A REPORT ON

“

SUBMITTED BY:

NAME: DEBAYON SAHA

CLASS ROLL NO: 12/EI/28

UNIVERSITY ROLL NO: 10300512028

UNIVERSITY REG. NO: 121030110360

DEPARTMENT: APPLIED ELECTRONICS & INSTRUMENTATION ENGINEERING

PAPER NAME: TECHNICAL REPORT WRITING & LANGUAGE PRACTICE LAB

PAPER CODE: HU-481

SUBMITTED TO: PROF. POULAMI ROY CHOWDHURY

DATE OF SUBMISSION: 28thMARCH,2014

COLLEGE: HALDIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGYYEAR: 2014

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PREFACE‘GHOST’- It is really a diplomatic and confusing subject. People will experience the death of others and they will wonder whether there is anything beyond our life in the physical body or not. Question is whether there are actually any spirits or souls or not. Do they survive after the death of our body? Are they real or hallucination of our mind? These questions get into METAPHYSICS, a branch of philosophy and science. Metaphysics deals with anything beyond science.

I would like to preface by stating that I have never encountered a ghost or any spiritual phenomenon till date. I have just heard many stories about them. Are the stories about them true? What scientists say about ghosts or spirits? Are Gods really exist or not? All these questions are really confusing and also make some people curious about the subject. Out of this curiosity many people researches about paranormal phenomenon. Some of them claim that there is nothing about them, all the stories and incidents are fake or man-made or hallucination of our mind. But some of them also claim that the stories and incidents are real and ghosts or spirits really exist, they are not the hallucination of our mind. Till now we have no prominent evidence from which we can say that they really exist. Also science can not give us any proof about their non-existence. I have collected lots of data, stories, incidents and also studies what paranormal researchers and scientists have said about those incidents to complete my report. I am really confused about their existence- they really exist or not.

In this report I tried to give all the information about the paranormal phenomenon- some story, incidents, research and explanation relating science both about their existence and non-existence. Now it depends on the reader that they believe in ghosts or not after going through the report. Apart from this after reading this report some reader will become really curious about the paranormal and they will think about all these. I hope one day this subject will be really disclosed to us by scientists with some proper evidence and that day there will be no conflict about their existence.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTApart from the efforts of myself, the success of any project depends largely on the encouragement and guidelines of many others. I take this opportunity to express my gratitude to the people who have been helpful in the successful completion of this report. I want to express my gratitude to all the people who have given their heart whelming support to finish this report. First of all I would like to express my thanks and deep regards to prof. Poulami Roy Chowdhury for her exemplary guidance and encouragement throughout the course of this report. I would like to express my thanks to my parents for their financial as well as moral support. I would like to also express my thanks to my group mate Rupesh, Abhay, Amit, Pragnya and Saborni for their contribution. I would like to thank other friends for their help and support to complete this report. The guidance and support received from all the members who contributed in this report, was vital for the successful completion of this report. I am grateful for their constant support and help. My thanks and appreciations also go to my colleague in developing the report and people who have willingly helped me out with their abilities.

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ABSTRACT

Whether or not ghost actually exist is a question that has been debated in almost every culture and region around the world. Those who believe in ghost point to countless instances of unexplained phenomena in which strange sightings and paranormal phenomena happenings have taken place. The skeptics on the other hand dismiss such suggestions about “ghost” as figments of human imagination that have no scientific basis or proof. This report explores this question.

This report has two different aspects one, it will emphasis on the facts of ghosts existence and other on facts denying their existence. In the first part we will go through some incidents, facts, places, claims and certain scientific theories so that if ghosts do exit then how it could be justified. Second part of this report will explain the reasons behind paranormal sightings, human brain and lots of other facts through which it can be justified that if one don’t believe in ghost then what could be the reasons.

At the very beginning, I think it’s you and your perspective which decides that “Do you believe in GHOST?” In my personal opinion, Yes, I do believe in ghost as I had an incident in my life about which I will be terrified in my whole life. Other of my group-mates have their own opinion. This report is not really meant to contradict anyone’s view. We have heard about a lot of incidents in past which reveals the existence of ghost such as The Curse of Tutankhamen, and there are many such stories. There is a long list of people claiming that they have encountered ghost and it was real creature. These stories must have something in it. We can’t neglect the presence of that supernatural power which drives this mighty world and but this is also a universal truth that good and bad are the two different faces of a coin. In this modern era of technology and globalization it’s worthless if you don’t have any evidence. We agree that that there are people claiming these things but a few of them are able to have some evidence of any scientific proof about it. If anyone claims that he/she has an encounter with something called “ghostly”, it might be his/her mental illness or he/she might be lying.

So, here in this report we will go through all these facts and try to make you decide that “do you

believe in ghost?”  

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

SL NO TOPIC PAGE NO

1. PREFACE 1.2. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 2.3. ABSTRACT 3.4. TABLE OF CONTENTS 4.5. INTRODUCTION 5.6. WHAT IS A GHOST 5.7. METAPHYSICS 7.8. TYPES OF GHOST 8.9. HISTORY OF GHOSTS 9.10. FEELINGS WHEN GHOSTS ARE AROUND 13.11. PLACES WHERE GHOSTS ARE FOUND 13.12. HAUNTED PLACES IN INDIA 13.13. HAUNTED PLACES AROUND THE WORLD 16.14. THE CURSE OF TUTANKHAMEN 20.15. RELATING SCIENCE WITH GHOSTS 21.16. CASE STUDY OF BORLEY RECTORY 23.17. LOGICAL FACTS- WHY GHOSTS DO NOT EXIST 25.18. SCIENTIFIC REASONS- ‘WHY DO WE ENCOUNTER GHOSTS’ 26.19. CONCLUSION 31.20. REFERENCES 32.21. ONLINE SOURCES 33.22. BIBLIOGRAPHY 34.

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MAIN BODY OF THE REPORT

INTRODUCTION

When we discuss about the ‘Ghosts’ or on the topic ‘Do We Believe in Ghosts’- then the first question arise that “What is a Ghost?” Now we will see that “what is a ghost” & some basic information about them. Then we will try to relate science with the Ghosts.

WHAT IS A GHOST

In traditional belief and fiction, a ghost (sometimes known as a specter, phantom, apparition or spook) is the soul or spirit of a dead person or animal that can appear, in visible form or other manifestation, to the living. Descriptions of the apparition of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to realistic, lifelike visions. The deliberate attempt to contact the spirit of a deceased person is known as necromancy, or in spiritism as a séance.

The belief in manifestations of the spirits of the dead is widespread, dating back to animism or ancestor worship in pre-literate cultures. Certain religious practices—funeral rites, exorcisms, and some practices of spiritualism and ritual magic—are specifically designed to rest the spirits of the dead. Ghosts are generally described as solitary essences that haunt particular locations, objects, or people they were associated with in life, though stories of phantom armies, ghost trains, phantom ships, and even ghost animals have also been recounted.

The English word ghost continues Old English gást, from a hypothetical Common Germanic *gaistaz. It is common to West Germanic, but lacking in North Germanic and East Germanic. The pre-Germanic form was *ghoisdo-s, apparently from a root denoting "fury, anger" reflected in Old Norse geisa "to rage". The Germanic word is recorded as masculine only, but likely continues a neuter s-stem. The original meaning of the Germanic word would thus have been an animating principle of the mind, in particular capable of excitation and fury. In Germanic paganism, "Germanic Mercury", and the later Odin, was at the same time the conductor of the dead and the "lord of fury" leading the Hunt. Besides denoting the human spirit or soul, both of the living and the deceased, the Old English word is used as a synonym of Latin spiritus also in the meaning of "breath" or "blast" from the earliest attestations (9th century). It could also denote any good or evil spirit, i.e. angels and demons; the Anglo-Saxon gospel refers to the demonic possession of Matthew 12:43 as se unclæna gast. Also from the Old English period, the word could denote the spirit of God, viz. the "Holy Ghost". The now prevailing sense of "the soul of a deceased person, spoken of as appearing in a visible form" only emerges in Middle English (14th century). The modern noun does, however, retain a wider field of application, extending on one hand to "soul", "spirit", "vital principle", "mind" or "psyche", the seat of feeling, thought and moral judgment; on the other hand used figuratively of any shadowy outline, fuzzy or unsubstantial image, in optics, photography and cinematography especially a flare, secondary image or spurious signal.

