Oh, how odd I feel! Somehow I feel like changing teams.

Join BOINC Synergy! Click the sig!

---

me@rescam.org

Ya know....with as much as they protest about me trying to get people to join my VERY small team....one would think that they are either jealous or worried about our little group. :-)

Maybe they want to join us, but have to keep it a secret from their current team....

NO TH ATS WHY WE HAVE A FORUM JUST FOR TEAM RECRUITING.
OR POST IT IN YOUR SIG (and your avatar). BUT TO HAVE YOU CONSTANTLY MENTIONING YOUR TEAM IN A VEILED ATTEMPT TO RECRUIT LESSONS YOUR CREDITABILITY, I like you allot KM but if we mentioned TFFE in almost every post people will get mad at us.

BTW
I am Sure your Calm Chaos is a great team.

Well let's see here. TFFE has a Team Recruitment thread...but there is also a thread called " A Cunning Plan...." which is nothing more than a " veiled " recruiting thread.

Let me worry about my credibility. Everyone...except you, apparantly...knows that I just let people join as they will. If they don't want to....fine. Oh....some of the people that have seen me mention the team have actually joined up. You guys have enough people that you can afford to miss a few.

Not to mention that I haven't been doing it nearly as much as I did before.

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

LOL

I respectfully protest

So do I. Fight fire with fire.

Damn..I hate it when we agree on things. It feels so wrong somehow.

But you've agreed with me twice recently!

Once is an uncomfortable coincidence...

Twice sounds like a conspiracy ;)

Ya know....with as much as they protest about me trying to get people to join my VERY small team....one would think that they are either jealous or worried about our little group. :-)

Maybe they want to join us, but have to keep it a secret from their current team....

Now, now, Sir KM I hope your not trying to turn your very interesting thread into some kind of gulp, god forbid... "Subliminal Calm Chaos Team Recruiting Campaign"

Nahhhh...not me. some people seem to want to take it that way though.

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

Well let's see here. TFFE has a Team Recruitment thread...but there is also a thread called " A Cunning Plan...." which is nothing more than a " veiled " recruiting thread.

At least you haven't had hijacking attempts on your recruiting threads. So you have that going for you, which is nice.

Let me worry about my credibility. Everyone...except you, apparantly...knows that I just let people join as they will. If they don't want to....fine. Oh....some of the people that have seen me mention the team have actually joined up. You guys have enough people that you can afford to miss a few. Not to mention that I haven't been doing it nearly as much as I did before.

I know of one person you keep trying really hard to recruit. ;)

---

me@rescam.org

Well let's see here. TFFE has a Team Recruitment thread...but there is also a thread called " A Cunning Plan...." which is nothing more than a " veiled " recruiting thread.

At least you haven't had hijacking attempts on your recruiting threads. So you have that going for you, which is nice.

Let me worry about my credibility. Everyone...except you, apparantly...knows that I just let people join as they will. If they don't want to....fine. Oh....some of the people that have seen me mention the team have actually joined up. You guys have enough people that you can afford to miss a few. Not to mention that I haven't been doing it nearly as much as I did before.

I know of one person you keep trying really hard to recruit. ;)

LMAO!!!! That's cuz we love you Misfit....lol

Besides, it's all in good fun. :-)

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

I like you allot KM but if we mentioned TFFE in almost every post people will get mad at us.

Just to clarify....

I do not mention the team in " almost every post ".

I like you as well CA, but exaggerating things is not necessary.

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

well look at that. KM messed up his link. Under unspoken forum rules regarding serial links once a link is broken it may not be repeated. Sorry dude.

---

me@rescam.org

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

well look at that. KM messed up his link. Under unspoken forum rules regarding serial links once a link is broken it may not be repeated. Sorry dude.

I always thought that was an urban legend...

---

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles

What? No re-posting when links were mis-typed, Misfit?

---

Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

What? No re-posting when links were mis-typed, Misfit?

Nice try.

---

me@rescam.org

LOL

I respectfully protest

So do I. Fight fire with fire.

