We do firmly believe that UFO's exist. More to follow soon.
You are not alone.
Is that why you don't talk to him?
Interest and the belief in paranormal phenomena is on the increase in today’s society, which is surprising to some because it is still viewed by many, particularly mainstream scientific researchers with much scepticism, due to lack of concrete scientific evidence in support of the subject.
The term paranormal encompasses many and varied topics including ghosts, cryptozoology, Psi, belief in extra terrestrial life forms, astrology, EVP to name but a few in a vast sea of related subject matter. For something to be viewed as paranormal phenomena, it will usually be or exist outside an individuals normal cognitive understanding and involve interactions that are beyond that usual physical way of exchanging with and understanding of the world.
Some elements of paranormal phenomena even cross over into religious beliefs, for example, Hoodoo, Wicca, Paganism and if I dare to say so, some main stream religious beliefs such as Islam, Hinduism and Christianity, the doctrines of which contain many events which could be viewed as paranormal phenomenon.
When an individual prays to their God are they not communicating or trying to communicate with an unseen force or entity and asking for help and guidance from that omnipresent being? If the individuals prayer is answered it is seen as a miracle in the mind of the receiver, but still this could be seen as a paranormal phenomenon because, as we all know the science of the paranormal is a very subjective matter and personal to the individual experience and how it fits into their particular framework of belief and cognitive perception.
Misunderstanding and scepticism in the area of paranormal phenomena usually occurs because the experiences related to this phenomenon are as said subjective, in that they are generally based on how the individual interprets the experience within the framework of personal understanding.
So cognitive bias could play a large part in how paranormal phenomena is interpreted and whether the individual is more open minded to such an experience or whether they have a point of view which is more sceptical, or maybe interpret the experience within a religious context. In both cases of believer or sceptic, the experience could be distorted and a negative or positive correlation between mind and subjective belief drawn from the individuals perception and predisposition.
Returning to my earlier comment regarding religious belief, what may be considered by some as an act of God, could by others be seen as some kind of paranormal phenomenon, where as the next individual could put that experience down to pure coincidence, depending upon their own reasoning, intuition and understanding.
Psychic fraud relates to a practitioner operating in the fields of psychic healing, divination, mediumship or any other practise connected with the paranormal. In itself it is the same as any other kind of fraud, being that it deceives an individual or audience into believing something that has no true foundation, usually for financial gain.
There are many fraudulent psychic who exploit unsuspecting or gullible people and they tend to be unscrupulous in the way in which they operate, sometimes utilising peoples weaknesses and vulnerability for there own benefit.
They use all kinds of methods from prestidigitation, or slight of hand, cold reading whereby they prompt the audience or individual with suggestions, hot reading where the fraudulent psychic will research the subject beforehand to acquire information or a combination of these techniques and others in order to deceive and trick the participants.
An individual who may seek advice from a psychic practitioner will normally have a predisposition and a cognitive bias to this kind of practice or even be self deluded regarding the psychic experience, for example, an individual seeking guidance from a Tarot card reader will usually hold the belief that this form of divining can provide the answers that they seek and therefore will be more willing to accept the apparent insight procured by the reader.
Fraudulent psychics can be very perceptive, intuitive and able to read the body language of people and manipulate the individual in to a false sense of what they are being told is true. A fraudulent psychic will gather information through a series of questions and answers from which they will be able to dictate the future or provide details relating to a past event, through no others means than simple logic and elimination.
Due to the huge amount of people who exploit the term psychic, those who may possess any true ability are generally looked upon with suspicion and in turn this makes it a harder task for those who wish to research the science of parapsychology and help develop an understanding of parapsychological phenomena
Electronic Voice Phenomenon, also known as Raudive voices, named after the psychologist/parapsychologist Konstantin Raudive, who carried out some early research into the EVP phenomenon. The term is used in the area of paranormal research and relates to sounds, usually human voice or voices that are detected on audio recording devices such as digital recorders, analogue tape, video cameras and even telephone answering machines. The sounds or voices can not usually be heard by the human ear during the recording session, but can be detected during the playback using sound enhancers or amplification devices via a computer.
It has been said that theses voices which are normally just whispers, random words, short sentences or incoherent sounds are related to something called apophenia, a cognitive illusion whereby the mind will try to make sense of random or meaningless data, this is often attributed to the cause of much paranormal phenomena.