The synonym spook is a Dutch loanword, akin to Low German spôk (of uncertain etymology); it entered the English language via the United States in the 19th century. Alternative words in modern usage include spectre (from Latin spectrum), the Scottish wraith (of obscure origin), phantom (via French ultimately from Greek phantasma, compare fantasy) and apparition. The term shade in classical mythology translates Greek σκιάor Latin umbra, in reference to the notion of spirits in the Greek underworld. "Haint" is a synonym for ghost used in regional English of the southern United States, and the "haint tale" is a common feature of southern oral and literary tradition. The term poltergeist is a German word, literally a "noisy ghost", for a spirit said to manifest itself by invisibly

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moving and influencing objects. Wraith is a Scots word for "ghost", "spectre" or "apparition". It came to be used in Scottish Romanticist literature, and acquired the more general or figurative sense of "portent" or "omen". In 18th- to 19th-century Scottish literature, it was also applied to aquatic spirits. The word has no commonly accepted etymology; the OED notes "of obscure origin" only. An association with the verb writhe was the etymology favored by J. R. R. Tolkien. Tolkien's use of the word in the naming of the creatures known as the Ringwraiths has influenced later usage in fantasy literature. Bogeyor bogy/bogie is a term for a ghost, and appears in Scottish poet John Mayne's Hallowe'en in 1780. A revenant is a deceased person returning from the dead to haunt the living, either as a disembodied ghost or alternatively as an animated ("undead") corpse. Also related is the concept of a fetch, the visible ghost or spirit of a person yet alive.

Another widespread belief concerning ghosts is that they are composed of a misty, airy, or subtle material. Anthropologists link this idea to early beliefs that ghosts were the person within the person (the person's spirit), most noticeable in ancient cultures as a person's breath, which upon exhaling in colder climates appears visibly as a white mist. This belief may have also fostered the metaphorical meaning of "breath" in certain languages, such as the Latin spiritus and the Greek pneuma, which by analogy became extended to mean the soul. In the Bible, God is depicted as synthesizing Adam, as a living soul, from the dust of the Earth and the breath of God. In many traditional accounts, ghosts were often thought to be deceased people looking for vengeance (vengeful ghosts), or imprisoned on earth for bad things they did during life. The appearance of a ghost has often been regarded as an omen or portent of death. Seeing one's own ghostly double or "fetch" is a related omen of death.

White ladies were reported to appear in many rural areas, and supposed to have died tragically or suffered trauma in life. White Lady legends are found around the world. Common to many of them is the theme of losing or being betrayed by a husband or fiancé. They are often associated with an individual family line or regarded as a harbinger of death similar to a banshee. Legends of ghost ships have existed since the 18th century; most notable of these is the Flying Dutchman. This theme has been used in literature in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge.

Engraving of the Hammersmith Ghost

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METAPHYSICS

Metaphysics is a traditional branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world that encompasses it, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:1)What is ultimately there? & 2) What is it like?

A person who studies metaphysics is called a metaphysicist or a metaphysician. The metaphysician attempts to clarify the fundamental notions by which people understand the world, e.g., existence, objects and their properties, space and time, cause and effect, and possibility. A central branch of metaphysics is ontology, the investigation into the basic categories of being and how they relate to each other. Another central branch of metaphysics is cosmology, the study of the origin, fundamental structure, nature, and dynamics of the universe. Some include Epistemology as another central tenet of metaphysics but this can be questioned.

Prior to the modern history of science, scientific questions were addressed as a part of metaphysics known as natural philosophy. Originally, the term "science" (Latin scientia) simply meant "knowledge". The scientific method, however, transformed natural philosophy into an empirical activity deriving from experiment unlike the rest of philosophy. By the end of the 18th century, it had begun to be called "science" to distinguish it from philosophy. Thereafter, metaphysics denoted philosophical enquiry of a non-empirical character into the nature of existence. Some philosophers of science, such as the neo-positivists, say that natural science rejects the study of metaphysics, while other philosophers of science strongly disagree. The word "metaphysics" derives from the Greek words μετά (metá, "beyond", "upon" or "after") and φυσικά (physiká, "physics"). It was first used as the title for several of Aristotle's works, because they were usually anthologized after the works on physics in complete editions. The prefix Meta- ("beyond") indicates that these works come "after" the chapters on physics. However, Aristotle himself did not call the subject of these books "Metaphysics": he referred to it as "first philosophy." The editor of Aristotle's works, Andronicus of Rhodes, is thought to have placed the books on first philosophy right after another work, Physics, and called them τὰ μετὰ τὰ φυσικὰ βιβλία (ta meta ta physika biblia) or "the books that come after the [books on] physics". This was misread by Latin scholiasts, who thought it meant "the science of what is beyond the physical". However, once the name was given, the commentators sought to find intrinsic reasons for its appropriateness. For instance, it was understood to mean "the science of the world beyond nature" (physis in Greek), that is, the science of the immaterial. Again, it was understood to refer to the chronological or pedagogical order among our philosophical studies, so that the "metaphysical sciences" would mean "those that we study after having mastered the sciences that deal with the physical world".

There is a widespread use of the term in current popular literature which replicates this error, i.e. that metaphysical means spiritual non-physical: thus, "metaphysical healing" means healing by means of remedies that are not physical.

And the one section of ‘METAPHYSICS’ is Religion and spirituality. Theology is the study of a god or gods and the nature of the divine. Whether there is a god (monotheism), many gods (polytheism) or no gods (atheism), or whether it is unknown or unknowable whether any gods exist (agnosticism; apophatic theology), and whether a divine entity directly intervenes in the world (theism), or its sole function is to be the first cause of the universe (deism); these and whether a god or gods and the world are different (as in panentheism and dualism), or are identical (as in pantheism), are some of the primary metaphysical questions concerning philosophy of religion.

Within the standard Western philosophical tradition, theology reached its peak under the medieval school of thought known as scholasticism, which focused primarily on the metaphysical aspects of

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Christianity. The work of the scholastics is still an integral part of modern philosophy, with key figures such as Thomas Aquinas still playing an important role in the philosophy of religion.

TYPES OF GHOST

There are no such type of classification of Ghosts, but according to human knowledge and paranormal researchers, claim Ghosts can be classified into 4 categories. They are as follows:

1) Poltergeists:

In folklore and parapsychology, a poltergeist is a type of ghost or other supernatural being supposedly responsible for physical disturbances such as loud noises and objects moved around or destroyed. Most accounts of poltergeists describe movement or levitation of objects, such as furniture and cutlery, or noises such as knocking on doors. Poltergeists have also been claimed to be capable of pinching, biting, hitting and tripping people. Poltergeists occupy numerous niches in cultural folklore, and have traditionally been described as troublesome spirits who haunt a particular person instead of a specific location. Such alleged poltergeist manifestations have been reported in many cultures and countries including the United States, Japan, Brazil, Australia, and most European nations, with early accounts dating back to the 1st century.

A Picture of a Poltergeist

2) Tuyul or Toyol:

A Toyol or Tuyul is a mythical spirit in Malay mythology of South-East Asia, especially in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Singapore. It is sometimes called the "Kwee Kia" in Hokkien. In Thailand, they are called Koman-tong (Male) and Koman-lay (Female). In Philippines they have a similar child spirit called the "tiyanak". In Cambodia they are called "Cohen Kroh". In South Korea called "Do Yeol". It is a small child spirit invoked by a dukun (Indonesian shaman) or pawang (Malay witch doctor) from a dead human fetus using black magic.

