Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everybody,
Speaker 1: Welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and
Speaker 1: I'm the tech editor here at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me, as he always does, is senior
Speaker 1: writer Jonathan Strickland's Hey there, and uh, I don't know
Speaker 1: that we have a ghost of a chance of getting
Speaker 1: through this without you losing it, but we should try.
Speaker 1: I ain't afraid of no ghost. Uh So you may
Speaker 1: have already guessed what our topic is, but it comes
Speaker 1: to us courtesy of a little listener mail. List listener
Speaker 1: mail comes from Will from Austin, Texas, and he says, Hi, guys,
Speaker 1: I just recently started subscribing to the podcast and always
Speaker 1: have it playing in my car to and from work.
Speaker 1: I am in the I T field and even though
Speaker 1: I feel like I have a some firm grasp on
Speaker 1: some of the concepts that are discussed, it is always
Speaker 1: nice to have something explained in a visual manner. There's
Speaker 1: which is odd for an audio podcast. Right now, you
Speaker 1: know that maybe he senses that there's something I am
Speaker 1: curious about which seems to be all the craze right now,
Speaker 1: and that is all the different ghost hunting shows on
Speaker 1: TV right now. I'm a sucker for them myself and
Speaker 1: end up watching them somewhat intrigued with the technology that
Speaker 1: they use, the things they catch within the infrared spectrum,
Speaker 1: the e m F meters and e m F pumps
Speaker 1: that they used to attract entities, and the digital recorders
Speaker 1: used to capture what is called e v P electronic
Speaker 1: voice phenomenon. From what I understand, there's nothing hard and
Speaker 1: fast that says e m F detectors are legitimate for
Speaker 1: detecting levels of magnetic activity. So it would be really
Speaker 1: nice to hear y'all talk a bit about the technology
Speaker 1: used in TV shows like Ghost Hunters, Ghost Labs, Ghost Adventures,
Speaker 1: Paranormal State. Thanks will Well, I think we're going to
Speaker 1: have a spirited discussion. Yes, yes, I'm going to rattle
Speaker 1: my chains. You know what. I will say that that
Speaker 1: my wife is a fan of a lot of these shows, um,
Speaker 1: and I have only watched bits and pieces of them,
Speaker 1: so I am less familiar with them. But um, one
Speaker 1: of the things that I found out when I started
Speaker 1: getting into this is that, uh, they're not using a
Speaker 1: whole lot of high tech gadgetry in order to investigate
Speaker 1: the paranormal and stuff off the shelf. What little they're using,
Speaker 1: they're using incorrectly. Okay, I'm going to preface this by
Speaker 1: saying I'm going to preface this by saying I am
Speaker 1: a skeptic. And when I say skeptic, I don't mean
Speaker 1: someone who automatically denies whether or not something exists. When
Speaker 1: I'm saying skeptic, I'm talking about a person who requires
Speaker 1: there to be some sort of empirical evidence that something
Speaker 1: exists before I just go ahead and accept it. And
Speaker 1: as far as ghost hunting goes, there is such an
Speaker 1: enormous lack of empirical evidence that any of this is
Speaker 1: doing anything that I find the whole industry that has
Speaker 1: sprung up around ghost hunting to be infuriating. And I
Speaker 1: really do mean that, because, Okay, folks, if you want
Speaker 1: to type in e m F detector into any search engine,
Speaker 1: I guarantee you that at least one, if not several,
Speaker 1: of the main results that pop up first are going
Speaker 1: to be about ghost hunting equipment. And here's the thing.
Speaker 1: They don't detect ghosts. I mean, there's no proof that
Speaker 1: they detect ghosts. There's no proof that ghosts even affect
Speaker 1: electromagnetic fields, which is what E m F detectors and
Speaker 1: meters are designed to detect. There's no proof that a
Speaker 1: ghost exists number one, and then there's no proof that,
Speaker 1: if they do exist, that they affect these fields. So
Speaker 1: why would using this tool be an indication that there
Speaker 1: is a ghost present? Well, that's uh, that's sort of
Speaker 1: the whole thing is that I mean, is that people
Speaker 1: are using these people are using these devices um in
Speaker 1: hopes of finding something right, and in many cases it's
Speaker 1: either in disproving the existence of a an entity in
Speaker 1: the room or proving it. I mean, it's not it's not, Hey,
Speaker 1: let's stick a tape recorder in the room for an
Speaker 1: hour and see what it drives me nuts? Because why
Speaker 1: would this device, over any other be a good indicator
Speaker 1: that there is a presence in the room. That's what
Speaker 1: That is the point where I'm already having My first
Speaker 1: problem with the whole ghost hunting thing is that it's
Speaker 1: like you arbitrarily assigned ghosts this ability to do something
Speaker 1: based upon I don't know what and that somehow watching
Speaker 1: a little needle move indicates that there must be something here.