Some early pioneers of this technique for contacting spirits were Attila Von Szalay who began in 1941 using basic techniques with 78mm recordings and later in the 1950's he started using reel to reel tapes with more success. Other earlier researchers were Von Szalays assistant Raymond Bayless, film producer Friedrich Jurgenson, who while recording bird songs later found the audio contained what appeared to be his dead father and wife’s voices calling to him and as mentioned earlier Konstantin Raudive, who also worked with Jurgenson and Hans Bender in what was yet to be known as EVP research. Raudive compiled around 100 000 audio recordings, many of which he claimed were communications with deceased entities.
However, the earliest recordings of EVP, which pre-dates theses pioneers of paranormal research were made in 1901 by the anthropologist Waldemar Bogoras who unintentionally recorded spirit voices while making recordings of the indigenous tribal people in Siberia. On these recordings unexplained voices were detected speaking in English and Russian. Even to this day the origin of these voices remains unsolved and solid evidence in support of EVP. Thomas Edison also claimed that if there was a possibility our souls do transcend death, then an apparatus could be construed in order to allow communication between our existence and the spirit world.
Today the equipment that is used in this area of research has become more technologically advanced, obviously, but the fundamental principles remain the same. Paranormal investigators have access to a variety of digital equipment to help in research. The most popular tool of use being the digital voice recorder. Admittedly EVP is a technique that, although I have been aware of, was something I have not been involved in, but after doing some background research I have invested in an Olympus WS 6505 DSNS digital voice recorder myself and will be using this as a preferred method of investigation. The results I have viewed by other researchers of this field are fascinating and this is one of the most interesting, captivating and what appears to be rewarding techniques to use in terms of providing evidence
As usual, our friends in mainstream scientific study and sceptics of paranormal phenomena in general are wary of what exactly EVP is and what the cause of it may be. It has been suggested that the probable cause of EVP are stray fragments of radio transmissions, mobile phone conversations and other forms of electric transmissions. As mentioned briefly earlier auditory apophenia is another explanation and even just fraud in some instances and although this may be the case, the real reason still haunts within the realms of ambiguity.
Class A. This example of EVP are the best and clearest in terms of clarity of diction and sound, without any discrepancies regarding what is being said. Theses examples of EVP require no further enhancement or amplification and can be presented as good evidence without any technical tampering and processing to the recording. This kind of EVP tend to be direct answers to specific questions asked by the researcher, rather than random words. This classification of EVP tend to be rather rare in comparison to the other categories.
Class B. This classification of EVP is the most common type obtained by researchers. Not as clear class A, there may be some misunderstanding as to what is being said in this example. The voice may not be clear enough to be understood, for example, being spoken quietly or in a whisper and therefore may require some form of digital enhancement to detect what words are being articulated.
Class C. This is the lowest quality type of EVP and will be very hard to distinguish words or a phrase and extensive work on enhancement will be needed using computer manipulation, variations in recording speed and minimising hiss or background noise, although it still may remain hard to understand words or phrases that are being spoken, if at all. This kind of EVP is less likely to be presented as evidence of paranormal phenomena.
In some cases researchers have a further classification D. But these are not usually of much use at all and may only consist of low whispers, or breathing sounds, almost being unintelligible.
There are two types of EVP, intelligent EVP and residual EVP. Intelligent EVP is that of a spirit or entity that is able to communicate directly with an inquisitor, by responding directly to specific questions being asked, usually in single words or short phrases. The second type of EVP are residual in nature or simply sounds that have been captured at some point in history by the environment, such as doors opening or closing, footsteps or even trapped voices and conversations from the past. In both ceases the evidence is not normally evident until during playback of the recordings and in some cases unintentionally caught while recording.
Specialist equipment has been designed to record EVP phenomena such as the spiricom, designed by William O' Neill in 1980, apparently from messages received from scientist George Mueller who had died six years earlier, although the spiricoms authenticity is largely discredited in recent times.The Ghost Box was created by Frank Sumption in 2002. Unlike other types of communication, The Ghost Box can receive immediate messages from spirits without having to review recordings, which can be very time consuming. This technique uses white noise static with an AM radio receiver which scans back and forth across across channels. It is claimed by protagonists of this method that the AM frequency provides a type of electronic voice for spirits and even extraterrestrial life forms to utilise and communicate to the researcher directly. Critics of this device say that it is purely subjective since it only relies on radio noise and results are coincidental and a result of the mind incorrectly interpreting random sounds into something more meaningful, pareidolia.
Although some parapsychologists have no interest on EVP and claim that there is no real evidence of anything paranormal in the recordings, I feel that this is somewhat short sighted as much evidence produced in terms of paranormal normal support is disputed and fellow researchers should not be so dismissive about a field of investigation that does have potential for further research and might be able to produce solid evidence in support of the science of parapsychology.
