Ghostly Categories
Most natural things on Earth have been assigned into categories such as mineral, animal, vegetable and sub categorized further such as mamal, fish, amphibian and again and so on. Hence everything has a place in the order of things.
Most natural things on Earth have been assigned into categories such as mineral, animal, vegetable and sub categorized further such as mamal, fish, amphibian and again and so on. Hence everything has a place in the order of things.
What about ghosts? We’ve mentioned Battlefield Ghosts, Phantom Hitchhikers, Road Ghosts and Poltergeists in other topics, but can ghosts be categorised, any families identified that share common traits.
If they are hallucinations this would be impossible, but there are distinct differances of appearance between black shadow ghosts, those that pass for living people and the grey mist form types. Have a think about and whether it may or may not be possible and how it put together.
This would be a huge task,
This would be a huge task, and it needs to be remembered that minerals, animals, etc all exist. Whereas solid evidence for the paranormal is scant at the least.
Thinking about the lists of ghosts you mention, hitchikers, battlefield ghosts, etc – maybe we should be looking at what is seen and categorising them as oppose to grouping them by location.
Take for example, battlefield ghosts – these tend to be groups of people (for the sake of argument) so we could place them in such a category. Then we list all the common features for sitings of groups which could include; being viewed near/on battlesites, period they are from, any sounds. Once we have that information, we could then see if there are common features which would allow us to regroup ghosts into more useful categories as suggested above.
Quote:What about ghosts?
[quote]What about ghosts? We’ve mentioned Battlefield Ghosts, Phantom Hitchhikers, Road Ghosts and Poltergeists in other topics, but can ghosts be categorised, any families identified that share common traits.[/quote]
You could start be defining a ghost …
Mysteryshopper wrote:
You
[quote=Mysteryshopper]You could start be defining a ghost …[/quote]
I think that is the right first step. Any takers?
Just to confuse things
Just to confuse things further – how do we know that aliens and fairies don’t have the same origins/causes as ghosts?
For the sake of discussion,
For the sake of discussion, I’ll suggest the definition that Spritualists use, where ghosts are non-sentient "recordings" of past events and spirits are sentient yet non-corporeal beings, as a decent starter.
I would suggest “a ghost (or
I would suggest "a ghost (or apparition) is a human figure witnessed by someone who has good reason to believe it is not physically present"
This definition contains no assumptions about the nature of ghosts and agrees with the evidence. People clearly see ghosts from time to time – no one could argue with that. Once you talk about spirits or recordings you are getting into interpretation. I don’t think we yet have sufficient evidence to go that far.
As for categories, there is your ‘standard’ apparition – like the definition above. Then there is the ‘road ghost’ which is notably different because of its specific habit of hanging around roads and frequently getting run over. There are ‘crisis apparitions’, different because they are often of living people.
I would say poltergeists were something rather different. Many poltergeist outbreaks don’t even involve an apparition.
Ghosts aren’t just human –
Ghosts aren’t just human – apparitions of cats are more numerous than people may think.
Broadly, a ghost is an echo of the past, I suppose.
I wouldn’t limit poltergeists to within the "ghost" definition – they’re just as much to do with folkloric aspects like elementals and fairies as latter-day ghosts.
I think the problem with
I think the problem with categorising beyond a broad description such as Road Ghost is that we can only base it on observations provided by witnesses who, at the time of the experience are not looking too deeply for details about the appartion and thinking how it can be categorised.
Ian Topham wrote:I think
[quote=Ian Topham]I think the problem with categorising beyond a broad description such as Road Ghost is that we can only base it on observations provided by witnesses who, at the time of the experience are not looking too deeply for details about the appartion and thinking how it can be categorised.[/quote]
Since we don’t have any definite explanations for ghosts as yet (though lots of theories), I think definitions of types must rely on witness descriptions. This isn’t unscientific – animal species were originally described purely on appearance and behaviour.
matt.h – would you disagree with my definition if we include animals: "a ghost (or apparition) is a human (or animal) figure witnessed by someone who has good reason to believe it is not physically present"?
Are you suggesting defining ghosts as "echoes of the past", because that, to me, is more of theory than an observation.
I would argue that the
I would argue that the principal current definition of a "ghost" concerns the dead, and so is an echo of the past. This is evidenced by the use of the word "ghost" in literature as a metaphor for the past.
I’m not sure you could limit ghosts to just those that aren’t physically present – amongst road ghost reports, for example, there are plenty where the witness has been certain they have hit something or someone.
