Thursday, May 1, 2014

The effect of electronic voice phenomena (EVP) on the paranormal world



This article was found on http://www.helium.com

It was written by Dan Hiland

Created on: July 30, 2009 Last Updated: August 01, 2009

Mankind has always had an interest in life after death, and more particularly, the "spirit world." From the first observed instances of "spiritual" activity- known as the "paranormal"- its followers have struggled with ways to document such manifestations. The degree to which they have succeeded has determined the level of interest in further research, as well as increased efforts to contact those spirits that they believe not only exist, but want to communicate with those of us on this side of the "veil."

During the heyday of Spiritualism (the mid 1800's-1920's), efforts to communicate with departed souls by way of séances and other means led to an exhaustive collection of stories, accounts , theories and the like, most of it gathered from eyewitness testimony or word-of-mouth. Throughout the early 1900's, photography was employed to "capture" images of spirits, in an attempt to further verify and prove to the world that the paranormal was more than mere conjecture- but with mixed results.

With the development of magnetic tape in the 40's and 50's, though, came a new way to capture evidence of spirit activity. Researchers found that playback of tape recordings (where there was no sounds to record), contained noises for which they could not account. Some of these were believed to be the voices of spirits from the "other side."

As more and more experiments were conducted, a small but dedicated group of scientists , technicians and psychologists came to believe that they had captured the voices of disembodied spirits attempting to communicate with the living. Everything from barely audible mutterings to full and coherent messages - some seemingly in code - were being heard. After ruling out technical problems like radio interference and the like, the only possibility left was that of spirits communicating from beyond the grave.

Due to a renewed interest in spiritualism, these manifestations came to be known as Electronic Voice Phenomena, or EVP, and in 1982, the American Association of Electronic Voice Phenomena was born. Founded by Sarah Estep, the AAEVP's mission was to increase understanding and awareness of EVP, and teach others about standardized methods of capturing it (http://en.wikipedia.org).

With increased public exposure to EVP existence came seminars, workshops and the formation of other societies dedicated to its study. Ghost hunting, a pastime formerly the stuff of folklore and the marginally sane, became the subject of television shows and movies , such was the general public's interest in, and acceptance of, the paranormal world.

Currently AAEVP boasts membership of 500 people across the United States and in 22 countries (http://www.aaevp.com), while tens of thousands of other EVP-related sites are scattered across the Internet.

The end result of EVP research and education has been a renewed interest in all aspects of paranormal activity, especially as it relates to the Spirit World- and nowhere is this enthusiasm more pronounced than within the community of the "Big Circle."

Tracing its beginnings to a small group of AAEVP recorders, the Big Circle's mission "is to support, educate, and inform all who have lost loved ones, especially children, focusing on the role EVP can play in healing and spiritual growth regardless of belief system" (http://bigcircle.aaevp.com).

If the discovery of EVP does nothing else but serve as a way of bringing peace to the suffering, it will have earned its place in history .