Paranormal Phenomena; Does the Origin Lie in a Forgotten Human Ability?
With film director, science-based paranormal investigator and award winning author Benjamin Radford
It is being said that when a ghost, spirit or demonic force is in the near…your hair is standing up straight due the static electrical charge it is moving in and/or with. But what if there is another reason for our hair to act this crazy from time to time?
What if we… the modern version of the Homo Sapiens … still possess a primordial but natural ability of blowing ourselves up, so to speak, as soon as we are in a stress or dangerous situation?
Indeed, an idea as such could be for some a ridiculous one but imagine you walking home from work and you are passing a dark allay. You will feel a little bit stressy due to the fact of you not knowing what might be hiding in the dark corners. This feeling of fear could be a left over from ancient times in order for us to sense if there is a blood thirsty predator or not and then to flee or fight?
I am your host Maria Anna van Driel… and you are listening to “The Next Truth; Where Science and Myth Meet” and this week I am speaking with, film director, science-based paranormal investigator and award-winning author and co-author of over twenty books and thousands of articles on a wide variety of topics including urban legends, the paranormal, critical thinking, and media literacy, Bejamin Radford about if there could be a more Earthly explanation for what we have become to understand as “The Paranormal”.
I Was Very Curious to Meet “Him”
Attorney of Law Ms. Karen Conti weighs in on her experience with serial killer John Wayne Gacy.
Clowns, they were once figures of innocent fun, brightly colored jesters performing to laughing children – but the real-life story of killer clown John Wayne Gacy is more disturbing than anything you will see in cinemas.
John Wayne Gacy, aka Pogo the Clown, was one of the most sadistic serial killers in the 1970s. No one could suspect that beneath the colorful makeup a cruel and pitiless murderer was lurking who was luring his young victims back to his home in Norwood Park, Illinois. … killing at least 33 young men and boys.
It was in March of this year that I became tremendously curious to this horrifying case when I encountered Ms. Conti’s story about how she had served as one of John Gacy’s last attorneys as he fought to overturn his pending death sentence that has now become part of America’s true crime hall of fame.
Not only does Ms. Conti know what it is like to look the killer clown in the eye, she is a dynamic and influential attorney in the local and national legal community and has handled of numerous high-profile cases.
She is a member of the Illinois, California, and U.S. Supreme Court bars. She taught and lectured at Stanford University and American University in Washington, D.C., regular appears on MSNBC, Fox News, The O’Reilly Factor, truTV, and other media venues. Her current focus is on her practice in family law, where she has gained prominence among her peers and the bench.
I am your host Maria Anna van Driel… and you’re listening to “The Next Truth; Where Science and Myth Meet” and this week I am speaking with Ms. Karen Conti about how the story of a young lawyer, whose client turned out to be a sadistic serial killer wearing a painted smile, begins.
Parapsychology-deniers“, Do They Have Some Special Veto Power(s)?
By Maria Anna van Driel
Parapsychologists. What comes to mind first when hearing this term? Correct! A bunch of crazy people who asking for research funding to proof the existence of white, free flying, bedding having an intelligence and mind-reading while looking into a piece of glass for instance. And all because they “think” that all that lies just outside the reach of our (familiar) visible spectrum is…real.
Throughout history, people have reported events that seem to violate the common sense view of space and time. Some psychologists have been at the forefront of investigating these phenomena with sophisticated research protocols and theory, while others have devoted much of their careers to criticizing the field.
It is unfortunate to see that too many are still expressing their doubts and thus instantly rejecting the authenticity of this field of research. I wonder why that is? Are you really that afraid of the possibility that, for instance, mental events might influence physical objects at a distance? Or that someone can read your diary while not physically being present?
Let me ask you a reasonable question; do you believe in God? I mean, do you accept the “evidence“ provided by a priest blindly when he or she is telling you that they are special because God is speaking through him or her and that you are not able to do this? Why is that…does a priest have a special gift or some kind of “telepathic super power“?
Another question that comes to mind is, mainstream science labels Near-Death-Experiences as nonsense or pseudoscience. But when we place those same people in a church, they listen to the biblical story of Jesus Christ rising from the death which, according to the bible, was witnessed by several people at the same time. Not to mention Lucifer or the behaviours and actions of all the other myriad angles and demons what is so fearful described in the holy writings. Were these events, noted down on papyrus and vellums, all the fantasies of people experiencing heat stroke or had they eaten a little too much monatomic gold?
Anyway, it is truly remarkable to see that many accept the words echoing through a church, but demand cold, hard data, which should provide irrefutable evidence for its (non) existence, when similar words are coming from someone who is not wearing a cassock. I assume that these same people are listening a bit too much to this minority group of…um, well, “parapsychology-deniers“. Do they have some special veto power(s) that they can impose on the majority?
No, I am neither attacking religion of accepted science in any form. I am only stating that many of the unexplainable events, historical or not, are not approached with an open-mind and contains this infamous layer of negativity what is better known as…taboo.
Did you know that the word “taboo“ implies that investigating the topic is strictly forbidden and that anyone who dares to defy the taboo can expect severe punishment?
