The etymology of the word "ghost" comes from the now obsolete Old English word "gast" meaning "breath of life" referring to a soul, also "to scare". Quite appropriate really for something that has been known to scare the proverbial living daylights out of some folk!
But what is a ghost in paranormal terms?
According to AI "A ghost is generally defined as the disembodied spirit or soul of a deceased person or animal, often believed to haunt specific locations or appear to the living in a translucent, shadow-like form."
Quite a good defintion really but it's much more than that.
In psychical research parapsychologists have established 3 categories to define ghostly goings on: apparitions, hauntings and poltergeists.
Apparitions:
The term "apparition" is used when referring to a deceased consciousness that appears after death. A part of the deceased that has survived death and is able to interact with the living via a type of telepathy.
In his book "A PARANORMAL CASEBOOK: Cases from a Parapsychologist's First 25 (or so)Years" Loyd Auerbach describes this as when:
"The apparition essentially broadcasts sensory information (what he or she looks, sounds, feels, and smells like) to the minds of us living folk. Our brains / minds process the signals and add them to waht our normal senses are picking up. Some people do better with visual input, some with auditory or other kinds of information. Some can process combinations."
Interestingly not all apparitions are of the dead there have been cases reported of living ghosts one eg of which is of a teenage girl seen crossing the road outside The Feathers Hotel in Ludlow, Shropshire before passing straight through a parked car as if it wasn't there. A paranormal investigator suggested that this living ghost was that of a woman who was still alive who had been remembering her stay in Ludlow as a teen.
Hauntings:
Hauntings are more like a replay of events, a environmental recording sometimes referred to as a psychic imprint. You could describe them as holograms repeating the same actions over and over again, or a video playback. There is no interaction with the living witnessing the event.
Poltergeists:
Poltergeist activity involves physical disturbances such as objects being moved, thrown, or actually disappearing, loud knocks and other noises, electrical disturbances, in some cases like the Enfield Poltergeist even levitation. Parapsychologists believe this phenonmenon to be activated, not by a ghost or apparition, but, by a living person. Usually someone in some kind of emotional turmoil unconsciously using a type of mind over matter called psychokinesis (PK).