Damn..I hate it when we agree on things. It feels so wrong somehow.

But you've agreed with me twice recently!

Once is an uncomfortable coincidence...

Twice sounds like a conspiracy ;)

Ya know....with as much as they protest about me trying to get people to join my VERY small team....one would think that they are either jealous or worried about our little group. :-)

Maybe they want to join us, but have to keep it a secret from their current team....

Now, now, Sir KM I hope your not trying to turn your very interesting thread into some kind of gulp, god forbid... "Subliminal Calm Chaos Team Recruiting Campaign"

Nahhhh...not me. some people seem to want to take it that way though.

To make a small point:
I've been lurking around in this thread for some time, and NO-ONE has attempted to recruit me!
I find that refreshing :)

---

To make a small point:
I've been lurking around in this thread for some time, and NO-ONE has attempted to recruit me!
I find that refreshing :)

Yes I have. You just need to look at this thread.

---

me@rescam.org

To make a small point:
I've been lurking around in this thread for some time, and NO-ONE has attempted to recruit me!
I find that refreshing :)

Yes I have. You just need to look at this thread.

I s'pose there's a first time for everything!! lol

I might set up my own team tho... specially for small male alien life-forms and the cute female earthlings that like them!! hehe...*wicked grin*

---

To make a small point:
I've been lurking around in this thread for some time, and NO-ONE has attempted to recruit me!
I find that refreshing :)

Me too, but you know you always have a Home if you would like it! (Veiled Attempt)

---

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

well look at that. KM messed up his link. Under unspoken forum rules regarding serial links once a link is broken it may not be repeated. Sorry dude.

Misfit....WTH are you talking about????

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

LOL

I respectfully protest

So do I. Fight fire with fire.

Damn..I hate it when we agree on things. It feels so wrong somehow.

But you've agreed with me twice recently!

Once is an uncomfortable coincidence...

Twice sounds like a conspiracy ;)

Ya know....with as much as they protest about me trying to get people to join my VERY small team....one would think that they are either jealous or worried about our little group. :-)

Maybe they want to join us, but have to keep it a secret from their current team....

Now, now, Sir KM I hope your not trying to turn your very interesting thread into some kind of gulp, god forbid... "Subliminal Calm Chaos Team Recruiting Campaign"

Nahhhh...not me. some people seem to want to take it that way though.

To make a small point:
I've been lurking around in this thread for some time, and NO-ONE has attempted to recruit me!
I find that refreshing :)

I am pretty sure that the last time I looked....you were on BOINC Australia. Therefore, I didn't try to get you to join up. I don't go after people who are already on a team. Those who aren't on a team, I tell about mine.

---

Air Cold, the blade stops;
from silent stone,
Death is preordained

Calm Chaos Forums : Everyone Welcome

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20061028/sc_space/theshadyscienceofghosthunting

The Shady Science of Ghost Hunting

Benjamin Radford

LiveScience.com Sat Oct 28, 8:45 AM ET

Ghosts are big business. For entities that may or may not exist, they seem to be everywhere, especially during Halloween.

They are in books and on television shows, such as CBS's "The Ghost Whisperer" and NBC's "Medium." Dozens of "ghost hunter" organizations exist across North America, small groups of self-styled ghost buffs who lurk around reputedly haunted places, hoping to glimpse or photograph a spirit.

The most famous ghost hunters are two plumbers who moonlight as paranormal investigators, seen in the popular Sci-Fi Channel reality show/soap opera series "Ghost Hunters." They go to haunted places and find "evidence" of ghosts such as cold spots, photographic anomalies called orbs, and other such spookiness.

The two featured investigators, Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson, are proudly blue-collar workers, not egghead Ph.D. scientists, which adds to their strong "regular guy" appeal.

Top 10 Scary Creatures / Top 5 Haunted Houses / Pumpkin Shortage?

Where are the ghosts?

