Skeptics & Believers

Bigfoot

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 29 Dec 2017 02:29:00 +0000

Undeniably, Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti, or however it is named depending on the geography, culture, or reality TV show that describes it is the most elusive creature so far. Even though so many people claim to have seen it, pictured it, or collected hairs or footprints, there is no scientific evidence whatsoever that a large, unknown ape is roaming the woods or mountains of North America or the Himalayas, so far. However, the analysis of some alleged evidence is always full of surprises and interesting debunks.

Under Spell

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 04 Aug 2014 23:00:00 +0000

Figure 1- Witch by Viviana Gomez

Every Friday night coming to completion on a full moon, throw salt on an open fire with your right hand while speaking these words:

"It is not salt I turn to fire , but the heart of the man/woman I seek. Let him/she have no peace of mind until he/she come to me".

This spell must be cast three times on each occasion. On the third occasion the wording should be altered slightly to:

"It is not the salt I turn to fire, but the heart of the man/woman I seek. He/she shall have no peace of mind until he/she come to me".

With this spell, the love of your life sought usually appears within a few weeks. (12)

A good friend of mine started a new job as an assistant. She basically has to do what many assistants do: greet and assist clients with bookings and re-arranging appointments. Nothing strange about that except for the fact that her boss is a witch.

Last Farewell

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 23:18:00 +0000

The room was in the darkness when he woke up and saw his friend at the end of his bed. They attended grade 2 together and they were best friends. His friend had been absent from school the last whole week. He only knew his friend was very ill and had to stay at the hospital. Now he was there smiling at him. He smiled back and then his friend walked out of the room. He didn't follow him. He knew.1

Tales of widows seeing their late husband sitting on the foot of their bed or children encountering the manifestation of their dead sibling in their bedroom are legion, and even recently departed family pets have even been occasionally reported. Many had been written about spirits and ghosts, but this particular phenomena is usually the shortest in duration of all encounters where the spirit simply stays behind to give to a loved one, the last farewell.

Tauromachy from Spain to Atlantis.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 22:18:00 +0000

Since a U.S.-led research team headed by researcher Richard Freund and detailed in "Finding Atlantis," a National Geographic Channel special, believe to located the lost city of Atlantis, the legendary metropolis, in mud flats in southern Spain, I started to wonder if the tauromachy culture from Spain are related with the Atlantean system of bull worship described by Plato.

Plato says that the bull was important in Atlantis' culture. Since the beginning of Summer the bull was lunar and the horns represented the crescent moon. Another interesting aspect of Atlantean society is that some custom seems to have been preserved to this day. This is a custom, known to us all and with which some disagree, which is practiced mainly in Spain and southern France: the bullfight. The only difference with the bullfight is that the bulls are killed during capture here and during a sacrifice in Atlantis. The Atlantean kings knew in fact a religious custom, which was to catch a bull from a herd in semi-liberty in order to undergo a religious sacrifice. These same kinds of sacrifices existed in ancient Egypt. The Bible tells of sacrifices of bulls in honour of divine justice.

That Place Called Time

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 05:06:00 +0000

We are ready. We are waiting for that phone call. Time pass slower as tension increases in silence. We are a few of us waiting at the student house for that verdict. The delay puts some shy hope in our look and allows our bodies relax just a bit when the phone rings and we jump. The phone rings and continuous ringing but nobody have the courage to answer. Finally the tension is so high that makes me wake up as well as the phone’s rings in my living room.

Dream incorporation is a common phenomenon whereby an actual sensation, such as environmental sounds, are incorporated into dreams, such as hearing a phone ringing in a dream while it is ringing in reality or dreaming of urination while wetting the bed. Sounds, smells, lights and other stimuli from our sleeping environment often get absorbed into our dreams, challenging our dreaming minds to incorporate them into the dream storyline in a way that makes sense. It is well known that during our sleep there may be many external stimuli bombarding the senses, and the brain often interprets the stimulus and makes it a part of a dream in order to ensure continued sleep. Many of you had experience the incorporation of external stimuli in a dream, and most probably very similar as mine. When you hear the doorbell, it begins. Your brain is racing madly creating the story. You might wake up three seconds after, but in that time you'll have dream a one-hour story.

Telepathy or Coincidence

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 16:27:00 +0000

I had been working with this person for over a year in a stressful project with tight deadlines. We got along pretty well which it was a blessing considering the amount of hours of work, the stress and the fact that we were sharing the same small office.

