My wicked stepsister freaked out when I changed some details of my literally wicked father's funeral...(he was wicked, the funeral was actually cool). She was afraid he'd be 'mad at us.' My response? Look, if he's going to haunt anyone, it will be me and, frankly, I can take it. 13 years later, so far, so good.

If his spirit sustains, I hope it has better things to do!

On the other hand, I've counseled a lot of people who culturally support the notion of a sustaining presence. I can't argue with them.

As a friend says, "Believe nothing, but entertain all possibilities."

I don't think I could believe in a ghost I had not been personally introduced to. Or presented other kinds of overwhelming evidence. (Even then, they'd have to compensate for the "I don't believe I'm so smart I can't be fooled" factor.)

But in terms Allyson's argument about whether ghost will haunt the burnt out remains of the earth after the sun goes nova - I could so fan-wank that question, just for the sake of arguing. That is actually a pretty easy one to rebut. The big reason I don't believe in ghosts is the same reason I don't believe in Santa Claus. The burden is on anyone arguing for their reality to prove it, not on me to disprove it.

Or this for the "Looks like happy innocent fun time...but wait, what's that!?!" factor. [link]

From the link:

If you noticed the point of the flash, it's flat, as if no depth. But the ghostly image is embossed, as if the computer actually detected that the image does indeed have depth . Creepy!

Um... no. The computer didn't detect "depth" - just patterns of light and dark. "Embossing" is just a digital effect that processes the light and dark as if they follow usual rules of light and shadow for 3-d objects, and inferring depth from that. But really, we can't actually say if there's "depth" or just an odd pattern of light and dark.

Plus I dig up dead people from thousands of years ago and have yet to be haunted. And you'd think that if they were going to go after anyone, it'd be the people disturbing their everlasting rest. Because they're getting in the way of a new motorway.

Well, even assuming there are ghosts they're not all that common. It's not every disrupted dead guy that gets all wiggy. Maybe they had some sort of meeting and decided that the motorway seemed like a good idea and sent the whiner or two off to give grief to the politician who planned the thing.

It is the politicians who deserve the grief.

This is nice and creepy. Videos are soooo much better than pictures for the shiver factor. [link]

Do not watch this if you scare easily.

[link]

I don't believe in ghosts. The human brain is incredibly good at detecting patterns, to the point where it often detects patterns that aren't there. Plus a good chunk of our brains are devoted to recognizing human faces, leading us to see faces on random pieces of toast or water towers or whatever.

It is the politicians who deserve the grief.

And once you're a disembodied spirit you get to employ that sort of direct justice. Reason enough to stick around I'd say.

My BFF, who believes in all sorts of stuff which to me is total craziness, like reincarnation and pet psychics and other woo-woo ideas, cured me of going all "Let me prove you wrong" which I used to do when she or other folks I knew started bringing it up. She told me it was what she believed and I may think it's stupid, but telling her that wasn't going to change her OR me, so what was the point? Plus it made her feel bad.

When people talk about stuff I don't believe, I'll say "Hmm. I don't believe that, but that's me." and stop there. It is reallly hard when I am COMPLETELY RIGHT, but I am not the thought police and I don't want to be Ms. Buzzkill. Of course, if they want to have a discussion of our mutual beliefs, then the gloves are off.