Skeptic: Promoting Science and Critical Thinking

Episode Notes for
Getting into the Spirit of Things

Dr. Steven Novella

This week on Monstertalk, we begin a multi-episode examination of ghosts. We start at the core of the idea by discussing the plausibility of continued consciousness after death. Our guest is neurologist and skeptical activist, Dr. Steven Novella. Steven is a prolific blogger whose work regularly appears on SkepticBlog.org, NeurologicaBlog, Science Based Medicine and The Rogues Gallery. He is the president of the New England Skeptical Society, and host of the popular Skeptic’s Guide To the Universe podcast as well as the short-form SGU 5x5.

All three hosts of MonsterTalk have conducted ghost investigations. Ghosts are a huge topic, and it will take many episodes to cover this type of phenomena. We begin with a brief discussion of the nomenclature, and some of the strange implications of ghosts in relation to privacy. We will dig much deeper into these issues in future episodes, bringing our own unique experiences to bear on the topics.

In this episode

• The terminology of ghost hunting
• New England and the culture of “Ghost Country”
• The legacy of Ed and Lorraine Warren
• The distinction between demons and ghosts
  and the impact of religion on ghost belief
• The mind as hardware/software
• The brain as an antennae for consciousness
• Connections between NDE and ghost sightings
• The NESS’s own ghost investigations
• Many tangential topics including AI, robots and Dungeons & Dragons

Music

• Monstertalk Theme: Monster
  by Peach Stealing Monkeys
• Haunted by Kelly Cavagnuolo
  (her CD is available at CDBaby.com)