However, even though it is fact that mainstream science tends not to take parapsychology seriously and saying that if parapsychology has not won a widespread acceptance, because of the faults within the subject itself rather than alleged bigotry on the part of scientists and that it seems to exist mainly in the minds of parapsychology believers, it is not “proof” for acting irrational and rejecting the claims made.
If you can accept Einstein’s or Tesla’s thoughts concerning time travel than why is it so hard to acknowledge that there is a legit truth in what has been criticized by some in the mainstream science?
As always, I leave it up to you whether it is all real or not. But I think we shouldn’t sweep the possibility that parapsychologists are on to something, under the rug.
[Top]How Does Our Brain Translate the Messages From What it is that Dwelling in the Realms of the Beyond.
With Nick Howe and Andy Wilson
Hauntings, EVP’s and Mystical Visions; how does our brain translate this and what is the ‘the-new-house’ effect?
Even though a national daily newspaper reported in July 2015 that 82% of Britons believe in the supernatural, 68% say they have experienced a supernatural event and 56% have had some sort of contact from a bereaved loved one… many are still holding a skeptical view on the scientific research conducted in order to search for a plausible explanation of what these paranormal events really are.
I am your host Maria Anna van Driel… and you’re listening to “The Next Truth; Where Science and Myth Meet”. This week I am welcoming back two dedicated and trained by the Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena, UK-en paranormal investigators, Nick Howe and Andy Wilson whose view is that a more rational approach has to be taken, one which respects the client’s opinions and privacy.
Together with their team PRI-UK, Nick and Andy are gathering evidence and trying to make sense of what still lies beyond the borders of the unexplained and share the opinion that, despite the wide spread belief, some scientific fields lacks a broad minded approach to the paranormal and generally rejects the idea that these unexplained events could occur.
I believe these events are not just your mind playing tricks on you. In fact, there might actually be a scientific explanation for things like ghosts, demonic hauntings, and even shadow people.
Extraordinary Experiences; Could Real Information Have Somehow Bypassed the Usual Sensory Channels?
With Dr. Neil Dagnall and Dr. Kenneth Drinkwater
Can we sense what is happening to loved ones thousands of miles away? Why are we, sometimes, certain of a caller’s identity the instant the phone rings? Is it possible to perceive information without the use of the ordinary senses?
There is absolutely no doubt about it that you have asked questions concerning the myriad unexplained events which seem to move in that particular spectrum we are not able to see with the naked eye. Many people believe that such “psychic phenomena” are rare talents or divine gifts. Others don’t believe they exist at all.
Nightmares, malevolent dark shadows, ghostly figures and lucid dreams … even though they are assigned to sleep paralysis, a vivid imagination and sometimes to pre-cognitive knowledge, there could be another rational explanation for these blobs and blips to overlap our classical reality.
I am your host Maria Anna van Driel… and you’re listening to “The Next Truth; Where Science and Myth Meet”. This week I am speaking with Dr. Neil Dagnall and Dr. Kennett Drinkwater from the Manchester Metropolitan University to get a clearer picture about what is it that we see fleeing from our peripheral vision, what has, or is, creating this variety in believes and how to pour all this in the research fields of parapsychology and cognitive science.
Can psychic or “psi” experiences be studied by science, or are they beyond the reach of rational understanding?
[Top]May I Believe
British Journalist and Media Commentator Nick Pope Weighs In
By Maria Anna van Driel, www.nexttruth.com
Below the written version of Nick Pope’s interview for you to download while listening to the TNT-Podcast.
Since the dawn of civilization humanity pondered over the question of where we, as a species, will go and what will happen when we get there. But it was not until the 19th century that we realized that we had the technology to do great things and to expand beyond the limits of our own imagination. https://youtu.be/HGWCVqsQjN8
If you think that some technologies from Star Trek seem far-fetched, think again. Many of the devices from the acclaimed television series are slowly becoming a reality. While we may not be teleporting people from starships to a planet’s surface anytime soon, we are getting closer to developing other tools essential for future space travel endeavors.
But where does this particular knowledge about these advanced technologies come from? Do extraterrestrial beings exchange this information via a yet unknown form of communication what vibrates though your whole body… a form of brain-to-brain communication creating holographic images in the mid-brain?
Or is there something what is that logic and common, many of us never thought of being a plausible answer to why our species feel this almost uncontrollable urge of applying A.I. to our existence?
UFO expert Nick Pope was, from 1991 to 1994, an employee at the British Government’s Ministry of Defense (MoD) where he was working on real-life X-Files. He has discussed the subject on numerous TV shows, and written news stories and features about conspiracy theories (including tie-in publicity material for the second X-Files movie, and extensive material for truTV’s Conspiratorium), covering topics that include JFK, the moon landings, 9/11, UFOs, and many other conspiracy theories – some well-known, others less well-known. Currently he is a freelance journalist and media commentator, and is, by the media, called “the real Fox Mulder”.
To become more familiar with the work of British freelance journalist, UFO expert and former MoD employee Nick Pope visit his Website www.nickpope.net or read the highly interesting summaries of his books via www.amazon.com
Welcome Nick, I appreciate the time you took for letting us peer behind the scenes in your journey as a former MoD employee, a media commentator, freelance journalist and author of several books.
