Let’s get the cards on the table at the outset here—this list comes from a sceptical position. A heavily sceptical position. That is not to say an A priori, entrenched, denialist position. Rather, it is that one should always seek proof, not merely evidence, in order to move away from the doubt that is held when encountering extraordinary claims. With that said, evidence is still evidence, and may indeed lead to proof. So an open mind and a willingness to consider counter-narrative positions (when presented clearly and rationally) is key when faced with such debates and conjectures. We good? Right then.

The entries in this list are comprised of stories, footage and other such circumstantial evidence that rise above the usual ‘friend-of-a-friend’ type gossip, phoney mediums on hokey ghost hunter TV shows or the clearly digitally manipulated videos that pollute the interwebs. Scared? You probably shouldn’t be. Maybe just a little bit.

10 Famous Photos Of The Paranormal That Aren’t Paranormal

10 Hell Of A Video

It may be surprising that any case related to famed charlatans the Warrens (of ‘The Conjuring’ fame) would be on a list such as this. But the case of Maurice ‘Frenchy’ Theriault is difficult to easily dismiss as a hoax. Why would this be?

Psychological reasons for odd behaviour, overblown and exaggerated accounts and a general willingness to believe in the supernatural above any rational explanation would usually suffice to sow the seeds of doubt in a story like this.

Then there’s the troubling footage from his exorcism.

As with many supposed victims of demonic possession, Frenchy had a very troubled upbringing. It seems his father was a brutish, violent man, subjecting his son to terrible beatings and, although Frenchy was vague on this, it is assumed some sexual abuse happened also. It was after this terrible event that Frenchy began to notice he had gained preternatural powers—increased strength, hidden knowledge revealed to him and the ability to be in multiple places at once. So far, so Hollywood.

But during an exorcism conducted by Bishop Robert McKenna (with the Warrens close by for, um, moral support?), things get pretty weird, and not in the usual growling and body contorting sort of way. The slow morph of Maurice’s face seen in the video of his exorcism is really freaky. Given that this case occurred in the mid 80s, years before the sophisticated CGI tech we have today, it is hard to believe that anyone involved would have had access to the Hollywood editing required to stage the footage without jump cuts.

There is more than this to the story, however. Frenchy had previously spent time on probation for the rape of a child in 1976, dodged another rape charge in 1985 (charges were dropped when he claimed to be possessed by demons) and his father had killed his mother before killing himself in 1982. So, there’s plenty of precedent beyond the supernatural for what happened next—in 1992, Frenchy succumbed to his violent urges, attempting to murder his estranged wife, shooting her in the arm outside her Massachusetts home with a shotgun. He then turned the gun on himself.

9 Exchanging Tinfoil Hats For Tinfoil Crowns

‘Finally!’ cried all the UFO true believers when this footage was leaked. Hold your horses, though, all this stuff is not proof of the existence of aliens, gang. It is simply proof that US authorities know and study the phenomenon of UFOs (and seem to have no idea what is going on). In and of itself, this is as close to proof that UFO fans and fanatics have ever gotten. You must admit, sceptics, it’s all quite intriguing.

The leaked footage is pretty amazing stuff. This one feels more real. But as compelling as the video is, it’s not proof of the supernatural. Rather, it’s proof that there are phenomena that even the most heavily funded and expert institutions on earth cannot yet explain.

Keep watching the skis… I mean skies (obligatory Simpsons reference complete).

8 The Body In The Billings Reservoir

A body was found near a reservoir outside of the city of Sao Paolo, Brazil in 1988. The man was seemingly tortured to death; facial skin peeled back, eyes pulled out, eyelids cut off, entire muscles had been removed, symmetrically-aligned puncture wounds all over the body with accompanying cauterisation, multiple organs removed (without an obvious incision save a small hole—suggesting the organs had been sucked out). The victim also been castrated and drained of his blood. Furthermore, the man had been probably been conscious during the whole ordeal, given that there was no sign of anaesthetic in his system. There was also a cerebral oedema, suggesting extreme pain. Cause of death—cardiac arrest during extreme agony. Official verdict—Death from natural causes.

It seems that authorities may have (rather poorly) covered up this case. Perhaps it was due to the awful, gruesome details being too alarming for the public. Perhaps there is some darker conspiracy afoot here. Given the similarity between this case and the cattle mutilations often touted as evidence of alien experimentation, it’s hard not to allow the possibility that we humans may be viewed as guinea pigs by some advanced alien species.