Matt.H wrote:I would argue
[quote=Matt.H]I would argue that the principal current definition of a "ghost" concerns the dead, and so is an echo of the past. This is evidenced by the use of the word "ghost" in literature as a metaphor for the past.[/quote]
There have been many apparitions of the living, particularly crisis apparitions. The ‘dead’ connection is purely a cultural / legendary one. There is no evidence to support it. If I saw a ghost I didn’t recognise today I would have no evidence to decide whether the figure is of a living or dead person or even a hallucination of ‘someone’ who has never existed.
[quote=Matt.H]I’m not sure you could limit ghosts to just those that aren’t physically present – amongst road ghost reports, for example, there are plenty where the witness has been certain they have hit something or someone.[/quote]
I think if you ran over a hallucination you would be convinced you had ‘hit’ them, in the same way as things that happen in dreams can appear perfectly real. The fact that when someone runs over a road ghost, they never find any trace of the collision or ‘victim’ afterwards will, I think, convince them that there was no one physically present. Just before the ‘accident’ they may well think the ghost is real and react accordingly. They may well be shocked but there is no evidence found afterwards that the ghost was ever physically present.
Hi Mysteryshopper,I agree
Hi Mysteryshopper,
I agree that the "ghost-as-from-the-past" definition is flawed. I don’t agree with it myself, but I feel that in terms of the current popular cultural perception, a ghost is a haunting from the past.
I’d argue that crisis apparitions and the like aren’t ghosts at all, and need to be classed differently. I don’t know how you’d do this, but then that was the problem Ian raised in the first place.
Perhaps the road ghosts angle wasn’t the best to articulate what I meant about the physicality of ghosts. A better example may be how ghosts are said to be able to interact physically – hair pulling, doors opening, moving objects. In this respect, I’d say using a definition that includes an assertion of physicality is problematic.
Matt.H wrote:Perhaps the
[quote=Matt.H]Perhaps the road ghosts angle wasn’t the best to articulate what I meant about the physicality of ghosts. A better example may be how ghosts are said to be able to interact physically – hair pulling, doors opening, moving objects. In this respect, I’d say using a definition that includes an assertion of physicality is problematic.[/quote]
Ah, the nitty gritty! You’re assuming ghosts CAUSE these phenomena. However, so far as I am aware, no ghost (as per my definition) has ever been SEEN to open doors, move objects, etc. I think it’s a crucial point! (Like the dog that didn’t bark in the night time). Those physical phenomena are certainly symptoms of a haunting but there is no evidence that a ghost actually does them.
Ghosts are only seen in a minority of haunting cases. There is, therefore, no obvious reason from the evidence to assume that they are essential to a haunting. Furthermore, ghosts are not seen to interact either with the witnesses or the environment. I therefore think that ghosts may simply be just another symptom of hauntings, like cold spots, rather than their cause. The idea that hauntings are caused by ghosts is, once again, tradition and legend with no real evidence to support it.
[quote=Matt.H]I agree that the "ghost-as-from-the-past" definition is flawed. I don’t agree with it myself, but I feel that in terms of the current popular cultural perception, a ghost is a haunting from the past.[/quote]
I think we really need to leave these cultural ideas of ghosts and hauntings behind once and for all. They do not fit the evidence and they never did. They simply hold back the entire subject which, as we know, hasn’t moved forward much in over a century, possibly for this very reason.
[quote=Matt.H]I’d argue that crisis apparitions and the like aren’t ghosts at all, and need to be classed differently.[/quote]
Maybe so, though my definition of a ghost does not exclude crisis apparitions. If anyone has a better definition of a ghost then please suggest it. I would caution, though, that such a definition should rely on the evidence we have and not on popular culture otherwise we’re just stuck where we started.
I wasn’t suggesting that
I wasn’t suggesting that there was any evidence to prove or disprove that ghosts cause physical activity, merely pointing out that this is one theory. Indeed, in the absence of any definite evidence either way surely it’s best not to limit a defintion to either the physical or metaphysical? This was what I meant when I said it’s problematic!
To be brutally honest, is chasing a definition of such a culturally loaded and apprently diverse word as "ghost" really the best way to categorise these phenomena?
I agree that there’s little evidence to support traditional theories as to the cause behind "ghosts". My own opinion is that we as humans intepret paranormal phenomena through our own cultural perceptions, and I reckon that at some point we will find the mechanism behind ghosts, UFOs, fairies and the like to be strikingly similar.
Are we not better served accepting that "ghost" will always be a rather slippery concept and instead concentrate on classifying phenomena rather than the manifold intepretations of the causes behind them?
“The visible disembodied
"The visible disembodied soul of a dead person" is a definition I have found for a ghost and one I think we can ignore. But it does illustrate Matt’s point that culturally the term ghost is related to dead people and is associated as such by the the general population.
