I agree– it's pretty impressive, although it doesn't give the visceral chills that I get from the "moving chair".

There are some odd bits, though. (Going by memory here, so please let me know if I'm off the deep end.) Jason puts the camera down precisely so we can't see the handle, but can see the door open. When it comes open again, we have no idea whether the handle turns (ghostly or human activity) or if it stays level (the door was left slightly ajar). It could be chance, but it seems suspicious.

The breaking glass is very interesting. I'd love to see a scientific analysis of the audio recording and the breakage patterns in the glass, but that's not likely to happen. As you point out implicitly, there's no way of being sure that that sound is actually of that glass breaking. The elevator shaft being nearby is interesting. Not only is there the normal effect of the elevator, but the shaft might kick up some interesting standing acoustic waves under wind. Enough to break a glass? Doubt it, but I'd love to find out.

So it's not proof. In fact, no video put out by an effects house could be proof. I'd really like to believe that the Ghost Hunters are honest. Little things like that camera placement make me doubt (and also bigger things discussed elsewhere).

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While I am a fan of the show and what TAPS does, I do agree some of the footage could be faked - not that it is, mind you, but it could be. But some of these are a bit farfetched. I guess my question - and feel free to respond via e-mail - is why this site is so convinced TAPS is not a real ghosthunting venture, and if you don't believe in it, why do you continue to watch the show? Seems weird to me…

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In response to Reservoir_Writer, I think there are four basic types of viewers who watch this kind of show.

1) Viewers who are interested in the paranormal because they want to believe.

2) Viewers who have a more scientific interest in the paranormal and aren't going to go out of their way to believe it, but think it would be pretty cool if someone had proof.

3) Viewers who don't believe in paranormal phenomena but enjoy the "spookiness" of the show much like they might enjoy a creepy horror film.

4) Viewers who don't believe in the paranormal and basically align with Houdini, who spent many years exposing mediums and mystics as frauds because he felt it was dishonest and wrong for them to profit by pretending to have supernatural abilities, proof of an afterlife, etc.

Personally, I fall into category #2 but I've got a lot of respect for those in category #4. I watch because I want to be "wowed" with some incredible piece of evidence that I cannot easily dismiss. On the other hand, when I'm shown easily dismissed evidence and told how amazing it is, it does not help the show's credibility in my eyes.

Hope that answers your question.

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I'm going from memory here too…but doesn't the video (Jason's room) not show the bottom of the door as it's opening? I can't remember. I do remember that the glass is not seen until he turns the camera on it at which point it is broken (which seems a little shady to me).

Also…to correct what was said in the original post: None of the scenes or the stories from The Shining are true…nor did they come from personal experience at the Stanley. Stephen King and the Stanley both say that it is entirely fictional. King stayed a weekend at the Stanley and was inspired by the off-season solitude he experienced and from there came up with the the story of the Shining.
The supposed ghost children on the 4th floor are said to be children of the lower-class workers who lived on that floor during the Stanley's hey-day.

I've personally been to the Stanley many times, stayed there and was also married there and I can't say I've had one experience that was paranormal. I also notice that the ghost stories change based on who is heading up the ghost tour that day.

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Right, Cristy, that's what I meant by my ramble about "camera placement"– you can't see the bottom of the door, and you can't see the handle. Normally, I'd just chalk it down to bad luck, but Jason had just put that camera down specifically to catch that door opening– why didn't he check its field of view? Still probably just carelessness, grogginess, and bad luck. Maybe I'm being naive.

Logisti, I think I have a dash of #2, a heavy dose of #4, and maybe just a hint of #3. If someone showed me valid evidence that ghosts exist, I'd be blown out of the water– but I'd accept it. Plus, I have to admit to a bit of #3– I don't think that a show about Loch Ness Monster sightings would keep me quite so riveted.

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[...] The Stanley Hotel: There was of course the incident in Jay's room that is certainly intriguing — and another one of those moments where you really feel either [...]

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I guess I'm kind of with sneaker98 on this one. I think it's a little overboard to call anything Jay did in that scene "suspicious". It would have been nice to catch the bottom of the door, yes, but not only is it entirely plausible that Jay just made a mistake — it's the middle of the night and he just woke up and repositioned the camera so I would *never* expect him to have set up some perfect angle.

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I'll happily retract the word "suspicious". As I've said elsewhere, I'm not trying to figure out whether or not Grant and Jay are hoaxers. I'm interested in whether the things they show us start to approach the level of evidence.

