At a recent BBQ, a couple of guests described in length their experiences ghost hunting at nearby haunted buildings. Myself and another skeptic attempted to poke some holes in their airtight logic (e.g. "You just.. had to be there.. You could just FEEL it, you know?"). They seemed surprised and disappointed that we wouldn't simply take their word for it, and insisted that we couldn't offer an opinion until we spend an entire night stumbling in the dark of a moldy condemned building with no electricity or functioning indoor plumbing (I refuse to do so, so I must either be too scared or too proud to admit I'm wrong).
Among some of the points Team Skeptic brought up:
1. If ghosts really do exist, why can't they haunted a functional, contemporary household in good repair? After all, people have also died in such houses. Why is a spooky atmosphere a prerequisite to having a ghost encounter?
2. Unbelief in ghosts is not simply about "only believing what you can see around you". I can see no dinosaurs around me, but I know that they once existed because I can go to a museum and be surrounded by physical evidence. There are no museums full of ghosts.
3. Out of the infinite possibilities (both known and unknown) to explain the feeling of being lightly touched in a pitch black room, or hearing noise that sounds like a voice, etc, why must it be a ghost? A person goes looking for evidence to confirm an already-held unjustified conclusion (ghosts exist), and then conveniently uses any sensory perception that fits that prejudice, without giving the evidence it's due diligence exploration and research.
I've been dwelling on that third argument. Skepticism is not just about avoiding silly beliefs. It's also about avoiding prejudice, and I think that is frequently overlooked (especially by die hard believers). Belief (in something, anything) is often revered, or at least respected in our culture. Taking a skeptical stance, while seen as sensible, is also looked at as being a killjoy or fuddy-duddy.
Skeptics do not deny the evidence (even if it's personal and subjective), but they do question the conclusion if it is not supported by sufficient evidence. It has nothing to do with what they want to believe, it is the recognition that what they want is irrelevant, and prejudice and selectivity about a conclusion has no place in honest inquiry. The evidence (say, for ghosts) may actually indicate something. It may be centuries, or even never that we understand what it really is. But jumping to belief in the supernatural, for the sake of spicing up life is doing a disservice to the truth, and putting ones own needs before self honesty. To recognize that is not a weakness. It is, indeed, a virtue. And one that requires deliberate effort and discipline.
