People Who May Have Been Saved by Ghosts

Ghosts can be terrifying, but I don’t think they’re all dangerous. Of course, there are stories of demon possessions all around the world, but I think ghosts usually want to be left alone. Some people believe ghosts will even go as far as saving people’s lives. Here are some examples of such cases.
 

1. The Gray Man

The small town of Pawleys Island in South Carolina is home to beautiful beaches, historic homes and apparently a lot of ghosts, the most famous of which is known as the gray man. For 200 years there have been numerous sightings of the mysterious grey figure typically right before a major hurricane hits the area. And seeing the grey man could not only save your life but also save your home.

Sounds like an urban legend right? Well, not according to Jim and Clara Moore who had a run in with the Grey Man two days before Hurricane Hugo struck in 1989. They told the story on one of my favorite childhood shows, mysteries. According to Jim, "We were talking a walk late in the afternoon which we usually do. You see so many people walking on the beach at this time of the day. That particular afternoon we only saw the one, and he was coming directly toward us. When I got within speaking distance, I raised my hand to say ‘Hi’ or ‘Beautiful evening’ or whatever, and he disappeared.”

Although the hurricane wreaked havoc on Jim and Clara’s neighborhood, their home was somehow the only one to escape the storm unscathed.

No one really knows who the Grey Man was, some say he was just some pirate, there are others who claim he was a young man who died in quicksand while on the way to see the woman that he loved. Not long after his death he appeared before his lover and warned her to leave the island the woman and her family did, right before a deadly hurricane struck. So I’m thinking maybe he loved the woman so much he came back to warn her but in the process was cursed to wander through eternity warning others of impending doom. So kinda like the Flying Dutchman, except the opposite.

2. The Wife with a Warning

According to the Chicago Tribune, a farmer named Charles Henry Durand was heading home late one evening when his horse stopped in the middle of the road, yea this happened back when people still rode horses, anyway, his horse stopped and would not move any further and began to tremble. Suddenly the air grew oppressive, and a faint light appeared gradually taking the shape of a woman beside Durand's wagon.

At this point, Durand wanted to run away, but he said he was scared stiff. The white figure then spoke in a whisper and said: "There is danger at home, stay away until morning." It was then Durand said he recognized the voice of his late wife. As soon as the warning was uttered, the figure disappeared.

Durand just went straight on home where he noticed that a window he had locked was now open and there were muddy footprints inside the house. As he walked inside carefully, he noticed a string which he pulled with his umbrella. Right then a gun went off, and the bullet would have hit Durand straight in the chest if he did not notice the string which was hard to see in the dark, Durand told the paper he would have died if not for the warning of his late wife.

3. The Woman Who was Dead for 56 Minutes

50-year-old Sonia Burton counts herself as a living miracle, for a good reason too because she was dead for 56 minutes following a heart attack.

Sonia’s day was just like any other as she showed up for work at a bingo hall, but as her shift started, she felt a pain in her chest and then collapsed. Paramedics were on the scene quickly and worked for the next 56 minutes to try to save Sonia as she was being transported the hospital. It was during this time that Sonia said she received a message from her late husband John who died of a heart attack in 2004

She said: "The only thing I remember is my late husband coming to me and saying 'It's not your time Sonia. Go back to the children.' Then I woke up in hospital."

4. The Mother’s Ghost

In March of 2015, emergency responders responded to a report about an overturned car in an icy river. When they arrived, they saw a woman and a baby who was strapped in a seat in the back of her mother’s car, which was hanging upside down in cold water.

Here’s where it gets creepy, when the rescuers entered the water they say they heard a voice calling for help. The 25-year-old mother was already dead, but the officers swear they heard an adult's voice calling out to them for help.

Officer Jared Warner of the Spanish Fork Police Department was one of the first to reach the vehicle; he told the Desert News that “We’ve gotten together and to just talk about it and all four of us swear that we heard somebody inside the car saying, ‘Help,’”

Officer Bryan Dewitt who was also on the scene said “The only people in there were the deceased mother and the child.” Officer Tyler Beddoes another responder said they couldn't explain it, but have no doubt they heard it.

"It wasn't just something that was just in our heads. To me it was plain as day cause I remember hearing a voice," Beddoes told the Deseret News. "I think it was Dewitt who said, 'We're trying. We're trying our best to get in there.' How do you explain that? I don't know,"

Also, it was a miracle that little Lily survived, as she was hanging upside down for almost 14 hours in her car seat with no food or water with the icy river flowing right below her head and temperatures dropping to near freezing throughout the night.

6 Clues That May Prove, We ALL Have Souls

Have you ever wondered if you were something or someone else in your past life? Or if you had a past life in the first place? 

A chief question for many philosophers and scientists alike is whether or not humans have souls. A soul is the spiritual, immortal part of a human being that pre-exists the body and stays alive after death. It is the reason why people are able, if possible, to reincarnate and start a new life in a different body. 

Although many people do believe that they have souls, others are skeptical and want real evidence of the existence of such spiritual entities. So without further ado, here are clues that may prove we all have souls.

#1 - Soul Captured on Photo & Video

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Sometimes we see photos that seem to capture images of ghosts or an always blurry bigfoot so it would make sense that cameras may be able to capture souls as well and regardless of whether they are real photos or not, they are always interesting and sometimes very hard to explain. 

For example, in Powell County, Kentucky there supposedly was a horrible motorbike crash, and a guy named Sal Vazquez took a picture of the incident while driving by in his truck. Vazquez posted his picture on Facebook to share the devastating news, but what he received in the comments wasn’t what he expected. People who saw the picture claimed that Vazquez had captured the dead man’s soul leaving his body. They shared the post, and eventually, it became viral. The picture shows a translucent, human-shaped figure leaving the body of the man who passed away.

Next, we take a look at a video posted in a Chinese hospital. Which showed the body of a deceased woman lying on a stretcher. The body was covered by a sheet, and the room was dark, and you can clearly see a ghostly figure begins to exit the body of the deceased woman. Now if this were real, I would just hope that this is something that can only be captured on camera because can you imagine seeing this in real life. I’m glad this was in a hospital because I would definitely have a heart attack.

#2 - Near Death Experiences

We all know the story, someone almost dies and is brought back to life, they then talk about a white light and probably heading towards it. But that's the thing, you've heard about it before because it happens a lot and the stories all seem to be pretty similar. 

For example, after the horrific Tang Mountain Earthquake in 1976, doctors brought many victims back from the brinks of death with most of these individuals recounting similar experiences of floating above their own bodies and instead of pain and fear they felt very much at peace. And although according to a 2011 study in which researchers say near death experiences are just biological reactions, a Harvard Neurosurgeon named Dr. Eben Alexander disagrees.

Dr. Alexander didn’t believe that souls existed. But one day, Dr. he fell into a coma for a week due to bacterial meningitis. During that time, he claimed to have a surreal journey into the afterlife in which he experienced something so real that it made the human world seem artificial in comparison. He also said that the afterlife was filled with love and that communication in that dimension was telepathic. 

People didn’t need to speak to each other to understand what they were trying to say. When he regained consciousness seven days later, he was healed of his meningitis and was so intrigued by his otherworldly experience that he wrote an entire book on it called “Proof of Heaven.”

    
#3 - Bioelectric Photographs

Next, we have an experiment done by Russian scientist Konstantin Korotkov, who photographed a person using a special bioelectrographic camera at the time of his death. Korotkov teaches physics at St. Petersburg State Technical University and is famous for his research on human energy fields. The bioelectrographic camera creates a high-intensity electric field and produces a flow around the object. Once, Korotkov photographed a person at the moment of his death, and the pictures showed him the soul leaving the body. He explained that the life force (in blue) first left the core, then the head, and lastly the heart and groin.