Without seeing the handle, I can't see if it turns– so I can't see if what we're seeing is a latched door opening, or an unlatched door blowing open, or something else entirely!

We hear that they latched it, but if I could simply take their word for things, I wouldn't need to analyze the footage. I could just listen to their verdict at the end.

Unfortunately, what's "overboard" is subjective. Which is more likely– that an opening door is caused by the disembodied spirit of someone who has died, or that perhaps the door wasn't latched as well as they thought (or any other non-paranormal explanation)? Our estimates of likelihood are personal, and so evidence like this isn't objective evidence.

I'm still curious about the glass, though. That could be something interesting.

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I don't think "overboard" is as subjective as you think. "Suspicious" may be objective to an extent but saying the door was manipulated by dead spirits is completely unprovable as therefore even more "overboard".

As for the door handle, we don't see the door open — just the door closing. There would be no need for the handle to turn at any point, whether or not it latched. The only time that might be useful would be if we actually saw a supposedly latched door open by itself.

Now, this has actually happened at least twice on the show and now that you mention it I'm going to pay close attention to the door handle the next time I see those clips, but this Stanley Hotel clip is not one of those times — Jason has the camera aimed at himself on the bed at the time that the closet door opens.

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Reviewed the footage. I stand corrected; the door was indeed closing. We hear a couple of clicks, and then we immediately cut to Tango telling us that it latched, and that that's paranormal.

I'm a little unclear on that bit. Let's say that something non-paranormal (e. g. air currents) closed the door. Why is it paranormal that the door would latch itself?

I'm afraid you lost me somewhere in the suspicious/overboard sentence. If what you're saying is that claiming the door was manipulated by spirits would be "overboard", well, yes, I agree. My point simply is that I can't use "overboard" in an argument and still play fair. Otherwise I'm using my belief that spirit phenomena are unprovable to prove the unprovability of spirit phenomena. And I'd hope nobody'd let me get away with that.

I have no explanation for the glass breaking. Doesn't mean that it's evidence for the paranormal. It may simply mean that I'm not bright enough to think of one.

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Stephen, there isn't anything unfair about "overboard" — I'm just saying let's keep speculation to a minimum and focus on what we can see. What we *didn't* see was a latched door *opening* and that would have been significantly more impressive (although we still couldn't be sure of the cause).

As for the door latching itself when closing — I agree wholeheartedly. No matter how excited they get about the door latching, the fact that it did really doesn't mean anything.  If there was any breeze at all in that room then we might not be able to explain a latched door opening (which we have to take Jay's word for) but we could easily write off the door closing (and latching) on it's own as an entirely natural occurance.

Essentially, this incident is one of those times when we have to rely heavily on what Jason says happened — so even if you trust 100% that he is on the level and that no one was hiding in the closet and helping him stage this, because we're relying on an eyewitness we can't really *prove* anything anyway.  I like to categorize incidents like this as "raising questions".  As you say, just because you cannot explain it doesn't mean there isn't a perfectly normal explanation — but it's still intriguing.

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Darn. And here I thought we disagreed.

Here's a question: what would you consider undeniable evidence for the existence of haunted houses? (I'm afraid I've been technically misusing the term "proof" above.)

I'm trying to formulate what my standard of belief would be. I'm not sure that anything that TAPS could offer me would suffice.

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Stephen, i know your question was aimed at Logisti, but i have thought about what it would take for me to believe in evidence as "undeniable proof" and i'm afraid i would have to agree with you. i think anything could be discounted from this show.

but i would like to be wowed in some way. for instance, the St. Augustine lighthouse episode was fairly impressive to me. i can't say that it is beyond a doubt paranormal evidence, but i do believe in it to a certain degree.

the only evidence that could convince me would be a personal experience. for example, if i heard footsteps in my house when i was alone. or if i saw a figure go into a room when i was the only one at home. other than that, it is pretty darn hard to prove, i think. i keep hoping for that awesome piece of evidence, though…

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I'm going to take a stab at answering this as best I can. I'm going to change "Haunted Houses" to "Paranormal" and define paranormal as something that cannot be plausibly explained using current scientific knowledge.

I also like the St. Augustine episode and I would say that that if TAPS had gone in there with a group of independent, skeptical observers tagging along, several of which were known to me as serious, reputable scientists and professional magicians/illusionists — if that group of observers was able to confirm that all of the audio/video evidence was captured properly and that none of the cast or crew was involved and that the environment was not compromised in any way (no hidden closets for someone to hide, etc) *THAT* would convince me that *something* not explainable by traditional science occurred.

