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Ghostly face
Halloween gives license for kids and some adults to dress up as things that go bump in the night, be those ghosts, vampires, goblins, werewolves or the like. It’s make-believe fun. After all, rational people don’t believe in such entities, right? Not so fast.
Surveys show a surprising number of us subscribe to various paranormal phenomenon (think poltergeists, UFOs, bigfoot, psychics, etc.). While some of the supernatural happenings we believe in cannot be entirely disproven, claims of their validity are based on opinion and personal experience, meaning suspect. The counterargument to that might be, “The absence of proof is not the proof of absence.” Fair enough.
A similarly large percentage of the population is superstitious, believing in supernatural influences (think luck charms, knocking on wood, performance rituals, etc.). Superstitions are common among athletes and gamblers, and they employ a wide array of rituals to magically bring them good fortune. All of which pretty much explodes the myth that humans can aspire to be like Vulcans (Spock).
So, are folks who subscribe to paranormal events and superstitions cut from similar cloth? Not as much as one might suppose. Surveys indicate they range from drifters to neurosurgeons, span all socio-economic and ethnic groups, and include both high school dropouts and PhDs.
Dedicated Believers
Some paranormal enthusiasts dedicate themselves to proving their beliefs. They pursue UFOs, visit haunted houses, try photographing poltergeists, comb the forest for bigfoot and the like. Many harbor a childlike sense of adventure, getting a real charge out of the hunt. They kind of do the Halloween thing all year long.
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So, how prevalent is the belief in paranormal happenings? As one example, according to the Pew Research Center, about 18% of Americans believe they have seen a ghost, 40% think poltergeists exist, and roughly 29% say they’ve been in contact with a deceased loved one. Women and African Americans are more likely to endorse these beliefs than men and other ethnic groups.
Other paranormal occurrences also garner widespread validation. One-third of us believe ET has visited in recent times, and over 40% say aliens came to Earth far in the past. More than a quarter of us believe certain people can move objects with their minds, over 20% think bigfoot is out there, and a whopping 58% say spirits can haunt places.
Rational Explanations
Understandably, skeptics assert otherwise, suggesting so-called ghostly visitations are the result of poor lighting, hypnagogic states associated with sleep, visual distortions, unidentified noises and other matter-of-fact explanations. They launch similar arguments against reports of demons, auras, angels and related phenomena.
The skeptics have an uphill battle here because only one fifth of Americans don’t believe in at least one paranormal happening. Similarly, just 30% of us claim we aren’t superstitious. Meaning folks are big into magical thinking and supernatural beliefs.
Psychologists maintain at least some of these claims arise from a cognitive process called “illusory pattern perception.” This is the mind’s innate tendency to perceive associations between events that simply aren’t there. We are hard-wired to engage in pattern perception because this ability helped our species survive. One example? “If the tall grass is moving, it’s a predator.” That wasn’t always the case but treating it as the truth saved many a Homo sapiens.
Like nature, the mind abhors a vacuum, so we’re more inclined to believe our experiences fit a meaningful pattern as opposed to being random and disconnected. This is particularly true when we feel diminished control over our lives. The illusion of “something there” rather than the reality of “nothing there” gives us a sense of agency, of control. The basic problem is that, while we are good at seeing patterns, we lag in our ability to distinguish real ones from their illusory counterparts.
Does that mean all paranormal experiences are BS? No, the limited scope of human knowledge being what it is, we have no basis to claim we’ve unlocked all the mysteries of existence. Perhaps both sides in this debate should consider a quote from Rod Serling’s TV series The Twilight Zone:
“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man, a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge.”
For more, visit philipchard.com.
