Poltergeist Primer

A poltergeist, or noisy ghost is a type of haunting characterised by physical phenomena: objects may fly through the air, furniture may  move on its own, electrical devices may fail, fires may start spontaneously   and pools of water may appear. Sometimes the haunting behaves as if a malevolent spirit is involved and sometimes the haunting looks merely mischievous.   Some but not all cases are associated with a teenager, though it is unclear why  many households with teenagers are poltergeist free. Other cases occur in  dysfunctional households and it seems likely that certain forms of stress may result in Poltergeist Phenomena. And  of course, there is always the possibility of fraud, sometimes mixed in with a genuine mystery, or of mundane explanations

Poltergeist Phenomena have been reported  for thousands of years and almost every country in the world.   They can be highly distressing and investigators have  sometimes had to alter their focus from finding out what is going on to stopping  it.  If they cannot stop the phenomenon the victims may move, but the phenomena may move with them.

For the purpose of this note a poltergeist is a haunting that involves more than an apparition, where an apparition can  involve sight, sound, touch, hearing and even taste.  There has to be some indication that the phenomena are not purely subjective.  Clearly when only one person is involved differentiating a poltergeist from a convincing multisense apparition will be hard.  Where two people agree that something moved spontaneously this can be taken as objective in most cases though the case of the moving  virgin of Ballinspittle  where hundreds of people saw a statue move but there was no evidence of actual movement means this  criterion needs to  applied with caution.

As examples if two people are sitting facing  each other and one sees a brick fly between them  but the other does not that can be classed as an apparition. If you feel something push you  down stairs that could be a tactile  apparition ( if that term makes sense) but if you then find grimy handprints on your back it is probably a poltergeist. If however  your  recognise the prints or you just told the family you are about to change your will and leave it all to a cats' home I would lower the probability of the poltergeist explanation.

Any candidate poltergeist infestation needs to pass a few hurdles. One  is physical causes. Vibrations from say underground trains or passing traffic can cause things to move unexpectedly and  some cases are explained by static electricity, fraud,  or even Ball Lightning.  Physicist John Hutchinson claims to have observed poltergeist like effects   when generating intense magnetic fields,  and some researcher s have  postulated  the quantum mechanical zero point field as a caues of poltergeist activity. 

All these explanations are speculative and need more research and do not account for the cases where the phenomenon apparently responds to events in the vicinity or where voices are heard.

There is always the possibility of fraud or self deception. Bear this in mind.

Poltergeist phenomena have parallels in physical mediumship, common in the 19^th century but rare now and recorded cases of ecstatic levitation by St Joseph of Copertino and certain miracles attributed to saints of all religions. Folklore gives stories of people beaten by fairies or other inhabitants of the spirit world and Batcheldor's experiments in induced Psychokinesis (Unusually I found no reference to Batcheldor's work available on the Internet).

Poltergeist Phenomena, where genuine, involve some form of Psychokinesis, either by a discarnate spirit, or by a human agent unconsciously causing the manifestation. In the latter case there is some form of stress involved, and it seems likely that stress can result in the uncontrolled release of psychic powers in the minority of people who are open to this possibility and have such powers.

A genuine poltergeist manifestation, one of the few that have been investigated properly and cannot be attributed to mundane causes, fraud or other non-paranormal causes will almost certainly either involve a “spirit” or the unconscious use of psychic abilities by someone involved. In either case the energy needed to move objects has to come from somewhere, though where it comes from is not certain.

A poltergeist differs from a conventional haunting, which often behaves like a video recording, in that the phenomena are not random, but limited to a range of manifestations: pools of water and spontaneous fires do not seem to occur together, and sometimes appear to respond to the words or actions of the people involved, like the pair of floating gloves that responded to a skeptic singing “Onward Christian Soldiers” by beating time to the tune.

If you are (un)fortunate enough to experience poltergiest phenomena DONT PANIC. First eliminate any mundane causes like the neighbours drumming practice as far as possible. If you find no mundane cause look at the household ( some cases occur in business premises by the way) and possible family tensions. Try and check whether any one person is the focus of the distrubances and try to resolve their problems.

Your next step will be to contact a good psychic investigation group. In the UK this would be a branch of ASSAP, the Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena. If they can find no mundane explanation they may be able to advise on how to contact the authorities, insurance companies etc without being labelled insane. In a recent case builders tools kept vanishing but the victim made the mistake of mentioning ghosts tot he Insurance company and had their claim refused.

If the manifestation is likely to prove dangerous or over stressful the investigators may be able to recommend measures to take. These could include getting a priest to bless the house though this usually brings only temporary relief or calling in a medium to talk to the spirits.

In future hubs I hope to look at a few case stories