Page 53 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - September 2021
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Here’s Why People Believe In Ghosts 53
Here’s why people believe
in ghosts
by Lydia Ramsey Pflanzer
From haunted houses to creepy clowns
terrorizing the US, 'tis the season for spooky —
and potentially paranormal — encounters, if
only in the name of Halloween fun.
But for some, believing in ghosts is way more
real than a simple Halloween prank.
According to a Gallup survey from 2005, about
three out of four Americans harbor at least one
paranormal belief. And a Pew Research Center
survey from 2009 found that 29% of those
polled said they were in touch with the dead,
saw, though the words didn't have the same protest sign following the Great Recession of
with 18% saying they've seen a ghost.
effect on those that weren't religious. 2007 read, “Jump, you [censored].”
So what is it that makes us susceptible to these
Some seek the thrill of it **
beliefs, despite any evidence that they're real?
It has a lot to do with how our brains Of course, another reason people believe in MYTH: The stomach rumbles because you’re
ghosts is the same reason that people like to hungry.
are wired
watch scary movies or play Bloody Mary in
girls' bathrooms: for the thrill of it. TRUTH: Known medically as borborygmi,
Barry Markovsky, a sociologist at the University those noises aren’t coming from your stomach,
of South Carolina, told Business Insider in 2015 nor do they necessarily indicate hunger. Your
There's a word for buying into these scary
that the human mind tries to create patterns to
stories: legend-tripping. Basically, people do small and large intestines are hollow groupings
make sense of information that's muddled.
this because they know they're not in any real of muscles that expand and contract to move the
danger, Radford said. food along after it has left your stomach - which
"Ghosts are almost always seen under is much higher than you might realize, just
ambiguous circumstances — such as in poor below your nipples. The rumbling comes from
But that's the confusing thing about our many
lighting, or when we're just waking up or falling
perceptions of ghosts: Are they out to harm us, intestinal muscles contracting or squeezing
asleep, when our senses are not at their peak
in which case we might need some secret fluids and swallowed air. The acoustics
function," Markovsky said. depend on the ratio of solids, fluids, and gases.
"Ghostbusters" to save the day? Or are they
harmless lost spirits?
Basically, those who have encountered a ghost **
are most likely expecting them. That's why they
Many ghost hunters see themselves as "traffic
show up in the places we'd expect: haunted
cops for the afterlife," Radford said. Instead of MYTH: Saying “God bless you” after a sneeze
houses, or in the places our loved ones used to is a throwback to the days when people feared
believing ghosts to be evil, they think of them as
frequent.
spirits that have simply gotten lost on the way to that the soul could escape in the sneeze.
the hereafter.
It's related to what we think happens TRUTH: They were actually afraid of catching
to us after death As Radford put it, "If you're genuinely terrified the plague, which ravaged Europe in the sixth
of ghosts and think they could kill you, why the century. There was no effective medical
Ghosts tend to be the most common supernatural [heck] would you go looking for them?" treatment, so Catholics heeded Pope Gregory’s
belief present among different cultures, order to say a prayer of “God bless you” after
Benjamin Radford, deputy editor of Skeptical Of course, movies and TV shows about ghost- someone sneezed to keep the plague in check.
Inquirer magazine and author of "Scientific hunting, which are often presented with very
Paranormal Investigation: How to Solve little skepticism, aren't helpful. **
Unexplained Mysteries," told Business Insider
in 2015. It's all good fun, but as Radford said, "Don't MYTH: Buddha was overweight.
believe everything you see on TV!" []
And that might have a lot to do with their TRUTH: The spiritual icon who became known
relationship to the afterlife, which is also a as the Buddha was born Siddhartha Guatama,
common tenet of most major religions. MYTH-CONCEPTIONS and lived in India in the fifth and fourth
centuries B.C. He was not fat - he was thin for
In 2014, Dutch researchers looked into this. most of his life. Somewhere along the way, he
They also studied the idea that we're more MYTH: When the Great depression with the became mixed up with a 10th-Chinese folk hero
susceptible to see something supernatural when stock market crash of October 1929, dozens of and Buddhist leader named Budai. It’s Budai -
broke investors jumped to their deaths from Wall
we're looking for it. They ran five experiments, not Siddhartha - who is depicted in all those
testing to see if participants who were religious Street skyscrapers. chubby Buddha statues.
and not religious had supernatural sightings after
being presented with a number of words TRUTH: On the day of the plunge, a visiting FACT*oid:
("demon" or "spirit," for example). German scientist fell out of a 16th-floor window
of the Savoy Plaza Hotel near Central Park, and
By the end, the researchers were able to it was reported along with all the other bad Dairy cows produce five times more saliva each
conclude that giving those supernatural words financial news. The two events became so linked day then they do milk,
did have an effect on what religious participants in the public consciousness that an often-seen