Speaker 1: You could just as easily say, hey, let's take this
Speaker 1: metal detector and we'll run it over the ground and
Speaker 1: every time it beats, that's where a ghost is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Because I mean, there's you just you're making up the
Speaker 1: rules as you go along. You can't do that. What
Speaker 1: you have to do first established that there is such
Speaker 1: a thing as a ghost, and then determine whether or
Speaker 1: not a ghost is able to affect an electromagnetic field,
Speaker 1: because then you could say, okay, this tool will detect
Speaker 1: this thing. That's the way science works, people. You don't
Speaker 1: sit there and assume something is true and then try
Speaker 1: and find a way to justify it. Here's how it works.
Speaker 1: You observe some sort of phenomena, You try and create
Speaker 1: an explanation for that phenomena. You then test your explanation.
Speaker 1: If your explanation holds after multiple tests done by multiple
Speaker 1: people under multiple situations, and it still holds true, then
Speaker 1: you can say you know something. You can't just say, hey,
Speaker 1: this needle move, therefore there's a dead person in the room. What. No,
Speaker 1: that's not how it works. I joked that we could
Speaker 1: call this podcast how critical thinking works. Honestly, people, critical
Speaker 1: thinking is so important. If you don't use critical thinking,
Speaker 1: if you just swallow that the needle moved, therefore some
Speaker 1: thing is in this room, then I don't know what
Speaker 1: to tell you. Okay, well, let's uh, let me breathe,
Speaker 1: let's back away from that from that edge. We're gonna
Speaker 1: have to stay with this edge because we have to
Speaker 1: talk about what E M F detectors actually do. Well,
Speaker 1: that's the thing. I mean, that's what I'm saying. Let's
Speaker 1: opinion aside, Let's talk about this stuff that actually works.
Speaker 1: What opinion? Sorry, I'm just well, that's but that's the thing. Though,
Speaker 1: there are other people who claim that they have heard
Speaker 1: and seen things using this equipment countless I'm saying, and
Speaker 1: I don't know, I have I have no doubt there.
Speaker 1: I have no doubts that there are people out there
Speaker 1: who truly believe that they have experienced something that is inexplicable,
Speaker 1: just as I have absolutely no doubt that the things
Speaker 1: they experienced were completely explicable because they did not have
Speaker 1: the necessary facts or ways of determining those facts at
Speaker 1: their disposal at the time. And also these events tend
Speaker 1: to come more um outlandish or or perhaps we should
Speaker 1: say more extravagant. Over time, as we think back and
Speaker 1: we tell stories over we tend to elaborate and and
Speaker 1: I'm not even saying people are are fibbing or anything
Speaker 1: like that. They could completely believe in what they're saying.
Speaker 1: There are stories I've told where I've gone back and
Speaker 1: looked at something, you know, like like a video of
Speaker 1: a performance I was in and realized that the story
Speaker 1: I tell is not matching up to reality. But in
Speaker 1: my mind, that's exactly the way it happened. We all
Speaker 1: do this, It's just in this case, I think what
Speaker 1: it's done is spawned an entire industry. Well, you know,
Speaker 1: you're right that there there is no empirical evidence. There's
Speaker 1: nothing in scientific journals that indicates that any of these
Speaker 1: pieces of gear that we're going to talk about has
Speaker 1: any ability to really find a ghost. There's nothing in
Speaker 1: any scientific journals about it that I was able to
Speaker 1: find in my research. Well, but the first step, of
Speaker 1: of course, is the fact that there's no scientific evidence
Speaker 1: for a ghost, so you can't device could find something
Speaker 1: that would be the point. But I looked. I'm glad
Speaker 1: you did. But and you know what I found out.