3) Psychic Mediums:

Psychic mediums are persons who claim to be able communicate with the spirits of dead people. There are people who actually believe that they have powers to perceive paranormal phenomena, but none have been able to demonstrate such powers when tested under controlled laboratory conditions.

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A Psychic Medium named Evan Colin

4) Holy Spirit:

The Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is the third person of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. As one of the three persons of the Trinity, the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) is understood to be equal with God the Father (Jehovah), and God the Son (Jesus Christ). Christian art often depicts the Holy Spirit as a dove.

HISTORY OF GHOSTS

1) Ancient Near East and Egypt:

There are many references to ghosts in Mesopotamian religions – the religions of Sumer, Babylon, Assyria and other early states in Mesopotamia. Traces of these beliefs survive in the later Abrahamic religions that came to dominate the region. Ghosts were thought to be created at time of death, taking on the memory and personality of the dead person. They traveled to the netherworld, where they were assigned a position, and led an existence similar in some ways to that of the living. Relatives of the dead were expected to make offerings of food and drink to the dead to ease their conditions. If they did not, the ghosts could inflict misfortune and illness on the living. Traditional healing practices ascribed a variety of illnesses to the action of ghosts, while others were caused by gods or demons.

The Hebrew Bible contains few references to ghosts, associating spiritism with forbidden occult activities cf. Deuteronomy 18:11. The most notable reference is in the First Book of Samuel (I Samuel 28:3–19 KJV), in which a disguised King Saul has the Witch of Endor summon the spirit/ghost of Samuel. There was widespread belief in ghosts in ancient Egyptian culture in the sense of the continued existence of the soul and spirit after death, with the ability to assist or harm the living, and the possibility of a second death. Over a period of more than 2,500 years, Egyptian beliefs about the nature of the afterlife evolved constantly. Many of these beliefs were recorded in inscriptions, papyrus scrolls and tomb paintings. The Egyptian Book of the Dead compiles some of the beliefs from different periods of ancient Egyptian history. In modern times, the fanciful concept of a mummy coming back to life and wreaking vengeance when disturbed has spawned a whole genre of horror stories and films.

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Egyptian Akh glyph – The soul and spirit re-united after death

2) Archaic and Classical Greece:

Ghosts appeared in Homer's Odyssey and Iliad, in which they were described as vanishing "as a vapor, gibbering and whining into the earth". Homer’s ghosts had little interaction with the world of the living. Periodically they were called upon to provide advice or prophecy, but they do not appear to be particularly feared. Ghosts in the classical world often appeared in the form of vapor or smoke, but at other times they were described as being substantial, appearing as they had been at the time of death, complete with the wounds that killed them. By the 5th century BC, classical Greek ghosts had become haunting, frightening creatures who could work to either good or evil purposes. The spirit of the dead was believed to hover near the resting place of the corpse, and cemeteries were places the living avoided. The dead were to be ritually mourned through public ceremony, sacrifice and libations, or they might return to haunt their families. The ancient Greeks held annual feasts to honor and placate the spirits of the dead, to which the family ghosts were invited, and after which they were “firmly invited to leave until the same time next year”. The 5th-century BC play Oresteia contains one of the first ghosts to appear in a work of fiction.

3) Roman Empire and Late Antiquity:

The ancient Romans believed a ghost could be used to exact revenge on an enemy by scratching a curse on a piece of lead or pottery and placing it into a grave. Plutarch, in the 1st century AD, described the haunting of the baths at Chaeronea by the ghost of a murdered man. The ghost’s loud and frightful groans caused the people of the town to seal up the doors of the building. Another celebrated account of a haunted house from the ancient classical world is given by Pliny the Younger (c. 50 AD). Pliny describes the haunting of a house in Athens by a ghost bound in chains. The hauntings ceased when the ghost's shackled skeleton was unearthed, and given a proper reburial. The writers Plautus and Lucian also wrote stories about haunted houses. In the New Testament, Jesus has to persuade the Disciples that he is not a ghost following the resurrection, Luke 24:37–39 (some versions of the Bible, such as the KJV and NKJV, use the term "spirit"). In a similar vein, Jesus' followers at first believe him to be a ghost (spirit) when they see him walking on water. One of the first persons to express disbelief in ghosts was Lucian of Samosata in the 2nd century AD. In his tale "The Doubter" (circa 150 AD) he relates how Democritus "the learned man from Abdera in Thrace" lived in a tomb outside the city gates to prove that cemeteries were not haunted by the spirits of the departed. Lucian relates how he persisted in his disbelief despite practical jokes perpetrated by "some young men of Abdera" who dressed up in black robes with skull masks to frighten him. This account by Lucian notes something about the popular classical expectation of how a ghost should look. In the 5th century AD, the Christian priest Constantius of Lyon recorded an instance of the recurring theme of the improperly buried dead who come back to haunt the living, and who can only cease their haunting when their bones have been discovered and properly reburied.

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4) Middle Ages:

Ghosts reported in medieval Europe tended to fall into two categories: the souls of the dead, or demons. The souls of the dead returned for a specific purpose. Demonic ghosts were those which existed only to torment or tempt the living. The living could tell them apart by demanding their purpose in the name of Jesus Christ. The soul of a dead person would divulge their mission, while a demonic ghost would be banished at the sound of the Holy Name. Most ghosts were souls assigned to Purgatory, condemned for a specific period to atone for their transgressions in life. Their penance was generally related to their sin. For example, the ghost of a man who had been abusive to his servants was condemned to tear off and swallow bits of his own tongue; the ghost of another man, who had neglected to leave his cloak to the poor, was condemned to wear the cloak, now "heavy as a church tower". These ghosts appeared to the living to ask for prayers to end their suffering. Other dead souls returned to urge the living to confess their sins before their own deaths. Medieval European ghosts were more substantial than ghosts described in the Victorian age, and there are accounts of ghosts being wrestled with and physically restrained until a priest could arrive to hear its confession. Some were less solid, and could move through walls. Often they were described as paler and sadder versions of the person they had been while alive, and dressed in tattered gray rags. The vast majority of reported sightings were male. There were some reported cases of ghostly armies, fighting battles at night in the forest, or in the remains of an Iron Age hill fort, as at Wandlebury, near Cambridge, England. Living knights were sometimes challenged to single combat by phantom knights, which vanished when defeated. From the medieval period an apparition of a ghost is recorded from 1211, at the time of the Albigensian Crusade. Gervase of Tilbury, Marshal of Arles, wrote that the image of Guilhem, a boy recently murdered in the forest, appeared in his cousin's home in Beaucaire, near Avignon. This series of "visits" lasted all of the summer. Through his cousin, who spoke for him, the boy allegedly held conversations with anyone who wished, until the local priest requested to speak to the boy directly, leading to an extended disquisition on theology. The boy narrated the trauma of death and the unhappiness of his fellow souls in Purgatory, and reported that God was most pleased with the ongoing Crusade against the Cathar heretics, launched three years earlier. The time of the Albigensian Crusade in southern France was marked by intense and prolonged warfare, this constant bloodshed and dislocation of populations being the context for these reported visits by the murdered boy. Haunted houses are featured in the 9th-century Arabian Nights (such as the tale of Ali the Cairene and the Haunted House in Baghdad).

5) European Renaissance to Romanticism:

Renaissance magic took a revived interest in the occult, including necromancy. In the era of the Reformation and Counter Reformation, there was frequently a backlash against unwholesome interest in the dark arts, typified by writers such as Thomas Erastus. The Swiss Reformed pastor Ludwig Lavater supplied one of the most frequently reprinted books of the period with his Of Ghosts and Spirits Walking by Night. The Child ballad "Sweet William's Ghost" (1868) recounts the story of a ghost returning to his fiancée begging her to free him from his promise to marry her. He cannot marry her because he is dead but her refusal would mean his damnation. This reflects a popular British belief that the dead haunted their lovers if they took up with a new love without some formal release. "The Unquiet Grave" expresses a belief even more widespread, found in various locations over Europe: ghosts can stem from the excessive grief of the living, whose mourning interferes with the dead's peaceful rest. In many folktales from around the world, the hero arranges for the burial of a dead man. Soon after, he gains a companion who aids him and, in the end, the hero's companion reveals that he is in fact the dead man. Instances of this include the Italian fairy tale "Fair Brow" and the Swedish "The Bird 'Grip'".

