To be really freaked out about seeing someone that wasn’t there??

[freakedoutseeingthings]

My partners mum, step-dad, brother and 2 nieces are on holiday at the seaside so to we took our little one for the a day trip to have a beach day with his cousins today.

As we were driving into where they are staying and my partner was packing I said to him ‘I didn’t know your whole family was here’ when I saw his grandma standing next to his mum. He must have assumed that I was talking about his stepdad as he didn’t respond to it in a weird way/ask what I meant.

Then when we were inside I asked where his grandma had gone and where she was sleeping as they only have 2 bedrooms. Well it turns out that she isn’t there and is at home and I couldn’t have seen her because she’s not there??

What on earth happened?? What/who did I see?? Am I crazy now? 🙈

How do you know you have never ever seen something that wasn't there? It is impossible to know that by its very nature. You might see things all the time and accept them for what they are and never even stop to think that they may be paranormal experiences.

Some people don't want to believe the possibility that things can happen that they can't explain, or be explained away by logic.

I have some very vivid dreams and some dreams where I can control what happens but I know they are dreams because I know I was asleep at the time but I have experienced things that logically can't be right eg seeing my Dad at the kitchen table long after he had died. He was clearly there, reading the paper. Most of the dreams are fantastical and so far from reality that they couldn't be true, but the "visions" if you like are real, not a trick of the light, or a dust cloud or any other explanation that some people want to have.

I dreamt about my Dad the other night. We were in his car, not his car, and driving past our old house. When he saw the house and the work and extensions that have been added he swerved into the middle of the road, quickly corrected and we drove away. I know this was a dream and not a vision.

I find it amazing that some people believe in the existence of God and Jesus and all the stories in the bible, without any supporting evidence but refuse to believe some people do see things that others don't just because they can't explain it. I also find it a little sad that some people's minds are so closed to the possibility that this can and does happen.

How do you know you have never ever seen something that wasn't there? It is impossible to know that by its very nature. You might see things all the time and accept them for what they are and never even stop to think that they may be paranormal experiences.

Well, indeed. I did sort of see that point coming. I guess all I can say is that I’ve got no reason to believe I’ve ever seen anything that’s not there! I am resolutely non-woo in that sense; I don’t get weird experiences that I struggle to explain.

I think the bottom line is that we all experience the world differently. The experiences that stop people in their tracks must, surely, be ones that are outside their normal experience and don’t make sense. I’m not interested in dream-related experiences - they’re obviously ripe for misunderstanding. I’ve had really lucid dreams myself, and also those disconcerting experiences when you’re sure you’ve been woken by a doorbell but in reality you really haven’t. I’m familiar with all that, and it’s very easily explained.

I just think there are other, more compelling, instances.

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine " I just think there are other, more compelling, instances."

What sort of thing do you mean?

The many, many things that people report on threads like this. And elsewhere.

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine "
The many, many things that people report on threads like this. And elsewhere."

Ah. Not really easy to discuss then! I just think it's a shame that people instantly leap to the paranormal and close their minds to the possibility of rational explanations. And also disregard the undeniable fact that whenever any paranormal event has been properly investigated it has been shown to have a rational explanation.

What I mean is, the things that people deem remarkable and worth reporting. I don’t bat an eyelid if I think I see my cat out of the corner of my eye but it turns out to be a cushion! Wouldn’t bother to mention it. But when people have had a disturbing experience and already been through the though processes you suggest, they are still sometimes baffled.

You’re wrong to suppose that every weird experience has been rationally resolved.

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine "
You’re wrong to suppose that every weird experience has been rationally resolved"

I didn't say that. I said every weird experience that has been properly investigated has been rationally resolved.

What about that timeslip place in Liverpool? Can you blame people for wanting to believe anything other than the utterly dull explanations of science...

@CurlewKate
I just think it's a shame that people instantly leap to the paranormal and close their minds to the possibility of rational explanations.

This is a bit disingenuous. People routinely go for the rational explanation! They only look elsewhere after they’ve exhausted the rational! It’s the opposite of closing your mind, if anything.

I said every weird experience that has been properly investigated has been rationally resolved.

Ok. I take the distinction you’re making… but what is ‘properly investigated’ in this situation? Every single anecdote on this thread is impossible to investigate, I’d say, because they’re all fleeting, isolated incidents. Where does that leave us? Exactly what kind of paranormal events could be ‘properly investigated’ given that they’re usually, again, fleeting and isolated?

@Firefly1987 Can you blame people for wanting to believe anything other than the utterly dull explanations of science..."

Gosh-I honestly can't imagine thinking science dull!

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine "People routinely go for the rational explanation!"

Well, if you take this thread as an example they don't! At least 4 perfectly sensible explanations, but no, it's the woman's soul checking in to say goodbye on the way to heaven......

It absolutely is dull though, maybe not in all contexts, I'm sure science is fascinating for some things. But in this context and for things like orbs just being dust on a camera, I mean yeah that's an incredibly dull explanation for something people were previously excited about being a mystical or spiritual thing. Scientists just like shattering people's illusions though.

The explanations are only sensible if the person it happened to can accept them as a possibility.