Actually, scratch that.  It would have to be independantly verified to convince me — and by independantly verified I mean a completely different group of people (no TAPS) investigating a completely seperate (but similar) location and coming up with similar results.  By similar location I mean only that the lighthouse is one large room, only one way to move through it and only one entrance/exit — so it's almost an ideal controlled environment.  Anything like that would do for the second investigation but the location couldn't be somewhere complicated because the more rooms/floors/etc the more chance someone is tampering with the environment.

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i posted that your show is rateings only and guess what you took my posted off i us the truth about yourself and your show is a little hard to see just like your paranormal con. a true paranormal investagator

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I took your posts off because 1) your english is absolutely terrible to the point where it's nearly impossible to understand what you are trying to say and 2) it's not *my* show — in fact, if you bothered to read any part of this site it should be immediately obvious to you that I have nothing to do with the show beyond the fact that I watch it.

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first of all the comments I made was not aimed toward you It was aimed at taps and what a con job that they put on the air.[2} i do not understand how you can say my english was terrible just because i told the truth. And from a paranormal position this makes us all look like con artist If TAPS is going to do this at least try not to make us look stupid.

Besides come on the ball rolling across the floor, the lamp on the table, the chair in the attic,all i am saying is that they need to think out how it looks before they say that a house or anything is paranormal. Logisti I have read some of your comments and you have the same observation that I have had

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Well I don't think anyone from TAPS spends a lot of time on this website, so you'd be better off not directing comments to them.  This website is run by people who watch the show like you and me.

Also, I didn't say your English was terrible "just because you told the truth". I said your English was terrible because I couldn't understand what you were saying, but it sounded angry and on this website everyone is expected to be cool, like little Fonzies.

Your last two posts were much better English, but just remember TAPS does not have anything to do with this website and all conversation here is requested to be civil and polite.

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Sorry if I sounded angry I did not mean to. And your right I will leave sorry I made that impression. thank you

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oookaaayy….that was a bit strange. not sure i understand this whole interaction, but it was highly entertaining!

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You should see some of the stuff people type into the "contact us" box

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Uh… good night, Darlene… it's been educational. Best of luck!

Tracy's post reminded me of my own ghost experience.

I went to high school in what used to be the estate of a wealthy man– one of the inventors of the phonograph. We used to have choir concerts, accompanied by piano, in a hall that used to be the main mansion. Its acoustics were perfect; you could hear the slightest footstep.

One night, I was working late in the hall in an office off the second floor balcony. It was after eleven, and I was tired and getting ready to call it a night. It was weird being there without the noise of other students.

Without warning, the piano downstairs sprang to life. Random notes rang out as though someone were smashing down randomly on the keys. It was over in a second, and the hall fell silent again.

I was frozen solid. I hadn't heard a single footstep– in fact, I hadn't heard a sound for hours. There was simply no way that anyone could be down there. Worst of all, I couldn't run– the only way out of the building was right by that piano. So I gritted my teeth and made myself walk out to the balcony and look down onto the first floor, telling myself that the first levitating object I saw would send me running…

(…)

And as I reached the balcony, I saw a black cat dart out of the shadows and silently pad out the open door into the moonlight. A cat who had almost certainly tried her paws at piano playing a few minutes earlier. If I hadn't made myself go and investigate, or had waited just a little longer, then I'd never have seen the cat, I'd have no explanation, and I might very well believe in ghosts.

So if I ever start sounding a little high on the skeptical horse– just mention black cats. On the other hand, it taught me that even the personal paranormal experience can be misleading.

Remind me to tell you about my UFO sighting or my alien abduction sometime.

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Logisti, I appreciate your answer. I think it's a good one. I'm going to take a bit of time to formulate my own standards, and post them when they're ready.

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i also agree with Logisti that it would have to be very controlled for me to believe the evidence. i'm very interested in seeing the Ghost Adventures show that comes on tomorrow night at 11. here there are only two guys on the show running the investigation. we'll see.

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One of the most interseting things on this investigation was grant sitting at that table and then all of a sudden "WHOAAA"
and the table table and chair jump or move. I dont have this show taped so i cant go back and look at it, but seeing it again on revelations just cracks me up. Just love the way his voice sounds, this is one of my favorites so far. What do you guys think about this incident?

