3 quick rules for "sensitive" investigators

Stew_DPS wrote:

KBarrows wrote:Okay, most of the people I have talked to about this have voiced the opinion that people who believe themselves to be “sensitive” to the paranormal do not make good paranormal investigators. I think this isn’t true because I believe paranormal investigating to be more scientific than that.

I'm kinda confused by this statement. More scientific than what?

These are fine steps for anyone, not just those who consider themselves "sensitive". My question is more for how those who consider themselves "sensitive" prove it. You said you have worked with psychics...were they able to back that up? how?

To be honest, I have only worked with one person I really believed to have any psychic ability. It was an older woman who told me the exact life story of my late great grandmother (note that my great grandmother wa not well known nor did she ever meet this woman). Other than that, most of the other psychics were more like wet matches in a dark cave (not to be rude). Proving just depends, I would expect, on accuracy of claims and scientific backing I.E. taking a "psychic" on an investigation and comparing his/her claims to you EMF, EVP, Temp, Video, Picture, and other devices. Depending on how similar the claims are to the science would in turn prove or disprove it, right? I suppose though that a gray area exists when only some thing are similoar and other aren't, I guess that's the flaw.

O and more scientific than just riding something off because of A; you don't believe in it. Rememder just becasue no proof currently exists doesn't mean some won't or can't turn up or else paranormal investigationg as a whole would be utterly useless or B; because you don't believe a persons claims. I believe that science is about either proving or disproving a hypothesis (most likely I spelled that wrong so forgive my spelling errors please) no matter how "out there" or silly it may at first appear to be. So, there you go haha

Sensitive people do have a place in investigation of the paranormal, however, the team must be very careful with this. Misused, it can do much more harm than good. There's LOTS of people who claim to being sensitive, but actually have no such abilities at all. Not pointing fingers at all, so no one start screaming about that. (I don't know any of you so I COULDN'T point fingers if I even wanted to. )

Imagine if one of these "false-sensitives" started claiming "feelings" in a place that really had no paranormal history at all, but this fact wasn't known to the rest of the group. Here we have a situation which could GREATLY impact future reputation of that group.

And that part does concern me. 85% of the time, if a "sensitive" is on a ghost hunt, they'll say at some point, "I feel a presence here." Are 85% of places actually haunted?? Now, true, that could be biased in that we normally CHOOSE locations that have paranormal history & not just any old house. But it still seems that you hear that phrase a bit too often...."I feel a presence here."

Hopefully, as professional investigators, anyone that has sensitive abilities, or think they do, will always use these in a mature way. I'll use myself as an example....I am an expert & proven dowser. I was hired for 2 years by a somewhat large well drilling firm to locate for them. During this time, I located over 100 drilling locations perfectly, with the sole exception of one. It WAS a good well, but we had to drill over twice as deep as was usual for one of my wells. At $7 per foot, depth adds up quick. However, nothing was ever said, nor would it had ever been......I located a successfull well, and a HIGHLY productive one also.....it was just deep & expensive. The only one disappointed in that particular one was myself.

BUT....I never actually specify a depth, only a location. Even if you know nothing about well drilling, you can see how a dowser could easily put himself in a dangerous situation by doing that. Kinda like ghosts....I can't actually SEE water down there, but I'm 99.8% sure that it is, and I know the technique fo locating the depth also. But what if I was wrong?? What if I said "150 feet", but we actually had to drill 400 feet. Somebody wouldn't be too happy.

So, I feel it's just more professional to tell a client, "This feels like the best location in the area." Then we drill & see what happens.

Now, I know myself that I can also locate depth, specific metals/ores, utility lines, natural gas pockets, & even the actual QUALITY of water. But going that far is REALLY pushing it. You're talking some major repurcussions if I'm wrong. I trust myself, but just do not feel it's in the best interest of anyone to use my ability, which I can't even explain, for something like this.

The same discretion should be used by ANYONE with these type of abilities, gifts, whatever you want to call it. If that is followed, then the use of "sensitives" in paranormal investigation should work just fine in most cases.

P.S. I can also locate EM energy easily, but won't do this for paranormal research. I just don't think it's provable enough when a meter can do the same thing & be 100% verifiable.

P.S.S. You can't "learn" dowsing, you have to have the ability within you. But it CAN be tuned. I "apprenticed" under a Master Driller for a while, who was also a dowser. He's the one that taught me how to fine-tune the ability & use it to find depth, quality, direction of flow, etc.

He could actually locate coal, which we proved several times by drilling through it, producing jet-black dust that tasted really bad. I never could learn that from him, even though I eventually exceeded his abilities with water locating.

I suppose the same "training" is possible with other sensitive abilities...don't know.

Good points Merc, excellent.

Stew_DPS wrote:ahh...you're catching on. Yep, we plan to with hold the resident's claims from two people who will be investigating together as sort of a "blind" team. It will be interesting to see if those who DO know what is "going on" report anything different from those who do not. More for the purpose of experimenting during the investigation.

We've done this. It caused more .. um, discussion for afterwards. There were 4 in the group that did not know what the general claims were, but 2 of them were sensitive as well so it seemed better to not tell them anything. One of them preferred it that way, the other liked to know because he liked to hone in on the areas specifically that were active.