Speaker 1: What's that some one of the culprits behind the idea
Speaker 1: of using electronics to try to find spirits or you know,
Speaker 1: some kind of paranormal activity, Thomas Edison. He actually said that, Um,
Speaker 1: and I didn't get the quote. I should have gotten
Speaker 1: the quote. But basically he said that he believed that
Speaker 1: there was a way to create an electronic instrument that
Speaker 1: if a ghost existed, would be that the instrument would
Speaker 1: be capable of detecting it, some sort of ghost detector. Now,
Speaker 1: he he never built anything like that, and he never
Speaker 1: That doesn't necessarily mean that he believed in ghosts, because
Speaker 1: actually he said he didn't know whether or not they existed,
Speaker 1: that if they did exist, there should be a way
Speaker 1: to detect them, is what he was saying. And of
Speaker 1: course I actually saw quotes from him in a couple
Speaker 1: of places. Um, but it's kind of funny to imagine that,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm sure that that some people said, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: let's try to build something that will detect a ghost.
Speaker 1: And if you believe that a ghost, if it exists,
Speaker 1: is creating some kind of field, um magnetic or electrical
Speaker 1: or you know, giving off some kind of signature in
Speaker 1: another plane that you cannot see. Then you might try
Speaker 1: to use things like infrared cameras or e m F
Speaker 1: detectors or i on density detectors to try to find
Speaker 1: something that would indicate why you feel cold when you
Speaker 1: walk in this room. Just that, just it seems so
Speaker 1: strange to me, because you could just as easily say,
Speaker 1: you know, I believe ghosts exist, but the only people
Speaker 1: who can detect them are female, left handed redheads. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's just as valid a point as saying ghosts must exist,
Speaker 1: therefore they give off some sort of electromagnetic field. Well,
Speaker 1: this is one of those things that that surprised me
Speaker 1: when I started doing the research was that, um, the
Speaker 1: people who have been doing this for a while basically
Speaker 1: take a plain old tape recorder and a camera and
Speaker 1: a note and they go in and they sit down
Speaker 1: and they try to find, you know, see if they
Speaker 1: see anything unusual. They take pictures, um and trying to
Speaker 1: make notes of anything they don't get. They don't buy
Speaker 1: a lot of fancy and there are plenty of them
Speaker 1: who who do this in the hopes of finding some
Speaker 1: sort of proof of of that. There are such things
Speaker 1: as ghosts, but who are also very intellectually honest, and
Speaker 1: they they objectively look at each and every indicator and
Speaker 1: determine whether or not there is a physical explanation for
Speaker 1: it or not. And in those cases, I think you'll
Speaker 1: find that most of those ghost tunters have so far
Speaker 1: come up zero percent on the ghost and a percent
Speaker 1: on some sort of physical explanation. Yeah, but that's not Again,
Speaker 1: let me make this clear. That's not to say that
Speaker 1: ghosts do not exist. I can't say that. There's no
Speaker 1: way that I could say that ghosts do not exist
Speaker 1: and be honest with myself about it. I don't know.
Speaker 1: What I can say is that there's no empirical proof
Speaker 1: that they exist, and until there is, I just don't
Speaker 1: believe in them. So, but let's talk about Let's talk
Speaker 1: about the what electro magnetic field meters do. What you're
Speaker 1: designed to do. These are devices that, as you would imagine,
Speaker 1: detect fluctuations in electromagnetic fields, and various things can create fluctuations.
Speaker 1: Usually it's some sort of electronic device. Because, as you've
Speaker 1: probably heard us talk about before, electricity and magnetic fields
Speaker 1: are closely related. You can induce one using the other
Speaker 1: So these detectors, what they're designed to do is to
Speaker 1: detect fluctuations in the field, mainly for electrical purposes. And
Speaker 1: so you might detect a fluctuation around electronics where you
Speaker 1: might have something that's not properly grounded. It's really an
Speaker 1: indicator to tell you, Okay, wait, the wiring in my
Speaker 1: house isn't as good as I thought it was and
Speaker 1: I need to have this looked at. Or the shielding
Speaker 1: on this this power cable is clearly not as strong
Speaker 1: as it needs to be, and that's why I'm getting
Speaker 1: interference with my other electronics. That's what's meant for. Um,
Speaker 1: It's ok. And what what drives me nuts as seeing
Speaker 1: companies that are selling e m F meters which do
Speaker 1: have a legitimate, useful application, and they're saying it's a
Speaker 1: great e m F meter slash ghost detector. That drives
Speaker 1: me crazy because again there's no proof that it's actually
Speaker 1: detectually detecting anything other than electromagnetic fluctuations that could be
Speaker 1: explained by wiring or magnets or whatever. And in fact,
Speaker 1: I saw one site and I'm not going to name
Speaker 1: the site, but I saw one site that had a
Speaker 1: frequently asked question section and said what reading am I
Speaker 1: looking for on this gadget? And said a reading of
Speaker 1: two to seven milligos may be due to spirit activity.