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"Hamlet and his father's ghost" by Henry Fuseli (1780s drawing). The ghost is wearing stylized plate armor in 17th-century style, including a morion type helmet and tassets. Depicting ghosts as wearing armor, to suggest a sense of antiquity, was common in Elizabethan theater

6) Modern period of western culture:

Spiritualist movement: Spiritualism is a monotheistic belief system or religion, postulating a belief in God, but with a distinguishing feature of belief that spirits of the dead residing in the spirit world can be contacted by "mediums", who can then provide information about the afterlife. Spiritualism developed in the United States and reached its peak growth in membership from the 1840s to the 1920s, especially in English-language countries. By 1897, it was said to have more than eight million followers in the United States and Europe, mostly drawn from the middle and upper classes, while the corresponding movement in continental Europe and Latin America is known as Spiritism. The religion flourished for a half century without canonical texts or formal organization, attaining cohesion by periodicals, tours by trance lecturers, camp meetings, and the missionary activities of accomplished mediums. Many prominent Spiritualists were women. Most followers supported causes such as the abolition of slavery and women's suffrage. By the late 1880s, credibility of the informal movement weakened, due to accusations of fraud among mediums, and formal Spiritualist organizations began to appear. Spiritualism is currently practiced primarily through various denominational Spiritualist Churches in the United States and United Kingdom.

Spiritism: Spiritism, or French spiritualism, is based on the five books of the Spiritist Codification written by French educator Hypolite Léon Denizard Rivail under the pseudonym Allan Kardec reporting séances in which he observed a series of phenomena that he attributed to incorporeal intelligence (spirits). His assumption of spirit communication was validated by many contemporaries, among them many scientists and philosophers who attended séances and studied the phenomena. His work was later extended by writers like Leon Denis, Arthur Conan Doyle, Camille Flammarion, Ernesto Bozzano, Chico Xavier, Divaldo Pereira Franco, Waldo Vieira, Johannes Greber and others. Spiritism has adherents in many countries throughout the world, including Spain, United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, France, England, Argentina, Portugal and especially Brazil, which has the largest proportion and greatest number of followers.

By 1853, when the popular song Spirit Rappings was published, Spiritualism was an object of intense curiosity

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FEELINGS WHEN GHOSTS ARE AROUND

Generally people claim that when Ghosts are around us, then we- the living beings feel something awkward or something special as the follows:

1) A chill in the air.

2) Low light conditions.

3) Smokey smell.

4) Weird noises e.g. – thumping and whistling.

5) Things getting chucked at you from no-where.

6) Paranormal visuals like shadows, smoke etc...

7) Sensation of someone being around. . . . . . . . . .

PLACES WHERE GHOSTS ARE FOUND

People claim that the Ghosts live in the following general places:

1) Usually ghosts are found where they die, such as Haunted Houses, Asylums, Prisons.

2) Sometimes people claim that they encountered ghost in Forests, Forts, places which are not being used for a long time.

3) Graveyards, on Trees, Mines, Hospitals.

4) LAST BUT NOT THE LEAST SOMETIMES THEY POSSESS HUMAN BODY.

HAUNTED PLACES IN INDIA

1) Bhangarh Fort, Rajasthan:

Bhangarh was built in 1573 by Raja Bhagwant Das as the residence for his second son Madhoo Singh. The structure is said to have been abandoned in 1783 amidst a severe drought. The area is dotted with banyan trees and ruins of temples, havelis and peasant homes. The Shiva, Gopinath, Mangla Devi and Keshava Rai temples are the best preserved ruins here. Local legends offer two alternative explanations for the town’s ruin. One story involves an arrogant king and an offended sadhu, while the other is a tale of obsession involving a tantrik and a beautiful princess. Whichever version visitors choose to believe, many agree that the ‘no entry after dark’ sign put up by the Archaeological Survey of India is justified by the unsettling presence of an otherworldly force, bizarre sounds and accompanying anxiety.

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Bhangarh Fort

2) Golkonda Fort, Hyderabad:

Textbooks have plenty to say about this imposing 13th century structure and how it shaped the history of South India. A visit to this ancient city is a history lesson in itself. It has seen the rise and decline of various dynasties and was the original home of the famous Koh-I-Noor diamond. But history books don’t talk about the spirits of thieves that are said to live in the trees, the baffling shadows seen gliding around, and the sounds of people crying out in pain. The spirit of Taramati, a courtesan turned queen, is often spotted here. Visitors aren’t allowed to linger after dark. But since it’s a popular film location, movie crews are often here past the deadline and see much more than they’d like.

Golkonda Fort

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3) The Savoy, Mussoorie:

Built in Mussoorie in 1902, The Savoy was amongst the grandest hotels of its time and the guestbook read like a social register. But in 1910, a guest named Lady Garnet Orme was found dead in her room. Strychnine had been slipped into her medicine bottle. Agatha Christie found this to be the perfect setting for a mystery story and based her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, on Lady Orme’s death. The perpetrator was never found and the ghost of Lady Orme is said to still roam the halls of the hotel. Guests have reported hearing flushes going off, seeing the floating silhouette of a lady, and doors opening mysteriously. The IPS has recorded the sound of a woman whispering and singing softly. Perfect for guests who need a lullaby at bedtime.

The Savoy

4) Abandoned Army Cantonment, Meerut:

The Meerut Army Cantonment was the site of the Mangal Pandey uprising in 1857. The British cracked down on Indian revolutionaries and crushed rebellion. Over 150 soldiers were killed here. This is where history leaves off and legend begins. It is believed that the spirits of the soldiers who died here still wander the abandoned cantonment, although their activities are less regimented nowadays. Visitors have reported seeing headless apparitions, spooky shadows, hearing mysterious sounds of dripping water and sensing a supernatural presence. Gaurav Tiwari of the IPS spent a night here and says that the presence does things like running around in circles and making animal-like sounds.

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A picture of 1857

HAUNTED PLACES AROUND THE WORLD

1) Aokigahara Forest, Japan:

I wrote about Aokigahara a few years back when I covered some of the creepiest spots on Earth, but it’s worth touching on again in this context because it truly is a spooky place. As the world’s most popular spot for suicides, there’s no wonder the forest has a reputation for being haunted. While statistics vary and the government has stopped releasing the numbers in hopes that it might curb the number of suicides in the forest, estimates say that around 100 people end their lives in Aokigahara every year. Even if you don’t believe in ghosts, the forest itself still invites a sense of dread and signs everywhere beg visitors to reconsider their decision to commit suicide; tape used to mark off areas where volunteers have searched for bodies remains strewn across the park; and the dense vegetation and minimal wildlife leave the setting eerily quiet. The forest, often called the “sea of trees” is so dense that it is believed many people who did not intend to commit suicide have died in the area simply because they could not find their way back to the main trail –something believers can blame on evil spirits lurking in the forest. Aside from the suicides in the area, many also claim the forest was once a popular location for the practice of ubasute (the abandonment of the elderly in distant locales during periods of drought or famine, where the family member was left to die). While some officials claim this practice is largely myth, if Aokigahara was a popular location for the act, you could certainly imagine the spirits of those left to die remaining to haunt those foolish enough to venture into the ghostly forest. You can find a wonderful, though exceptionally creepy photo essay on the forest at Punyari’s Island Adventures.

