Yes. I would have liked to have been able to expand on that, but it can get a bit involved and I didn't want to monopolize the discussion. My reasoning is based purely on logic that given the available evidence, is sufficient to justify my statement. The reasoning involves a more in-depth look at what we mean by life, identity, personality, death, and consciousness. Without delving into it at this moment, I do recall saying something to the effect that I do believe strange experiences and perceptions happen, but there is a problem with how we interpret them. In the case of life after death, belief is based on a leap in logic that upon closer inspection simply cannot be the case.
I would however also be interested in what your reasoning is and hope you decide to share.
Ufology, I think generally, people are prepared to make certain leaps of logic depending on the estimated distance. I also think that, sometimes, an individual's non-repeatable life experiences support leaps of logic that, to the unexperienced, seem as wide as the Grand Canyon. Then again, I think there's a lot of confusion about such things that results from too much enthusiasm, and not enough cool reflection.
I thought I would list what seems are predominant ways in which humans see reality (world views). Nothing necessarily says any are true, it is just what many humans have accepted about reality. This list is my impression, it is not exhaustive, and I would imagine that various aspects overlap for many people. For example, I am no expert but it seems to me that traditional views of First Nations folk take reality as mix of animism and possibly Theism of some sort, if a Great Spirit fills that role:
Naturalism — (e.g. non-theism, atheism, secularism)
Reality is defined by random interfacing of matter, energy, fields, space and time, and contains no transcendent "spiritual" aspect. Life, cognition and intelligence arose in a low-entropy valley from long-term arbitrary interaction of these elemental constituents of reality. Transcendent "spiritual" experiences result exclusively from the brain's bio-electro-chemistry, possibly aided by natural external field effects on the brain. UFOs, evaluated in these terms, are either:
- real physical craft with real physical occupants from distant space, ETH
- natural phenomena
- subjective brain-manufactured dream-like visions with no existence outside the observer
Animism | Polytheism — (e.g. Gaia? Wicca? First Nations? shamanism, Hinduism)
Reality contains not only basic constituents recognized by naturalism, but also a transcendent aspect, including intelligent nonphysical entities which humans can perceive and interact with. Transcendent experiences can result from a combination of the brain's bio-electro-chemistry, an innate human transcendent aspect, and interaction with external transcendent beings or aspect of reality. UFOs could either be:
- ETH
- real, internal trancendent aspect, or external transcendent intelligence directly interacting with the observer
- natural phenomena
- subjective, brain-manufactured vision
Pantheism | Deism | Philosophical Theism — (e.g. Spinoza, Einstein? Gödel)
Reality contains the elements of naturalism, as well as a cohesive and overarching intelligence, a Deity, which is either immanent in all things (pantheism), or distinct from the universe and currently non-interactive (deism), or distinct from the universe and personally detectable and interactive (Gödel, philosophical theism). Transcendent experiences can result from a combination of the brain's bio-electro-chemistry and an innate human transcendent aspect that could interact with the universal intelligence (philosophical theism). UFOs could either be:
- ETH
- real, external transcendent intelligence directly interacting with the observer
- natural phenomena
- subjective, brain-manufactured vision
Revelatory Theism — (e.g. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, other revealed religions)
Reality contains the elements of naturalism, as well as a cohesive and overarching transcendent infinite intelligence – Theos-God – who intentionally interacts with humans at times. Reality also includes subordinate intelligences that interact with humans either in obedience to God (angels) or in disobedience (sheddim, daimonia-demons, jinn, Satan). Transcendent experiences can result from a combination of the brain's bio-electro-chemistry, and an innate human transcendent aspect that can interact with the universal transcendent intelligence, or the subordinate intelligences. UFOs could either be:
- ETH
- real, external transcendent intelligence directly interacting with the observer
- natural phenomena
- subjective, brain-manufactured vision
An experiencer's report of UFOs or paranormal phenomena, and an investigators examination of such phenomena, will doubtless be influenced by their view of reality. So IMHO familiarity with these various views is important. IMHO, the ETH is possible, but is the least likely source of the multitute of UFO reports.
In addition to the above, naturalism would typically say that an individual's existence is completely and permanently terminated at death (annihilation). The remaining views would at least leave open the possibility, or affirm, that the transcendent "spiritual" component of an individual's existence continues after bodily death (e.g. reincarnation, or resurrection, or a permanent spiritual state).
It is worth remembering that no one knew of the microbial world of bacteria until microscopes went into wide use in the mid-17th century. But before then everyone knew that something "invisible" caused, for example, the Black Death, 1346–53, where from 30 to 60 percent of Europe died from bacterial infections. Likewise, it is possible that there is a transcendent "invisible" realm that causes so much of humanity to accept a spiritual aspect to life, and that the tool to investigate that realm has yet to be invented. It was only in '70's that dark matter left the realm of speculation to fact, thanks to
Vera Rubin's observations of spiral arm galaxy red shift anomalies. If, from a scientific point of view, visible matter is now understood to make up only about four percent of reality, then there's a lot of mysterious matter-energy out there that might influence reality in ways far greater than simply gravity.
My brief explanation, Ufology, of why I tend to agree with your statement, that "no one is communicating with the dead" is this: while I do think there is a transcendent aspect to every human which continues after bodily death, I do not think the dead are allowed to interact with the living, certainly not in a general way. If the meager events reported as ghosts of the dead are the real and actual spiritual continuation of people who've died decades or centuries earlier, then they evidently have entered into quite a fixed or retarded kind of life experience. That doesn't seem likely to me. I do think there is some kind of transcendent realm that humans can detect, and to me it is possible that "ghost haunting events" are something like "Rupert" dummy parachutists dropped the evening before D-Day to fool the Wehrmacht. IMHO, the "trickster" phenomenon would tend to support this speculation.
