Ghost Hunting Tools of the Trade
Why the use of electronic equipment by TV ghost hunters is so stupid.
| Skeptoid #81 January 01, 2008 Podcast transcript | Listen | Subscribe |
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Television shows about ghost hunting have been popular for over 50 years, and though the basic concept is the same, recent decades have seen the hunt become less about psychics and séances and more about electronic detection gear. Just about every TV show about ghost hunting sends a crew of investigators into a building, armed to the teeth with all sorts of equipment.
The use of any kind of measuring equipment to detect ghosts is fundamentally, and completely, bogus. How can I make a blanket statement like that? Measuring equipment detects what it is designed to detect, whether that's light, heat, electromagnetism, or whatever. Thus it will only detect things that emit measurable amounts of those energies. For us as viewers to accept that some piece of handheld measuring equipment has a useful function in detecting a ghost, we must base our acceptance on the premise that ghosts are known to emit those types of energies in measurable amounts. If there were any truth to this, science would have discovered it long ago. Hospital operating rooms would have ghost detection equipment built in. Mortuaries and crematoriums would have ghost detection equipment at the top of their list. Search and rescue crews would use ghost detection equipment. If ghosts did exist and were detectable, you can bet that there would be huge industries behind it. I can't think of anything that would attract more venture capital dollars from Silicon Valley. However, no rigorous research has ever shown that ghosts can be reliably detected with hardware. It's easy to disbelieve me, but it's much harder to disbelieve the lack of interest from greedy corporate America.
So now let's look at the popular tools of the trade of ghost hunting. The important takeaway is to understand what these devices are actually detecting when the ghost hunters point them around the room, and why their crazily jumping needles and indicators are perfectly consistent with, and explained by, the absence of ghosts.
- Infrared thermometers are the most blatantly misused of the ghost hunting tools, so are a great place to start. These handheld devices measure the temperature of the object they are pointed at. They work exactly like your vision, except that they are sensitive to far infrared instead of the visible spectrum. They measure surface temperatures, just like your vision measures surface colors. If you can see something, an IR thermometer can measure its temperature. However, ghost hunters use these devices to detect what they believe are cold spots in rooms. IR thermometers are not capable of detecting something without a visible surface. In fact, an IR thermometer is even less likely than your vision to see a hazy apparition. Firefighters use infrared because the longer wavelengths of infrared penetrate smoke more effectively than the shorter wavelength of visible light; so if there were a hazy invisible apparition floating in the middle of the room, infrared is perhaps the worst technology to detect it. Variations of IR readings inside a room are merely showing temperature gradations on the walls, caused by heating and AC, insulation variances, studs, wiring, or pipes behind the wall, radiant heat, recent proximity of another ghost hunter, sunlight, temperatures in adjacent rooms, or countless other causes.
- Infrared motion detectors work on the same principle. If the amount of IR radiation striking the sensor changes, an alarm can be activated. Such a change is caused by a sudden change in temperature within the detector's field of view, or a significant movement by an object with a visible IR signature. A ghostly cold spot moving within a room could not be detected, unless it also cooled the walls or floors enough to trip the activation threshold.
- Particle detectors are devices that measure ionizing radiation. The most common particle detectors are Geiger counters, also called halogen counters. These work by measuring cascade effects caused by incoming particles that strike molecules of halogen gas inside the detection chamber. Typically, alpha, beta, and gamma particles are detected by these. It's not the most common of ghost hunting tools, but occasionally you will see someone pointing a Geiger counter around the room, though you may hear them describe it by any of several fancier and more high-tech sounding names. It's a Geiger counter. For a ghost to emit ionizing radiation, it would have to be an awfully sick ghost; or be composed largely of unstable radioactive metals. Ionizing particles don't just appear out of thin air, they are emitted by the decay of unstable isotopes that are typically heavy and have significant mass.