Aokigahara Forest, Japan

2) The Manila Film Center:

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You wouldn’t think a film center completed in 1982 would be considered such a foreboding place, but when you hear the story of the Manila Film Center, you’ll understand why it belongs on this list. In 1981, the First Lady of the Philippines, Imelda Marcos, decided her country needed a national film achieve. Plans were developed and the 1st Manila International Film Festival was scheduled for one year later. As you can imagine, one year from inception to grand opening doesn’t leave much time for construction, so 4,000 workers were hired to complete the structure on time, working in three shifts across all 24 hours of the day. At 3 AM on November 17, the rushed scaffolding collapsed and 169 workers fell into the quick-drying wet cement below. Rather than immediately rush help to save the workers, the Marcos administration refused rescuers or ambulances until an official statement was prepared. It wasn’t until 9 hours after the collapse that rescuers were finally allowed to assist those who had fallen. Because the incident was handled so badly, there are stories that the First Lady ordered cement to be poured over the workers, burying all the workers, many of whom were still alive. According to this story, the bodies of all the men were left in the building’s foundation. Official government records show that of the 169 workers, all were removed from the concrete and not more than a dozen died, all of whom were given a proper burial. Given how badly the incident was handled, it’s not entirely surprising that many locals refuse to believe this version of events, though it still seems unlikely that all 169 workers were buried under concrete and left there. Given the horrific event, it’s no wonder that the building was reputed to be haunted. Tales claim that the site was plagued by mysterious sounds, voices and poltergeists. Either way, the building does seem to have a bit of a curse. Just one year after it was opened, the building was severely damaged in the 1990 Manila earthquake. It remained abandoned until 2001, when it received a full renovation. Then, earlier this year, a fire hit the center, rendering it once again, totally inoperable.

The Manila Film Centre

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3) Eastern State Penitentiary – Pennsylvania, United States:

Built in 1829, Eastern State Penitentiary is a former prison in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It’s known for being the very first prison of its kind to introduce solitary confinement, or what they used to call, the Pennsylvania System. Prisoners were sent to solitary during this time as a form of rehabilitation. They would be completely isolated, living alone, eating alone, and even exercising alone in their own individual yards. Whenever an inmate left his cell, a black hood would be placed over his head to assure he remained in confinement. Due to Eastern States’ harsh approach, many prisoners were drove to insanity, and as a result the Pennsylvania System was scrapped in 1913. From then until 1970 it was used as a regular prison, and held the likes of Al Capone and the bank robber, Willie Sutton. Reports of the paranormal have been going on since the 1940′s, but ever since the stone prison was abandoned in 1971, paranormal experiences have seemingly increased.

Reports include:

Shadowy figures that seem to quickly turn away when approached, A dark figure that is occasionally seen in the guard tower, An evil cackling is heard coming from cellblock 12, Shadowy figures have been seen sliding down walls in cellblock 6, Ghostly faces have been witnessed in cellblock 4, And strange sounds such as disembodied footsteps, distant talking, and banging of cell doors have also been heard.

Eastern State Penitentiary – Pennsylvania

4) Castle of Good Hope – Cape Town, South Africa:

The Castle of Good Hope in Cape Town, South Africa was built in the 17th century by the Dutch East India Company. It’s the country’s oldest colonial building, originally serving as a replenishment station for ships passing the treacherous waters of the Cape. The first reported paranormal occurrence was when the apparition of a tall gentleman was seen in 1915 on one of the castles’ ramparts. The man wasn’t seen again until 1947, when he was seen on a regular basis over a two week period. He would be seen jumping off the side of one of the castle walls, and walking between the bastions Leerdam and Oranje. One of the most popular stories associated with the Castle is of the former governor Pieter Gysbert van Noodt. He died on 23 April 1728, the same day he had sentenced to death seven soldiers who were caught attempting to desert the military. It’s believed one of the soldiers placed a curse on him and demanded he came to watch the execution, which he didn’t. Later that day, Van Noodt was found dead slouched over his desk with a look of terror on his face. Another famous haunting is of the Lady in Grey. She has been witnessed running through the castle holding her face and crying hysterically. However, since a woman’s body was found during recent excavations her ghost hasn’t been reported. Sometime in the 1700′s, a soldier was found hanging

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from the bell rope in the bell tower, which overlooks the entrance to the castle. After his death, the bell tower was sealed off however, to this day the bell has been known to strike off its own accord. There’s also the ghost of a black dog who has been known to pounce on unsuspecting visitors, then simply vanish into thin air.

Castle of Good Hope, Cape Town

5) Island of the Dolls – Xochimilco, Mexico:

Located on Lake Teshuilo in Xochimilco nr Mexico City, the island La Isla de la Munecas (The Island of the Dolls) is certainly one of the strangest haunted locations in our list. In the 1950′s, a man named Julian Santan Barrera moved to the island (despite being married with a young family). Julian was unaware of the dark history of the area when he moved there to become a recluse. Legend says that three young girls were playing near the water in the 1920′s, when one of the girls fell in and drowned in the murky waters. Locals believed that ever since her death, the young girls’ spirit has been unable to leave the island. It soon grew quite a reputation as a haunted place, and locals wouldn’t go near it at night for fear of what they may see. Julian claimed that as soon as he moved on the island a little girl began speaking to him. The girl told Julian how she had died, and that she was trapped on the island. He began to get the dolls for this little girl, often selling off fruit and vegetables that he had grown on the island, so that he could buy old dolls for her to play with. Julian later told his nephew that it was becoming more difficult to appease the young girl’s thirst for these dolls, with him seemingly worried that she wanted him to join her in her watery grave. The same day he had this discussion, his nephew was returning to the island, when he found his uncle face down in the canal. His body was in the same spot where the little girl had apparently drowned seventy years before. Today, tourists to the island often speak of the doll’s eyes following them. Others have also reported that the mutilated dolls whisper to them, especially at night. Julian’s ghost is also said to remain on the island, as well as the young girls’.

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THE CURSE OF TUTANKHAMEN

When Lord Carnarvon died on 5 April 1923, seven weeks after the official opening of Pharaoh Tutankhamen’s burial chamber, rumors were rife about a curse. News of Tutankhamen’s tomb and its discoverers had sent the world's media into a frenzy and the death of Lord Carnarvon added another twist for eager journalists. All sorts of links were found. The lights of Cairo were said to have gone out at the moment of his death, while back at Carnarvon's English estate his dog, Susie, was supposed to have howled and died at the same time. Carnarvon's death came just a couple of weeks after a public warning by novelist Mari Corelli that there would be dire consequences for anyone who entered the sealed tomb. The media and public lapped it up. Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes and a believer in the occult, announced that Carnarvon's death could have been the result of a "Pharaoh's curse". One newspaper even printed a curse supposed to have been written in hieroglyphs at the entrance of the tomb, the translation being: "They who enter this sacred tomb shall swift be visited by wings of death." However, no inscribed curse was found. One inscription, found on the Anubis shrine in the tomb's so-called Treasury, did say: "It is I who hinder the sand from choking the secret chamber. I am for the protection of the deceased." Reporting of the curse was further fuelled by more deaths, many with very stretched associations to Tutankhamen. Five months after Carnarvon died, his younger brother died suddenly. Closer to the tomb, another "casualty" was the pet canary of the tomb's discoverer, Howard Carter. The bird was swallowed by a cobra on the day the tomb was opened. This was interpreted as retribution for violation of the tomb, particularly as a cobra was depicted on the brow of the pharaoh from where it would spit fire at the king's enemies. According to one list, of the 26 individuals present at the official opening of the tomb, six had died within a decade. In reality, many of the key individuals associated with the discovery and work on the tomb lived to a ripe old age. Even when some of the treasures of Tutankhamen went on tour overseas in the 1970s, some people were still of the belief that the curse might be at work. One example was from San Francisco where a policeman guarding Tutankhamen’s gold funerary mask tried to claim compensation for a mild stroke based on the effect of the curse. The judge dismissed the claim. Does anyone here believe in this curse? Would you dare go in Tutankhamen’s tomb? Step into the Paranormal. The Curse of King Tutankhamen. A curse on whoever disturbed the tomb of King Tutankhamen!! The newspapers of the day certainly had a field day. Lord Carnarvon dead on the 23rd April 1933 from a high fever caused by a mosquito bite, his dog supposedly howled and died at the same time his master had passed away and the lights of Cairo reportedly went out.

