[Jamie89]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

One very strong emotion in humans is the need to be liked and the need to feel important/worth. Saying you saw a "ghost" feeds those needs in some people and amoungst their friends - think back to a time before tv, radio and the like - a good story was a very popular commodity so I can fully see how such things occurred - look at Tam o Shanter by Burns etc

Because in certain sections of society seeing a "ghost" would be seen as rare and special and no one would perhaps question the validity of the claim so it is given status.

People also have a need to rationalise the things around them in terms that they're able to understand, which is what you're doing here (and the fact you've been able to give an explanation that sounds rational, doesn't act as proof that what you've said is correct), but you're not accounting for the possibility that there might be things you're not able to understand. If we're intelligent enough to know that our intelligence is limited, then could it not be possible that some things exist, and some people have experiences that can't be explained, simply because we don't have the terms to be able rationalise them? People have answered your 'what are ghosts?' question by sharing the experiences they've had as they understand them.

And science isn't meant to be a definitive. It's purpose is to help us understand things as well as we're able to, and it progresses as we progress, but it will always be limited because we are. The concept of ghosts requires you to consider that there are things that go past our limit of understanding, so science can only help so much.

Ghosts can be disbelieved, but the only way it can be considered 'fact' that they don't exist, is if you think that as humans, we are the pinnacle of existence and have limitless intelligence (but that would be kind of a dumb thing to think, so...)