7 A Better Way To Look At The ‘Missing 411’ Phenomenon

Author and former police detective David Paulides’ work on collating and examining the many thousands of unexplained missing person cases that occur in the USA’s National Parks is entertaining stuff. Is it convincing? Not really, no. But it is the reason it lacks credibility as a working theory that is interesting here—Paulides and his supporters seem to instinctively try and join up some invisible dots, fashioning a joined-up, all-encompassing conspiracy that will explain each and every case of missing people in the National Parks of the US. We don’t need to do that—scrap the grand narrative approach and take each case on an individual basis and you’ll see that they are far more fascinating, and better evidence of possible explanations beyond our current understanding than Paulides’ loftier claims.

Paulides’ work has brought new life and fresh eyes to some truly baffling cases, cases that may point to something we cannot explain with conventional science. Avoid the web-weaving, and we may find something truly extraordinary.

6 Co-twin-cidence

Here we have a pair of twins separated at birth—some degree of similarity is to be expected, I mean, they are genetically identical. But these coincidences are incredible.

Both were named James by their respective adoptive parents, and went by Jim. One named his first son James Alan, the other James Allan. Both men married a woman named Linda. After both men divorced their respective Lindas, they both married women named Betty. They both named their dogs ‘Toy’. They both worked as deputy sheriffs. They both liked to vacation on the same beach in Florida. They both developed tension headaches when they were 18. They both smoked. They smoked the same brand of cigarettes.

It could simply be the interplay between nature, nurture and environment. But both marrying a Linda then a Betty? There has to be some degree of ESP going on here, surely?

Probably not, but it’s all very strange.

5 Unexplained Sounds And Mysterious Lights

Mysterious loud hums, ringing sounds, low rumbles and trumpet-like blares are heard the world over, causing wonder and confusion by all who hear them. Strange lights in the sky or floating up from bodies of water or dancing on the horizon also seem to have been an unexplained phenomenon for centuries. What the hell is going on? Well, we don’t really know.

The strange noises have been suggested as coming from heavy industrial machinery, fast-moving air currents shearing against slower currents, bio gasses from decaying vegetation or God heralding the end of days.

Strange lights are suggested as being marsh gasses (again), optical illusions cased by mist and car headlights, missile tests, ball lightning, radon decay from rocks causing plasma bursts or God signalling the end of days via Morse code.

4 LiveDieLiveDieRepeat

Reports of paranormal activity are often met with derision. It doesn’t help when the individual or family that are being pestered by a poltergeist/demon/vampires/haunted doll/gremlin immediately call the wrong person to help them. They never call the police. They never try to get clear, irrefutable photo or video evidence. Do they ever get in touch with a decent investigative journo to experience the phenomenon for themselves? No. They call a ‘paranormal expert’—a medium, a ghost hunter, a bloody TV crew. One guy who rose above the colossal dung heap that is the ‘paranormal expert’ community, was Canadian academic Ian Stevenson.

Stevenson’s research into re-incarnation in children is thorough- maybe the only peer-reviewed body of work on the paranormal which is taken remotely seriously. Even ardent sceptics like astronomer Carl Sagan respected his work, writing in his seminal work, ‘The Demon Haunted World—”At the time of writing there are…. claims in the ESP field which…. deserve serious study:… that young children sometimes report the details of a previous life, which upon checking turn out to be accurate and which they could not have known about in any other way than reincarnation.”

Wow!

However, as compelling as Stevenson’s collected anecdotes are, they’re just that—anecdotes. Not proof. That would require rigorous experimentation. So far, we have nothing else to indicate that reincarnation occurs. We cannot rely on Stevenson’s work as more than just a tasty academic snack, not a fully satiating meal of proven theory.

To illustrate this, Carl Sagan’s next line reads—”I pick [this] claim not because I think it’s likely to be valid (I don’t), but as an example of a contention that might be true”.

3 Strange Objects Out Of Place And Out Of Time

1) The Anitkythera Mechanism. 2) The Baghdad Batteries. 3) The Coso Artefact.

1) An uncommon, but not unheard of invention in Ancient Greece. 2) Two storage jars with some acidic residue that was probably a rotted papyrus scroll. 3) A rusty spark plug.

No mysteries here.

Except that damned hammer. Discovered in 1936 in London, Texas, this modern-looking tool was found encased in a 400 million year old limestone concretion.

Clearly it must’ve been made an ancient race of giants. From Jupiter.

Well, maybe not. The hammer seems to be a miner’s hammer from the era it was discovered. There is also a theory posited as to how the hammer could have become encased in the limestone in a relatively short period—the soluble material found in the limestone could have formed around a dropped hammer in a petrifying well—a natural occurrence that is due to water containing an extremely high mineral content. Ok, plausible. Likely, even.

If so, then where are the thousands of other examples that would have doubtlessly occurred?

2 Terminal Spinal-Tap-Drummer Syndrome

All sorts of animals explode—whether it is a rotting whale on a beach, Vietnamese termites that will rupture themselves to defend their pals from attackers or when bored teenagers strap dynamite onto gerbils, animals can blow up naturally. But what about people? There have been many cases of spontaneous human combustion throughout history, baffling relatives, medical examiners and scientists alike. Why and how does this happen?

