Does anyone know how to get started being a ghost hunter?

Here is a good basic guide to getting started. It’s not the most affordable hobby/career, yet very interesting.

ETA- A good basic guide to EVP collection.

Hunting ghosts is not my thing, simply because you can mess around with lost souls that can wreak havoc on your life. However, if you are determined to do it….be prepared to carry these energies with you when they (discarnate spirits) attach themselves to you. So, besides having the best equipment and finding places that ghosts go a-haunting…make sure you have a way of protecting yourself because carrying the ghost of old Mr. Mykabley who died in the Civil War back to your house won’t bode well when the china starts flying.

I was part of a ghost hunting group for over a year and I recommend joining an existing one first, before you attempt to start your own. You’ll get a lot of experience without all of the stress of managing a group of personalities on top of it.

You can buy the equipment online, but it isn’t the cheapest thing to do. Again, I recommend working with a group who already has the equipment so you can see how it works, what equipment you want and don’t want, and also to learn how to use it, how to analyze EVPs, that sort of thing.

I don’t mean to be dismissive, but I wouldn’t worry too much about what @DarlingRhadamanthus has mentioned. What should worry you more is messing with demonic hauntings, something that personally scares the shit out of me. Call them demons, call them entities of pure evil, but from what I know, they are extremely powerful, they can do physical harm to you, they can follow you, and can also mess with you from a distance.

@MissAnthrope…......... That’s exactly what I was talking about….I just didn’t want to be so blunt and rain on the parade…your point is very well taken…and should be heeded.

Some good, contrary discussion:

http://skepticblog.org/2009/06/22/hunting-the-ghost-hunters/

Whatever you do, be safe—a lot of older houses and such have dangerously deteriorated floors and structures, if you’re running around in the dark, you can be seriously injured or killed.

Just looking at Ghost Mart a spook box spirit communication radio is $69.99. A gun style infared and ambient temperature recorder is $99.99. An EMF/ELF (whatever that is) tester is either $79.99 or $99.99. A Tri-field natural EM meter is $174.99.

I’m impressed that people are rich enough to afford all that fancy useless equipment.

I don’t believe in using electronic equipment for ghost hunting. It is too easy to use it improperly, but even when it is used properly, I don’t think you get enough signal definition to say anything or prove anything, even to yourself.

I think the most effective ghost hunting is done personally, using your own ears and establishing an appropriate mental state such that you can detect the spirits. I don’t think people pay enough attention to personal preparation, and as a result, I think a lot of the data are garbage. The stuff they do on the TV shows is a lot of show-offs who are trying to sell equipment that they don’t even really know how it works.

Ghost hunting is mostly a solitary practice. Too many minds around confuse the ghosts. They need calmness and safety—that can only be provided by a perfectly stilled, perfect quiet and perfectly receptive mind. True ghost hunting is like preparing for a shamanic journey or doing Zen meditation.

It’s also kind of dangerous because you have to let the ghosts inside your mind—enough that they can generate thoughts and images for you. It is difficult for them to communicate, and the instant your mind starts up, it ejects them, sometimes hurting them in the process. I know there aren’t a lot of people out there who take this approach, and even the ghost hunters will say I’m full of it.

But I know people who have experienced that incredible kind of knowingness that happens when you peacefully let a ghost enter and leave your mind. There are messages—important things they have to tell us. But it’s stuff they do not entrust to EVP wielding bumblers.

I love it when they take ghost hunters into a house that’s brand-new, but made to look old and then let them loose with all of their instruments. They always find all kinds of ghosts, as their needles jump off the charts.

The problem with ghost hunting is that it’s a scientific experiment without a control for comparison, so the results usually seem positive.

Thermometers measure temperature, obviously, but the reason they are used (infrared with probes) is that people report feeling cold spots and temperature fluctuations when they are experiencing paranormal activity. Using a thermometer allows you to measure fluctuations, rather than going by “hmm, it feels colder here”.

EMF stands for electromagnetic field. These detectors pick up EMF, obviously. The theory is that there are electromagnetic spikes, supposedly caused by the spirit drawing energy from its surroundings in order to manifest. Without proof, this is a hypothesis. However, EMF detectors are very useful if you are trying to be scientific about paranormal investigation, in one particular area that I think many people can agree on whether they believe in ghosts or not. Excessively high electromagnetic fields (due to unshielded wires and ancient wiring) can cause physiological effects most people are unaware of and may attribute to paranormal causes. At the very least, an EMF detector can help an investigator pinpoint an actual cause for experiences someone may be having.