One day I was focused in my morning‘s routine when this melody kept going and going in my mind as only minds know how to do in a loop. My co worker arrived and while he was putting his stuff on his desk he began to whistle the same melody.

How could that be possible? How could be possible that at the same moment I was thinking in this melody he started to whistle it? Was that a telepathy phenomena or just a very odd coincidence? Could two people’s thoughts get in some kind of harmony after sharing long time together or they just get to know each other so well that start to anticipate the other behaviours?

From Accountant to Future Teller

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 20:48:00 +0000

by Viviana Gomez - July 18, 2012

Some months ago I was researching the increasing popularity of the paranormal phenomena. I found that this phenomenon is historically influenced by the antagonism of two groups in different levels: the skeptics and the believers. One group can be as close minder as the other one in their own opinions and beliefs, but it is from this conflict where I learn most.

In this journey, and thanks to the intervention of a good friend, I had the luck to meet Ariana, a professional tarotist, who lives in Spain. She has the unusual background of being first an accountant and then a psychologist before she decided to leave her rationalist professions and use the power of the cards and planets to help people. Below you can find our chat:

What exactly do you do for living?

I’m tarotist, but I don't always reveal it because it doesn't have a good reception. This is related with our culture. Usually I introduce myself as astrologist. I am also astrologist, and a professional in alternative therapists. This is more accepted. So, I introduce myself in this way, and usually people ask for my help as tarotist.

Only for Addicted to Paranormal TV Shows

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 17 May 2012 21:09:00 +0000

by Viviana Gomez - May 17, 2012

Are you addicted to paranormal TV shows? I can’t help it. I go from one to another looking for that something that I never really find. I don’t consider myself a believer, neither a skeptic and that’s the problem. I belong, like many others; to that group in the middle looking for that elusive evidence to validate or not our suspicious about the existence of paranormal phenomena. The term 'Paranormal' is defined as a phenomenon or an experience that is beyond or unexplained by conventional theories of science.

Paranormal television shows like Ghost Hunters and Ghost Adventures are becoming incredibly popular. We watch them, then, to give proof and validation to some of our experiences or fears. If anyone is looking for more scientific proof, rather than anecdotal evidence, these shows promote to provide that.

The paranormal/supernatural-investigation subgenre has cropped up on cable television over the last few years, which includes “Ghost Hunters,” “Destination Truth,” “Ghost Adventures,” “Ghost Hunters International”, “Fact or Faked” and a few others. Each one promises to take a skeptical approach in its investigations and to rely on science to confirm or disprove paranormal claims. So far not one has been able to consistently keep that promise, but we still watching them hoping that in one episode that promise will fulfilled.

Zener Cards: Above the 20%.

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 23:57:00 +0000

By Viviana Gomez - April 10, 2012

I’ve been practicing with the Zener cards for a while, looking to find out any extrasensory perception (ESP) giftedness in myself, without getting more than the average 20% of guessing. I have also tried them with everybody who wanted to volunteer for the test. Nothing yet, but I am not giving up. I am sure there is some gifted candidate out there. I am determinate to reproduce the success that Dr. Rhine got in 1931 in his laboratory.

The Zener cards were created by Dr. Karl Edward Zener, a psychologist from Harvard University who in 1930, along with colleague J.B. Rhine, devised the card symbols that were used by Rhine in early ESP tests. Rhine called cards bearing these symbols "Zener cards" in honour of his colleague.

The Zener Cards consist in a standard pack of cards containing 25 cards, each portraying one of five symbols, viz., circle, cross, square, star, and waves. The cards would be shuffled and a receiver would then try to guess the cards that a sender would try to telepathically communicate. Or a subject might try to guess which card from the deck would be turned up next. A correct "guess" is called a "hit". Anything significantly higher than an average 20% hit in the long run would indicate some possible ESP condition.

Polls: Believers winning over Skeptics? I can’t believe it!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 03:00:00 +0000

By Viviana Gomez-March 02, 2012

"Science without religion is lame,

religion without science is blind."

- Albert Einstein

In 1633, the Church condemnation of Galileo Galilei, was one of the most dramatic incidents in the long history of the relations between science and religion. Galileo had published a year before that the sun-centered system was the physical truth and was convicted of grave suspicion of heresy for "following the position of Copernicus, which is contrary to the true sense and authority of Holy Scripture.” Galileo was placed under house arrest for the rest of his life.

But beginning the 16th century, the Protestant Reformation, the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment began to erode the position of authority held by religion. A new willingness to confront religious authority and a new respect for reason and its accomplishments began to counter established ways of thinking based on revealed religious truth.