If I see a person, in the cold light of day, and someone tells me it was a trick of the light, I’m unlikely to be convinced by that. I see what’s there, generally. It just wouldn’t be a ‘reasonable’ explanation for me.

I’m not in the habit of hallucinating either. And as for ‘you see what you expect to see’… I know that on some scientific level there is something to that on some split-second level, but it doesn’t reflect most people’s actual experience of the world. I expect to see our cars in the drive when I look out of the window; if one of them isn’t there, I do a double-take before I remember that it’s at the garage. On no level do I see something that’s not there because I expect it!

Many posters do seem to have a different relationship with their senses. I’m prepared to accept that. So you see something and take it with a pinch of salt, thinking it may or may not be there. For many of us it’s absolutely not like that; we don’t have random flights of fancy or see things through a lens of distrust. So when something that seems inexplicable happens, it takes a lot to explain it away.

😂

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine If you expect to see two cars on your drive and there's only one you do a double take, then remember that it's at the garage, or Fred said he was going out early or you parked it somewhere else for some reason. Or, worse case, you realise it's been stolen. You don't immediately leap to "oh my god-a space ship with a tractor beam must have hovered over my house last night and taken my car to research alien technology"

Here's a very interesting article by Steve Novella, a neurologist, called "I know what I saw".. theness.com/neurologicablog/sleep-and-false-memory/

About 30 years ago My mum saw me walking along her street , it wasn't me as I stayed 200 miles away . She even described what I was wearing , I had the same clothes on when she phoned, all very odd

Indeed. But no one is suggesting something like that in any scenario on this thread. You don’t help your argument by making up things like that.

All people are saying is that, say once in a lifetime, something happens to them that they can’t explain. They look for the rational first - of course. If my daughter and I see a white rabbit in our garden, we don’t think ‘ghost rabbit’; we think ‘ooh, someone’s pet rabbit has escaped.’ If, though, we’re staring out the window at the rabbit, and it disappears in front of our eyes, we have a problem. You might say all sorts of things: it was a paper bag that blew away (but I know it wasn’t because of, you know, my eyes and the fact it was a shared experience); there was no rabbit, we were just expecting to see one (obviously we weren’t); it was a shared hallucination (???).

To be clear, this hasn’t happened to us. It’s just for illustrative purposes.

Now, we’re not saying ‘ghost rabbit’; we’re not saying ‘rabbit beamed into space’; we’re not saying ‘the rabbit is an unusual manifestation of the Virgin Mary.’ We’re simply describing what we saw and are shocked by it because it doesn’t conform to the physical rules we know.

People do have these experiences even if you don’t like it. Obviously you (as in you @CurlewKate )can’t explain them all away individually, but you’re nevertheless convinced that you can sweepingly say that they all have rational explanations that you, @CurlewKate , would be able to find if you looked, because you are rational and they’re not. That’s where I’m getting stuck.

Look, I’m prepared to concede that there are rational explanations, yes - every time. Yes. But I’m not prepared to accept that you, @CurlewKate , could find those explanations using current science and technology. So therefore if they happened to you, you would remain baffled and would describe the event as ‘unexplained’. And it might bug you, or distress you or present itself to you as a story worth sharing on a forum. And you might find it annoying if a poster rolled their eyes and presented you with a range of inadequate ‘rational’ explanations that you’ve already been through and struggled to accept.

No one is saying ‘alien abduction’ based on nothing. People are sharing baffling experiences that, if they happened to you, might also baffle you, hard though you find that to accept.

@BernardBlacksBreakfastWine "But I’m not prepared to accept that you, @CurlewKate , could find those explanations using current science and technology. So therefore if they happened to you, you would remain baffled and would describe the event as ‘unexplained’. "

I don't think we can explain everything using current science and technology. I am fine with unexplained. The issue is using paranormal as an explanation, rather than saying "we don't understand this yet". And another issue is refusing to accept multiple explanations because "I know what I saw". And, as one poster has said because scientific explanations are "very dull."

I am fine with unexplained.

So why do you insist on trying to explain away people’s experiences by saying things like ‘it’s a trick of the light’ or similar? Surely that’s the opposite of accepting a weird experience as unexplained? You’re rejecting the original experience, saying ‘you did not experience that but here’s an explanation for why you think you did.’

I think we have different definitions of ‘unexplained’.

We’ll also have to agree to differ as to whether something not being covered by current science makes it ‘paranormal’. You say you’re fine with the idea that current science doesn’t have all the answers, but when people say ‘I had this weird experience that doesn’t conform to the rules of physics as we know them’, you insist they’re calling it ‘paranormal’ and tell them off.

There is a BBC program cannot remember the name that deals with such "strange" phenomena. These phenomena should be reported and recorded. A lot of people have such "real" experiences, including myself along with some 4 other members of my family all AT ONCE seeing a person recently cremated -- all seeing the same person at the same time and same place recently passed.

Update: My grandmas twin who I have never met has just died 😣 Could it actually be linked or just a coincidence??

Oh goodness . I'm sorry for your loss. Maybe she was just saying goodbye. That does seem odd doesn't it?

My partners grandmas twin not mine sorry 🙈

@eatingandeating24 that's amazing.