Is it weird to have an imaginary friend

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Skepticism does not mean that one would shut down investigation.

You seem to be moving the goalposts. This hasn’t been about seeing something and not being sure what it was. It’s been about assuming that something is paranormal with insufficient evidence/subjective experience.

People can have whatever experience they think they’ve had. If they interpret unknown external stimuli as aliens or something paranormal, they are still employing imagination because the fact is that they don’t know what it is they’ve experienced. It’s often something mundane. My friend had a neighbor who thought the metal fan on their roof was a UFO. Real experiences and imagination often go hand-in-hand as I’ve previously stated in this thread. I’ve made no blanket statements because I said that various possibilities can contribute to or create experiences. Until sufficient evidence comes along, the most likely reasons for supposed paranormal phenomena are the ones I’ve already stated and are not dependent on factual reality apart from the misinterpretation factor. Refer back to my “imaginary” quote.



It’s perfectly rational for a person to say that they saw something and didn’t know what it was. It’s not rational to assume aliens.

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 19 Feb 2024, 8:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I am referring to your statement

I think you are casting shadows by inserting "lower levels of education", "beliefs" and "absurd" to describe "insufficient evidence"

The “lower levels of education” was referring to a previous comment. People who are less educated are more likely to have high levels of religiosity,

It is absurd to believe in something with insufficient evidence. Some people may think differently, but IMO belief in bigfood, Nessie, etc. is absurd.

Most people who have lived experience don't. But they keep an open mind to all possibilities till the experience can be explained. What doesn't help is stigmatising personal experience with labels such as "low levels of education", absurd and belief. Personal experience does not mean belief, people just want answers.

Yes belief is absurd, one must find explanation before they can become comfortable with what happened to them. Knowledge is the key, but without serious investigation they are left in the dark.

Not a single person has said that people shouldn’t investigate in this thread. Once again, you seem to be moving the goalposts. I don’t have a problem with people experiencing something and not knowing what it was. My issue lies with assuming something is paranormal which is what this conversation was about. It wasn’t about investigating or about people having unknown experiences. It was about people having paranormal experiences. I have yet to see a compelling reason to believe that something was paranormal and won’t until it’s been proven objectively. There’s often a mundane reason for stuff although it might be more fun to think otherwise. If people have had all these paranormal experiences, there’d most likely be extraordinary evidence by this point.

Sure, people can see metal fans or airplanes and not know what they are. The irrational belief lies in assuming it’s an alien spaceship or whatever. That’s what I meant by misinterpretation, and it does involve imagination. With less concrete experiences, I think the reasons I’ve already stated are most likely although it doesn’t mean that a person wouldn’t investigate. A sleep study could be part of the investigation depending on the nature of the experience(s). If no rational explanation can be discovered, it doesn’t mean that it was paranormal by default.

You seem to conflate skepticism with arrogance and dismissiveness. Not believing a far-fetched claim someone makes doesn't require arrogance, only the desire to better understand the claim than just accepting it at face value.

If someone accepts unlikely and completely unsubstantiated claims at face value without any skepticism they're a fool.

Addressing this point for the umpteenth time - Having a paranormal experience is neither "Belief" nor is it necessarily "imaginary".

Skepticism is part of science. Skepticism without investigation is unscientific. Relying on skepticism to debunk claims of people having a paranormal experience is unscientific. Not every experiencer claims aliens, spirits or monsters. However if no conventional explanation is forthcoming then they might choose to explore other explanations.

One can't debunk an unsubstantiated claim, all they can do is dismiss it.

If someone makes claims of aliens, spirits or monsters and shows no evidence, how much credibility does their baseless claim have? Zero. It can't be and doesn't need to be debunked, only doubted or dismissed.

Debunking is only possible once someone starts to provide evidence that can be evaluated. With no evidence whatsoever it's not even possible to debunk a claim. The options are to either take it at face value or dismiss it as unsubstantiated nonsense.

Paranormal experiences haven’t been proven. It seems that they are, by their very nature, rooted in belief and imagination. As with my stance on fairies, my position on paranormal activity is disbelief until the evidence proves that I am wrong. I can’t prove that there aren’t fairies, but it appears so unlikely that I simply say that I don’t believe in them. My position on God is similar, so I’m an atheist. I’m not saying people aren’t having experiences. I just don’t believe they are paranormal. For the umpteenth time, I’ve not been presented with extraordinary evidence to believe in anything paranormal or supernatural.

But, I know a guy who knows a guy who knows a lady who knows another guy who knows a lady who's cousin knows someone who's dog was being gangstalked by the fae.

Are you calling that dog a liar?

I don’t know… That IS pretty overwhelming evidence. How could I not believe?

I think I’ve finally changed my stance on this stuff.

Not true, a lot of debunking starts the moment somebody mentions "I saw a flying saucer"

In this thread, we go from talking about paranormal experiences, then just experiences of something unknown, now we are back to paranormal ones. It’s sort of like people pick whatever is most convenient at the time and/or conflate one with the other. It doesn’t work. They are not the same thing. A hallucination, no matter the physical or mental cause, is an experience even though it exists solely in a person’s mind. Imagining that one is hanging out with God or Frodo is also an experience. Seeing a metal fan or hearing a door slam are experiences too.

Shouldn’t people scrutinize the evidence rather than blindly believing it? Not doing so when it comes to scientific claims sounds risky. Maybe someday evidence will turn up that can’t be debunked. It just hasn’t happened yet.

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 19 Feb 2024, 11:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.