While one doesn't need to be a scientist to search for ghosts, the pair (like most ghost hunters) could benefit greatly from a little critical thinking. They claim to be skeptics but are very credulous and seem to have no real understanding of scientific methods or real investigation. (Audiences don't seem to wonder why these "expert" ghost hunters always fail: Even after two seasons and over ten years of research, they still have yet to prove that ghosts exist!)

Though most ghost investigators' worst crime is wasting time, sometimes they make nuisances of themselves and even break the law.

In October 2005, three ghost hunters in Salem, Massachusetts, were arrested for trespassing on private property in search of ghosts. They had entered an abandoned hospital reputed to be haunted. The group was so busy looking for spirits they failed to notice the police station across the street; all three were arrested, fined, and sent home. Trespassing or vandalizing ghost hunters have also been arrested in cemeteries in Illinois, Connecticut, and other states.

Ghost detectors

When it comes to searching for ghosts, you'd think that only the most reliable methods would be used in an attempt to get solid evidence for something as mysterious and elusive as a spirit. Yet in ghost hunting, often the less scientific the methods and equipment, the more likely a researcher is to find "evidence" for ghosts.

Ghost hunters use a variety of creative—and dubious—methods to detect their quarry's presence, including psychics. Psychics not only claim to locate ghosts but also to communicate with the spirits, who unfortunately don't provide any useful or verifiable information from the afterlife [see a séance].

Virtually all ghost hunter groups claim to be scientific, and most give that appearance because they use high-tech scientific equipment such as Geiger counters, Electromagnetic Field (EMF) detectors, ion detectors, and infrared cameras [and sensitive microphones]. Yet the equipment is only as scientific as the person using it; you may own the world's most sophisticated thermometer, but if you are using it as a barometer, your measurements are worthless.

Just as using a calculator doesn't make you a mathematician, using a scientific instrument doesn't make you a scientist.

Devices that don't work

In 2003, while I was investigating a haunted house in Buffalo, New York, the owner of the house asked me what equipment I planned to use. He had glanced in my duffel bag, which contained two cameras, a tape recorder, notebooks, a tape measure, a flashlight, and a few other items. Perhaps he was expecting to see a Negative Ionizer Ghost Containment backpack like the kind Bill Murray wore in Ghostbusters.

An EMF meter is among the most common devices used by ghost hunters today. I spoke to Tom Cook, of TomsGadgets.com, a British purveyor of "scientific" paranormal kits for the enterprising (and gullible) investigator. Starter kits begin at £105 (US$180) and reach up to £500 (US$850) for a custom ghost-hunting kit. (Negative Ionizer Ghost Containment packs were not listed.)

I asked Cook what, exactly, the scientific rationale was behind the equipment he sold.

"At a haunted location," Cook said, "strong, erratic fluctuating EMFs are commonly found. It seems these energy fields have some definite connection to the presence of ghosts. The exact nature of that connection is still a mystery. However, the anomalous fields are easy to find. Whenever you locate one, a ghost might be present.... any erratic EMF fluctuations you may detect may indicate ghostly activity."

In the final analysis, Cook admitted, "there exists no device that can conclusively detect ghosts."

Uncomfortable reality

The uncomfortable reality that ghost hunters carefully avoid—the elephant in the tiny, haunted room—is of course that no one has ever shown that any of this equipment actually detects ghosts.

The supposed links between ghosts and electromagnetic fields, low temperatures, radiation, odd photographic images, and so on are based on nothing more than guesses, unproven theories, and wild conjecture. If a device could reliably determine the presence or absence of ghosts, then by definition, ghosts would be proven to exist. I own an EMF meter, but since it's useless for ghost investigations—it finds not spirits but red herrings—I use it in my lectures and seminars as an example of pseudoscience. The most important tools in this or any investigation are a questioning mind and a solid understanding of scientific principles.

The ghost hunters' anti-scientific illogic is clear: if one area of a home is colder than another, that may indicate a ghost; if an EMF meter detects a field, that too may be a ghost; if dowsing rods cross, that might be a ghost. Just about any "anomaly," anything that anyone considers odd for any reason, from an undetermined sound to a "bad feeling" to a blurry photo, can be (and has been) considered evidence of ghosts.

