2007-09-17 11:36:54 · 10 answers · asked by sammy1jo 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Alternative ➔ Paranormal Phenomena
Yes! And fictional as well.
2007-09-17 11:53:15 · answer #1 · answered by John 7 · 4⤊ 2⤋
No, ectoplasm was part of the Spiritualist movement and was often shown with mediums. The photographs and samples of the material were examined and found to be cheese cloth. Mary Roach's book Spook has a chapter dedicated to it. Here's part of an interview with her about it
Dave: Who is credited with the idea of ectoplasm?
Roach: The first medium to produce it was a woman named Eva C., but nowhere did I find out what her inspiration was or how she decided to do this. And it was such a peculiar thing to do, to take what was most of the time cheesecloth and pass it off as an extruded physical manifestation of spirit energy.
How do you come up with that? Let alone how did anybody buy it, but how did anybody come up with that? I know! Let's spit up some cheesecloth and say this is spirit energy!
She was the first. Charles Richet, who won a Nobel Prize—he was a pioneer in the study of anaphylactic shock and thermoregulation, a very respected scientist—he got caught up with Eva C., bizarrely enough.
Dave: And people believed the mediums. Women started doing some very creative things to conceal the cheesecloth.
Roach: Creative, yes.
Dave: It took Houdini, among others, to prove it was a hoax. It's not as if this was just some quack that desperate people were taking seriously.
Roach: The Sorbonne University sponsored an ectoplasm study. Harry Price's lab did a lot of extensive work. They were cutting samples of it and sending it off for analysis. Scientific American did a five-part article, searching for a medium that could not be debunked. Margery Crandon is the one they came up with, and in the end the committee was divided. Some of them still believed everything she was doing.
It took magicians to figure it out; it took Harry Price and Houdini. Just because you have a Ph.D. doesn't mean you can figure out a magician's tricks.
2007-09-20 22:52:52 · answer #2 · answered by The Faery of P 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
As TR has pointed out, it is non-existent as a supernatural substance. Mediums of the early 20th century used stuff to dupe their victims. Cheesecloth was popular, but they used something gooey as well and sorry, but I can't remember what it was. This, I believe, is the origin of ectoplasm.
Sassychicken, all you or anyone else has to do is produce such stuff for proper scientific examination. That will shut up the skeptics. Until then, it is your flaccid condemnation of rational people, which doesn't mean squat.
2007-09-19 18:50:15 · answer #3 · answered by Brant 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Now you'd done it,see ? Supernatural or no, but it's something in between. I hope you wouldn't be scratching you body of late. You see...something supernatural and bad likes to be hanging around them critters. I hope you're not been attacked by invisible spittle which the Malay medium dudes or medison man or "bomoh" called " Sembok Bokta " It can be serious, man.
2007-09-18 01:49:19 · answer #4 · answered by johan 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Ectoplasm is just another medium by which frauds can provide "evidence" of their "abilities". No such material has ever been seen except in direct contact of proven frauds.
2007-09-17 21:36:45 · answer #5 · answered by Peter D 7 · 2⤊ 1⤋
they say dark matter exists too, but you cant see it, its only a theory to explain the voids in space. but since its mainline science its got to be true, right? I dont know if ecto plasm exists or doesnt, but it wasnt long ago that that if you said you were going to have a world wide forum to talk with someone 7,000 miles away from your lap top, you would have been laughed at and snickered at. My cel phone like strangely like a communicator from star trek.
2007-09-21 00:27:35 · answer #6 · answered by nuff said 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I read somewhere when you feel as though you've walked through a spider-web its an ectoplasm... Obviously some of the time its and actual spider's web
2007-09-17 20:26:02 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 3⤋
yeah it falls under the paranormal 'umbrella'
Term introduced into parapsychology by Charles Richet to describe the “exteriorized substance” produced out of the bodies of some physical mediums and from which materialization are sometimes formed. [From the Greek ektos, “outside,” + plasma, “something formed or molded”]
http://www.prairieghosts.com/ectoplasm.html
http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/613962/1/26348107/Medium
2007-09-20 20:57:35 · answer #8 · answered by kokopelli 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Whatever it is you found, I am guessing you should wash your hands with soap. Thats not ectoplasm.
2007-09-17 19:28:26 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋
Of course such things exist, and they could be considered natural.
Plenty of good stuff out there. Skeptic speak means absolutely squat.
2007-09-17 22:19:17 · answer #10 · answered by sassychickensuckerboy 4 · 1⤊ 3⤋