- EMF meters are perhaps the favorite tools. EMF meters detect electromagnetic fields, and are used in ghost hunting on the premise that ghosts emit electromagnetism, though this claim is rarely supported by any suggestion of what the power source might be. There are many different types of EMF meters. More affordable units, such as those typically used by television performers, need to be held precisely for a period of time at each of the three axis to get a reading, and so they are clearly not used on television in a manner that would produce any useful result. When they are, or when a more expensive three-axis meter is used, they are designed to detect the operation of electrical appliances or wiring. Ghost hunters are usually thoroughly accessorized with every electronic gizmo under the sun: radios, cell phones, flashlights, cameras, TV cameras, and other ghost hunting accessories; and all of these will produce a result on the EMF meter. Building wiring or appliances will also be detected. But, even in an environment with no electrical devices at all, the presence of the TV camera alone renders the EMF readings totally useless. Even without ghost hunting equipment, electrical wiring, or a TV camera, a sensitive meter can even detect the oscillation of a steel filing cabinet vibrated imperceptibly by footsteps. In the midst of all the absurd amounts of EMF pollution on a TV ghost hunting set, the pretense that the alleged EMF field of a ghost (who's not carrying any batteries) can be identified, is foolish.
- Ion detectors are interesting animals. The few commercially available ion detectors are available online almost exclusively through ghost hunting and alternative wellness web sites, which gives some clue of how useful they actually are. Ions occur naturally in the atmosphere from a variety of sources: solar radiation and weather being the main ones. Also, if you go to a part of the country where radon gas is an issue, an ion detector taken into the basement can go crazy sensing airborne ions created by radon decay. Ghost hunters prefer to regard this reading as indicative of the presence of a ghost. Ion detectors can also sense the presence of static electricity, so if your ghost is carrying a large static charge, you ought to be able to see it scuffing its shoes across the carpet.
- Cameras of different types are used by ghost hunters. Sometimes they'll take a conventional visible spectrum camera and snap away, in the hope that spirit orbs or other manifestations will appear on the processed film. Since this phenomenon has already been thoroughly discussed in our episode on orbs, there's no need to repeat it here. Suffice it to say that all such images are well established artifacts of photography and of cameras, and well understood by knowledgeable photographers. They happen every day in photographs that have nothing to do with ghosts. Near infrared photography is the monochromatic "night shot" video that you see all the time, and that your home video camera probably offers. The light source is an infrared bulb on the camera, similar to the invisible light source inside your TV remote. These cameras record only what near infrared light is reflected from the subject, and of course they also record other near infrared sources, which are relatively common. Far infrared photography is the thermal imaging discussed previously. It's simply a visual display of the same heat sources detected by IR thermometers and motion detectors.
- Dowsing rods are probably the least controversial of ghost hunting tools, in that increasingly few people accept that they have any useful function. Yet ghost hunters still employ them. And why not? A self-described psychic's untestable verbal reports are under the psychic's complete control. They cannot be tested, measured, or duplicated by others — they say only exactly whatever the psychic wants to say. Dowsing rods simply give the dowsers another way to communicate whatever they choose to communicate. Since the rods are held in the dowser's own hand, they move only when the dowser wants them to move, and do not move when the dowser doesn't want them to. No form of dowsing has ever passed any type of controlled test, and no dowser has ever proposed any plausible hypothesis suggesting that dowsing might be an actual phenomenon. It is among the most childish of pretended ghost detection methods. The only thing you can learn from dowsing is which way the dowser wants to swing his dowsing rods.
- Audio recording gear is used when the ghost hunter hopes that EVP. or electronic voice phenomena, will appear on the recording. EVP's are discussed often enough to warrant their own Skeptoid episode, and we'll be discussing them in detail in the future. An EVP is said to be the voice of a ghost, and the claim is that ghosts can talk perfectly well but can only be heard on an electronic recording. This means that recording gear has the ability to convert inaudible frequencies into audible ones. Engineers do not design this capability into most recording gear, since a change of frequency of perhaps tens of thousands of hertz would render all recordings completely useless and horrible to listen to. So, like they tend to do with all the electronic gear they carry, ghost hunters completely misunderstand, misuse, and mischaracterize the functions of these instruments.
When you turn on the television and you watch people pointing their gizmos around the room, acting all dramatic and pretending to detect ghosts all around them, any intelligent adult should laugh out loud. Or better yet, change the channel. Of course an intelligent adult should be free to watch whatever they want, and that's fine — but one place I will draw the line is the point where you let your children watch one of those shows and allow them to accept the silly claims as fact. Watch it and enjoy it as entertainment, if you find those people truly engaging and clever enough to be entertaining; but please, explain to your kids the science behind what they're seeing. Or, as the case may be, the lack of science behind it.
References
© 2009 Skeptoid.com
Discuss!
5 most recent comments | Show all 92 comments
Remember, you should always read with skepticism the comments of anyone too lame to put their real name & city.
Occam's Razor, kids. Learn it, live it, love it.