Speaker 1: How do you determine that? How did you just say that? Oh,
Speaker 1: if you get a measure of two to seven, that
Speaker 1: means there's a there's probably a ghost there. This it's
Speaker 1: made up out of whole cloth because there's no basis
Speaker 1: effect behind it. But at any rate, E m F
Speaker 1: meters are legitimate tools for electricians, not necessarily for ghost hunters.
Speaker 1: And maybe ghosts do affect e m F fields somehow,
Speaker 1: or I shouldn't say e m F fields because now
Speaker 1: I'm repeating part of the acronym. But maybe they do
Speaker 1: have some sort of effect on electromagnetic fields. But without
Speaker 1: any evidence to back that up, we can't say for sure.
Speaker 1: And it turns out that in most cases, in fact,
Speaker 1: I would have would probably argue all cases, whenever you
Speaker 1: use a meter and the little needle is starting to
Speaker 1: go around and find a hot spot, there's probably just
Speaker 1: a wiring issue that would explain it. Um. Yeah, Another
Speaker 1: another item that I saw that it's more higher tech,
Speaker 1: I guess um would be the ion density counter. Yes,
Speaker 1: and that could be used for a lot of things. Um.
Speaker 1: What it does is it tries to detect the number
Speaker 1: of ions in a cubic centimeter of air, and it
Speaker 1: can be used to detect things like rate on um,
Speaker 1: whether there are combustible vapors in the area, electric electrical arcs. Right,
Speaker 1: very legitimate uses, UM and this really uh plays into
Speaker 1: the whether you know, into the skeptics view of whether
Speaker 1: or not this gadget would be useful in detecting any
Speaker 1: paranormal activity. You would have to assume first that whatever
Speaker 1: the paranormal activity is gives off ions. Well, that's number one.
Speaker 1: I thought that was assumed at this point. I'm I'm
Speaker 1: spelling it out, okay, because there's here's here's why I
Speaker 1: spell that out. I think there are a lot of
Speaker 1: people who use these devices who have no idea what
Speaker 1: the device is truly meant for, or at least was
Speaker 1: originally meant for. That's a good point, and they don't
Speaker 1: understand what it really means when they get a reading
Speaker 1: off these devices. So I know it sounds like I'm
Speaker 1: going super basic on this, but it's really to drive
Speaker 1: home the point of there are legitimate uses for these devices.
Speaker 1: That had nothing to do with ghost hunting, and if
Speaker 1: you keep that in mind before we move on to
Speaker 1: the whole ghost hunting thing, it helps explain away a
Speaker 1: lot of the quote unquote anomalies that you might find.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I interrupted you, Please go on. Well, the
Speaker 1: thing about an ion detector or eye in density detector
Speaker 1: is the air has to be very, very still around it,
Speaker 1: so it's a particularly sensitive device and lots of things
Speaker 1: can affect the reading on it. So like a draft, Yeah,
Speaker 1: a draft will affect the reading. And you know if
Speaker 1: a draft comes in, um, you know, you might say,
Speaker 1: oh wait, the needles moving. Yeah. It turns out that
Speaker 1: a lot of ghost behavior can be explained by poor
Speaker 1: celent around the window. It sounds like a joke, but
Speaker 1: it's really true. No, no, no, it's but it's it's
Speaker 1: funny because you know, just apparently just the slightest thing
Speaker 1: will um, you know, it really needs to sit still
Speaker 1: and be left alone for a while if were it
Speaker 1: to be to give off an accurate reading of whether
Speaker 1: or not there are a lot of ions in the area,
Speaker 1: and of course the whole if there were ghosts, would
Speaker 1: they give off ions. So there you are, you're talking
Speaker 1: about devices that are very sensitive and can easily give
Speaker 1: off false positives. That's another problem, and that it's very
Speaker 1: easy to interpret a false positive as evidence of some
Speaker 1: sort of supernatural activity, when in fact, it may just
Speaker 1: be that there was a breeze that blew by and
Speaker 1: that's what affected the reading. Um. Knowing how to use
Speaker 1: this equipment properly eliminates a lot of the doubt around
Speaker 1: the equipment, all right, So what else? Um? Well, you know,
Speaker 1: then some people actually have been using Geiger counters, apparently,
Speaker 1: because which is designed to detect radiation exactly. Again, there's
Speaker 1: no I don't think a lot of them do. And
Speaker 1: I haven't heard heard, but I saw that in a
Speaker 1: list of equipment that you might here with you. I mean,
Speaker 1: if if a ghost is to affect electromagnetic fields, why
Speaker 1: wouldn't a ghost be radioactive? I mean, why wouldn't ghosts
Speaker 1: be able to create jello out of thin air? I mean,
Speaker 1: we we could just go ahead and keep on attributing
Speaker 1: stuff that goests all day long. And you know, again,
Speaker 1: my metal detector example earlier on is completely valid. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you're gonna just grab whatever tools and use them
Speaker 1: to this purpose, why not a metal detector. I mean,
Speaker 1: we've we've seen motion sensors being used as ghost hunting
Speaker 1: material as well. Um, lots of stuff can trip motion sensors,
Speaker 1: and I wonder if a ghost would trip a motion sensor.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't understand how the I don't understand
Speaker 1: the set of rules that ghosts apparently obey. That's part
Speaker 1: of the problem is that if they trip motion sensors
Speaker 1: but not other things, I mean, how does that work?