#4 - Brain Activities

Canadian Neurosurgeon Dr. Wilder Penfield is responsible for a lot of what we currently understand about our brains and is widely considered the father of neurosurgery. For years Penfield though that the brain could explain all human behavior, but after decades of research, he changed his mind. For example in one experiment Penfield conducted. He wanted to observe the brain activity of one of his subjects, so he set up a system that would monitor all the subject’s brain activities. 

He first told the subject to raise his hand, and when he raised his arm, a certain part of his brain was activated. When he took his arm down, that same part of the brain was deactivated. At the same time, Penfield asked the subject did you raise your arm, which the subject replied, "Yes I did."

Then, Dr.Penfield used a machine to activate that part of the brain again but this time artificially. The arm rose up. Then, he deactivated that part of the brain, and the arm fell down. When asked again if he raised his arm the subject said No it went up by itself. This simple experiment is really amazing because in the second case, it was Penfield who triggered the brain to cause the arm to go up, but in the first case who or what triggered the brain? 

Because of this Penfield concluded that: “The brain is a computer, but it is programmed by something outside of itself.”

He also said in his last book The Mystery of the Mind, “I came to take seriously, even to believe, that the
consciousness of man, the mind, is NOT something to be reduced to brain mechanism. 

#5 - Ghosts

I ain't afraid of no ghosts... well actually that’s a lie, I am deathly afraid of ghosts. Personally, I think ghost hunting is one of the worst things that you can do. I mean what are you doing? You don't have a proton pack, what are you gonna do when a ghost attack? Throw your iPhone at it.  Oh, there’s the ghost, oh it's getting close, and now it's chocking me, and now I'm dead... But seriously, we all know there are countless pictures and videos and testimonials out there that are evidence that ghosts may in fact exist and ghosts are suppose to be lost souls so this is also evidence that we do indeed have souls. 

#6 - Reincarnation

Throughout history there have been countless cases of people remembering their past lives, some cultures even treat reincarnation as fact. 

Professor Ian Stevenson formerly of the University of Virginia and his successor Dr. Jim Tucker spent decades researching claims of reincarnation by children and is said to have investigated over 3000 cases. In many of these cases like the people, mainly children were able to remember incredibly specific details of their previous lives. 

For example one of the cases was a boy known as Sam, Sam was four years old when his grandmother died. His father brought an old photo album home from her house when he cleaned it out. To Sam’s parents’ knowledge, Sam had never seen a photo of his grandfather.

When they were looking through the album, Sam pointed to a photo of a car, and said: “That’s my car.” It was his grandfather’s first car. Sam’s mother was skeptical, so she showed him a photo of his grandfather as a young boy with other boys of the same age. Sam pointed to his grandfather and said, “There I am.”

Testing it further, Sam’s mother asked if he remembered anything else from his past life. Sam said someone “turned my sister into a fish.”
When asked who, Sam replied “Bad men.”
It turns out The grandfather’s sister had been murdered, and her corpse was dumped in a body of water.

Personally, I believe that we all have souls and that’s why I'm kinda scared of this whole cloning or making machines more and more lifelike. I personally do believe that the soul is what makes us who we are and I really don't think that when we die, its just over, I mean that’s kind of depressing. 

But there is so much evidence out there that we do all have souls, I think this is especially true in the case of past lives or reincarnation. There are so many documented cases of reincarnation, and even if you don't believe it, you can't really explain it. I mean how can you explain a little kid remembering accurate details of another person who died before they were born. 

Sources:

http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/14/us/spirit-leaving-body-photo-trnd/index.html

http://study.com/academy/lesson/dr-wilder-penfield-biography-research.html

http://www.korotkov.eu/

http://www.iisis.net/index.php%3Fpage%3Dian-stevenson-semkiw-childhood-memories-reincarnation-past-life-lives

CREEPIEST Ghost Ships of All Time

I love going to the beach, nice soft sand, the sound of the waves crashing, all very nice. But I am scared to go into the water. Because here’s the thing, when you are in the ocean, you are literally on the bottom of the food chain. I mean forget about sharks, anything could just come up and kill you. A little fish could just swim up to you and just take a bite, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. What I'm trying to say is that the ocean could be a scary place, not just for people swimming in it, but also ships. The ocean is unpredictable, a lot of crazy things can happen You’ve got pirates, crazy weather, the Bermuda Triangle and often things don't go so well for these ships. So here are some of the creepiest ghost ships to have ever sailed the high seas, some may just be legends, some may be haunted, and some could still be out there.  

1. The Mary Celeste

On December 4, 1872, The Mary Celeste, an American merchant ship was discovered in the Atlantic Ocean, off the Azores Islands. But here’s where it gets spooky, the ship’s cargo and valuables were completely untouched, and it’s still stocked with six months’ worth of food and water, but not a single passenger or crew member could be found. The sails were in poor condition, but the ship was still in seaworthy condition having only set sail for about a month.  The ship's single lifeboat was also missing. None of those who had been on board were ever seen or heard from again. Theories in regards to the disappearing crew include explosion caused by alcohol fumes from the cargo, seaquakes, waterspouts,  the Kraken and of course the Bermuda Triangle.

2. The Carroll A. Deering

On  January 31, 1921, a massive five-masted schooner was found grounded on Cape Hatteras in North Carolina.

The ship was deserted with all its eleven crewmembers missing. Its sails were up, and there’s evidence that a meal was about to be prepared. The crews’ personal stuff was gone, along with the ships navigational equipment, logbooks, and the two life rafts.

The ship was scheduled to pick up coal at Norfolk in Virginia and then go all the way to Rio de Janeiro of Brazil to unload the coal, and then return home to Maine. It is after setting homebound sail from Barbados when things started going horribly wrong.

On January 29th, 1921 the ship was spotted by a lightship at Cape Lookout North Carolina. A lightship is an anchored ship which guides other ships passing by with its lights and radio communication. The Captain of the lightship heard a crewman from Carroll A. Deering hailing at him saying they had lost their anchors. The Carroll A Deering, however, did not stop and sailed out of sight. That was the last time anyone ever saw the ship sailing in its normal condition.

To this day, Mutiny: A plotted rebellion by the crew members and led by the first mate seems like the most acceptable theory. It was evident from the Captain’s comments at Rio that he was not in good terms with the first mate and possibly with most other crewmen. But there was no definitive evidence of this.

What’s also crazy is that at the time the crew’s mysteriously disappearance, marine investigators discovered that nine other ships also disappeared without a trace in that same area at about the same time.

The information went all the way to the White House and prompted President Herbert Hoover to order a special investigation. In spite of efforts by top government investigators, not only by the United States but by nations where many of the lost ships originated, the fate of the Deering’s crew and the nine missing ships, was never learned. Yea I would def blame the Bermuda Triangle on that one. Or maybe mermaids...

3. The Ourang Medan OOOO Rang Ma Dang

In 1947, two American ships navigating the Strait of Malacca, off the coast of Malaysia, as well as British and Dutch listening posts, claimed to have picked up a series of SOS distress signals. The unknown ship’s message was: “All officers including captain are dead, lying in chartroom and bridge. Possibly whole crew dead.”  This communication was followed by a burst of indecipherable Morse code, then finally came the message that simply stated: “I die.”

The men manning these posts managed to triangulate the source of these broadcasts and figured out that they were likely emanating from a Dutch freighter known as the SS Ourang Medan, which was navigating the straits of Malacca.

An American merchant ship called the Silver Star was closest to the presumed location of the Ourang Medan and rushed to help. As the silver star caught sight of the Ourang Medan, the crew noticed that there was no sign of life on the deck. And attempts to hail the crew was not successful. That’s when the Captain of the Silver Star decided to assemble a boarding party

As they boarded the Ourang Medan they noticed that the decks of the vessel were filled with the corpses of the crew; whats more creepy was the fact that their eyes were wide open and their arms were grasping at some unseen assailants, their faces twisted in agony and horror. Even the ship’s dog was dead.