Davin, New York CIty
June 11, 2009 12:31am
I have a HUGE problem believing in any EVP, especially after listening to the "When People Talk Backwards" episode.(http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4105)
For the orb fans, I can't sway their belief here. But for those who disbelieve in orbs, but believe in EVPs, just try to drop your belief for a few seconds:
An orb is usually a dust particle in the flash. Why can't an EVP be a stomach gurgling, or the wind as a person walks by, or even the general creaks of the human body and the shuffle of clothes? I remember silently hiccupping while recording a video, only to hear the hiccups loud as day on the replayed tape.
What if the reason EVPs only supposedly are on one mike is because that's where the little burst of wind was?
PLEASE go listen to the "Backwards" podcast and think about all your EVPs - all your proof. Isn't the proven scientific phenomenon of pareidolia give you pause on your proof? Can you say that you have carried on a real conversation with someone in an EVP? Or did "they" just kind of respond to a single question and the effect sounds logical (again, see pareidolia)?
Now, I'm not trying to insult you, but now think about the dogs on Youtube and various home video shows that can "say" "I love you."
Do you believe they are REALLY saying those WORDS? Or is it just that their owners have reinforced the behavior of that specific whine of theirs and now have them do it as a trick?
I still want to believe in ghosts, but the evidence is against me.
Scott, California
June 12, 2009 10:32am
Some people try so hard to prove ghosts they will take the recording of wind escaping someones back side along with a cold spot or stray EMF field and say it's proof. Granted, those people need to be made fun of. Others, like myself though, actually try to do paranormal investigating with some intelligence and only after we go over evidence with a fine tooth comb several times, and subject it to others for advice, and then go through it again and try our hardest to prove it ISN"T paranormal, do we present it to the world as a POSSIBILITY of ghosts. For every one person who may actually listen with an open mind and consider it, there are 3 or 4 others like some of you on here that will refuse to even consider it.
I find it funny how many people wish to try to discredit paranormal investigating, talk like you know so much, yet I bet most (if not all) of you have never actually tried it to see for yourselves if there is actually anything to it. At least a possibility of there being ghosts.If you don't actually have the experience from both sides of the issue, then I think it is kind of hard to act like you know for sure one way or the other. In fact, dare I say, it's kind of moronic to even open your mouths.
Seeing as I have actually had experiences, I can actually say that there are ghosts. If you want to argue about it fine, but if you have never tried to prove there isn't, other than making fun of Ghost Hunters, you are hurting your cause more than helping it.
Chris, Indiana
June 12, 2009 7:12pm
I completely agree with the comment above. We could capture Bigfoot, and still sceptics would find something to cast doubt. It is absolutely rediculous that every time a Ghost Hunter comes up with any kind of evidence, it is immediately attacked.
To say that the equipment we use does not help produce evidence because it is not mass marketed, and thay we don't know how to properly use it, sounds like something a politician would say. Perhaps you should use the equipment for yourself in a paranormal setting, or read up on how it's made before you cast judgment.
First of all EMF stands for Electromagnetic Fluctuation, not "Field"...we are not measuring "Fields" in the paranormal but "Fluctuation", which is what an EMF Meter does. Second, to say that a digital voiced recorder picks up harmonics that the human ear can't hear is not correct. There have been many EVP's that I have captured I could hear at the time of recording. In fact, it's the inner electronic sounds that all recorders produce that enable a spirit to communicate, not the misconception it is picking up frequencies we can't hear. Any electronic device can be used for an EVP to come through..the recorder simply picks up these sounds better, and if you look at any popular recorder's schematics, you would see an amplification chip in the dynamic microphone circut, which makes this possible.
We can go back and forth all you want, but perhaps you should try it for yourself before discrediting the work of others.
Scott Trulove, Nevada
June 15, 2009 4:55pm
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And ghost hunter should continue to be mocked and laughed at, until they can reproduce their 'proof' in a controlled environment. Heck, i'd be impressed if they could produce any kind of testable theory or proof that cannot be explained by a far simpler theory.
If spirits exist, as many believe they do, then for a researcher to reproduce their "proof" in a controlled environment would be impossible. To do that the researcher would have to have physical control of the spirit and the ability to make it do what they wanted it to. I don't see that happening if spirits exist.
If science only accepts what it can control, then it can't ever expect to grow and discover new things. There's a great big world out here. Take a look outside the lab sometime.
Linda, Kentucky
May 20, 2009 7:29pm