MovieChat Forums > Paranormal Witness (2011) Discussion > I broke all the rules of the Ouija board

I broke all the rules of the Ouija board


When I was a kid, we got a Ouija board. Coincidentally, I lived in Houston, where this episode took place. Some kids from school taught me how to play -- but not with the "rules" from the recent Ouija-themed films & TV shows. We greeted it, but we never said goodbye at the end. I often played alone. And, of course, I played it in my very own house.

What happened was shocking!

Absolutely nothing.

Actually, that's not true. I scared the hell out of my dumber friends. The smart kids never fell for it, of course, but I managed to convince the dumb ones we were chatting with the devil.

As with all things supernatural, the Ouija board is essentially an IQ test. You can easily spot those who cannot distinguish fiction from reality.

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Hmmm...Do you think that your IQ might perhaps be low, because your argument is essentially "If it didn't happen to me, then it simply cannot happen. Period." Which is absurd.

Everyone has different experiences and some people are definitely more apt to have "paranormal" occurrences of various types in their lives. Your propensity for this type of experience is apparently zero because you lack the requisite qualities of vulnerability and openness, as indicated by your haughty, arrogant, ego-centric post.

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No, there is no such thing as being more "vulnerable" or "open" to something paranormal happening. Since these things only ever happen to people of lesser intelligence, it means that those people are simply incapable of understanding the rational explanation.

Primitive people thought storms or illnesses were caused by evil spirits or displeased gods. Through science, (intelligent) people came to understand that there is no supernatural element to these things. Viruses are not evil spirits, nor are low pressure systems angry gods.

My son thought noises in the attic were caused by ghosts. A little investigation proved that the noises were caused by raccoons. Most peoples' beliefs that something supernatural is happening are simply an inability to understand the natural cause. Others are mentally ill, and they really are seeing or hearing things that aren't real -- because those things are only in their minds.

The fact is that no one in the history of humanity has ever produced a single shred of evidence that a Ouija board can contact anything. As the saying goes, claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. Only someone of low IQ thinks otherwise.

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Edited to comment on the following. RE: " Since these things only ever happen to people of lesser intelligence, it means that those people are simply incapable of understanding the rational explanation."

It is typically the case that an unintelligent person makes the case for a specious argument, which he presumes to be self-evident without regard for something as important as supporting fact. In particular regard to the case above, one might ask - so, is there any support for the argument that "only unintelligent people believe in ghosts"?

None.

Farha-Steward (2006)Oaklahoma City University put this question to the test and actually found no correlation whatsoever between the level of one's education and belief in ghosts. Quite the contrary - it is, accordingly, an entirely specious argument to think that only the unintelligent believe in ghosts etc. There is no evidence to support it, and in fact the available evidence completely denounces such lacklustre reasoning. Prediction: Stubborn persons of low intellectual capability will of course, refuse to believe the available evidence, on this question, and instead will continue to live their lives as if such mistaken belief were fact.


A further comment on the truly unintelligent:

Dogmatic, as opposed to open-minded viewpoints, are more usually the preserve of those with feeble intellect. People of lower intelligence often believe, for example, that the science of today, has an answer for everything. The truth is that science certainly does *not* have an answer for everything - notwithstanding that the unintelligent like to place their faith in such a dogmatic/closed-minded position. Such people have, nonetheless, an absolute faith in man's achievements to date, and entirely write off the possibility that scientific discovery to date is moreover a continuing process - one which has a long, long, long way to go.

That is to say, the truly scientific mind is open to possibility. The unintelligent mind is usually closed to possibility.

Thus for example, the search term "Hampton Court 2003 CCTV skeletor" - on youtube, yields that which is not at all explained by modern science.



Again, modern science does not yet explain everything paranormal, nor has everything which has been claimed as a sighted entity been entirely rebutted. Otherwise that Hampton Court CCTV evidence would not have made BBC news that day, in 2003, as "a possible ghost?". And there are plenty of other examples to date, which make the closed minded position a very questionable one indeed.

Some sixty years ago, we did not have the technology to speak into a tool in our hands, while seeing and hearing a person who is on the other side of the globe. With the technology at our disposal in the 1950's such was impossible, and every experiment which then tried to prove it were possible would have failed - owing to the fact that humankind had not yet discovered the means to do so. The unintelligent ones, those closed to possibility, the vision and foresight, would undoubtedly argue something along these lines:

"The fact is that no one in the history of humanity has ever produced a single shred of evidence that a battery powered tool in one's hand could allow one both to speak and see someone in Hong Kong, in real time, when he is in New York."

Does such reasoning sound familiar to anyone?

;-)



Sandwiched between The Principle of Mediocrity & Rare Earth Theory, you should see The Fermi Paradox

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That's simply not true.

It is true that paranormal activity cannot be induced at will in a laboratory, however very intelligent and credible people have experienced and spoken about their inexplicable experiences. You are very dogmatic. You remind me of evangelical Christians I've met, so convinced that they know everything that there is to know and that the things they've been taught represent the Truth with a capital T. That type of attitude is anathema to true scientific inquiry. I have no doubt that in a couple hundred years, what people know of the quantum world (which allows for all sorts of "paranormal" phenomena), the universe as a whole and its workings will be very different than what we now know right now. You should open your mind a little bit, just to allow for the possibility that the world is much more complex than you think it is.

Your attitude of "This is the way it is, goddamit, and that's all there is to it!" is pathetic. You sound ridiculous and deeply unscientific. The best scientists have an open-mindedness and curiosity to understand and get to the bottom of any misunderstood phenomena in the world so that an unknown will becomes a known.

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I'm an evangelical Christian, who definitely believes in the supernatural and can admit there's a lot I don't know! :) But I rest in the fact that God does....

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nothing more ignorant than saying if it hasn't happened to me it doesn't exist. lol. really intelligent line of thought there....

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My former youth group leader used to own a Ouija board as a teenager, and she used it all the time and kept it under her bed. When she became a Christian and learned it was occult, she threw it in the trash can in back of her house...only for it to reappear back under her bed! She threw it away again and said it was gone for good after that. This is a great gal, who I know would not lie about this. I believe she was being tested to see if she would really get rid of the board, since she had placed faith in it in the past.

Also, I went to a Christian college where one of my professors and his wife had been heavily involved in the occult before becoming Christians. At one time, they had owned an object that would "answer" their questions by levitating once for "yes" and twice for "no". It was an ordinary wood object with no special characteristics, but it had a spell on it. After going to church and becoming Christians, they stopped cold in their occult activity and now speak out against it.

As a Christian, I believe in the spirit world and that there is both good and evil at work. Even activities that can seem like innocent fun can really be distractions from a real relationship with God and can bring evil into your life and home. Stay away from it! So many of these occult activities take a dark turn and lead people down a path of hopelessness. God is the opposite of all of that--He is hope! Put your trust in Him. :)

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