Has any supernatural event been 'proven'?

[Ivan Seeking]

I can only say that if this didn't happen exactly as I perceived it, then it must have been a truly vivid hallucination of some sort. I would be forced to concede this as plausible were it not for Tsu. The only thing that I can even imagine beyond a classically ghostly explanation is that some physical phenomenon was able to induce similar physical sensations, and similar sensations of smell in both of us. The only unique feature of our living conditions that comes to mind was that we lived in a seismicly active area. This all happened on the 5th floor of an apartment in Glendale Ca.

 

[juju]

When someone says that they experience something but then cannot really communicate it or replicate it -- my guard goes up immediately because despite what that person may say -- there is no way of knowing whether it is true or not -- did or did not happen etc etc. Does not imply that they lie -- but they may well be delusional -- who knows ?
Am I to believe in UFO's just because a bunch of people say that they experienced something or got kidnapped , when in every single case it is a 'one off' non-repeatable experience. I do not think so.
Ray.

Belief and doubt are equally irrelevant. Take the maybe path. Don't dismiss others experiences completely. It is true they may be delusional, or they may be perceiving other aspects of a larger reality.

juju

 

[Sabine]

doc brown i think that what they are doing is a big mistake if god existed an wanted to proof hie existence he does need them, and btw lots of people create these stories for a living do not believe evrthg

 

[phoenixthoth]

This is such a vague question. Has any *natural* event been proven? lol

I don't think the supernatural can exist by definiton, assuming that there is nothing beyond "nature." Assuming one defines "nature" as an all ecompassing "thing".

But having said that, there are tons of weird things going on that many would blindly label as supernatural. To me, it's all natural.

 

[TheAntiRelative]

Because random rare events cannot be proven on anything but a very large scale, all we have left are those who have experienced and interpreted something as supernatural.

The rest of us who have not had such an experience fit into two categories: Speculators and Believers. The funny part is that disbelievers somehow think they are different than what they consider believers. Those that are convinced negatively or positively without personal experience have exactly the same religion-like belief.

It could be argued that the frequent repetition of anecdotal evidence can be considered as valid as any other type of experimental evidence since evidence itself is never a 0.000% or 100.000% representations of "truth" but instead relies upon interpretation. Anecdotal evidence just has to be lent far less credibility per iteration, it has to equal fewer percentage points of a given person's truth meter.
We all believe things that have never been directly proven in a lab. Has someone come to you house and set up an experiment to prove that your toilet actually delivers excrement to the local sewage system intead of passing through a wormhole to the sun or do you rely on the small necessarybelief system that we all construct to lead normal lives? You use anecdotal evidence.

Set up an experiment right now to capture on film the impact of a metorite. You can't? Well then metorites are are just not scientifically proven...

From what I understand, ball lightning cannot currently "Truly" be re-created in a lab and therefore is just as anecdotal as ghost stories. You can't repeat the experiment as required by some of the (un)believers in this thread. I would wager that stories of ball lightning are far far less frequent than ghost stories. Ball lightning however is thought of as far closer to truth. Why?

It comes down to belief systems. Ball lighting can fit into current scientific belief systems easier than ghosts can.

(un)Believers of yersteryear would have burned you at the stake for talking about the technology of radio. (un)Believers of today will burn you at the stake verbally for violating their perfect picture of reality.

The problem of (un)belief is two-fold. Arrogance is one part of it. The second part is a human tendency to internalize their knowledge as part of who they are and to tie it to self-worth. Contradiction of their internalized knowledge is a direct attack of that person's validity. It is seen as an attack of their worth and value. It is claiming that they are ignorant of the truth. These people see ignorance as undesirable and translate that undesirability to themselves.

A scientist is willing to embrace his own ignorance with grace and even pride.

 

[phoenixthoth]

supernatural experiences as higher D events

Michio Kaku wrote in "Hyperspace" about how he had an epiphany while observing carp in Golden Gate Park. The carp were essentially trapped in two dimensions while he was in three. He imagined what would happen if he removed a carp and put it back. How would that be understood by the other carp? It would seem to vanish and then suddenly return but what if they wonder where it went? Where did the missing carp go? A higher dimension. And, thus, Kaku uses this as an analogy to us and hyperdimensional beings, where by that I mean beings occupying n dimensional space with n>3 or n>4. We "carp" are unable to see or by any means detect hyperdimensional beings but they are there watching us, perhaps. If they're interested, that is, and able to. (For all we know, we are living on a molecule two alternate Planck lengths in an alternate universe and they can't detect us!)

But the carp can detect traces of hyperspace. Rain, for example, creates waves in the "space" they occupy. Perhaps one day we will have conslusive empirical data of hyperD beings by inference if not direct evidence.

I was thinking about this today while a cat was sitting next to me. It was relatively short compared to me and it might as well have been two dimensional (for the sake of argument). I tried to get its attention. I said, "pss, pss, pss... knick knick knick." Those are utterances not even in my language but I'm trying to be heard by the lowerD being for I cannot speak its language any more than it can speak mine. It heard something and looked around. Around. Not up at me. If it just looked up, it would have had direct evidence of a hyperD being, me.

The 4D equivalent of "up" has been deemed "ana" (or "kata"?). Unfortunately, the method of looking ana is contraversial and definitely not considered scientifically rigorous.

But it makes me wonder how many of my odd (some would say "supernatural") experiences in my life are really some hyperD being saying, "pss, pss, pss, knick, knick, knick."

 

[Louis Cypher]

Two categorys

There is a third category, those who think that all this stuff is fascinating, if very anecdotal and who are slightly skeptical but willing to look closely at good research into the area; I have attended many lectures on the 'unexplained' and have a deep respect for people who try to go about finding proof scientificaly: the anal and often boringly repetitive lengths these people go to to try and gain some accepetance put's me in mind of science itself, and we should heartily encourage these paraphsycologists, because all they're looking for is proof! Many have started as skeptics of the most ardent kind, some have found that it is indeed a load of old nonsense, but some -often the most ardent critics - have found some truly bizarre results that defy logic, like all good scientists, they don't dismiss there results, but neither do they accept them; one of the finest lectures I ever attended was from an ardent skeptic who had changed into being open minded and less dismissive; free your mind surely and the rest will follow: let's not dismiss the scientific but when we have a result above the probability we expect, let's not dismiss it as nonsense because we can't understand it; I am at heart a scientist, as such I want proof but my biggest asset is my ability to say 'sheez that's odd!' I just don't know! Let's start looking at the unexplained scientifically instead of dissmissing it as fringe science, after all that's what string theory is itself! Where's the difference? I am a physisist and as such few things surprise me about the world, but there are explanations for those things that surprise us, be it Quantum mechanics or ghosts? Let's not lose our ability to look at the world in wonder, for if we do we die inside, surely?