Later one of the boarding crew members testified that “Their frozen faces were upturned to the sun… staring, as if in fear… the mouths were gaping open and the eyes staring.”

After boarding the ship, the American crew members claimed to have felt an extreme chill in the air even though the temperature outside was 110°F.  Although it’s obvious the crew of the suffered a horrific death, there was no evidence of injury or foul play and the ship itself was not damaged.

The Captain of the Silver Star decided that they would tow the Ourang Medan back to port, but as soon as the tow line was attached. Smoke started pouring out from the lower decks then the Ourang Medan just exploded and sank into the ocean.

There have been of course a number of theories proposed about what might have caused the death of the crew. The most popular of these is that the ship was illegally transporting some kind of illegal nerve agent, which was not properly secured. Others, claim the ship was a victim of some kind of paranormal attack.

And I’m here to tell you what really happened, a look of fear and agony? Everybody dead? That ship was carrying The Ark of The Covenant... That’s why when ghosts attack, you gotta just close your eyes. I mean if I was gonna be killed by a ghost, and I know for sure that I'm gonna die, do I really want to be so scared that I poo my pants before I die? If I'm going to die, I'd want to die with clean pants, that’s all I'm saying. So remember, when ghosts attack and you’re pretty sure your gonna die, just close your eyes, and either you die with clean pants or it’s the ark of the covenant and your gonna be spared... Win-win.

4. The Octavius

The Octavius was allegedly discovered West of Greenland by a whaling ship on October 11th, 1775. Crewmembers of the Whaling ship boarded the Octavius and discovered that the entire crew froze to death. The Captain was found in his cabin, frozen at his desk while writing in his log. The boarding party freaked out so much they quickly left the ship, but in their haste, they only grabbed the first and last pages of the log as the rest was frozen to the desk. The partly complete entry in the log was dated 1762, meaning the ship had been in the state they discovered it for 13 years.

The Octavius had left England for in 1761 and was doomed when the Captain decided to take the much shorter but unconquered route of the North West Passage. It is believed the ship became trapped in ice when traveling past Northern Alaska.

The discovery of the ship meant that the Octavius was the first ship to Navigate the North West Passage. The ship was presumed to have later broken free of the ice and drifted for 13 years until the discovery in Greenland,  The Octavius was never seen again after this strange encounter. So yea, if you ever run into a super old ship with a bunch of frozen bodies, you may pee your pants, but at least you can identify the ship! That’s a learning moment if you ask me.

5. Flying Dutchman

This is arguably the most famous ghost ship of all. The ship is said to haunt the waters near the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. Contrary to popular belief, the term "Flying Dutchman" actually refers to the captain, not his ship. There are several variations of the story, but the most famous one is that the ship's captain, Hendrick Vanderdecken, who lived in the 17th century and served with the Dutch East India Company, encountered a storm off the Cape of Good Hope.

Legend states that "the very stubborn Dutch sea captain was struggling to round the Cape of Good Hope and when other vessels asked if he would take refuge in the bay he laughed and shook his fist at the wind and swore He would Round the Cape if it took him ’til Doomsday."

His crew and passengers eventually tried to stage a mutiny, but the captain shot the leader of the rebellion and threw his body overboard. Then the clouds parted, and a form appeared on this ship that said,

"You’re a very stubborn man," to which the Captain replied, "I never asked for a peaceful voyage, I never asked for anything, so clear off before I shoot you too!"

He then fired at the form, but the bullet pierced his hand instead. Then the form said.

"You are condemned to sail the oceans for eternity, with a ghostly crew of dead men. Bringing death to all who sight your spectral ship, and to never make port or know a moment's peace. Furthermore, gall shall be your drink, and red-hot iron your meat”

Thus to this day the captain and his ghostly crew are said to sail the waters for all eternity, hoping one day to be forgiven.

There have been many sightings of the Flying Dutchman. For example, in 1939, dozens of people at Glencairn Beach in Cape Town reported seeing the Flying Dutchman charging toward shore under full sail, only to disappear just before the disaster.

Lighthouse keepers at the Cape Point Lighthouse are said to have frequently sighted the Flying Dutchman during storms.

You know why I don’t like ships, I mean I’m fine going on a boat ride near shore, but I have no interest in sailing into the middle of the ocean. Because like I said, when you're in the ocean, you are the bottom of the food chain, and I always had this fear that I'm gonna fall off the ship in the middle of the night and just get left behind and end up like that open waters couple. That’s literally my worst nightmare, cause I'm a good swimmer so I probably wouldn't drown, so that means I'm gonna get eaten by something. At that point, I hope I get eaten by a shark, at least that would be quick, couple, bites, done! But with my luck, it’ll probably be a bunch of tunas taking revenge for all the tuna salad sandwiches I've eaten.

Towns And Villages You Didn't Know Were Cursed

Haunted or cursed places where strange supernatural phenomena take place are typically the foundation of a vast assortment of novels and movies in the horror genre that exists today. From novels like Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot” to the film classics like Sam Raimi’s “The Evil Dead,” the plots of scary fictional tales with this kind of common theme are sometimes even set in towns and villages that actually exist in the real world. These existing locations are believed by many to be haunted by ghosts or cursed by powerful and malevolent unearthly beings. Because there are many chilling accounts of allegedly real hauntings and tragic events involving these old towns and villages, it is not surprising that they are used in fiction to maximize a story’s potential to horrify and terrorize its audience.

1. The Al Jazirah Al Hamra

Once a prosperous fishing village located on the northeastern edge of the United Arab Emirates, Al Jazirah Al Hamra used to be filled with antiquated houses that date back to the ancient times and was once an active coastal area where various trade transactions took place. For some reason, around 1968, the residents of the village collectively abandoned their homes. Today, while many of these previous inhabitants still have ownership over some of the land in the village, very few of their descendants continue to live there.

It was around the 1960s when rumors of Al Jazirah Al Hamra being haunted started to gain ground among UAE citizens. Many believe that the village is home to several “djinns” or genies – supernatural creatures in Arabian and Islamic mythologies. These djinns, in particular, are malevolent beings that feed on human flesh. Because of the dark tale surrounding the village, it is a popular tourist spot for those who enjoy ghost hunting and thrill-seeking. While some residents in the area discourage the nocturnal visits of strangers, many locals have also reported sightings of these djinns and have shared their stories with others.

2. The Cinco Saltos

Located in the rural region of Rio Negro, the City of Cinco Saltos is also notoriously known as the “City of Witches” due to reports of the rampant presence of black magicians, necromancers, and witches in the area. One infamous story about this old city involves its large cemetery where a body of a 12-year-old girl was supposedly found while workers renovated the area. Despite the fact that the girl was dead for around 70 years, the girl’s body is well-preserved due to mummification. Some even say that her body was tied to her coffin, leading superstitious residents of the city to suggest that the girl was used as a sacrifice in an occult ritual conducted by one of the hidden covens in the city. There are also reports of seeing a ghost of young girl roaming around the cemetery.

Another terrifying tale said to have taken place in Cinco Saltos involves the Pellegrini Lake where many child sacrifices were purportedly performed by the resident witches. This is supported by reports from visitors of hearing eerie shrieks of young kids when they pass through the lake’s crossing at night. Some people tried to locate the source of these unnerving screams but they always ended up unsuccessful.

3. The Dargavs

This village is more popularly known as the “City of the Dead” and is regarded as among the most enigmatic locations in Russia. Hidden somewhere in the Caucasus Mountains in North Ossetia of southern Russia. Looking at the site from a distance, it may seem like a regular hill village with crude houses, but in reality, Dargavs is no ordinary village. It is actually an ancient necropolis built around the Middle Ages. People of the Ossetian or Alanian tribe erected these house-looking crypts to bury their family members in, and today, there are currently around 100 stone crypts in the area and some of them contain scattered bones.