Speaker 1: I find it a kind of confusing night vision goggles.
Speaker 1: That's that's actually a question I have, And maybe maybe
Speaker 1: somebody can answer that for me. And you know, I
Speaker 1: don't want to sound like I'm making fun of any
Speaker 1: of these shows, but if the ghosts can be seen
Speaker 1: in the lighter, the I mean, why are all these
Speaker 1: shows shot in the dark. Let me explain that, because
Speaker 1: I really don't know. I have a I have a
Speaker 1: good reason for the whole dark ghost thing. That has
Speaker 1: everything to do with psychology, all right, And actually there's
Speaker 1: some physiology here as well. So at night you're in
Speaker 1: you're you're at your house at night, you settled down
Speaker 1: to go to sleep, and you hear a strange noise
Speaker 1: at night your house tends to be more quiet than
Speaker 1: during the daytime. People have settled down, right, everyone's in bed,
Speaker 1: so noises that would normally be covered up by just
Speaker 1: the activity in your house during the daytime are no
Speaker 1: longer covered up. Your your mind is still alert, so
Speaker 1: you're laying in bed and you're thinking, is there someone
Speaker 1: moving around the house. I just heard a creaking noise.
Speaker 1: They could just as easily be the sound of your
Speaker 1: house settling. Uh, it could be the sound of a
Speaker 1: board warping slowly, just boards do warp over time. Sometimes
Speaker 1: they make no ways. Sometimes it's like a low moaning noise,
Speaker 1: which might sound familiar to people who are familiar with
Speaker 1: the whole ghost mythology thing. Um, so that's part of it.
Speaker 1: Is just that that's the physiological part of it, But
Speaker 1: psychologically it's that, you know, uh, night time, that's when
Speaker 1: we're not concentrating on anything else. Our mind can completely
Speaker 1: focus on these events. And humans like to create patterns
Speaker 1: out of things. They like explanations for things. And if
Speaker 1: we can't easily explain it by something that we're really
Speaker 1: familiar with, it's very easy to jump on the unfamiliar
Speaker 1: supernatural train and say, oh, well, this must have been
Speaker 1: caused by this paranormal activity. So you'll see similar things.
Speaker 1: Like if you look into the clouds and you see
Speaker 1: a human face, it's because humans like patterns. We find
Speaker 1: patterns and stuff all over the place. That's actually called
Speaker 1: a paradolia is what's referred to us. So paradolia is
Speaker 1: where we start seeing patterns and things. We usually actually
Speaker 1: paradolia specifically about faces, being able to recognize faces and
Speaker 1: things like the water. You know, you might look into
Speaker 1: some muddy water and say, oh my gosh, I just
Speaker 1: saw a face looking back at me. That wasn't a reflection,
Speaker 1: it was actually a face. Welts. Because we see these things,
Speaker 1: our mind creates a pattern and we convince ourselves that
Speaker 1: we've seen something that wasn't necessarily there. Uh. The same
Speaker 1: sort of thing happens when we hear noises. We start
Speaker 1: to our brains start to to fill in gaps, and
Speaker 1: as a result, we add information there that wasn't necessarily
Speaker 1: there originally. Uh. I would argue that this is also
Speaker 1: the case when you're talking about the whole electronic voice
Speaker 1: phenomenon stuff where you've taken a recorder and you you
Speaker 1: listen to the sounds that have been left on that
Speaker 1: recorder and you start to try and pick stuff out.