Dead -Arthur Mace, an American archaeologist who had assisted in the opening of the tomb,

Dead -George Jay Gould, who died within 24 hours of being taken to the tomb by Carter,

Dead - Lady Carter from an insect bite in 1929

The deaths continued apparently for another 10 years with 20 other people involved in the opening of the tomb collapsing and dying from heart attacks or other illnesses, including madness. Apparently there have been over more than 20 deaths linked to King Tutankhamen! This number is more than just a coincidence. A curse perhaps? You decide.

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Paper Cutting On the Curse of Tutankhamen

RELATING SCIENCE WITH GHOSTS

Even if we have not spotted a ghost ourselves or felt the presence of one, we would surely know people who claim to have experienced a ghostly encounter. People usually attribute their paranormal experiences to their imagination. Ghosts have been around for centuries, and science has not been able to explain them. Modern technology, however, has rushed to the rescue by providing ghost hunters with myriad devices to capture the images, videos, and voices of ghosts. Unfortunately, tricksters and frauds have used the same technology to fool a number of people. No wonder that genuine evidence that ghosts exist is being dismissed as fraud material. People, especially those with a scientific or rational background, tend to dismiss any explanation that ghosts exist with disbelief and amusement.

1) Law of Thermodynamics:

The law of thermodynamics, if examined from a different angle, could prove that ghosts exist. Even if it cannot be taken as proof, it could give rise to a number of questions. If these questions are taken seriously and attempts made to find answers to them, we might very well come up with proof that ghosts exist.

What is the law of thermodynamics? Among the gravitational laws, this is the most significant law. A careful study of it reveals the fact that science has already proved that ghosts do exist. According to this law "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed; it can only change form."

Let us now analyze this law carefully. Energy never dies, according to this important law; instead, energy shifts from one form to the other. Accordingly, the energy that we are is not destroyed by death; it just changes form.

Skeptics would say that our bodies would be decomposed by the action of the microorganisms, and this is how human energy would change form. But, what about the intelligence that gives us an identity? Just consider the amazing nature of our minds and bodies. Would all this just end up as being fodder for the microbes? Does this sound like a fair exchange? The more one questions, the more one feels that there is more to life than what meets the scientific eye. The world of the paranormal will become familiar to us only if we keep a positive and open mind and study it. Instead of dismissing paranormal experiences as exercises of the imagination, we must get more curious about it and question it. Only then will great knowledge be opened to us.

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Energy-Mass Equivalence Formula

2) Dr. Barrie Colvin’s Experiment:

Even the best evidence gathered by paranormal investigators will likely never be accepted, even considered, by scientific communities as undeniable proof that ghosts exist. It may take Science itself to finally prove, one way or the other that life continues on beyond the grave. In late June 2010, such scientific research was published in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research. Dr. Barrie Colvin, who does not believe in life after death, has been Studying ghostly knocks and noises emanating from various cases of poltergeist-type Haunting for five long years. His findings are set to convince a few skeptics that some paranormal activity, specifically odd noises created by ghosts, are real.

Using advanced scientific equipment to analyze sound waves believed to be made by ghosts during haunting, Dr. Colvin has found that these sounds are strikingly different wave forms when compared to known noises created by people, animals, or anything else found within our world. The paranormal acoustic wave forms have no conventional explanation by Dr. Colvin or his fellow scientists. Being skeptics, the results of the experiments have left them dumbfounded. In short, these findings were not expected. Colvin's publication about ghosts within a well-respected scientific journal is sure to spark debates among scientists.

Dr. Colvin plans to continue analyzing noises created by ghosts, but this time he will take his research into the parlors of psychic-mediums. He hopes to record ethereal noises that are heard during ghost communications, namely séances, analyzing the wave forms in order to test if these are truly made by souls of the dead. If these experiments confirm his earlier findings, then Dr. Colvin is convinced it would provide even stronger evidence for the existence of ghosts and spirits.

Dr. Barrie Colvin

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CASE STUDY OF BORLEY RECTORY

Till now we have discussed about what is ghosts, their history & types. We also discussed about some haunted place in India and also across the World. Beside all these case study we can also find some fake or man-made case about ghosts. Where it is claimed that the incidents are paranormal but after investigation it reveals that all the incident is fake i.e. man-made. Among this type of case studies ‘Case Study of Borley Rectory’ is famous.

Borley Rectory was a Victorian mansion that gained fame as "the most haunted house in England”. Built in 1862 to house the rector of the parish of Borley, Essex and his family, it was badly damaged by fire in 1939 and demolished in 1944. The large Gothic-style rectory in the village of Borley had been alleged to be haunted ever since it was built. These reports multiplied suddenly in 1929, after the Daily Mirror published an account of a visit by paranormal researcher Harry Price, who wrote two books supporting dramatic claims of paranormal activity. The uncritical acceptance of Price's reports prompted a formal study by the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), which rejected most of the sightings as either imagined or fabricated and cast doubt on Price's credibility. His claims are now generally discredited by ghost historians. Neither the SPR's report nor the more recent biography of Price has quelled public interest in the stories, and new books and television documentaries continue to satisfy public fascination with the rectory. A short programme commissioned by the BBC about the alleged manifestations, scheduled to be broadcast in September 1956, was cancelled owing to concerns about a possible legal action by Marianne Foyster, widow of the last rector to live in the house.

Hauntings:

The first paranormal events apparently occurred in about 1863, since a few locals later remembered hearing unexplained footsteps within the house at about this time. On 28 July 1900, four daughters of the rector, Henry Dawson Ellis Bull, reported seeing what they thought was the ghost of a nun at twilight, about 40 yards (37 m) from the house; they tried to talk to it, but it disappeared as they got closer. The local organist recalled that the family at the rectory were "very convinced that they had seen an apparition on several occasions". Various people were to claim to have witnessed a variety of puzzling incidents, such as a phantom coach driven by two headless horsemen, during the next four decades. Henry Dawson Ellis Bull died in 1892 and his son, the Reverend Harry Bull, took over the living. On 9 June 1928, Henry Foyster Bull, the rector, died and the rectory again became vacant. In the following year, on 2 October, the Reverend Guy Eric Smith and his wife moved into the home. Soon after moving in Mrs. Smith, while cleaning out a cupboard, came across a brown paper package containing the skull of a young woman. Shortly after, the family reported a variety of incidents including the sounds of servant bells ringing despite their being disconnected, lights appearing in windows and unexplained footsteps. In addition, Mrs. Smith believed she saw a horse-drawn carriage at night. The Smiths contacted the Daily Mirror asking to be put in touch with the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). On 10 June 1929 the newspaper sent a reporter, who promptly wrote the first in a series of articles detailing the mysteries of Borley. The paper also arranged for Harry Price, a paranormal researcher, to make his first visit to the house that would ultimately make him famous. He arrived on 12 June and immediately objective "phenomena" of a new kind appeared, such as the throwing of stones, a vase and other objects. "Spirit messages" were tapped out from the frame of a mirror. As soon as Harry Price left, these ceased. Mrs. Smith later maintained that she already suspected Harry Price, an expert conjurer, of causing the phenomena. The Smiths left Borley on 14 July 1929, and the parish had some difficulty in finding a replacement. The following year the Reverend Lionel Algernon Foyster (1878–1945), a first cousin of the Bulls, and his wife Marianne (née Marianne Emily Rebecca Shaw) (1899–1992) moved into the rectory with their adopted daughter Adelaide, on 16 October 1930. Lionel Foyster wrote an account of various strange incidents that occurred between when he and his family moved in and October 1935, which he sent to Harry

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Price. They included bell-ringing, windows shattering, stones and bottle throwing, wall-writing, and their daughter being locked in a room with no key. Marianne Foyster reported to her husband a whole range of poltergeist phenomena that included her being thrown from her bed. On one occasion, Adelaide was attacked by "something horrible". Foyster tried twice to conduct an exorcism, but his efforts were fruitless; in the middle of the first exorcism, he was struck in the shoulder by a fist-size stone. Because of the publicity in the Daily Mirror, these incidents attracted the attention of several psychic researchers, who after investigation were unanimous in suspecting that they were caused, consciously or unconsciously, by Marianne Foyster. Mrs. Foyster later stated that she felt that some of the incidents were caused by her husband in concert with one of the psychic researchers, but other events appeared to her to be genuine paranormal phenomena. Marianne later admitted that she was having a sexual relationship with the lodger, Frank Pearless, and that she used paranormal explanations to cover up her liaisons. The Foysters left Borley in October 1935 as a result of Lionel's ill health.