The Next Truth: You have been asked this question probably a millions of times but, how did you gained your nick-name “the real Fox Mulder”?
Nick Pope: This was a joke that the British media first started. When it was revealed that I was doing this job from the Ministry of Defense (MoD) and when the British Government began to declassify and release some of it UFO files, one of the journalists, I cannot remember who, wrote an article about me and my UFO work for the British Government and made this comparison, ‘Well, Nick must be the real Fox Mulder working on real life X-Files.’
It must have struck a cord with people because they started repeating this and I started being printed in newspapers and magazines. At first I thought it trivialized my Government work but then I though, ‘No, you can’t be too pressures about this and just go with the joke.’ It’s good fun and that is how it all started.
TNT: With most people, when they hear your name, they automatically relate you to UFO’s, extraterrestrial life-forms and secret documents but you are also a freelance journalist. What influenced you to leave behind the MoD and step into the world of journalism?
NP: When I took early retirement from the MoD and again, this was in the same time as the British Government was releasing a lot of the files and documents relating to my old job, many journalists contacted me and wrote features about me and my Government work. Somewhere along the line one newspaper must have said to me, ‘We like to write you the articles in your own words.’ So write the articles as yourself or as an opinion piece.
Many journalists and newspapers noticed my writing style and quite liked it and I got asked to write some more. People initiated me to write about UFO’s and other mysteries and about conspiracy theories too so; I started broadening the subject that I wrote about. I like writing the articles myself because this way I can be 100% certain that all the information is in it correct.
TNT: How did you got involved with the MoD? I mean, the moment that you stepped into that particular world?
NP: Well, my father had been a senior Government scientist. He was an aeronautical engineer but, as he became more senior in Government, he stopped doing hands on science and became a manager of scientific programs. In fact, he ended up as the deputy chief scientific advisor for the MoD. We used to have a joke that the MoD was the family firm and he said, ‘Why don’t apply to join the family firm? The work is very interesting and varied.’ He said, ‘It doesn’t as much as if you where working for the private industry, but…’ he said, ‘you find the work more interesting and you will find the subjects you are dealing with that are those sorts of things that you see on the television news in the evening. And if you want to be a part of something interesting and important, and work for your country, then you should consider in applying.’
To me that sounded fascinating! I applied and I was accepted. And in the course I have served for 21 years as a civilian employee in the MoD. I had, I think, 7 completely different jobs; I mean, I was involved in many different subjects ranging from financial policy to the counter-terrorism. So, as you can see, the MoD is a huge organization. But it is the UFO job that I am best known for.
Download the written version of Nick Pope’s interview while listening to the TNT-Podcast.
The Next Truth edition of September 2020, Out Now!
Can We Unravel the World of (the) Death?
Do we perceive ‘time’ as it actually exists or is our brain deceiving us for what is real and what is not? Can we switch our lives, or biological existence, on and off without losing our awareness of what is happening around us?
From prehistory to this day, we have been haunted by our memories, the past itself, by inklings of the future, by events playing outside our lives, and by ourselves. Hence the lure of ghost stories throughout history and presumably prehistory. Science, many say, has been a great destroyer of myth and superstition, but over time scientists have, among others, created new black boxes, aka film camera’s, which we are filling with our ghostly imagination.
One way to look at the myriad realities you can hop in and out with full awareness is to imagine the world as a book case. As far as you can see …trillions and trillions of books, which are standing on an equal amount of shelves, some are thick, some thin…some with multiply colors while others might look dark and dull.
Walking along all these different books while running your finger across the backs, every now and then one of them draws your attention. Why? Perhaps by its shape or bright colors or, perhaps, it has fallen from the shelve. Regardless why that particular book is drawing your attention, you carefully read the cover following the summery on the back side. You read the first pages…absorbing the information presented by the text written. Instantly it is dragging you into this foggy state of a new reality or better said; the agreement in where we experiencing an idealistic or notional idea of ‘things’.
Did our brain found a brilliant technique to slow down and speed up time?
Another way to imagine dying is like time travel, except instead of journeying into the future or seeing Ancient Rome, you go to eternity, see nothing, and never come back.
We have no idea where people go when they die; it’s what makes death so scary and awful. But the sense that they obviously go somewhere—that the person in front of us, situated in the time and space we share, suddenly gets transported to another realm; that their consciousness flickers, then vanishes—also makes death incredibly inconvenient from a logistical standpoint.
The question of whether life continues after death has been at the forefront of many researchers, still, a conclusive answer in not forthcoming. It seems that we just cannot wrap our minds around this timeless area what lies between the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death and the hereafter.
Creepy as it might sound but many thoughts go out to the idea that, if we want to find out what a NDE is and what it means, our psychological knowledge has to “die”. Meaning, we have to let go of the density objects seem to posses and thus the material version of what we have become to understand as “life” or “reality”. This makes us experiencing the world around as a two point-projection perspective creating for us to “see” an, compared to classical reality, odd, almost holographic, behavior in time and space.
Can we say that death is just an accidental suspension of the biological process known as life? Or do we have to seek the answers in a more spiritual realm?
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