Skeptical Analysis of the Paranormal Society

"Le doute n'est pas une condition agréable, mais la certitude est absurde."

—Voltaire

The Importance of Sound

Why some paranormal footage has sound and some doesn't.

Sound in TV and movies isn't just something that happens. It's directed completely to make you feel a certain thing - be it fear or happiness or hilarity. For example, if I have a clip of a man walking down the street, and I put a spooky soundtrack in the background, it gives you the feeling that something frightening is about to happen. A well-placed crashing sound or a door banging shut also creates this sort of emotion.

In paranormal videos, even if they are by the same investigative group, some have sound and some don't. It doesn't matter if they were recorded on similar cameras or if someone was present or not. An example would be the Cloaked Figure footage vs. the Moving Chair footage. One was presented by the group with sound, and one without. Why would this be?

Because a cloaked figure moving down a hallway silently is more frightening than footsteps. Because a chair being dragged noisily across the floor with no one in view to move it is more frightening than a chair moving silently.

Note that the chair in the paranormal footage is lightweight. It's a travel chair, intended to be carried. It folds up small and fits into a nylon pouch with a strap. It's not a weighty chair at all, but it was making one heck of a racket. Is it because the floor of the room was that uneven, or because a near-noiseless chair doesn't have the same amount of drama?

In the paranormal cloaked figure video, pants and/or shoes can be made out beneath the cloak. This would imply that the spectre had feet. So why is it silent? Because "ghosts" don't make noise when they run down a hall (even though, apparently, their feet hit the floor).

If you don't believe that these TV investigation groups use audio and visual cues to create tension, remember that they have soundtracks. Eerie music plays throughout the shows. Occasionally, in between segments, there are flashes of ghostly faces. The show isn't designed to analyze, it is designed to alter how you feel. If a piece of footage is good enough to be considered proof of the paranormal, it shouldn't need to be altered.

If you don't believe these pieces of footage WERE altered, be sure to check out the links to fellow debunkers and our own analyses here at SAPS.

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