Speaker 1: You'll find a lot of sound files out there where
Speaker 1: people will claim, oh, if you listen carefully, you'll hear
Speaker 1: a woman crying in the background, where you'll hear someone
Speaker 1: saying something that you just can't quite make it out,
Speaker 1: or maybe you can even sort of make out a
Speaker 1: few words. I would argue on a lot of those,
Speaker 1: it's just random noises that our brain kind of pieces
Speaker 1: together and tries to make sense out of, because we
Speaker 1: don't really like random well, um, you know, they say,
Speaker 1: or at least the information I got when I was
Speaker 1: doing some research on it indicated that, uh, people who
Speaker 1: are engaged in ghost hunting activities will tell you that
Speaker 1: they don't hear these sounds when they're actually in the room,
Speaker 1: but when they go back and listen to the tapes,
Speaker 1: something has made that noise appear on the track. Of course,
Speaker 1: the a lot of people who disbelieve that say that,
Speaker 1: you know, this is what's called I t C. Instrumental transcommunication,
Speaker 1: which is um or no, that's what the proponents say
Speaker 1: that that's what it's called. They're trying to talk to
Speaker 1: you via the recording UM, And the people who are
Speaker 1: against it say, no, that's electrical interference. Something is, you know,
Speaker 1: making these noises pop up UM on your uh you know,
Speaker 1: on the tape recorder on your digital work order that
Speaker 1: you used to to do this and it's a flaw um.
Speaker 1: But you know they people stared at computer screens trying
Speaker 1: to analyze the wave form, looking for the patterns. Again again,
Speaker 1: it's just I think it's just our desire to be
Speaker 1: able to organize the universe in a way that makes
Speaker 1: sense to us. And I mean, that's that's what science
Speaker 1: is all based on. It's trying to understand the universe.
Speaker 1: It's just that science takes a very specific procedure to
Speaker 1: do so, whereas things like the Ghost Hunters, they leap
Speaker 1: to a conclusion without necessarily having the proof to back
Speaker 1: it up, and then they're looking they're kind of looking
Speaker 1: for the proof after the conclusion, or they're taking anything
Speaker 1: that happens as some sort of evidence for the conclusion
Speaker 1: they've already arrived at. But that's more fun. Oh my gosh, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's a good note, have a table between us. But
Speaker 1: I think I think that's the point. I think that's
Speaker 1: the point of doing all of this stuff is that,
Speaker 1: you know, they like to go out and they investigate
Speaker 1: things and they're hoping that they'll find something, and some
Speaker 1: of them just make a lot of money. There are
Speaker 1: people who depend upon this kind of belief system in
Speaker 1: order to make a living, and some of them are
Speaker 1: true believers and some of them are not. And it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter to the ones who are not actually in
Speaker 1: you know, the ones who don't believe in it, they
Speaker 1: don't care that, you know, there may or may not
Speaker 1: be anything to it. Um. Before we sign off on
Speaker 1: this this whole thing, we should also probably talk about
Speaker 1: photography and orbs. Are you familiar with the whole orb phenomenon,
Speaker 1: the glowing balls and supposedly indicate that there is a
Speaker 1: spirit present um. Actually, what it really indicates is just
Speaker 1: a bad flash. It turns out digital cameras have the
Speaker 1: flash located a little too close to the lens. That's
Speaker 1: why you hardly ever see any kind of orbs in
Speaker 1: a professional photograph. Because professional photographers keep the flash well
Speaker 1: away from the lens, you don't tend to get this
Speaker 1: weird um orb effect which often it's not always, but
Speaker 1: often caused by the flash reflecting off of something in
Speaker 1: the photo, whether it's a reflective surface or dust or
Speaker 1: water vapor. Um, the flash tends to reflect the light
Speaker 1: is bouncing back at the lens and it shows up
Speaker 1: as an orb in the photo. Also lens flare. That's
Speaker 1: the other really big common cause of these orbs. It's
Speaker 1: not necessarily that uh, you know, the the your ancient
Speaker 1: ancestor is trying to make contact with you. It's that
Speaker 1: your digital camera kind of sucks. Okay, so uh And
Speaker 1: people might say, well, why why is it blurred? Well,
Speaker 1: that's probably because we don't tend to hold still very well.