Price Investigation:

Borley remained vacant for some time after the Foysters' departure, until in May 1937 Price took out a year-long rental agreement with Queen Anne's Bounty, the owners of the property. Through an advertisement in The Times on 25 May 1937 and subsequent personal interviews, Price recruited a corps of 48 "official observers", mostly students, who spent periods, mainly during weekends, at the rectory with instructions to report any phenomena that occurred. In March 1938 Helen Glanville (the daughter of S. J. Glanville, one of Price's helpers) conducted a planchette séance in Streatham in south London. Price reported that she made contact with two spirits, the first of which was that of a young nun who identified herself as Marie Lairre. According to the planchette story Marie was a French nun who left her religious order and travelled to England to marry a member of the Waldegrave family, the owners of Borley's 17th-century manor house, Borley Hall. She was said to have been murdered in an earlier building on the site of the rectory, and her body either buried in the cellar or thrown into a disused well. The wall writings were alleged to be her pleas for help; one read "Marianne, please help me get out". The second spirit to be contacted identified himself as Sunex Amures, and claimed that he would set fire to the rectory at nine o'clock that night, 27 March 1938. He also said that, at that time, the bones of a murdered person would be revealed.

Society for Psychical Research investigation:

After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analyzed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Marianne later in her life admitted she had seen no apparitions and that the alleged ghostly noises were caused by the wind, friends she invited to the house and in other cases by herself playing practical jokes on her husband. Many of the legends about the rectory had been invented. The children of Rev. Harry Bull who lived in the house before Lionel Foyster claimed to have seen nothing and were surprised they had been living in what was described as England's most haunted house. Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar

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approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.

Borley Rectory

So from above information we can see that cases of Borley Rectory were pre-planned & fake. So it raises a question mark on the existence of the Ghosts.

LOGICAL FACTS- WHY GHOSTS DO NOT EXIST

Only the gullible and those that have mandates to substantiate the after-life believe in ghosts and the paranormal. Ghosts are simply wishful thinking and a convenient excuse for explaining ‘what goes bump in the night. ‘Proving ghosts are a man-made psychosis is in-fact very simple.

1) Ghosts come in one form – that just happens to be human - which is conveniently what we bipedal-chimps want to see, and not say a dead cow hovering at the end of one’s bed. Have you ever heard of the legend of oceans being haunted by ghostly plankton?

2) Ghosts just happen to be nocturnal, preferring night-time to ‘do their thing’. So when you die you suddenly become adverse to daylight – right?

3) Like the popular bug-eyed Aliens, modern ghosts are all stereotypical, with the same looks and characteristics.

4) Purportedly ghosts have the ‘magical’ capabilities to travel through walls, levitate etc. Powers they didn’t have when they were alive. They move objects all the time – but never get behind the wheels of a car and drive, type a letter on a computer or light-up a Bensons and Hedges. When it comes to interacting with humans all ghosts want to do is scare the shit out of the living in the dead of night or flash their tits at us in photos. Aimless activity, no-one has been able to detect with any surety.

5) Ghosts love hotels and pubs. When you die you head immediately to ‘your local’ for a pint. How else could you explain the disproportionately high number of pubs that are haunted? And it’s always old pubs that act as magnets to the living dead, rather than a Five Star Hilton.

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6) Seeing that potentially we living-humans share the planet with 60 billion spirits, comprising all of humanities dead – where do these hordes of living-dead spend their time? I mean where do they live? Caves? The bottom of the ocean? The stratosphere? Six to a house?

7) Last but not least – there is not a shred of evidence.

SCIENTIFIC REASONS- ‘WHY DO WE ENCOUNTER GHOSTS?’

Above are the some logical as well as funny facts which implies that ghosts do not exist. Now we will discuss about some scientific facts why scientists claimed that ghosts do not exist.

1) Ions:

Unfortunately, real ghost hunters don’t carry proton packs. However, they do use tools such as the ion counter. The ion counter, well, counts ions. An ion is an atom with an uneven amount of protons and electrons. If an atom gains an electron, it becomes a negative ion, and if it loses an electron, it becomes positive. Ghost hunters go crazy over ions because they supposedly show a paranormal presence. Some say a spirit’s presence interferes with the normal ion count in the atmosphere while others say ghosts draw upon ionic energy when they want to appear and scare people to death. However, ion counters are really pretty lousy when it comes to detecting ghosts. Ions are caused by all kinds of natural phenomena like weather, solar radiation, and radon gas. So it basically comes down to how someone interprets the evidence. Scientists see ions and think, “Natural.” Ghost hunters see ions and think, “Paranormal!” Interestingly, both positive and negative ions can affect our moods. Negative ions can make us feel calm and relaxed while positive ions can give us headaches and make us feel lousy. This might explain why people who live in “haunted” houses describe feeling tired and tense, as well as having headaches.

2) Mass Hysteria:

In June 2013, over 3,000 workers went on strike at a garment factory in Gazipur, Bangladesh. They weren’t protesting against long working hours, and they weren’t demanding better wages. They wanted someone to do something about the ghost in the restroom. An angry spirit had attacked a worker in the lady’s room, causing everyone to panic. A riot ensued, and the police had to restore order. A similar event took place at a school in Patong, Phuket when 22 students were hospitalized after seeing the ghost of an old woman. But while the Bangladeshi factory owner ordered an exorcism, perhaps he should have called a counselor instead. Both the workers and the students experienced a psychological phenomenon known as mass hysteria. These collective delusions occur when people are really stressed out, usually thanks to their oppressive environments (like a strict school or busy workplace). This pent-up stress then turns into physical symptoms like headaches, nausea, or violent spasms. Throw in religious and cultural beliefs, a relatively isolated environment and the always-busy rumor mill, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. Other people will “catch” the same strange symptoms, they’ll spread like a disease, and panic ensues. It’s interesting to note that very few of the 3,000 factory workers actually encountered the ghost. Even the woman who sparked the frenzy didn’t actually see anything. She got sick and just assumed it was the work of an evil spirit, but the suggestion was so powerful and the circumstances were so perfect that everyone freaked out. Fortunately, it didn’t end with human sacrifices or dogs and cats living together.

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Mass Hysteria

3) Carbon Monoxide Poisoning:

In 1921, ophthalmologist William Wilmer published a bizarre paper in the American Journal of Ophthalmology. It told the story of the “H” family and their haunted house. Their hell home was plagued with the sounds of slamming doors, moving furniture and footsteps in empty rooms. One of the children felt something sitting on him while the other was attacked by a mysterious stranger. During the night, the woman of the house awoke to see a man and a woman standing at the foot of her bed, only to watch them vanish moments later. As the hauntings continued, the family grew tired and depressed, and then their plants started to die. It was then they discovered the faulty furnace. The furnace was supposed to send its fumes up the chimney, but instead the gas was pouring into the house. It turns out the family was suffering from carbon monoxide poisoning. Carbon monoxide (CO) is an odorless, colorless gas, which makes it really hard to detect. It’s dangerous because our red blood cells absorb CO much easier than they do oxygen, and this oxygen deprivation leads to symptoms such as weakness, nausea, confusion, and eventually death. But before you kick the bucket, you might experience hallucinations, just like the “H” family. For example, in 2005, a woman called the authorities after seeing a spirit in her bathroom. It turned out the paranormal activity was due to her leaky water heater which was filling the house with CO. Bottom line: Stay away from carbon monoxide, folks, because one way or another, it’ll have you seeing ghosts.