Today, many of the residents residing on the mountains steer clear of the necropolis due to a local legend warning that those who would visit the tombs in Dargavs end up receiving a curse that supposedly drives them to an early grave. It also doesn’t help that the area is covered with fog most of the time, adding a spookier feel to the grave site.

4. The Canewdon

Located in East Anglia, Canewdon is often referred to as the “witch country” of England as there are a lot of unverified superstitious tales surrounding the village, particularly about witchcraft. There was once a prophecy made by a famous “cunning man” from the 19th century named James Murrell about Canewdon, saying that the area would be doomed to be infested with witches forever. This makes sense in a way since the village has been the subject of witch lore since the 16th century. There is also a legend which states that each instance that a stone drops from the tower of St. Nicholas Church, a witch will perish only to have another take her place. Another legend claims that should a person run counterclockwise around the church or one of the tombs found in its courtyard during Halloween, ghosts, witches or even the Devil would appear.

More than the legends, what’s really tragic about the village of Canewdon was the fact that it was the site of many witch trials and executions that resulted in the suffering and demise of many people during the 16th and 17th centuries. Among the more notable magicians who came from Canewdon include George Pickingill, a black magician heralded as one of the world’s primary authority on witchcraft and Satanism during the early 20th century.

5. The Yarumal

The municipality of Yarumal in the Antioquia Department of Colombia has the unfortunate reputation of having an alarmingly large portion of its population suffer from the neurological curse of dementia. Out of 5,000 of its villagers, it has been determined that half of them will develop early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, with some of them getting afflicted with the neurological disease even before they hit 40 years of age.

As for the reason why so many of the residents in Yarumal are fated to suffer the affliction of dementia early in their lives, scientists have determined that a genetic mutation causing the disease can be traced back to a Spanish conquistador who arrived in the region sometime in the 17th century. The mutation is referred to as E280A and can be found on the 14th chromosome of a gene. While suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease is not fate that should be wished on anyone, there is a silver lining to the fact that many of the residents in Yarumal have this particular genetic mutation. Researchers believe that the people of Yarumal are the key to finding a permanent and effective cure to dementia, which is why the mountain village today is also serving as a large laboratory where the conditions of the villagers are thoroughly studied.

6. The Bhangarh

Regarded as the most haunted site in India, the ruins of the city of Bhangarh in the Rajasthan, India was once a stronghold of the Mughal Empire during the 16th century until the empire weakened by the early 19th century. However, it was the famine of 1783 that drastically diminished the human population in city and since then, Bhangarh has remained largely uninhabited.

The fort of Bhangarh is full of temples and palaces but despite its breathtaking sites, the city today is nothing more than an abandoned “ghost” town. In fact, even now, entry to the city between sunset and sunrise is prohibited and outsiders are warned against entering the city by the Archaeology Survey of India. There is even a legend circulating in the region that anyone who dared to visit the ghost city at night is fated to remain trapped inside the city’s ruins for eternity. Nevertheless, thousands of people have visited Bhangarh at night every year, either because they don’t believe in the curse or they want to see for themselves if it’s real.

As for why the city is cursed, one story tells of a holy man called Baba Balnath who gave his permission for the people to construct the town so long as the buildings they erected did not cast a shadow over his residence. If they did, he would punish the people by destroying the city. A descendant prince, however, violated this rule leading Balnath to curse the entire town.

Another tale speaks of a wizard called Singhiya who fell in love with the princess of Bhangarh named Ratnavati. To make the princess love him, Singhiya cast a spell on a fragrance purchased by one of the princess’s attendants. However, the princess saw through the plan and caused the magician’s death. Before he took his last breath, Singhiya cursed Bhangarh, prophesizing that people would soon abandon the city completely.

There is no way to tell if all these old towns and villages from different parts of the world are actually cursed. What we can say is that the spooky tales and legendary curses connected with these old sites are what makes these places all the more interesting for many of us. This is why many of us go out of our way to see them for ourselves – because they infuse a little fear, strangeness, and mystery into our normal lives.

---

 Sources: 

http://listverse.com/2016/04/29/10-cursed-villages-and-towns/
https://moviepilot.com/posts/3895720
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazirah_Al_Hamra
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinco_Saltos
http://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/city-dead-mysterious-village-dargavs-russia-003436/page/0/1
https://books.google.com.ph/books?id=nDdcVt9-jnMC&pg=PA50&dq=canewdon+witches&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=canewdon%20witches&f=false
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28514-conquistador-brought-early-onset-alzheimers-to-colombian-town/
http://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-asia/ghost-city-bhangarh-and-curse-holy-man-002380?nopaging=1

The Mysterious Dark Watchers

The Santa Lucia Mountains or the Santa Lucia Range is a rugged mountain range located in the coastal area of central California. Named in 1602 by a Spanish cartographer as the Sierra de Santa Lucia, the mountain range stretches for 105 miles or 169 kilometers from Monterey County in the north all the way south to San Luis Obispo County. Among its southern peaks stands the famous Hearst Castle. The Santa Lucia Range is the coast north of Ragged Point, forming a 100-kilometer wall of wave-dashed cliffs known as the Big Sur, to which the Pacific Coast Highway clings. 

It is a land of immense beauty and tranquility, where California Condors fly high above its mountains, and sea otters and elephant seals populate the turbulent waters at their base. 

But lurking within these mountains is the strange and mystifying phantoms that stand motionless in long black cloaks. Surveying the crags and peaks of the mountains of Santa Lucia, these unfathomable creatures have been spotted by travelers to be looking out to the sea, often wearing broad brimmed hats, and sometimes carrying either a staff or a walking stick. But what is consistent in the description of those who have seen them is that they are always still, silent and featureless. Those who try to get a good look at these fantastical beings fail because, by the time that they attempt a second glance, they have already vanished. 

What Are Dark Watchers?

These mystical entities are believed to reside in the misty hillside of Big Sur in the Santa Lucia Mountains. The early Spanish explorers and Mexican ranchers that came after referred to these creatures as “Los Vigilantes Oscuros.” In modern times, they came to be known as “The Dark Watchers.”

The Dark Watchers are a group of migratory entities that have appeared in California Folklore for supposedly the past several hundred years and are purportedly stalking travelers along the Santa Lucia Mountains. They are apparently giant human-like phantoms that are only seen at twilight, and they are usually spotted standing silhouetted against the night sky along the ridges and peaks of the mountains. These beings are believed to possess incredible hearing as well as impeccable eyesight. They are also immune to high-tech detection and prefer to only reveal themselves to travelers or trekkers who are equipped with simple items like hats and sticks. 

Origins, References & Accounts

Tales about the Dark Watchers appear in many books, and many personal accounts of encounters with them can also be found online. A description of the Dark Watchers can be read in many books about California’s famous supernatural stories, but these descriptions always referred to the writings of Pulitzer Prize-winner John Steinbeck and poet Robinson Jeffers as literary sources that mention this phenomenon. 

In 1938, John Steinbeck was living near Monterey at the northern end of the Santa Lucia Mountains when he published his book of short stories titled “The Long Valley.” One of the stories included in the book is the short story “Flight,” which most famously mentions the Dark Watchers specifically. The Dark Watchers had notoriety in the area at the time because of poet Robinson Jeffers – who also lived in Big Sur – published the poem “Such Counsels You Gave to Me” in 1937. In his poem, Jeffers described the Dark Watchers as “forms that look human… but certainly are not human.”

Steinbeck and Jeffers writing around the same time in the same region and drawing inspiration from the same local traditions implied that some form of Dark Watchers lore predated both of their literary creations. But what was it?

