Paranormal, Ghosts and Hauntings?

Question

What are some opinions on EVP's (electronic voice phenomena)? If you are skeptic, why? How do you explain the voices caught on tape in an empty room?

Answer 1

There actually are filters when you consider the frequency levels required to record an EVP. Some and even most recorders out there don't have low or high enough frequency levels to record EVP. I have recorded some myself and at the point that I can hear the spoken words, the frequency range reaches levels that humans can not possibly speak at. You can take the recording and upload it into your computer to analyze it. There is software out there that will tell you exactly what the frequency level is all the way through the recording. In my opinion, that's how you can tell if it's real or not. A person making a fake one will have levels in the human range. A real EVP will have levels that are extremely high or extremely low making it's easy to determine if it's real or not.

Here are two that I recorded myself
http://media.putfile.com/Help-Us-40
http://media.putfile.com/seems-to-be-saying-Jason

Answer 2

To understand EVPs you have to understand how they are obtained. A ghost hunter or paranormal investigator turns on a recording device in an area that is supposedly haunted. That is a problem right there. They are in a "haunted" area and are more often than not seeking evidence to support the idea that the place is haunted. Therefore they are not really investigating, they are hunting for anomalies. This may be a fine point, but it's the key to understanding why so many people believe in EVPs.

You can turn on a recording device *anywhere* and, if you analyze and seek out snippets of audio that resemble coherent speech then you are likely to occasionally come across bits of audio that can resemble the language that you understand.

I see the EVP pehnomenon as being not much more than auditory pareidolia. If you listen to enough audio and if you try hard enough you will eventually find something that resembles spoken language, even if it's not much more than white noise. But because the audio was recorded in a "haunted" setting then the ghost hunter is hunting with a bias. He is looking for supporting evidence.

If you created a control to an EVP experiment you would record random audio from a wide variety of settings. I promise you that a ghost hunter would find something in just about every place you recorded--not because every place is haunted, but because he is looking for patterns of sounds that resemble language. This means one of two things--either every place is haunted or else the ghost hunter is simoply discerning coherent audio patterns out of random noise, regardless of the source.

Beyond that, what are EVPs? Are you telling me that ghosts have been talking to us for years, but we just couldn't hear them because we didn't have sensitive enough equipment? Are you telling me that ghosts have the ability to speak without voice boxes? If they can, then why only at a level inaudible by the audience they are seeking?

Answer 3

I don't think the "voices caught on tape in an empty room" require explanation because I've never actually heard an EVP that sounded like a voice AND which could not be explained by the fact that actual voices somewhere nearby or stray radio signals were being picked up by the recording gear. EVP recordings are typically characterized by very very poor controls.

EVPs can be classified as either Class A, B, or C. It seems about 95% of the EVPs reported are class B or C (indistinct). The Class A are recognizable voices and are very rare, and like I said above, tend to be explainable in terms of poor experimental controls. None of the Class B or C EVPs I've ever heard are compelling and there is no way to show that these nebulous sounds aren't simply being interpreted with pareidolia and power of suggestion. I've in fact created by own EVPs and I can "pattern match" words to them as well as any other EVP (see link).

As a point of reference, consider that even with real high quality recordings of human voices singing songs, many people have a hard time understanding the words being sung! There are several websites around dedicated to misheard lyrics. If humans have a hard time distinguishing the correct words coming out of an actual human mouth, why would they think they are able to correctly distinguish words coming out of a jumble of white noise from a supposed ghost?

Until the experimental controls on EVP recordings are significantly tightened up so that EVP recordings can be replicated, and a rigorous criterion is put forward which can distinguish "real" EVP from pareidolia, EVPs will forever remain in the realm of pseudoscience. I tend to think that this will be the case.

Answer 4

I film weddings and the sound is very important, and we only have one chance to get it. I have yet to get it screwed up by EVPs, however, I am told ghosts love to be around loved ones at special events.
How come the electronic companies don't take the evp thing seriously enough to make a screen or internal filter to minimize ghost voices? They do it for wind and background noise.

I think the reason is because almost all the EVPs are ordinary sounds, tweaked until you can imagine they are a word and many more of them are just fakes.

Answer 5

There are many things that cannot be explained adequately by modern science, many of which are generally accepted. One simple example is any kind of force field. Their existence is generally accepted, and their strength can even be measured, but just what they are is an unknown. Gravity is one simple example. As for how this applies to ghosts, there is a great deal of evidence that consciousness exists independently of the body. Many skeptics try to argue that this is not so, and come up with various explanations, none of which meet scientific criteria. These criteria require any scientific explanation to explain ALL aspects of the phenomena, while all proposed explanations meet just some of them. Further, there is nothing in our current understanding of quantum mechanics that precludes the existence of ghosts. In fact, there are aspects of quantum mechanics that work far easier if conditions that would allow for ghosts exist within the real world. There are mysteries still to be resolved by science, or perhaps that lie outside of science's view, and the existence of ghosts might well be one of these.

Answer 6

I am in a Paranoromal Investigation Group and I have several EVPS of all kinds of things. Our group was doing and old Mill and we had 5 digital tape recorders, night vision cam recorded and digital cameras that we use there and we had fresh batteries die right away and we had alot of scary things in that part of the Mill with us.
Our EMF reader spiked to a 10 and there was nothing that could have set it off that high and with what was going on around us I can understand the 10. Out of all that was there my recorder captured only 3 seconds of a female voice telling someone where a female could be found. I know it did not come from anywhere but inside that Mill and it is not the voice of any of the other females that were there.
I have recorded inside my house and it has never let me down. We know it is haunted and I wanted to see what I could get. I waited until everyone was in be and asleep and I put it in a place where no noise could get in and left it running and went to bed. No one knew I was going to do this and where I had it placed someone would have had to watch me but I was all alone.
I think that voices that we pick up are of those who have not passed over and they are trying anyway they can to get our attention or like this one 3 second one that I got, the voice sounded like it had to let someone know where this other female is at. Unfinished business can bring out the voices or if they do not want you there, it does let you know it.

Answer 7

I watch "Most Haunted" on Travel channel and "Ghost Hunters" on SciFi ALL the time and I believe that EVP's are real signs of paranormal activity. It will probably take a few more years for it to be more accepted, and I think that by then there will be more compelling evidence of paranormal activity uncovered.
But in my opinion, its real and its up to us to find ways to better communicate with the paranormals that are out there!!!

Answer 8

EVPs are pretty weird evidence but like anything else discarded as garbage. Even though there is no good explanation why a voice appears on a recorder when you couldnt hear it in person.

Being a skeptic should be " I would like to know, show me" but on this site, it is You are wrong, You are idiot, I am smart and end of conversation, I win.

Most likely we will all wonder forever and no one will ever know, so we might as well be civil with each other and enjoy discussing a kooky subject instead of all of this condescending skeptic BS.

Answer 9

I think they are real how else would voices get on tape in an empty room.