I have no idea what a spirit communication radio is, but if I had to guess, the idea is that humans can only hear in a certain spectrum of frequency and I would imagine this radio amplifies the frequencies we cannot hear. This is also the idea behind collecting EVPs, one thing is that sometimes electronic equipment can pick up sounds the investigators do not hear live, and the second is that, using software, you can analyze the frequencies we are physically unable to hear.

@MissAnthrope I’m not an expert, but an EMF will pick up fields based on the wiring of a house. If you run one through a house that confirmed to not be haunted, it will still blip around.

@gorillapaws – The ones we use are not so sensitive as to pick up every single wire in the house, and generally most places will give a reading of 0 or close to it. It’s when you put it close to an outlet, or close to unshielded wires in someone’s basement, that’s when you get readings. Or, in the case of absurdly high EMF measurements, when the reading is in the hundreds, you can pretty much assume the EMF is off the charts and affecting people living in the house.

A lot of other things can be debunked, as well. People often report sink taps being turned on by themselves. This quite often is due to poor seals on the tap handles and the water pressure gradually pushing them open.

Anyway, my point is that it’s condescending to think that people aren’t attempting to collect scientific data to discover one way or another whether there is such a thing as true paranormal phenomenon. I’m a scientist, but I’m not sold that everything tangible is all there is. I’ve had a few unexplainable experiences, ones that I myself have gone over and over trying to find some rational explanation for. And that is why I became interested in paranormal investigation.

[mod says]: Please keep the discussion on-topic. The question is about how to start hunting ghosts, not whether or not ghosts exist.

@MissAnthrope they can also react to the video-camera, the “spirit-communication radio” etc.

Look, I think it might be a lot of fun to do, in the same way that going on a haunted hey-ride with your friends is a fun way to spend an evening. But there are well-understood scientific explanations for the anomalies that ghost-hunters pick up.

Also, there’s a million dollar prize to anyone who can prove the existence of any paranormal phenomena. Since 1996, noone’s been able to do it, so that seems to indicate that it’s very hard to find ghosts.

So if I wanted to start hunting ghosts “FOR REAL” I would make sure that all of my experiments were carefully controlled for these factors. You would set up experiments under circumstances where you compare the results of suspected haunted places to ones as similar as possible in all respects, but isn’t believed to be haunted and then evaluate the differences.

@KatawaGrey Understood. But the premise of how to start hunting ghosts presupposes that a) ghosts exist, and b) that the equipment will work to detect said ghosts. I think it’s very relevent to the topic to discuss these issues. If my posts can dissuade someone from spending $500 on equipment then I consider them worthwhile.

@MissAnthrope I heard a report recently about a couple of Chinese investors who invested in a building that nobody would buy because people thought it was haunted. People were hearing noises and thumps in the wall. It turned out there were animals living in the pipes. They evacuated the animals, renovated the building and made a tidy profit. So I suppose that investigating ghosts does have some financial value.

@Rarebear: Your points are valid but there are better ways of going about it than saying you can’t believe people believe this kind of thing.

I completely agree with @KatawaGrey. Any decent paranormal investigator is a scientist seeking to prove or disprove hauntings. That includes finding logical explanations for haunting ‘symptoms’, like looking for things like animals in the walls. It’s when we can’t find a logical explanation that we scratch our heads. It’s rude and dismissive to act like you know what you’re talking about when you a) don’t, and b) are automatically closed off to simply discussing the matter.

@MissAnthrope Fair enough. I apologize for my initially dismissive attitude. Let’s put aside the fact that nobody has passed the Million Dollar Challenge and let’s assume ghosts really exist. How do these $100 machines actually detect ghosts?

Pardon my skepticism, but I would also like to know more about these devices and about the theory of ghosts. Who manufactures the devices? How are they tested? How do they detect ghosts? Are ghosts purely spiritual? If they are, how do they interface to the physical world? What powers a ghost? Are they able to create energy?

Is the ghost hunting thing a cable invention? I suppose you can always find an academy to learn more about it.
At this pace, soon enough we will end up having ghost hunting olympic games. How about a whole network of channels only and solely devoted to ghost hunting?
I am always stunned by the capacity of measuring magnetic fields and the inexplicable blinking up flash lights. I freak out every time the lights blink up in the dark, and the cold spots, as temperature is also measurable. That is a sign that someone is here. Did you hear that? What was it? Shhhhhh…
Better yet is to go out there in search of the humongous abominable Yetty –two T’s?– up in an exotic location in the Tahiti?