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Mark: As Logisti said in the Harrington Home article about Grant: "I think that there are too many events that seem to happen only around him and that would be fine if it weren't for the fact that each and every one of those events seems just a little suspicious."

And the "jumping table" incident is one of those that are suspicious in my opinion. It is convenient, perhaps too convenient, that the camera guy was right next to Grant when it happened and thus wasn't able to fully capture it on film. If you recall, the camera guy was beside Grant because Grant had asked him to come over and illuminate the table for him with his LCD screen so he, Grant, could change a tape in the mini-DV camera.

Tango said that the table and chair jumped, but I am unsure if he saw that himself or if he is just trusting what Grant said happened.

I don't think anything paranormal happened, especially considering Grant's legs were under the table and it would've been easy to fake with the camera in so close and perhaps with nobody's eyes on the table to witness the event.

Unfortunately, much of the evidence TAPS gets requires us to take their word for it instead letting the evidence speak for itself.

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One thing I think we should consider (perhaps it has been in other comments threads, since I haven't read EVERYTHING here), is that the non-TAPS camera & production crew are screwing with the TAPS crew from time to time. This is of course above and beyond the obvious errors and suspicious events regarding just the TAPS folks (Grant in particular).

There are several instances where the phenomena they experience strikes me as stuff that they experience as being paranormal, which it would be easy for outside people to manipulate without their knowledge or input:

1. The other heat signature in the woods on their Irish trip
2. The disembodied voice in the basement of the Stanley Hotel
3. Several of the shadows and creaks, possibly some of the "opening door" phenomena.

And so on. I get the sense that the TAPS folks take their jobs seriously, and where they fail is mostly due to incompetence. However the production crew have whole other priorities, starting with the impetus to drive ratings, and I should think this provides a LOT of temptation to "make things happen." Whether this rises to conspiracy level or not is hard to tell, but it's a possibility. Further, I wonder whether TAPS has full proprietary rights to "their" footage, which is why they may not release it–and they don't say so because that undermines their credibility/business.

Last thing along these lines: on another debunking website, someone has done an analysis of the percentage rate at which they find "hauntings" versus inconclusive or negative evidence, and it skews heavily toward the haunting end, and this is not explainable by their refusing to air cases that don't have activity. This is indeed suspicious, however there is another banal explanation for the high level of "paranormal" activity: for a highly rated show on a reasonably well-viewed cable channel, I imagine that the pre-screening process is fairly comprehensive. Even faking or forcing footage would be hard in places that don't lend themselves to funny occurrences.

So perhaps one thing to look for in "evidence" in the future is the possibility that the TAPS folks are being played by the television production crew.

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Hello,

I have been reading the posts here and find it very interesting. Although I am a fan of TAPS, I can see both sides of the coin on this subject. Without a full view or the ability to be there, it's hard to determine what really happened. It seems the paranormal has always been intriguing and entertaining for many people. I think this is all the show is meant to be.

I don't know Jason and Grant personally, but I find it hard to believe they would try to trick the viewers. I don't see them as underhanded whatsoever. It seems if there were trickery going on, it would be unbeknownst to them. But, just my opinion of course.

On another note regarding "Stephen" who posted here about the piano kitty I think I would have certainly concluded it was the cat too! But, was there evidence? Was there muddy paw prints on the keys? Maybe it was the cat and maybe it wasn't. Is it possible the cat seems logical and a lot less scary for the onlooker? (just some thoughts)

With all of this said… I think the key is to keep an open mind to all possibilities. We don't know what is out there and without our own personal, undeniable, paranormal experience to validate it, we will always question the unknown.

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OH! one more thing, does anyone know why Grant and Jason wont share their very own personal paranormal experiences? I just found it a little odd.

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Hi Beth,

Welcome to the site! I agree with you that Jason and Grant don't seem dishonest, but just because I can't imagine them lying doesn't mean they can't lie. I'd be a million dollars richer if I could read their minds.

I also agree that there are assumptions in my piano-playing cat theory. I didn't dust for paw prints. So, is it more likely that Mittens tried to play Mozart, or was it paranormal? Well, to call it paranormal would mean that nothing in the normal world could explain it. There's a normal-world explanation sitting there meowing.

Imagine if I hadn't seen the cat make her dash for the door. If I told someone the story of the spooky self-playing piano, and they said, "Well, a cat could've gotten in and run along the keyboard," I think I might have rejected that explanation. I would've been wrong.