Many theories have been floated over the years:

Heart attack + cigarette = slow-burning wick effect and very concentrated burn area.

Ketosis in victims caused by alcoholism or low-carb diets leading to a build-up of highly flammable acetone.

Mistaken ‘spontaneity’: intentional self-immolation in order to commit suicide, unidentified external accelerant, inability to move (e.g. stroke, morbid obesity, demonic possession) during immolation.

Maybe every case is one of the above. Maybe it’s some of the above and there remains some paranormal force that causes these weird cases. Either way, what an awful way to go!

1 Angel Hair And Star Jelly

Wouldn’t it be nice if these odd phenomena were actually the hair of angels and jelly thrown down to earth by the stars? For all we know, they may well be!

Scientists haven’t yet solved these twin mysteries from the natural world conclusively. Theories on ‘Angel Hair’ (thin metallic-looking strands that look like spider’s webs that turn up on tree branches and bushes) range from of accidental littering or industrial by-products finding their way into nature, polarized atmospheric electricity forming filaments out of dust particles or biological matter produced by some insect. Or it’s caused by UFOs taking off.

Star Jelly seems to be a bit easier to explain, just not conclusively. It’s frog puke. Probably. Or caused by UFOs taking off. Different UFOs from the ones that make Angel Hair, of course.

10 Paranormal Events Linked To Mass Tragedies

About The Author: C.J. Phillips is a storyteller, actor and writer living in rural West Wales. He is a little obsessed with lists.

What would you do if your four-year-old suddenly started to remember a previous life? You might laugh it off. You might take it seriously and consult an expert. You might contact the researchers at the University of Virginia’s Division of Perceptual Studies.

Among the Division’s 1,200 files are tales about kids who claimed to be stunt actors, kids born with birthmarks matching wounds that led to deaths of previous incarnations, and other fascinating cases. While some researchers attribute these cases to reincarnation, not all do. Others attribute these tales of childhood reincarnation to false memories, lies, impressionability, disassociation, or attention-seeking.

Consider the following cases for yourself about children who have claimed they were reincarnated from previous lives.

10 Suleyman Andary

Born in Lebanon in 1954, Suleyman Andray recalled a previous life. As a child, Andray claimed to even know some of his children’s names from this previous life. It should be noted that Andray was born to a Druse family. Druse is an Islam-derived religion that believes in reincarnation.

Andray also remembered coming from the village of Gharife, where he had an olive oil press. Around five or six, Andray’s family heard him muttering the names of individuals in his sleep. He later claimed these names were some of his children. At eleven, Andray refused to lend a book because he remembered a policy in his previous life of not doing so. He later remembered the name Abdallah from his previous life.

Over time, Andray chose to not talk about his memories because it led to teasing. In 1967, Andray visited Gharife. Residents of Gharife confirmed that a man named Abdallah Abu Hamdan owned an oil press and had lived there. Andary also recognized various landmarks while there.^[1]

9 Tae

Professor Ohkado Masayuki is a Japanese linguistics professor who publishes and researches childhood reincarnation cases. One of the most compelling Masayuki cases involves an interview conducted in 2015.

The previous life was that of a woman with three children, including a beloved daughter. Tragically, the woman passed away in 1993. The next year, the daughter got married, relocated, and had Tae in 1996. Tae reminded Atsuko of her mother. When Atsuko handed a picture of Midori to two-year-old Tae, claiming, “This is your grandmother,” the child responded, “Me.” Similar to the Andary case, Atsuko’s family practiced Zen, a religion that believes in reincarnation.

When Tae was three, Atsuko suffered a spell of depression over her mother. One day, when walking with Tae, Atsuko heard Tae say, “I have to cheer her up.” Atsuko reported feeling like her mother had returned. Later, when Masayuki re-interviewed Tae when she was in her late teens, she could not remember Midori or her previous life.^[2]

8 James Leninger

As a two-year-old in 2001, James Leninger made statements that he recalled a previous life during which he was an American World War II pilot. This came after the boy’s father took him to visit the Cavanaugh Flight Museum. The child later started having nightmares about an airplane fire. The same year, James claimed he had flown his plane off a boat called Natoma in his previous life. James later identified his previous incarnation as that of Jack Larsen. While looking through a book about Iwo Jima, the child even located where Larsen’s plane was shot down.

Skepticism has been drawn on Leninger’s case in recent years. Critics have argued that the case lacks explanatory or evidential value. Additionally, critics argue the boy’s parents are mostly the ones offering the details.^[3]

7 Dorothy Eady

Born in 1904 in London’s Blackheath section, Dorothy Eady experienced a serious fall at the age of three. While looking at photographs at the British Museum with her family, Eady saw a photograph of Seti 1, an Egyptian Pharaoh. Eady claimed the place depicted in the picture was her home. She then walked around the museum kissing the feet of Egyptian statues.

