hall, and bumping into my photo cabinet (As you can imagine, I slept with the lights on that night), but as it turns out, theres explanations for them all, but at the time - our brain doesn't know that, so makes stuff up. How could the gym ball roll out of my spare room, a good 10-20 metres down my hall, and bump into my photo cabinet? Well apparently I left the spare room window open, a storm was coming, the wind picked up, I had just recently used it so it was already sitting in the doorway facing the hall, and away it went.

Its just your brain being the sadistic, fear inducing bastard that it is.

Yes, in this discussion we thought of other non-existent stuff that people believe in, and besides religion we were talking about scary things in the dark, like monsters under the bed. I usually fear more 'real' things when I'm in that scaredy-mood on certain nights, like the murderer/rapist lurking outside the window, or the scientifically explainable 'zombies' created by a virus (the latter is exclusively brought on by watching '28 Days Later').

It can still be cultural though, even if there are examples in a variety of cultures. The specific manifestations and benign or malevolent nature of the un-dead ghosts (or zombies) being something learned.

[GenericBox]

Yeah I just watched Mirrors last night. Your everyday run of the mill new-age horror flick. Sudden bursts of sounds and ghoulish and gory CGI. Nothing scary. Still, I have a wall of mirrors in my lounge room (hard to explain, but our apartment looks over a lake, so, so you can look at the lake from the kitchen - our lounge room wall is entirely mirrors, so while your in the kitchen you can look at the wall and see the lake - if that made any sense at all. I'll take a picture one day :P ).

But yeah, after watching it you notice all the little noises, and watching it in complete darkness probably didn't help, and I could see the damn curtains flapping in the mirrors reflection. Etc. Creeps me out having a wall of mirrors I tell you.

I agree names, types of "ghosts"/zombies/whatever, and undead stuff can be cultural - the actual idea, and the initial fear, is something found in everyone.

[GenericBox]

Well I was bored - so here you go. I took the photos lol :)

This one is from the kitchen looking out the balcony - As you can see you can't see much of a lake:::::

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3580/3364216937_5552062d85.jpg

Buuuuuuuut. We have a very creepy wall of mirrors, so when you look at the wall, you see this :::::

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3628/3364217365_9a7d9a659c.jpg

Anyways, I was bored. Thats my apartment.

EDIT: I know we kinda go OT sometimes, but sorry for being soooooo OT this time.