@LostInParadise You can’t “create” energy. It just changes forms.

@Rarebear – I have explained to you how the equipment works. There is no “ghost detector”, only people using them in a manner to measure certain environmental things (often reported by people experiencing phenomena). In addition, people use infrared cameras as well as thermal cameras. I agree that a lot of so-called paranormal activity can be explained away in logical terms, and that is what legitimate, scientific groups seek to do. There are groups that make me shake my head, especially when I look at their “evidence”, which I can pretty much debunk without even having to be there. These folks are the ‘want to believe too much’ group and are not concerned with finding evidence, everything they catch is automatic proof to them. Look, look! Look at all the orbs I caught in this photo! OMG!

Emmmm.. yeah, that’s dust.

@LostInParadise – The working theory is that spirits are energy, or at the very least require energy to manifest. The reason for this theory is that you find a much higher number of reported hauntings in areas by or above water, as well as by or on top of large mineral deposits that are known to hold energy. From the laws of science, energy cannot be created or destroyed, it just changes form.

Anyway, as I have said, a lot of things can be explained away using logic, reason, and science. I’m cool with this because I am a scientist and that’s what I do, analyze things until I’ve teased apart the details and they make sense. It’s when you have an experience that you cannot explain or recreate that makes you stop and think.

@MissAnthrope You explained to me how the EMF works, and how it can be used to show normal things like electrical wiring, as opposed to ghosts. What you didn’t explain was how it detects a ghost.

@Rarebear – EMF stands for electromagnetic field. These detectors pick up EMF, obviously. The theory is that there are electromagnetic spikes, supposedly caused by the spirit drawing energy from its surroundings in order to manifest. Without proof, this is a hypothesis.

I feel weird, quoting myself.

@MissAnthrope I got all that. I just don’t understand why ghosts would even theoretically cause spikes in EMF.

@Rarebear – I’m surprised I never responded to this, but honestly, I was exceedingly busy at the time of this thread (12–14 hour days, 7 days a week) and my time online was kind of sporadic.

Anyway, the theory is that spirits/ghosts are balls of energy and that this can be measured via EMF. Additionally, the working theory is that in order to manifest, a spirit has to pull more energy from its surroundings and the EMF meter should detect any spikes. There seems to be a correlation between this drawing of energy during manifestation and resulting cold spot(s), brand-new batteries going dead on electronics, people feeling a “charge” in the air, hairs standing up, etc.

@MissAnthrope You and I have had this debate before, but I will be happy to engage with you on it again. Your statement makes three assumptions, each needing the prior assumption to be true.

Assumption #1: Ghost exist
Assumption #2: Ghosts emit EMF radiation
Assumption #3: The EMF radiation is something that is measurable.

Nothing in what you wrote shows me that Assumption #1 is true, therefore the following assumptions are false.

I wasn’t trying to restart the debate – your last question struck me as a genuine one, so I responded.

I just don’t understand why ghosts would even theoretically cause spikes in EMF.

Fundamentally, you and I disagree, which is fine, but I find it tedious to argue with people in circles. No offense. :)

Let me ask this. Why would ghost be balls of energy that could be measured with EMF radiation? Why make that assumption?

I’m guessing because EMF spikes have been correlated with paranormal activity.

@MissAnthrope the problem with that assumption is that EMF spikes can be demonstrated to occur with no alleged paranormal activity at all. As I stated above, this is equivalent to running a scientific experiment without having a control, which is worse than not running an experiment at all, since it can lead you to false conclusions. If we approached medicine in the same way, doctors would be prescribing sugar pills for all ailments because there seems to be a positive correlation with sugar pills and improvements in health.

All I can tell you is that EMF sweeps are done to take base readings of all locations prior to the actual investigation. Good investigators, when they get a spike, look for non-paranormal causes. It’s when there are none that that data gets marked down as ‘of interest’.

Anyway, as I said, I really am not interested in opening this debate again. I like discussing things, but I don’t really enjoy debating. It’s nothing personal.

Hypothetical question. Do you suppose that it’s possible that these makers of EMF machines saw a market of people who believe in ghosts, and then decided to make these machines and then just market them as ghost-finding devices? There is no evidence that it really works, but they make a buck on the unsuspecting public. Not so farfetched—that kind of stuff happens in medicine all the time.

I suppose it’s possible, but there are “legitimate” uses for EMF detectors, so my guess would be the EMF detectors came first. Ghost hunters began using them as a tool on investigations. Now? Yes, I’m sure there are several companies making these devices solely because paranormal investigation has become popular.