At the age of 15, Eady had a dream where she met the mummy of Pharaoh Seti I. Eady claimed that the Pharoah made her remember her previous life. Eady’s odd behavior, including sleepwalking, resulted in her being placed in a sanitarium several times. Eady later adopted the name of Omm Sety and became a well-known Egyptologist.^[4]

6 YTK

In the late 1960s, a man (MMS) resided with his wife at an air force base. In 1968, MMS was involved in a parachute training exercise when he was dropped from a plane. Unfortunately, he landed too close to the airfield’s edge and fell into a 15-foot-deep (4.5-meter) pond, leading to his death. Several years after MMS’s death, his widow married one of MMS’s comrades. The woman later gave birth to a baby boy (YTK). The baby had both birth defects and birthmarks that appeared as rope-like marks around his leg.

At three, YTK began to talk about falling from the sky, becoming caught up in rope, and dying. By the age of five, YTK had stopped talking about his memories completely. During his childhood, YTK lived on the base where parachuting occurred and slept on a cot suspended from the ceiling with parachute ropes. His mother reported that YTK knew nothing about his father’s death.^[5]

5 Shiva Tripathi

Sumitra Singh lived with her husband in Uttar Pradesh, India. In 1985, Singh experienced a loss of consciousness with eye-rolls and teeth clenching. Sometimes, she spoke during these encounters. Once, she predicted she would die in three days. Three days later, she appeared to die.

After a period of confusion, Singh started acting differently. She failed to recognize those around her and went by the name Shiva. She also stated that she was murdered by her in-laws in Dibiyapur, India. Singh also rejected her children. Singh later claimed that many details corresponded with a woman who died violently in 1985. Singh later went to Sharifpura, where she was recognized by a man who claimed she was his daughter. During this time, she also started to read and write even though she had little education. The Indian Express published details about the case in 1985.^[6]

4 Manisha

In 2005, a four-year-old girl named Manisha walked into a family home in south Delhi, India. The girl claimed that she was the couple’s daughter, Suman, who had passed away at the age of 15 from typhoid in 2000. The small girl ended up living with the couple she claimed as her “new” parents.

The child was born to a couple near Rajasthan, India. At the age of two, the girl told her parents that she was reincarnated. Later, she told her biological parents about her previous birth and the names of her “new” parents.^[7]

3 Cameron Macauley

Macauley was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 2000. At the age of two, Macaulay started talking about a previous life on the remote island of Barra. The little-known island of Barra is located in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. The child soon started demanding that he go to Barra with his “other family,” about whom he could provide multiple details, including the family’s surname. Macaulay also claimed that his previous father had been struck and killed by a car.

At the age of five, Macauley went to Barra, where the child located the Robertson home. While inside the residence, the child grew very sad. The boy told his mother that he missed his previous mother.^[8]

2 Luke Ruehlman

In 2017, two-year-old Luke Ruehlman began to worry about his safety at his family’s Cincinnati home. The child also named a ladybug Pam even though his family knew no other Pams. Shortly after, the child started naming everything ranging from toys to drawings as Pam. Luke also began to claim that he had previously been a girl with black hair and used to have earrings.

When the family asked who Pam was, the boy replied that it was his name from a previous life. The boy claimed that Pam died, went to heaven, saw God, and that God eventually sent the spirit back to Earth as Luke. Strangely, the child’s family was not religious and had never discussed religious subjects in front of him. The boy later revealed that he had been killed in a fire while jumping from a Chicago building. The child did not even know where Chicago was located. The boy’s mother later researched the Paxton Hotel, a building that mostly housed African Americans in Chicago. In 1993, a fire occurred at the property and trapped many of its upper-floor residents.^[9]

1 Bishen Chand

Born in Northern India in 1912, Bishen Chand was called Visha Natha by his mother. This is because the woman visited the Vishwanath temple before the boy was conceived. At ten months old, Chand heard his family discussing Pilibhit, which is a bigger town 31 miles (50 kilometers) to the northeast. The child gradually started speaking about Pilibhit and many other details about his previous life. The boy even gave his previous name, Laxmi Narain. At the age of four, Chand was taken to a town past Pilibhit. While returning, the child heard Pilibhit’s name pronounced and demanded to get off the train. His request was refused.

When the child eventually visited the town, he recognized various locations and made additional statements about his previous life. The child also learned that he could play a type of drum he had never seen before. As he aged, Chand began to lose memories of his previous life. After several interviews with Chand’s family, reincarnation researcher Ian Stevenson eventually interviewed a forty-year-old Chand in 1969. Chand expressed the perspective that his previous life was better because he had more money and more freedom.^[10]