As a result, modern philosophy began to separate from theology, and new philosophers began constructing a universal, human rationality independent of faith. For the first time in human history, it had become possible to not simply ponder faith and its forms of expression, but to challenge it as a fundamental truth—and to even question the very existence of God.

The western culture can be facing a deep religion crisis and God might not be as popular as used to be, but it doesn’t mean that believers are a specie in danger of extinction. They not only survived, they are even more than the skeptics and growing in number.

The Skeptic, the Believer and the Stargate Project

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 22:16:00 +0000

Researching paranormal phenomena is an overwhelming task, so I asked for the help of two good friends to collaborate in this research process; one is a staunch defender of the paranormal and the other an incurable skeptic. Both accepted to help me but for professionals reasons on condition of stay anonymous, so I will refer to them as Ms. Skeptic (is a she) and Mr. Believer.

I didn’t know where I was getting into before starting this fascinating route. I found, no kidding, more than 400 types of paranormal phenomena and counting. So where to start? And then, all we concluded in one: the winner, a component presents in most of the phenomenon that also wields a respectable reputation and a increasing popularity, was clairvoyance.

The french term clairvoyance, clair ="clear" and voyance ="vision", refer to the ability of seeing objects or actions removed in space or time from natural viewing. The information comes through clairvoyance in the form of visualization and clear consideration.

But a shy discomfort started to emerge between Ms. Skeptic and Mr. Believer. Rolling eyes, polite sarcasms, and deep sighs began to escort the increasing differences between them both reaching a heat point when Mr. Believer brought to serious consideration the Stargate Project and the remote viewing phenomenon.

Mom, I hear voices in my room!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 01:52:00 +0000

It was the time that my six years old daughter had started to experience fears at night. The light on, the door open, the jump to my bed in the middle of the night, and the look of terror for every single noise or shadow before going to sleep, pushed me to take some action in the matter. The argument that it was only her imagination had been long time obsolete, so I decided to listen carefully for every single detail that was provoking her any fear and tried to calm her down finding every logical explanation.

She told me that after going to sleep, she could see me from her bedroom when I was working in my computer on my desk on the living room. And a couple of time she could see a shadow approaching to me like peeking what I was doing. She told me that sometimes she could hear voices of people talking or laughing in her room, and finally what scared her most was a toy starting by itself in the middle of the night. I have to confess that I got some spooky feeling after listening to her, that of course I didn’t revealed.

Six Patients’s Souls

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 02:34:00 +0000

By Viviana Gomez

On my early 20s I had just decided to study biochemistry. Long days of physiology, biology, physic caught me in those old buildings of the university with hundred of student listening to a professor with some aura of rock star performing in front of a current audience of nerds. I’ve never imagine that in my enlightenment mind I would be pushed to think in the paranormal thanks to those classes that found us more than one time at the edge of the knowledge of the science that planted the seeds that inspire my today research.

In one of those days in physiology's class, the study of the rigor mortis and the mechanims of how the biochemistry of muscles provoke that effect (long to explain now) showed us its relationship in some way with the energy loss at the moment of death, tempted the professor to add a weird comment about some experiment that measured weight loss at the moment of the death. But as he regretted what he had just said suggested to "focus in what we know and don’t get lost in this detail that science can’t explain yet". Just what I needed to hear to do the opposite.

Hyperreality

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 05:02:00 +0000

More people are engaged with games and social media in an Internet hyperreality word, where the symbols become more real than people. Scientists talking about the existence of other dimensions and the relativity of time open up our concept of reality. The use of the money has become the trading of digital ones and zeros with a credit or debit card for goods.

What is real and what is fiction when they are blended together, when there is no clear distinction between where one ends and the other begins? Hyperreality It is a postmodern philosophy that deals in part with semiotics, or the study of the signs. Some famous theorists of hyperreality include Jean Baudrillard, Albert Borgmann, Daniel Boorstin, and Umberto Eco.

The recent wave of TV shows, movies and books devoted to paranormal phenomena are actually part of this larger trend incorporating alternate realities, a realm media analysts call hperreality. As the line between what is real and what is an altered representation became blurred, anything can be truly real in the age of mass media.

Now, let’s talk about the paranormal phenomena…

Rererences

^ Umberto Eco, Travels In Hyperreality, New York, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich

Baudrillard, "Simulacra and Simulations,"

What is Hyperreality? By Garry Crystal http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-hyperreality.htm

Real or Illusion?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 20:51:00 +0000

If it is so easy to create your own ghost, what is real and what illusion?