Original accounts of the Dark Watchers date all the way back to the Chumash - a native American tribe which has lived along the central coast of California and among the Channel Islands for around 13,000 years. These Chumash natives have included stories of The Dark Watchers in their oral legends and traditions since the Pre-Columbian era.

Validity of Origin Story

One of the most detailed and authoritative accounts of Chumash beliefs is arguably the 1974 1200-page doctoral dissertation by Thomas Blackburn, which was later on published as “December’s Child: A Book of Chumash Oral Narratives.” Blackburn’s principal source in writing his dissertation about Chumash beliefs was the massive archive collected by American linguist and ethnologist John Peabody Harrington between 1912 and 1928, including 111 oral narratives of the Chumash native tribe. Harrington’s body of unpublished research was housed at the Smithsonian’s National Anthropological Archives, and Blackburn went through it all, compiling virtually all there is to know about the Chumash beliefs. 

With an expert having researched extensively on the subject matter, we are now left with a very important question: Did the Chumash really tell stories about the Dark Watchers? If we are going to base our answer to this question on Blackburn’s work about the Chumash beliefs, then we can conclude that there were no creatures anything like the Dark Watchers mentioned in the oral narratives of this native American tribe. 

The closest thing that can be connected to these watchers was a creature called nunašīš. The Chumash believed that the Earth, as we know it, is the Middle World, which is an island surrounded by the ocean. The sun and other celestial bodies are a part of the Upper World, and down below are a Lower World. Among the dwellers of this Lower World are the Nunašīš, which are monstrous and misshapen animals who come up to the Middle World at night and spread bad luck, illness and other negative things. These creatures can also be shaped like humans, but they are neither dark nor cloaked. They are also not known for standing still against the night sky along mountain peaks.

The Chumash also believed in shape-shifting animals and humans, which is a belief widely held by many Native American cultures. However, so far, claiming that the Dark Watchers can actually be linked with any Chumash tradition cannot be done without casting doubts on its validity. Hence, it is also just as likely, if not more so, that the supposed connection of the Dark Watchers with Chumash oral stories could be just an invention of the 20th-century ghost story authors. After all, what better way to lend credibility to an urban legend than to tie it to an ancient culture?

Possible Explanations Behind the Dark Watchers

So, if the mysterious dark watchers are not at all a supernatural or mystical phenomenon, why are there people claiming to have seen one while hiking in the Santa Lucia Mountains in the fading twilight? 

We do not need to be an expert to know that our minds and eyes can sometimes play tricks on us, especially when we are in spooky environments where we are on edge, and our senses are on high alert. According to psychologists, illusions, hallucinations or misrepresentation of natural stimulus can be brought on by either exhaustion or isolation - conditions that are prevalent when you are traveling alone on the mountain trails of the Santa Lucia Range. 

Infrasound, which can be generated by the wind, can also cause feelings of uneasiness and anxiety in some people, which is why it is often connected to paranormal sightings. Studies show that infrasound between 7 and 19 Hertz can cause feelings of fear and panic in human beings. Researchers from the University of Hertfordshire conducted an experiment where they played music with and without tones of 17 Hertz frequency in the background. Results of the study showed that when the participants heard or felt the music with the 17 Hertz tones, they felt nervous, anxious and fearful. They also felt some pressure on their chests and chills crawling down their spine - feelings which are described by most people when they experience a paranormal event. 

An optical illusion known as the Brocken specter could also be a plausible explanation for the legend of the Dark Watchers. “Mountain Specter” can occur in certain atmospheric conditions when the sun is shining at a particular angle. A person’s shadow can be cast onto a cloud bank around them, which could create the illusion of a large shadowy humanoid figure. 

No one knows for sure who or what these Dark Watchers are. Where they come from or where they go when they disappear remains an unsolvable mystery to this day. As we have explained, it is likely that these creatures are nothing more than fictional legend, but even if they are real, these Dark Watchers were wise enough to have left no footprint behind that would have served as tangible proof of their existence. 

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Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Watchers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Lucia_Range
https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4522
http://www.weirdca.com/location.php?location=179
http://www.independent.com/news/2014/nov/13/search-dark-watchers/
http://www.messagetoeagle.com/mysterious-dark-watchers-one-of-americas-greatest-ancient-riddles/
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2015/03/exploring-american-monsters-california/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrasound#Suggested_relationship_to_ghost_sightings
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2013/06/ghost-of-the-machine-sounds-in-the-paranormal/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brocken_spectre
https://www.britannica.com/science/Brocken-specter
http://earthsky.org/earth/what-is-the-brocken-spectre
http://www.atoptics.co.uk/droplets/globrock.htm

The Ourang Medan, The Mystery of the Deadliest Ghost Ship in History

In June 1947, the Dutch freighter S.S. Ourang Medan was traveling along the straits of Malacca, when the ship suddenly sent out a chilling distress signal.

"All Officers, including the Captain, are dead. Lying in chartroom and bridge. Possibly whole crew dead."

This first message was followed by a series of indecipherable Morse code sequences until finally, a last ominous transmission:

"I die." 

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER VIDEO

Ourang Medan's grim SOS was picked up by British and Dutch listening posts around Sumatra and Malaysia, who worked together to determined where the signal was coming from and alerted nearby ships.

American merchant ship Silver Star was first to reach Ourang Medan. They waived and shouted at the vessel to check for signs of life above deck. But there was no answer. Only eerie silence.

The US ship decided to send out a rescue team to board the ship to look for survivors. But what they found was a blood-curdling nightmare.

The entire Dutch crew was a ghastly pile of corpses – eyes wide open in horror, mouths are frozen in an eternal scream, arms stretched out as if saying stop as if saying no more.

Inside, they found the captain with the same twisted expression on his face as that of his men, dead on the bridge of the ship. Now nothing more than a dead captain, leading a dead ship.

His once strapping officers are now cold corpses straggled on the wheelhouse and chartroom floor. Even the ship’s dog wasn't spared a horrific death.

But the most harrowing is finding the radio operator, fingertips still on the telegraph where he sent his dying message.

After seeing the chilling devastation on board, the Silver Star decided to tow the Ourang Medan to port. But it wouldn't make it to shore, as thick clouds of smoke started rising from the lower decks and interrupted the rescue.

The crew barely had time to sever the line and move to safety, before the Ourang Medan exploded. The blast was apparently so big that the ship “lifted herself from the water and swiftly sank,” taking with it all the answers to its mysterious end to the bottom of the sea.

Or so the story of the Ourang Medan goes.

Some details may differ slightly in each version of the story. Like it happened in February 1948 instead of June 1947. Or that the waters that day were choppy instead of calm. And that the crew wasn't just dead, but they were decomposing at a faster rate. 

While in some versions, the details are, well, too detailed. Like one of the two American ships that heard the distress signal was named The City of Baltimore. That the smoke from the lower deck before the explosion came exactly from the Number 4 hold. Or that the poor canine aboard was a small terrier.

But whichever version of the story you've heard (or told), the basic plot points remain the same - Ourang Medan's entire crew met a gruesome and inexplicable death, and then very conveniently blew up and sank to the bottom of the ocean, leaving us all with an unsolved nautical macabre mystery.

So what happened to the Ourang Medan?

Theory #1: It was a cover up.

The most commonly pointed out loophole in the tale of the Ourang Medan is the vessel's lack of paper trail.

The Lloyd's Shipping registers don't have any mention of the ship. It's not in The Dictionary of Disasters at Sea that covers the years 1824-1962. It wasn't in the Registrar of Shipping and Seamen either.

There's no trace of it in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. Nothing in the Dutch Shipping records in Amsterdam. The Maritime Authority of Singapore also doesn't have the ill-fated ship in any of their records. 

In other words, the Ourang Medan was a ghost ship, even before it gained notoriety as one. Because there's no tangible proof that it even existed.

