Up-to-the-minute reports of paranormal activity, news and views from around the world

GHOSTS, HAUNTINGS & POLTERGEISTS:

Are these spooky dolls really haunted?
Katrin Reedik believes that her 13 dolls are possessed by the spirits of dead people. The 34-year-old loves the spooky dolls like her own children and even gets a baby-sitter to look after them when she goes away...

Connie Britton lived in 'haunted' house
Connie Britton claims she rented a haunted house.

The Nashville star was staying in New Orleans earlier this summer while on location for a movie project. While she loved staying there, she says there were some freaky goings on at the house she was living in. "It's freaking haunted," Connie told the US edition of Esquire about the deep south...

Robin Williams the friendly ghost?
There's apparently a 'giggling ghoul' haunting the California mansion Robin Williams died in, according to strange new reports. Bizarre BS? Most likely. But for fans or loved ones it may offer some small comfort that Hollywood's favourite jokester is still laughing away...

Witches and watery graves feature in the world’s top 10 creepy travel destinations
From ghostly apparitions of a French girl in a white dress to scuba diving the ruins of the world’s largest ship graveyard, travellers have long been drawn to creepy destinations...

The paranormal is (still) normal: The sociological implications of a survey of paranormal experiences in Great Britain
Historically, there has been limited sociological interest in the paranormal and no systematic study of reported paranormal experiences.

There are also few medium-to-large-scale survey results with nationally representative populations focusing on paranormal experiences...

WEIRD CREATURES:

A mysterious creature that once haunted Glastonbury
It was a creature that let out "blood curdling yells at night." It was described as witnesses who saw it as a large dog with a cat-like face. Small dogs disappeared or were found mutilated along with goats and sheep...

LIFE AFTER DEATH:

What do near-death experiences tell us?
A fascinating essay by neuroscientist Mario Beauregard saying what we know to this point about Near-Death Experiences (NDEs). Beauregard tells the amazing story of Pamela Reynolds, an Atlanta woman who was put into clinical death to perform an extremely delicate procedure on her brain. When she was brought back to life, she reported having had a classic NDE...

TIME & SPACE:

Study creates 'time travel' illusion
Virtual reality can be used to give the illusion of going "back in time", according to an exploratory study. In this virtual world, subjects were able to reduce how many people a gunman killed, an event they had unknowingly been part of...

EARTH MYSTERIES:

A strange sound has permeated the Pacific Ocean since 1991 … source unknown
An unexplained sound has permeated the water from one end of the Pacific to the other since 1991. What could it be? It isn’t whales or ship vibrations or any of the other usual suspects making this noise in the ocean. In 1991, scientists first detected what has become known as the Upsweep...

HUMAN MYSTERIES:

The quantum effect of anaesthesia: A new theory of consciousness
Dr. Luca Turin, and a team from the Alexander Flemming Research Center in Athens, Greece, conducted a complicated experiment in which they froze flies then exposed them to anaesthetics. They then measured electron spin resonance (ESR) in their brains. They found that various drugs that cause anaesthetic unconsciousness are actually employing a quantum effect on our brains. And that’s fairly big news...

Out-of-body experiences: 3 scientific studies, next steps
New research is underway at Nottingham Trent University in the UK to further understand out-of-body experiences (OBEs). The research especially aims at getting a better idea of the varied forms of OBEs and the meanings they hold for the diverse people who have them...