4) Camera Issues:

Ghost hunters have a love-hate relationship with orbs. These glowing balls of light are supposedly the spirits of people who’ve passed away, but haven’t quite passed on. Invisible to the eye, orbs can only be seen in photographs, and that’s where things get tricky. Skeptic Brian Dunning says when a dust speck or bug is too close to the camera, it will show up in the photo as a blurry, out-of-focus circle. And thanks to the camera flash, the orb will appear to be glowing and is thus mistaken for a ghost. Perfectly reasonable mistake, right?

Even most believers are pretty skeptical about orb photography. While she thinks some real photos exist, parapsychologist Pamela Heath points out several natural causes of orbs such as fine hairs, dirty or wet lenses, lens reflection, or movement during exposure. Many paranormal websites have stopped accepting these photos because they say there are just too many false ones. So thanks to a basic understanding of how technology works, orb photos seem to be giving up the ghost.

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Paranormal Picture due to Camera Issue

5) Automatism:

What do witch doctors and Shirley MacLaine have in common? They’re all big into channeling! Channeling is one of mankind’s oldest attempts to reach the spirit world. The idea is to clear the mind, connect with some sort of cosmic consciousness and let a centuries-old spirit possess your body, which doesn’t sound creepy at all. The shamans of ancient religions were believed to channel the dead, TV psychic John Edward says he can speak to those who’ve crossed over, and medium J.Z. Knight claims she channels a spirit named Ramtha, a 35,000-year-old spirit from Atlantis. Obviously, there are quite a few frauds in the channeling community, but what about the people who sincerely believe in what they’re doing? The answer is automatism, an “altered state of consciousness” where people say things and think things they’re not aware of. So when a psychic clears his mind, he starts searching for a friendly spirit guide. The spirit guide is supposed to enter his body and then provide secret knowledge about the universe. When the psychic clears his mind, random ideas and images start popping up in his head, and the medium assumes these thoughts are coming from another entity. However, these ideas are just coming from his mind. Our brains are capable of coming up with all kinds of crazy stuff without any conscious effort on our part. How many times has something inspired you out of the blue? How many times have you had totally bizarre nightmares or daydreams? That’s not the work of an otherworldly guide. That’s your brain, working overtime all the time.

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6) Electric Stimulation of the Brain:

Frightened witnesses all over the world have seen the shadow people. These dark beings are glimpsed out of the corner of the eye only to vanish when confronted. Many believe them to be demons, some think they’re astral bodies, and some say they’re time travelers, here for a second and gone. However, some researchers have a more shocking theory. When Swiss scientists electrically stimulated an epileptic patient’s brain, things got really spooky. The patient reported a shadow person sitting behind her, copying her every move. When she sat up, it also sat up. When she bent forward and grabbed her knees, it reached around her body and held her. The doctors then told her to read a card, but the shadow person tried to take it out of her hand. What happened was the scientists had stimulated the left temporoparietal junction, the part of the brain that defines the idea of self. By interfering with the area that helps us tell the difference between ourselves and others, the doctors screwed up the brain’s ability to understand its own body, thus leading to the creation of a copycat shadow person. Researchers are hoping this is the key to understanding why so many people, both schizophrenic and healthy, encounter shadow beings and other creatures like aliens.

7) Bipolar Disorder:

And the last but not the list- Bipolar disorder, a mental illness is also one of the main reasons of encounter with ghosts.

Bipolar disorder (also known as bipolar affective disorder, manic-depressive disorder, or manic depression) is a mental illness. Individuals with bipolar disorder experience episodes of an elevated or agitated mood known as mania, alternating with episodes of depression. These episodes can impair the individual's ability to function in ordinary life. About 4% of people have bipolar disorder worldwide, a proportion that is consistent for men and women and across racial and ethnic groups. The cause is not clearly understood, but genetic and environmental risk factors are believed to play a role. Treatment commonly includes therapy and mood stabilizing medication. There are widespread problems with social stigma, stereotypes, and prejudice against individuals with bipolar disorder.

A person suffering from bipolar disorder starts hallucinating. The patient’s brain starts creating a virtual environment as real world, the extent of its effects progresses with time. For example: A bipolar positive person can interact, see and feel the presence of a person about whom he has heard a lot or thought a lot. The patient can even behave like the same. Thus the patient claims to encounter a ghost which is not really the truth. In this disorder a person can have multiple character.

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Brain image of a BD patient

A Bipolar patient having Dual character

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CONCLUSION

In this report we have tried to go through those things which people think about when they discuss about GHOSTS. We have gone through facts that makes the statement in favor of their existence. Also we have tried to go through those things which might be just a prank to prove that ghost do exist but actually these are nothing but fake. During the preparation of this report we (group-mates) discussed among ourselves and we came to a point that we all have different opinions about this topic. So we are making this conclusion that it’s an individual’s perception that what does he thinks and that person can’t be said to be wrong or right. We have decided ours part now it’s time for the reader to conclude himself that do he believe in ghosts or not. With this conclusion we are submitting this report.

Individual conclusion of group mates:

So now it’s your turn to decide.

Abhay SinghYesAs he has an encounter with something unworldly.

Amit SinghYesHe have heard of many such events in his family.

Debayon SahaNot decided yet.He has never encountered any such thing but heard of in Kolkata.

Pragnya DasguptaNot decided yet.She has a scientific approch and science itself is in dilemma.

Rupesh KumarNo.Never heard or encountered any unworldly event.

Saborni SanfuiNo.She has gone through a fake event.

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REFERENCES

1) Wiseman, R. Watt, C. Stevens, P. Etal. (2003). “An investigation into alleged ‘Hauntings’”. The British Journal of Psychology 94(2): 195-211. Doi: 1348/000712603321661886.

2) Richard Wiseman. Retrieved September 25, 2007.

3) “Sounds like terror in the air”. Reuters. Smh.com.au. 2003-09-09. Retrieved 2007-09-19

4) Choi IS (2001). “Carbon monoxide poisoning: systemic manifestations and complications”. J. Korean Med. Sci. 16 (3): 253-61. Doi: 10.3346/jkms.2001.16.3.253. PMC 3054741. PMID 11410684.

5) Deuteronomy 18: 11

6) I Samuel 28: 3-19 KJV

7) Ehrman. Bart D. (2006)

8) Emissary (2007-09-30). A Faraway Ancient Country

9) Ulster Scots- Words and Phrases: “Bogie” BBC Retrieved December 18, 2010

10) Donald Brown (1991). Human Universals. Philadelphia. Temple University Press.

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ONLINE SOURCES

1) www.wikipedia.org

2) www.spookesevents.co.uk

3) www.frightbytes.com

4) www.alimcnamara.com

5) www.google.com

6) www.ask.com

7) www.neilgaiman.com

8) www.anthonyhorowitz.com

9) www.ghostworld.com

10) www.horrormasters.com

11) www.canterburyatheist.com

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

1) The haunting at Stratton Falls by Brenda Seabrook, 2000

2) The haunting of Cassie Palmer by Vivien Alcock, 1980

3) Horror at the haunted house by Peg Kehret, 1993

4) Midnight Magic by Avi, 1999

5) Ghost Town: Seven ghostly tales by Joan Lowery Nixon, 2000

6) The Presence by Eve Bunting, 2003