But as espousers of this legend would explain, it's because the Ourang Medan is part of a transnational government cover-up involving the Netherlands, Japan, Germany, China, the United States, and possibly many others.

They believe that the ship was deliberately expunged from all maritime records because it was being used to smuggle a secret cargo of lethal nerve gas to Japan.

Saying the Ourang Medan's voyage is linked to Army Unit 731 founded by Japanese bacteriologist Shirō Ishii, whose main objective was to bring back a weapon of the chemical, gas, or biological variety, that could win the war in their favor.

But as the Geneva Protocol of 1925 prohibited the use of all chemical and biological weapons in war, the only way a large shipment of poisonous gas could make it across the other side of the world without raising any suspicion from authorities is by loading it as inconspicuous cargo, in an old, beat up Dutch freighter.  

This theory also provides a convenient and somewhat plausible explanation for the grisly death of the Ourang Medan's crew. With that much hazardous chemicals on board, a gas leak would've certainly led to the immediate death of everyone in the ship.

However, it wouldn't explain why the rescue crew from Silver Star wasn't affected by the poisonous gas when they boarded the ship.

Or why, like the Ourang Medan, there’s no mention of the Silver Star in Lloyd's register.

Theory #2: It was carbon monoxide poisoning.

American author and inventor of the term Bermuda Triangle, Vincent Gaddis, speculates that it was carbon monoxide poisoning is the answer to the mysterious deaths of the Ourang Medan crew.

According to his theory, burning fuel from a malfunctioning boiler system produced carbon monoxide fumes that poisoned the crew.

When breathed in carbon monoxide enters the bloodstream and prevents red blood cells from carrying oxygen around the body. At high levels, carbon monoxide can cause dizziness, vomiting, seizures, loss of consciousness, and even death. 

The trouble with this theory is that Ourang Medan is not an enclosed space. Fumes could've simply escaped into the atmosphere, and lives of the crew working the upper decks of the ship would've been spared.

Theory #3: It was pirates.

What's a story about a ghost ship without pirates, right?

There are theories claiming that pirates invaded the Ourang Medan and killed everyone on board, which although doesn't explain some accounts saying that there were no visible wounds on the victims' bodies, it does fit with the Strait of Malacca's long history with piracy as far back as the 14th century.

Because of its geography - narrow and dotted with many islets - it makes it ideal for a surprise attack towards ships using it as the trade route to China and Europe.

Theory #4: Ghosts

One of the most repeated, but arguably, also the most inconsequential detail in the story of the Ourang Medan is the extreme chill the rescue team felt as soon as they entered the hull of the ship, despite it being 110°F outside.

Inexplicable drop in temperature plus the frightened expressions on the crew's faces set in a vast, unforgiving sea, equals ghosts did it.

There aren't many supporters of this theory, but what's a ghost ship story without a ghosts-did-it theory?

Theory #5: Aliens

You might think that the alien theory is the most far-fetched, the most uncreative, the most cop out theory explaining the phenomena of the Ourang Medan, but it's a very popular theory, with entire books dedicated to it.

The story of the Ourang Medan has all the elements of a good mystery - inexplicable deaths, unknown assailants, world powers, war, pirates, ghosts, and multiple highly-plausible conspiracy theories. 

Which is probably why it still fascinates us to this day, even if it's already been dismissed by historians, researchers, and the casual internet fact-checker alike as a hoax.

But if it's good enough for the CIA to release a document in 1959 saying, that the Ourang Medan holds the key to many of the sea's mysteries, including that of sightings of huge fiery spheres that come from the sky and descend into the sea, then, it's certainly a hoax worth retelling.

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Sources:
1. Death Ship: The Ourang Medan Mystery, http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2011/11/death-ship-the-ourang-medan-mystery/
2. The Myth of the Ourang Medan Ghost Ship, 1940, http://skittishlibrary.co.uk/the-myth-of-the-ourang-medan-ghost-ship-1940/
3. S.S. Ourang Medan, http://www.crime-mystery.info/great-mysteries/ss_ourang_medan/the_hoax
4.S.S. Ourang Medan, https://www.historicmysteries.com/ourang-medan/
5. CARGO OF DEATH, https://web.archive.org/web/20070205223141/http://www.neswa.org.au/Library/Articles/A%20cargo%20of%20death.htm
6. LETTER TO<Sanitized> FROM C.H. MARCK, https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80R01731R000300010043-5.pdf
7. Did the Ourang Medan “ghost ship” exist?, https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/20263/did-the-ourang-medan-ghost-ship-exist
8. The SS Ourang Medan: Death Ship (Updated), https://shortoncontent.wordpress.com/2015/01/15/the-ss-ourang-medan-death-ship-updated/
9. Mysterious Death at Sea: the Disturbing Discovery at the S.S. Ourang Medan, http://weekinweird.com/2011/07/17/mysterious-death-sea-disturbing-discovery-s-s-ourang-medan/
10. The Mammoth Book of Unexplained Phenomena: From bizarre biology to inexplicable astronomy, https://books.google.com.ph/books?id=YHCeBAAAQBAJ&lpg=PT263&dq=Vincent%20Gaddis%20ourang%20medan&pg=PT263#v=onepage&q=Vincent%20Gaddis%20ourang%20medan&f=false
11. Vincent Gaddis, http://self.gutenberg.org/articles/eng/Vincent_Gaddis
12. Crime on the high seas: The World's Most Dangerous Waters, http://www.cnbc.com/2014/09/15/worlds-most-pirated-waters.html
13. The World's Most Dangerous Waters, http://time.com/piracy-southeast-asia-malacca-strait/

The Mystery of Streetlight Interference

One fine evening, you’re returning home after a long day’s work. As you stroll down the footpath of the street a block away from your house, no one else is around, and you only have the street lamps illuminating your path towards home. Oddly, the street lamp you just walked by suddenly switched off, only turning on again once you’ve passed it. Being the level-headed person that you are, you shrug off what happened as mere coincidence and think nothing more to it. However, three days later, you passed the same row of street lights, and the phenomenon happens again. Even weirder, this time around, three successive lamps are affected, each one suddenly turning off as you approach, only to switch on again as soon as you step away.

What just happened? Was this another random coincidence you should dismiss? Or did you somehow influence the street lights with a hidden energy or power you didn’t know you had?

Many people have personally experienced – or at the very least, witnessed – a streetlight suddenly turning off as someone passes under it. While some may think that this is mere chance, there are also others that suggest this to be an unknown phenomenon caused by a few individuals who supposedly possess an incomprehensible ability to influence electrical devices. Over the years, more and more people have become more open with sharing their unusual experiences involving street lamps, and this phenomenon came to be known as “Street Light Interference” or SLI.

What Is Street Light Interference?

“Street Light Interference” is a term coined by paranormal scholar and author Hilary Evans to denote the claimed ability of individuals to turn street lights or outside security building lights on or off when passing near them. Experience of this nature are quite common, with many people all over the world claiming that they involuntarily and usually spontaneously cause street lamps to go out. Typically, “the effect is intermittent, infrequent and is without an immediately discernable sequence of cause and effect.”

Although there are many personal anecdotes involving SLI experiences, the circumstances of each case are not always the same as with other instances. Some people report that they have only encountered switching off a single street light close by, while others claim to have influenced as many as a row of street lights in a single instance. There also those that possess the capacity to randomly affect only specific street lights, which makes it difficult to discern a testable pattern in studying SLI. Moreover, though the majority of SLI cases happen while walking, others say the phenomenon also occurs for them while they ride on bicycles, motorbikes, or even the bus.

However, the SLI phenomenon is not limited to street lights alone. There are also reports of people who supposedly can spontaneously and intermittently affect other electronic devices, which varies from battery-operated wrist watches to railroad crossing to aircraft navigation equipment. Some people also claim to affect volume levels on TVs, radios, and music players, and cause credit cards and other magnetically encoded cards to get damaged and erased while in their possession. There are also those who often experience problems with compasses, causing them to stop or malfunction.

