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October 13, 2006
I Don't Believe In Ghosts, OK?
This morning, the New York Times carries a lengthy story about haunted houses in Columbia County, NY:
Then a guest, Bill Placke, a banker from Summit, N.J., was dozing off in the guest bedroom, lying next to his sleeping wife, he said, when a smiling skeletal apparition robed in a white gown and ruffled collar appeared at the foot of his bed. It bobbed toward him, then vanished. “I have never been gripped by such fear!” he confessed.To which I say: Enough already.
I've had it with ghost stories.
Why is it that ghosts always seem to appear as pale and/or skeletal apparitions in vaguely nineteenth-century apparel? Guys in stove-pipe hats ... ladies in flowing dressing gowns or big hoop skirts ... drivers of horse-drawn carriages.
I mean, homo sapiens has been living and dying for 130,000 years. Where are the first 129,800 years' worth of dead people? Why do we never see some dead prehistoric dude walking around in a saber-tooth-tiger fur?
And why is it always just vaguely-nineteenth-century humans, with the occasional horse or dog thrown in? Who has ever seen the the skeleton of a fifteenth-century racoon scampering across a road late at night? Where are all the spectral skunks?
Show me the ghosts of a ninth-century American Indian and a couple of dolphins. Then maybe I'll believe your stupid ghost stories.
Posted by Eric at October 13, 2006 8:08 AM
Comments
Why, too, wouldn't ghosts accumulate over time and in space?
Why, for instance, do you never hear of ghosts competing for top billing at any venue? Do ghosts colocate? Those cave-ghosts and Victorian ghosts-- must they vie with 1980s spirits for attention from the living when occupying the same structure?
If a ghost-infected building is removed, does the ghost simply dissapear, or does the ghost domicile at the replacement structure?
Silliness for the suggestible.
Posted by: Ereshkigal at October 13, 2006 5:16 PM
Maybe ghosts only are active for a limited time. If I recall correctly, one of the concepts of spiritualism was that ghosts where unhappy souls that had to be placated into making their transition into death.
Maybe the original ghost stories were written at a particular time (during the popularity of said spiritualism) and they just haven't been updated. Ghosts in leisure suits? Who would dare report such a thing!
Nice Hallowe'en subject, BTW.
Posted by: idlemind at October 13, 2006 10:02 PM
Easy! Ghosts only haunt the houses in which they lived and/or died. Unless you live in the gulf stream or Mesa Verde, you won't meet dolphin or 9th century Indian ghosts. And most modern American homes only need to worry about the Ghost of Housing Bubbles Past.
OTH, if you build your house on an Indian burial ground, you could have problems with poltergeists. But those are completely different from ghosts, and other rules apply.
;-)
Posted by: DK at October 16, 2006 5:56 PM
I like this article on real ghosts and haunted places:
13 REAL Haunted Places That Will Make Your Cry For Mommy
http://www.americaninventorspot.com/13_real_haunted_places
13 Real Haunted Places
Posted by: Michelle at October 26, 2006 9:24 PM