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You can find out Jason's from the book excerpt on Amazon, here:

http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Hunting-Unexplained-Phenomena-Paranormal/dp/1416541136

It involves Reiki and green olives.

As far as I know Grant has never revealed his experience.

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oh goodness! no wonder he has kept it a secret for so long. that story of his is ridiculous! i'm probably being way too hard on the guy since it could all very well be true, but golly!

that's all i'm gonna say about that.

thanks for finding that nugget, Stephen. you've made me smile today.

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I would have to agree with Kyle on most of his above statements, it's a tv show so what is a tv show supposed to do? *Entertain* nowadays people will do about anything to make a buck, kinda sad if this is the case.

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You know what the broken glass in the Stanley reminded me of? I tend bar, and from time to time, we have glasses that break from thermal shock. Usually happens when we're running low on beer glasses and we put them straight into the glass freezer when they're still hot from the dishwater. Or if we put something hot into a glass that's frozen. It shatters. And it usually shatters around the circumference of the glass, taking a chunk or two out that look like a shark's fin. It's not been unusual to have a "bracelet" out of glass because the change in temperature made the rim snap off.

That's all I wanted to say. That's what the glass reminded me of at the time.

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Re: Glass Cracking at Stanley Hotel

Hey Ruby,

Your right! That's what it sounded like to me – a thermal contraction (hot to cold) causing the glass to crack with a "chink!" sound.

The really odd thing is that you hear the sound of the piece dropping off, bouncing/vibrating on the table, and then the "chink!" of the glass breaking. So what happened here? Did the glass silently crack and the piece come off, and then crack, a second time, to get the "chink!"? Or was the sound added later (or via a small player in the room at the time) and the order of the grass piece dropping, and the "chink!" sound, was put together in the wrong order? Regrettably, it’s a little suspicious.

Of course, a Ghostly explanation could be that the phantom took hold of the glass, which caused the heat to be absorbed from the glass, like a local, super cold spot.

– Dave

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Why do people think that this site is run by TAPS members? It's like they didn't even read it.

I read all of the comments and really appreciated the story of the black cat and the piano by Stephen. That story just goes to show how easily situations can get blown out of proportion. If you hadn't seen the cat, you would probably now be a firm believer in the paranormal, and would still be telling people to this day about the "ghost" you heard one night. Great story!

I was a firm skeptic in all things before my whole family had something happen to us. To make a long story short, both my parents and I have heard (on different occasions)a woman's voice saying "Hello?" My dad and I both heard it one day, then my mom heard it twice around a week later. And since then, we haven't heard anything. This was about 2 and a half months ago. Now I'm not saying that it was paranormal, it could have been a stray radio signal or something. But we heard it in the middle of our long hallway where there are no rooms around, and the voice was incredibly loud and clear. It did sound digital though, the closest thing I could compare it to would be a voice coming out of a walkie-talkie. (No walkie-talkies anywhere in my house though)

The creepiest thing about the voice we heard was that when my dad and I heard it, we had been shouting at each other down the hallway,and it was almost like the voice had heard US shouting and was wondering who the hell WE were.

Sorry for the long post!

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Logisti, that second paragraph really hit the nail on the head.

And what does it say about those who delete dissenting opinions and skeptics from their message boards when they themselves claim to be skeptical?

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I assume that you're referring to the TAPS message board, but for the record the deleting that I do is mostly of people saying, "GAWD! I LUV UR SHOW! GRANT IS SO HOT IS HE MARRIED?"

…Although, to be fair, I do have a dissenting opinion on that subject.

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Yea I think Ive won around 1,000,000 IPOD nanos in the last year.

The weird thing was, when we heard the voice it didn't scare us. We were more like "WTF was that?" Because it could have been anything - a neighbor outside, a television on in the other part of the house, a radio, etc. But it wasn't, the windows were all closed, no radios or tv's were on and my mom wasnt even home at the time, no females were around at all.

And about TAPS banning people, Ive read a lot of posts lately by people who were banned. I cant believe they would do that, I can see if someone is being a total ass but getting banned just for asking questions? That doesn't help their cred at all, at least in my eyes.

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You assume correctly.

I feel for you man.

But, to clarify: why would TAPS delete dissenting opinions and skeptics from their message boards when they themselves claim to be skeptical?

I think they just say that for the show when they are probably closer to being true believers.

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