People who supposedly experience the SLI phenomenon are referred to as “SLIders.” Many “SLIders” suffer from a lack of validation for their skeptical family members and friends unless the time comes that they witness the repeated occurrences firsthand. Without sufficient explanation for the phenomenon they experience and with no one to turn to confirm them, SLIders are mostly left with their own devices in imagining and speculating regarding the nature of their supposed power to influence street lamps and other items and devices.

Studies Related to Street Light Interference

In a modern world where empirical research decides the validity of a theory or a hypothesis, any attempt in determining the main cause of the Street Light Interference phenomenon without thorough scientific investigation is dismissed as mere speculation and intensely rejected by the academic community. This is where the problem with studying SLI arises. As with other reported psychic or paranormal phenomena, SLI is very difficult – if not impossible – to reproduce in a laboratory setting. They seem to occur spontaneously and sporadically without the deliberate intention of the SLIder.

However, there are some informal tests that have been conducted involving this phenomenon, and some of the data gathered in some research and studies are based heavily or solely on the personal anecdotes and subjective reports of the people who claim to have witnessed or experienced SLI for themselves. Even then, these tests and studies have shown that SLIders are usually unable to recreate the SLI effect on demand.

Prior to his death in 2011, the British paranormal scholar Hilary Evans was the foremost authority on SLI. Aside from being a pictorial archivist and authoring numerous books on the Fortean, Evans also helped found the Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena or ASSAP in 1981. And after receiving numerous reports from different people claiming that street lights respond to their presence in an inexplicable manner, Evans decided to uncover the truth behind the mystery. He collected hundreds of accounts of SLI through his research which he referred to as Street Lamp Interference Data Exchange or SLIDE. The culmination of this research was the publication of his final book titled, “SLIDERS: The Enigma Street Light Interference.”

Explanations for Street Light Interference

According to Evans, it is theoretically possible that every person who claims to have experienced SLI could be lying. However, since the majority of SLIders have “no ostensible motivation apart from a natural and commendable desire to resolve” this mystery, we can probably set aside deliberate deceit for the time being. And so, based on various research, studies and assumptions from experts that are supportive or skeptical about the validity of the Street Light Interference phenomenon, possible explanations for witness claims of SLI can be grouped into three broad categories -  psychological, paranormal, and mechanical.

Psychological Explanation

In his book about Street Light Interference, Evans raised this primary question: “does SLI occur at all, or are the alleged witnesses deluding themselves?” According to Evans, a decisive answer to this question cannot be produced until the SLI phenomenon is scientifically tested. However, he also mentioned the possibility that SLI could be a shared delusion, much like the widespread delusion that has taken place in the past – such as the witchcraft mania that took place in the 16th and 17th centuries – and even in our more enlightened era – such as the on-going alien abduction mania. However, Evans also noted that SLI does not have the same psychological pay-off as witchcraft or abductions. Those who seek to enhance their special gift of influencing street lamps will not find much to flatter themselves with achieving such a feat. In short, while its possibility cannot be disregarded, it seems highly unlikely that all SLI experiences are delusions. 

There are also those that suggest that that the SLI phenomenon might be attributed to people’s tendency to see patterns in “random noise.” Because it is unusual for a light to turn itself on or off when you walk past it, it catches your attention when it does happen. And when it occurs several times consecutively, people have the tendency to think that there is some kind of mechanism at work that makes it possible. And so, some argue that SLI can trace its roots in the power of suggestion, which requires a mix of different factors to work. As such, SLI could be brought about by the normal behavior of bulbs getting older, the witness’s observer bias, and some other important factor that is unknown to the person which would help in making sense of the situation.

Paranormal Phenomenon

Street Light Interference as a paranormal phenomenon is considered by skeptics to be the least likely possibility. By “paranormal,” we are pertaining to what occurs outside the conventionally recognized “normal” scientific parameters. It doesn’t have to mean that a supernatural force or an occult process is involved. If SLI really does occur as SLIders claim, then this phenomenon cannot be confined in the parameters of conventional science. Until now, there is no scientific recognition that the human mind can cause physical effects at a distance, which is what SLIders allege to be the case in SLI. However, the problem with SLI being a paranormal phenomenon is that it will be difficult to conduct experiments to test SLI since the phenomenon happens only at random and it is not produced by the person willing for it to happen.

There are also those who believe that what is causing street lamps to turn off or on could be some kind of “energy” that is emitted by the human body. SLIders report that the instances they spontaneously influence street lamps usually occur while they are tired, stressed, furious, or sad. Others, on the other hand, believe that street lamps are affected by some kind of static electricity that is produced by the body. There are also speculations that SLI might have something to do with the electrical impulses of the brain. At present, these electrical impulses are known to only have an effect within the body of an individual, but if it could somehow have an effect outside the body, then it could be the unconventional remote control that turns street lights off and on for these SLI eyewitnesses.

Mechanical Effect

According to Evans, “The fact that a mechanical device is involved logically suggests that a mechanical explanation should be looked for.” This is precisely why some skeptics suggest that SLI occurs as a consequence of lights nearing the end of their life. Typical modern street lamps are of the low-pressure sodium-vapor variety, which emit red glow at start up and turn into a steady monochrome yellow once they’re fully operating. The lamps automatically switch on at sundown through the activation of a light-sensitive cell or a photocell. When sunlight returns at dawn, the photocell is triggered again, switching the lamps off.

These bulbs take three to four minutes to light up and have a lifespan of 8,000 hours or approximately two years. When a bulb reaches the end of its life, it manifests a behavior that could explain the SLI phenomenon. This behavior is called “cycling,” which entails street lamps turning on and off every few minutes until the time comes that a technician comes along to replace the bulb. It is also possible that the bulb becomes slightly dislodged from its socket. If that is the case, even a minor vibration – such as that caused by a passing car, bike, or person – is enough to make the lamp blink for a brief moment.   

The Street Light Interference is a phenomenon that remains to be a genuine and fascinating mystery to those who believe it, and to those who are open to reserve judgement on it until such a time comes that sufficient empirical evidence is presented that completely disproves it or verifies it. Should it be proven true later on, SLI carries profound and exciting implications for science as well as for our knowledge about human potential.

But speculations aside, we also must not lose sight of the fact that at least some, if not all, incidents of SLI can be attributed to entirely mundane causes. It could simply be a natural event that could be explained by logical reasons, but we are unable to conclude as such because of insufficiency in tangible or verifiable evidence and the influence of psychological factors. 

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Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_light_interference_phenomenon
http://www.profilingtheunexplained.com/psychics_mediums/sliders.html
http://www.messagetoeagle.com/mystery-of-streetlight-interference-are-you-also-a-slider-2/
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2013/05/streetlamp-interference-a-modern-day-paranormal-mystery/
https://www.thoughtco.com/sliders-and-streetlight-phenomenon-2596547
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/109503-exploring-the-phenomenon-of-street-light-interference/
http://www.csicop.org/si/show/curious_case_of_street_lamp_interference
http://www.assap.ac.uk/newsite/Docs/sli.pdf
 

The Mysterious Black-Eyed Children

It’s late at night, you’re all alone in your home and it’s very dark outside. While you’re nestled in the warmth of your own home as you read a book to get yourself to sleep, you suddenly get startled by a sharp knock at the door. You stand up, head for the door, pull back the curtain of your window. Outside, you see a pair of trendily-dressed, olive-skinned teenagers. At first, you feel annoyed that some kids were disturbing you on a peaceful night, but you take a second look at them and realize that they are not the average, ordinary teenagers that live in your hometown. These two adolescents have something horribly wrong with them – their eyes. The creatures standing on your front porch have no white corneas, no colorful irises. All they have were just a pair of big, black and shark-like eyes, which sent chills down your spine as soon as you saw them.