As people who have looked more closely into hauntings as Mysteryshopper is saying we can see that there is no evidence really to associate ghosts with the dead. So should we be using the term ghost? Should we just stick with apparition? This restricts it to just one aspect of a haunting, the actual visual experience.
[quote]I think definitions of types must rely on witness descriptions. This isn’t unscientific – animal species were originally described purely on appearance and behaviour. [/quote]
Of course you are right with your comment on observations, but I think the quality of the descriptions have to play a key part if it is possible to narrow catagories down further.
Matt.H wrote:Are we not
[quote=Matt.H]Are we not better served accepting that "ghost" will always be a rather slippery concept and instead concentrate on classifying phenomena rather than the manifold intepretations of the causes behind them?[/quote]
[quote=Ian Topham]Of course you are right with your comment on observations, but I think the quality of the descriptions have to play a key part if it is possible to narrow catagories down further.[/quote]
I believe we have reached some sort of agreement that any definition of paranormal phenomena should be based on observation rather than on supposed explanations, whether from popular culture or not.
So, Ian, do you still want to classify types of ghost or should we be looking more widely? Personally, I think the concept of a haunting, whether it includes apparitions or not, is a phenomenon that can be usefully defined. The most important point about it is that it stays in one location which is surely important to understanding its true nature.
Mysteryshopper wrote:
So,
[quote=Mysteryshopper]So, Ian, do you still want to classify types of ghost or should we be looking more widely? [/quote]
I’d be happy to carry on trying to define the whole haunting experience. However, whilst having a bath, re-enacting the battle of Trafalgar with my glow in the dark Darth Vader Rubber Ducks (yes plural) and trying to remember the Rubby Ducky song I learned from Seaseme Street as a kid, I had a thought. What about ghost ships as are reputed to haunt the Solway Firth
And what about ghostly aircraft and carriages? Do we need to change the definition to include inanimate objects? Does anyone know of a recent sighting of a ghost ship, carriage or aircraft? Are all ghost aircraft from WWII? Phantom vehicles would probably make a great topic to discuss on their own. If we are talking hallucinations then technically there is no limit to what can be experienced, person, animal, vehicle, ghostly vegetable even.
How about;Ghost – the
How about;
Ghost – the appearance of a non-corporeal entity formerly believed to have previously been living.
Agricola wrote:How
[quote=Agricola]How about;
Ghost – the appearance of a non-corporeal entity formerly believed to have previously been living.[/quote]
If I saw a ghost, I wouldn’t ‘believe’ it had been previously living. That’s because I know (i) there are ghosts of the living and (ii) that I can hallucinate an entity that has never existed, from my brain.
Does that mean I am destined never to see a ghost? And if I see a human figure in front of me that subsequently vanishes, what do I call it?
Mysteryshopper wrote:Does
[quote=Mysteryshopper]Does that mean I am destined never to see a ghost? And if I see a human figure in front of me that subsequently vanishes, what do I call it?[/quote]
An apparition?
And don’t forget animals!
So an apparition is
So an apparition is different to a ghost! Can you explain the difference please?
(can we take animals as read, we can’t even agree a definition for human yet!)
Everytime we include
Everytime we include something along the lines of "beleived to have been living" or "from the past" etc we are falling into the same trap as the "visible disembodied soul of a dead person" definition I mentioned above, which is we end up showing a bias toward an unproven theory. I think this is exactly what Mysteryshopper has been getting at and he is right.
Ghosts are part of a haunting but there aren’t really any links between the visual experience appartion and for instance banging doors, foating armchairs (I wish) or flying crockery (I’d love to see some of that going on). I don’t think anyone has seen an appartion manipulate a physical object.
Therefore for a ghost I think we are looking at the visual experience, but the word ghost does conjure in most people a preconcieved notion of a visible soul, so we either ignore this or replace the word with appartion.
As for defining each aspect of a haunting or the haunting as a whole, that would be good too.
I just want to tie this up with the ‘Do Ghosts Go Woo’ topic slightly. If apparitions are silent then should that be included in the definition of one. If some apparitions are silent and others have been seen making a noise then do we have two different categories?
There’s a huge problem…
How about apparitions of objects?
We have the Biggin Hill ghost Spitfire, the Kensington ghost bus, phantom coaches, ghost ships aplenty… even whole ghost landscapes have been reported at times.
None of these objects was alive in the first place so even if the "disembodied soul of a living being" was found to be viable explanation it would not hold water in these cases.
T.C. Lethbridge was the first to put forward the idea that apparitions were "simple" recordings from the past: he speculated about the recording media (he was convinced that apparitions have some relationship with water) but could never come up with a good explanation about the "record player".