Speaker 1: Whenever you're taking a photo of your shutter speed is
Speaker 1: is fairly slow. Then uh, even though the flashes on
Speaker 1: and off in a second, the fact that you're hands
Speaker 1: are moving while the cameras taking the photo can cause
Speaker 1: a blurring effect. And that's why some of them aren't
Speaker 1: perfect orbs. They just look like little blurry motion. Um.
Speaker 1: And there are other things that can happen as well.
Speaker 1: I've seen video tape where people said, look, this must
Speaker 1: be some sort of ghost. You see the form that
Speaker 1: passed in front of the the There was one of
Speaker 1: a gas station or it looked like a weird blue
Speaker 1: form passed in front of the the the the gas dispensers,
Speaker 1: and I was thinking, um, no, that actually was probably
Speaker 1: a bug that was on the lens of the camera.
Speaker 1: And uh, as soon as I thought that, I started
Speaker 1: to do some research, and I started looking at other
Speaker 1: people who were really good at at analyzing video, and
Speaker 1: that seemed to be the prevalent theory that there was
Speaker 1: something on the actual camera lens. And so it made
Speaker 1: it look like it was much larger than it was,
Speaker 1: and it made it look like it was passing in
Speaker 1: front of the background as opposed to the foreground. So uh,
Speaker 1: there's lots of ways that are our brains will trick
Speaker 1: us into thinking we've seen or heard or experience something
Speaker 1: that may not be the case. Well, I think until
Speaker 1: until people get more scientific, they'll probably continue messing around
Speaker 1: with it. I just I think of it as someone
Speaker 1: who just grabs a bunch of unrelated tools and they
Speaker 1: don't understand really what they're meant for, and they're using
Speaker 1: them for something totally different and they think that that's
Speaker 1: somehow valid. Um. And again, someone may go out there
Speaker 1: today and prove definitively that ghosts exist and that they
Speaker 1: just they exhibit certain behaviors, but to this date, they
Speaker 1: have not done that, and it's more like just people
Speaker 1: flailing around arguing that they're there methods are valid without
Speaker 1: any any way of backing it up, which is why
Speaker 1: I go berserk, because there's just there's so much money
Speaker 1: being made out there by these people that, uh, it's
Speaker 1: just not we could be putting that that effort, that
Speaker 1: thought into actual science. That would be great. Please. Well,
Speaker 1: then let's move on to a little more listener mail.
Speaker 1: This comes from Ukrainian Mammoth. Ukrainian Mammoth says that guy
Speaker 1: Ben said that he had listened to your podcast for
Speaker 1: four hours. Let's lessen my average day. I've really listened
Speaker 1: to each one of your podcasts at least three times,
Speaker 1: try fifteen hours. Yeah, Ukrainian Mammoth, we have heard your
Speaker 1: cry for help. You're sending someone to you. Uh, no, thanks,
Speaker 1: that's great. We're we really appreciate that. That's a huge compliment. Personally,
Speaker 1: if I listened to myself for more than a couple
Speaker 1: of hours, I would go insane. But I'm glad you
Speaker 1: guys enjoy it. Keep it up because we we love
Speaker 1: to know that we were actually entertaining and informing you
Speaker 1: guys out there. If any of you have any comments,
Speaker 1: questions you want to yell at me because you believe
Speaker 1: in ghosts and uh and I'm stupid, you can send
Speaker 1: that email to tech stuff at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: And uh. Remember, we have a live show every one
Speaker 1: pm on Tuesdays and Chris and I will give you
Speaker 1: the technology news of the week, probably not having anything
Speaker 1: to do with ghosts. So if you prefer that, just
Speaker 1: go over to our blogs. You can find a link
Speaker 1: to them from how stuff works dot com. Look on
Speaker 1: the right hand side. That will guide you over to
Speaker 1: the right place. Check us out. We're funny and informative
Speaker 1: there too, and you get to see us and occasionally
Speaker 1: Chris will look at me as if he were about
Speaker 1: to hit me, and one of these days he probably will.
Speaker 1: Until then, we'll talk to you again really soon. For
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics, visit how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com and be sure to check out
Speaker 1: the new tech stuff blog now on the house stuff
Speaker 1: Works homepage, brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve. Camady,
Speaker 1: It's ready, are you