At first, you may think that these bizarre teenagers are just dropping by to give you a scare before going on their way, but to your horror, they insist that you help them. And as they stare piercingly at you with their dull black eyes, they demand that you let them into your house. Despite a hypnotic temptation to give in to their demand and let them in, you actively resist in doing their bidding, and chose to keep them out of your home.

What just happened? What are those creatures that tried to convince you to let them into your home? And why did they have such terrifying blackened eyes?

What Are the Black-Eyed People?

Modern mythology has always been riddled with unexplained phenomenon, and among them are these legendary creatures known as the “Black-Eyed People.” They are also often referred to as “Black-Eyed Kids” or “Black-Eyed Beings,” but what they really are is a complete and total mystery.

Most encounters with the Black-Eyed People usually follow the same patterns. In most cases, a human-looking entity with pure black eyes – including the sclera or the white part of the eye – will approach a person at their home or their car, asking to be let in. They usually have a very dull or dry personality, as if they possess no personality at all - that is until they are told that they can’t come in. At this point, they get very agitated and those who encountered these creatures firsthand report a feeling of intense dread and fear when in the presence of these Black-Eyed Beings, even if they can’t exactly explain why.

The Black-Eyed People usually have very pale or sickly-looking skin and very dark hair. The clothes they wear vary but some describe them to be wearing all-black or very dark clothes. These creatures are more well-known as the “Black-Eyed Kids,” a term which is used very often to generalize this phenomenon since a high number of reported cases involve children with black eyes. In many cases, there will be one or two children between ages 6 and 16 and they are reportedly seen hitchhiking or panhandling, or are encountered on doorsteps of residential homes. They often wear no shoes, and they also look dirty and disheveled. Much like their older counterparts, these children are devoid of personality until they get aggravated when denied entry into your home or your car.

Origins of the Myth/Legend of the Black-Eyed People

The exact origin or primary source of the phenomenon of the Black-Eyed People is very difficult to pinpoint. The stories about these terrifying creatures slowly began to surface back in the mid- to late- 1990s through various internet message boards – the Facebook of that decade. However, one source of the phenomenon might have been the story of Brian Bethel in 1998.

According to Bethel, two boys approached him while he was sitting in his parked car, and they asked him for a ride home. He was tempted to let the boys into his vehicle but he claimed that he was also overwhelmed by a “fight-or-flight” response. And so, he resisted the urge to grant their request, which as a result, only agitated the boys and they grew even more insistent that they be let into the car. It was only then that Bethel noticed that the boys had “cloak black” eyes, and he felt momentarily paralyzed with fear. When Bethel collected himself, he promptly exited the scene.

When Bethel shared this personal experience in a ghost hunter forum, it unleashed the legend of the Black-Eyed People onto the online world. Since then, cases and personal experiences of other people have been reported from all across the globe, with only few variances among different accounts.

Paranormal Explanations for the Black-Eyed People

Are the Black-Eyed People real? Or were the increased sightings and alleged encounters with these unusual creatures simply a paranoid overreaction to everyday events? The evidence is not clear either way, but paranormal and supernatural explanations have been presented in support of their existence.

Many encounters with the Black-Eyed Beings consist of youthful, and usually dapper young men who use hypnotic voices and mesmerizing black eyes to convince and coerce their “victims” into doing their bidding. They also display an evident inability to enter someone’s property without first being invited. And while, to date, attempted blood consumption has not figured into any reported encounters with these creatures, some believe that the attributes of the Black-Eyed People are very vampire-like.

There are also suggestions that Black-Eyed Beings might be the result of a strange synthesis of human and extraterrestrial DNA. This particular speculation originates from the vague reference of alleged female alien abductees having encountered half-human, half-alien babies that were supposedly created from these abductees’ extracted unfertilized eggs. Many of these women have claimed to have come into contact with humanoid babies, which they described to have olive-shaded skin and jet-black and almond-shaped eyes.

Some have considered these Black-Eyed Beings as merely the lost spirits of the departed children who are sorrowfully wandering the mortal world seeking help from the living. However, given that most eyewitnesses report feeling an almost overpowering rush of fear when they encountered these beings, some believe that it is more likely that these Black-Eyed creatures are dangerous predators in disguise. And so, while this theory is no more or less reasonable than the others we have just presented, those predisposed to believing in the existence of angels and demons are more inclined to consider the fact that the Black-Eyed People might be old-fashioned, shape-shifting critters from the bowels of hell.

Scientific, Medical & Psychological Explanations for the Black-Eyed People

As exciting as paranormal explanations to the Black-Eyed People phenomenon may be, there has never been a shred of physical evidence to suggest that these creatures are physically present in any way or if they actually exist. So, if we cannot say that the Black-Eyed People are real due to this lack of evidence supporting their existence, what else could they possibly be?

Psychology and medical science present several interesting possibilities. In psychology, the first explanation is people’s overreaction on a particular event they had been mentally prepared for. This preparation is called “priming.” In priming, pre-suggestion has already been placed into the mind and only an activator stimulus that is appropriately vague under the right conditions sets off the connection between the knowledge in the brain and the senses. A false connection is then made between the two, leading people to a flawed conclusion that is not supported by actual evidence.

Priming is tied to pareidolia – the unification of sensory data into a familiar subject based on the perception of complex lines, patterns, gradations, sounds, or random colors. Our perceptions of the everyday world work the exact same way, and frame of reference and context mean everything when it comes to putting things in perspective. For example, if you visit an old house in the middle of the day and you hear stories about it being haunted, you probably won’t be scared at all. However, if you visit the same place in the middle of the night or during an intense thunderstorm, your perceptions of the situation will change drastically.

In short, priming, pareidolia, frame of reference and context all play important roles in how people perceive events, experiences, and even other people. All of these factors combine together to create a terrifying experience, even if we would ordinarily dismiss such scary ideas for their absurdity.

Medical causes combined with psychological factors and environmental parameters could also lead people to think that a particular experience is an encounter with the Black-Eyed People.

The dilation of the pupil in the human eye is called mydriasis, and the terms is used to refer to pupil dilation that is not the result of physiological causes, like drugs, illness or injury. There are several conditions that can cause a pupil to expand beyond what most people have typically observed. A blown pupil, for example, refers to a condition where the pupils are dilated beyond the normal limits due to a possible increase in intercranial pressure or brain hemorrhaging. Drugs, traumatic damage to the iris, third cranial nerve palsy, and pharmacological dilation among many others may also bring about a similar effect.  

None of these medical causes could lead to a fully black-eyed entity, but if combined with the right atmospheric parameters and/or primed conditioning, it may influence the brain to make a connection between confusing and unknown sensory data and information held in long term memory. And so, an encounter with a supposed Black-Eyed Being is created in our minds, where there really isn’t one.  

The internet is an invaluable tool for the distribution of information, but it is also just as easily a medium abused by people in disseminating hearsay, rumors and outright lies. Every paranormal event is riddled with scores of pranks and copycat reports, and so it may very well be that the mystery behind the Black-Eyed People is nothing more than an urban legend that has taken on a life of its own ever since it was introduced to the rest of the world. While this phenomenon could be true even if it is also considered an urban legend, the evidence proving the existence of the Black-Eyed People remains elusive until now, and will probably never be found.

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Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-eyed_children
http://www.messagetoeagle.com/mystery-of-the-black-eyed-people-why-are-they-so-different-from-the-rest-of-us/
http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2011/04/black-eyed-kids-insidious-threat-or-myth-in-the-making/
https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4410
http://www.gods-and-monsters.com/black-eyed-people.html
http://www.snopes.com/horrors/ghosts/blackeyed.asp
https://www.thoughtco.com/black-eyed-kids-horror-or-hoax-2594476