I have problems with this theory: to put it very plainly it would be like burying an audio CD somewhere and expect people to hear music just by walking over it.
It’s pretty much the same problem which has always been plaguing UFOlogy: some people see/hear something, other nothing. Not only that but experiences are extremely different: Jacques Valle rightly pointed out that the problem with a "nuts and bolts" explanation is that we have too many sightings, too many reliable witnesses, not mention an unbelievable variety of phenomena.
Ghosts are probably similar: the "souls of the deceased" explanation is not enough here.
A suggestion
Ghost – A non-corporeal image limited to two or possibly three senses that does not appear to interact in a standard fashion with current corporeal reality, usually following a guide line or floor plan of a subjectively earlier point in space-time.
(Example – The Violet being wrecked over and over in the Goodwin Sands, various battlefield ‘re-encatment’ phantoms)
Apparition – A non-corporeal being that appears at least aware of corporeal reality, though it may or may not interact with it.
(Example – The phantom medical orderlies in the basement of Gettysburg College, ‘The Phamtom Hitchhiker’ ghost legend)
Entity – A normally non-corporeal being that is able to manipulate corporeal reality apparently at will, including physical manifestation, telekinesis, demonic possession, and other similar phenomena.
(Example – a poltergeist)
Summum Nec Metuam Diem Nec Optima
BaronIveagh wrote:Ghost –
[quote=BaronIveagh]Ghost – A non-corporeal image limited to two or possibly three senses that does not appear to interact in a standard fashion with current corporeal reality, usually following a guide line or floor plan of a subjectively earlier point in space-time. [/quote]
What is corporeal reality? Why are you limiting the number of senses – can you give an example please? How many seriously investigated cases (as opposed to legends or TV ghost hunting type nonsense) do you know of where a ghost actually followed a floor plan of a ‘subjectively earlier point in space-time’? The vast majority of ghosts are simply figures glimpsed briefed.
[quote]Apparition – A non-corporeal being that appears at least aware of corporeal reality, though it may or may not interact with it. [/quote]
Why is that different to a ghost in your definition? Most people would say the words ghost and apparition mean the same thing. Serious paranormal researchers generally prefer the word apparition because it isn’t as loaded with spirit connotations as ghost.
There are almost no seriously investigated cases where ghosts show ‘awareness’ and those that do are probably hallucinations.
Mysteryshopper wrote:
How
[quote=Mysteryshopper]How many seriously investigated cases (as opposed to legends or TV ghost hunting type nonsense) do you know of where a ghost actually followed a floor plan of a ‘subjectively earlier point in space-time’? The vast majority of ghosts are simply figures glimpsed briefed.[/quote]
There is the old chestnut of the Romans in the Treasury House, York. However, there is just one witness account of this and I am unsure of how good the investigation was, if indeed it has been scientifically investigated thoroughly. Apart from that I am unaware, off the top of my head of any other accounts of ghosts following early floor plans etc.
What about more recent
What about more recent catagories we find cropping up like Elementals and Shadow People. Have these terms got any real value?
Perhaps this case should
Perhaps this case should form a thread of it’s own as this post is more about the Treasurers House case rather than classifications. Incidentally, I seem to recall reading recently (cannot remember where) about a very similar case as the Treasurer’s which happened along the line of Dere Street (I think). Basically someone saw some soldiers, marching, cut off at the new, etc. I think it must have been recounted somewhere online as I remember reading it and wondering if someone was getting confused with the York case.
I’ve always been slightly puzzled regarding the Treasurer’s House case, although, I hasten to add, I’ve never done any in depth research into it, other than reading the reports, but the location of the House, from what I remember, always made it look like an unlikely location for a legion to move along – it’s too close to the walls. But it would be interesting to try and date the soldiers from the desciption of their clothing. Also, this area of York was heavily occupied during the early/mid Roman period, and yet the electrician in the case heard a trumpet which would imply that the soldiers were from a pre-occupation period – soldiers would be unlikely to be wondering round the edges of the walled city blowing their trumpets.
And then there is the trumpet sound and marching. I think it would be fair to say that a majority of visual hauntings are silent and that the majority of ‘auditory’ hauntings are associated with poltergeist activity – anyway I digress. It would be worth undertaking a bit of research on the sound – trumpets weren’t always used in Roman Britain, and certainly not wheeled out for any old activity. In fact, there were other ‘instruments’ used more frequently, and it’s unlikely that the electrician would be able to identify these sounds as we don’t have modern equivelants, so I’m wondering if he’s been influenced by popular media – I, Claudius, Carry on Cleo, Ben Hurr?