The other two were split : one had no experiences, the other felt she was touched on the face, but it happened in the attic and could have been a cobweb. After 6 more people went tramping through, there was nothing left to run into and it didn't happen again.

Meh. I'm not sure about the whole "sensitive" topic. Is it a sensitive topic? I think so. No matter what, I could never trust that someone is a sensitive if they claim it. No matter how close I am to that person. I'm just too skeptical in this "ability". I think it's waaaay to easy for people to say that they are sensitive, with little (nothing) to back it up. The word turns me off.

IF there is something, then we probably all have it, but just decide not to use it. I have a hard time believing in "gifts" or "abilities" it's just too convenient.

lol Stew. But no, I agree to a certain extent with you. (And yeah, I suppose it is a sensitive subject - he he!)

I would have a difficult time believing someone is sensitive if I had only just met them and they told me that. I would have to some sort of proof, and on more than one occasion (for instance, if they were able to tell me about one of my relatives that past away and then later warned me about something before it really happened).

But in all seriousness -- I do think humans have the capability as an entire species to exorcise that part of the brain (somehow!) to be able to predict certain events. I think this deja-vu type experience is just like that. Most people can't control it. It just...happens. Believe it or not, lately I've been experiencing a few premonitions myself. (I won't go into it, as it's a little personal.) But things that you would never really think of on your own, I just happened to know. It's hard to explain, but just know, it is a very odd thing to just explain away as coincidence.

I actually knew a really interesting person back where Tony and I used to live. You would have LOVED to sit and talk with him, Stew. He worked at our absolute most favorite coffee joint in the world -- Theo's in the Quad Cities. The stories that he told me...were just mind blowing. He never claimed to be psychic or anything special. But he was a really interesting guy. One story he had told me was about a woman who had come to live with him some years ago. (Basically, they met in a bar and she had no place to go. This guy is a really very kind, sweet guy, and he had decided to let her stay with him.) Later on, he just knew that something was going to happen to her and that she would die. He approached her about it and asked her to sign a photograph of herself for him. She laughed and asked why, and he just told her he wouldn't be seeing her again. She did it, thinking he was just being silly or something. About a week later though, she was killed (I think he said in a car accident or something? I can't remember. Or possibly drugs, as I think maybe she was involved in that.) But yeah, anyway, that's just one of the weird, bizarre, yet very interesting stories he told me. That's not even the half of it!

Anyway! Where am I going with this? I guess I just mean to say that I do believe people with crazy premonitions do exist. There are just SO MANY frauds that cover them up and make the majority of them look bad.

Right, I guess I have seen so many insincere attention needy people, that I am hyper critical about anyone claiming to have abnormal gifts or abilities.

Stew_DPS wrote:
IF there is something, then we probably all have it, but just decide not to use it.

Why would a person decide not to use a potentially useful ability??

I have a hard time believing in "gifts" or "abilities" it's just too convenient.

Over 100 families in west Arkansas that now have an excellent water well, in an area without city water, no aquifier, & very little ground water, USE to be somewhat skeptical that a person with a forked peach stick could locate drinking water also.

Once they saw that it works, none of them would ever think twice about paying a proven dowser $100 to come paint an "X" on the ground, before they pay a driller $7/foot for a new well.

That's what it often takes for these type abilities to be believed. A skeptic actually has to SEE that they do work. Same way with ghosts.....most of us WANT to believe, but as scientific investigators, it's just hard to do without hard proof.

I have no idea how dowsing works, but know 100% that it does...not 99.99%, but 100%. And I say that NOT as a dowser, but as a well-driller, who has seen how EXTREMELY difficult it is to find drinkable water in some areas.

I am first & foremost a scientist, with a degree in Applied Science & another in Arts. I'm a well-accomplished astronomer, having studied the mysteries of the heavens with professional quality instruments for a couple decades now. I'm a licensed electrician & have worked in that field for several years. And I'm also a skilled, but amateur, geologist. (Why did I decide to drill wells, one of the dirtiest & most physically demanding jobs in the world?? Easy....money's good, the office changes often, & they let me play with big, dangerous machinery. )

Locating underground water with a stick SHOULDN'T be possible. Nothing in nature should allow that to happen.

I try to explain my own ability with magnetics...but wood doesn't attract. Neither does it conduct, which rules out some form of electrical phenomenon...something else that I've pondered on. A natural water-to-water association has crossed my mind also, but a good dowser can make it work with a dead & dry stick also...so that sorta blows that theory away.

The scientist in me, and my religious beliefs also, make it REALLY hard to attribute dowsing to being any type of "paranormal ability"....but in the end, that's all I can come up with.

Stew_DPS wrote:Right, I guess I have seen so many insincere attention needy people, that I am hyper critical about anyone claiming to have abnormal gifts or abilities.

Dude! Why do you have to talk about me!

Donn_DPS wrote:

Stew_DPS wrote:Right, I guess I have seen so many insincere attention needy people, that I am hyper critical about anyone claiming to have abnormal gifts or abilities.

Dude! Why do you have to talk about me!

Because you simply cannot make people fall in love with you by casting spells! You do not have love magic! I've told you this a thousand times!!!!