I was even at one investigation where a ghost supposedly caused a person's mild headache. Because the standard of evidence is so low, it's little wonder that ghost hunters often find "evidence" (but never proof) of ghosts.

Reality check

The whole idea of ghosts runs into trouble as soon as a little logic is applied.

There's not even agreement on what ghosts are—or might be. A common claim is that ghosts are spirits of the dead who have been wronged or murdered. Let's inject some real-world statistics into that assumption and see what we get.

If murder victims whose killings remains unsolved are truly destined to walk the earth and haunt the living, then we should expect to encounter ghosts nearly everywhere. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, roughly a quarter of all homicides remains unsolved each year. (In fact, fewer homicides are solved now than in the past; in 1976, 79 percent of homicides were cleared, down to 64 percent in 2002.) There are about 30,000 homicides in America each year.

Using the most recent numbers, that's about 11,000 unsolved murders per year, and 110,000 over the course of only ten years, and probably well over million over the course of the twentieth century in America alone.

Where are all the ghosts?

And why aren't they helping to bring their killers to justice, with so many crimes unsolved? Why would they hang out in scary mansions instead of directing police to evidence that would avenge their murders?

For that matter, why are ghosts seen wearing clothing? It's one thing to suggest that a person's spirit has a soul that can be seen after death; but do shoes, coats, hats, and belts also have souls? Logically, ghosts should appear naked. The fact that they don't suggests that people's ideas of what ghosts are—and what they look like—are strongly influenced by social and cultural expectations. (For an excellent discussion of this, see Richard Finucane's book "Ghosts: Appearances of the Dead & Cultural Transformation.")

If ghosts exist, why are we no closer to finding out what they really are, after so much research?

The evidence for ghosts is no better today than it was a year ago, a decade ago, or a century ago. Ultimately, ghost hunting is not about the evidence (if it was, the search would have been abandoned long ago). Instead, it's about having fun with friends, telling ghost stories, and the enjoyment of pretending you are searching the edge of the unknown. (It's also about making money selling "Ghost Hunters" T-shirts, books, and videos.) Ghost hunters may be spinning their wheels, but at least they are enjoying the ride.

Benjamin Radford, of Skeptical Inquirer science magazine, has investigated ghosts and the paranormal for over a decade; you can read one of his haunted house investigations here.

Full Frightening Coverage

* What Halloween is Really About
* Top 5 Haunted Places in America
* Halloween's Top 10 Scary Creatures
* Higher Education Fuels Stronger Belief in Ghosts
* Vampires a Mathematical Impossibility, Scientist Says
* Candy Fears are Mere Halloween Phantoms
* Halloween Too Scary for Some Kids
* In Search of the Real Dracula
* Pumpkin Shortage?

* Original Story: The Shady Science of Ghost Hunting

Visit LiveScience.com for more daily news, views and scientific inquiry with an original, provocative point of view. LiveScience reports amazing, real world breakthroughs, made simple and stimulating for people on the go. Check out our collection of Science, Animal and Dinosaur Pictures, Science Videos, Hot Topics, Trivia, Top 10s, Voting, Amazing Images, Reader Favorites, and more. Get cool gadgets at the new LiveScience Store, sign up for our free daily email newsletter and check out our RSS feeds today!

---

Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

well look at that. KM messed up his link. Under unspoken forum rules regarding serial links once a link is broken it may not be repeated. Sorry dude.

Misfit....WTH are you talking about????

Oh you know.

---

me@rescam.org

Tonight on Coast to Coast AM airing at 1am EST

Sat 10.28 >>
Brendan Cook & Barbara McBeath from the Ghost Investigators Society, return with a new selection of actual recorded voices of ghosts, known as Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP).

[url= http://www.kfi640.com/pages/streaming.html]Free Streaming Radio courtesy Of KFI in Los Angeles[/url]

What? No re-posting when links were mis-typed, Misfit?

Nice try.

I succeeded, as well as performed another three letter version of consonance. See above.

---

Capitalize on this good fortune, one word can bring you round ... changes.