Phantom Hitchhikers
I have copied a bit from Wikipedia below that details the catagories set bt the folklorists Beardsley and Hankey. Also it compares Baughman’s classification system. Are scales like this useful and would something like this be a good model for catagorising ghosts and hauntings?
[quote]The first proper study of the story of the vanishing hitchhiker was undertaken in 1942-3 by Richard Beardsley and Rosalie Hankey, who collected as many accounts as they could and attempted to analyse them.
The Beardsley-Hankey survey elicited 79 written accounts of encounters with vanishing hitchhikers, drawn from across America.
They found: "Four distinctly different versions, distinguishable because of obvious differences in development and essence."
These are described as:
A. Stories where the hitch-hiker [sic] gives an address through which the motorist learns he has just given a lift to a ghost. 49 of the Beardsley-Hankey samples fell into this category, with responses from 16 states of the USA.
B. Stories where the hitch-hiker is an old woman who prophesies disaster or the end of World War II; subsequent inquiries likewise reveal her to be deceased. Nine of the samples fit this description, and eight of these came from the vicinity of Chicago. Beardsley and Hankey felt that this indicated a local origin, which they dated to approximately 1933: two of the version B hitchhikers in this sample foretold disaster at the Century of Progress Exposition and another foresaw calamity "at the World’s Fair". The strict topicality of these unsuccessful forecasts did not appear to thwart the appearance of further Version ‘B’ hitch-hikers, one of whom warned that Northerly Island, Michigan, would soon be submerged (this never happened).
C. Stories where a girl is met at some place of entertainment, e.g., dance, instead of on the road; she leaves some token (often the overcoat she borrowed from the motorist) on her grave by way of corroborating the experience and her identity. The uniformity amongst separate accounts of this variant led Beardsley and Hankey to strongly doubt its folkloric authenticity.
D. Stories where the hitch-hiker is later identified as a local divinity.
Beardsley and Hankey were particularly interested to note one instance (location: Kingston, New York, 1941) in which the vanishing hitchhiker was subsequently identified as the late Mother Cabrini, founder of the local Sacred Heart Orphanage, who was beatified for her work. The authors felt that this was a case of Version ‘B’ glimpsed in transition to Version ‘D’.
Beardsley and Hankey concluded that Version ‘A’ was closest to the original form of the story, containing the essential elements of the legend. Version ‘B’ and ‘D’, they believed, were localised variations, while ‘C’ was supposed to have started life as a separate ghost story which at some stage became conflated with the original vanishing hitchhiker story (Version ‘A’).
One of their conclusions certainly seems reflected in the continuation of vanishing hitchhiker stories: The hitchhiker is, in the majority of cases, female and the lift-giver male. Beardsley and Hankey’s sample contained 47 young female apparitions, 14 old lady apparitions, and 14 more of an indeterminate sort.
Ernest W Baughman’s Type- and Motif-Index of the Folk Tales of England and North America (1966) delineates the basic vanishing hitchhiker as follows:
"Ghost of young woman asks for ride in automobile, disappears from closed car without the driver’s knowledge, after giving him an address to which she wishes to be taken. The driver asks person at the address about the rider, finds she has been dead for some time. (Often the driver finds that the ghost has made similar attempts to return, usually on the anniversary of death in automobile accident. Often, too, the ghost leaves some item such as a scarf or travelling bag in the car.)"
Baughman’s classification system grades this basic story as motif E332.3.3.1.
Subcategories include:
• E332.3.3.1(a) for vanishing hitchhikers who reappear on anniversaries;
• E332.3.3.1(b) for vanishing hitchhikers who leave items in vehicles, unless the item is a pool of water in which case it is E332.3.3.1(c);
• E332.3.3.1(d) is for accounts of sinister old ladies who prophesy disasters;
• E332.3.3.1(e) contains accounts of phantoms who are apparently sufficiently solid to engage in activities such as eating or drinking during their journey;
• E332.3.3.1(f) is for phantom parents who want to be taken to the sickbed of their dying son;
• E332.3.3.1(g) is for hitchhikers simply requesting a lift home;
• E332.3.3.1(h-j) are a category reserved exclusively for vanishing nuns (a surprisingly common variant), some of whom foretell the future.
Here, the phenomenon blends into religious encounters, with the next and last vanishing hitchhiker classification – E332.3.3.2 – being for encounters with divinities who take to the road as hitchhikers. The legend of St Christopher is considered one of these, and the story of Philip the Apostle being transported by God after encountering the Ethiopian on the road (Acts 8:26-39) is sometimes similarly interpreted [/quote]