Paranormal Theories List
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(updated September 23, 2025)
I’ve been gathering different theories—more accurately, hypotheses, since most are not yet proven—about the currently unexplained, such UFOs and consciousness.
UFOs
1. credits to Berlinghoff Rasmussen, r/UFOs moderator
2. from Ret. Col. Karl Nell 's presentation at the Sol Foundation at Stanford last November 2023 https://twitter.com/matthew_pines/status/1757223639160680789
More info:
UAP Origin Classification System (OCS)
A comprehensive taxonomy of theories exploring the nature and origins of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena
https://www.uapcaucus.com/ocs
3. from u/LEOZZTT in r/UFOs (It's shorter but I like the pictures)
Consciousness
This is a cool map of 325+ theories about Consciousness created by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and Àlex Gómez-Marín
This part didn't fit the screenshot above but here it is:
If you want to read the paper, it's here. "A Landscape of Consciousness: Toward a Taxonomy of Explanations and Implications"
Paranormal Theories
So far, I haven’t come across a comprehensive list of paranormal theories. That’s why I’ve decided to collect and share them here in this blog.
What follows is a starting point: a summary of theories discussed in the book Ghosted! Exploring the Haunting Reality of Paranormal Encounters. I’ll be adding more as I continue my research.
| Theory | Core Idea | Support / Arguments | Criticisms / Limitations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Discarnate Agency (Survival / Spirit Hypothesis) | Ghosts are spirits of the deceased or spiritistic entities; motives include comfort, revenge, unfinished business, attachment, or out-of-body appearances. | Traditional spiritualist view; appeals to conservation-of-energy & speculative quantum entanglement ideas; historical reports of intelligent actions (e.g., SPR, Roll); high prevalence of haunting reports vs. low rate of hallucination disorders. | Conservation-of-energy often misunderstood; mediumship fraud; lack of direct scientific proof; some cases explained by contagion or hallucination. |
| Psi-Based Theory (Human Agency) | Paranormal events arise from psychic abilities of the living (telepathy, PK, ESP); apparitions are telepathic or internal projections. | Laboratory ESP/PK studies (RNGs, dice, telepathy); historical documentation (Gurney, Myers); explains poltergeists as unconscious PK from focus persons. | Experimental results are weak and debated; critics claim flawed methods and selective analysis; does not neatly explain all objective/physical phenomena. |
| Hybrid / Subjectivist–Objectivist (Stone Tape / Place Memory) | Traumatic events leave psychic or physical traces in locations that can later be replayed — a "recording" of past events experienced by sensitive witnesses. | Popularized in culture (1971 BBC play); rooted in older ideas (Babbage, H.H. Price, SPR); fits reports where place + sensitive person interact. | Physics offers no mechanism for persistent recordings; considered pseudo-logical by many; no empirical mechanism demonstrated. |
| Simulation Hypothesis | Reality is a simulation or hologram; haunt anomalies are glitches or encoded inputs from underlying hardware/software. | Philosophically and mathematically tenable for some thinkers; discussed in high-profile forums and debates; resembles a technological reinterpretation of trace theories. | In principle unfalsifiable (evidence could itself be simulated); largely philosophical rather than empirically testable. |
| Neurological / Transliminality ("Your Brain on Ghosts") | Ghostly experiences reflect brain function—especially in high-transliminals or those with temporal-lobe lability—producing dissociative, hallucinatory, or altered states. | High-transliminals show greater belief, mystical experiences, sensory sensitivity; correlations with psi-test outcomes; temporal lobe linked to sensed presences, déjà vu, religiosity; measurable neurocognitive changes during encounters. | Skeptics view them as cognitive errors or epilepsy-like activity; does not directly account for external physical effects; causation (brain→experience or experience→brain) remains debated. |
These are my notes from the book The Brave Mortal's Guide to Ghost Hunting by Alex Matsuo
| Theory | Core Idea | Support / Arguments | Criticisms / Limitations |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parallel / Alternate Universes / Multiverse | Apparent hauntings are interactions with beings (or alternate versions of people) from other universes or timelines, not the deceased from our timeline. | Explains anachronistic phenomena; allows for non-linear time interactions; aligns with speculative physics ideas about multiverses. | Largely theoretical with little direct empirical evidence in paranormal studies; hard to test; may conflate metaphysics with folklore. |
| Non-Linear Time / Temporal Overlap | “Ghosts” are people from different points in time whose timelines overlap with ours, so communication may be with individuals from a different era. | Accounts for historical voices/visuals appearing in present-day locations; fits some eyewitness reports tied to specific past events. | If common, should produce clearer historical corroboration; often lacks reliable documentation linking event + communicator across time. |
| It’s All in Our Head (Psychological / Sociocultural) | Hauntings arise from psychology: hallucination, suggestion, collective belief, memory errors, or the energy we give a story. | Explains variability in reports, placebo/nocebo effects; demonstrates how focused attention and rumor create events; supported by known cognitive biases. | Doesn’t account for multi-witness, multi-modal evidence easily (audio, physical traces) unless those are explainable by natural causes; can feel dismissive of experiencers. |
| Everything Is a Demon (Demonology / Religious Interpretation) | Apparitions are not spirits of the dead but demons or malevolent entities masquerading as the deceased (grounded in some Christian traditions). | Matches religious texts and some historical frameworks; fits reports of distinctly malevolent, oppressive phenomena and possession cases. | Strongly culturally specific; risks conflating medical/psychological illness with spiritual demonology; sensationalism and dangerous outcomes (e.g., misuse of exorcism). |
| Haunting in Layers (Multiple Planes / Stratified Energies) | Locations contain layered impressions/energies from many eras—ghosts of different centuries can coexist and not perceive one another. | Accounts for mixed-era phenomena (e.g., modern-dressed figure at historic sites); aligns with site-specific imprint ideas and stratified archaeological metaphors. | Mechanism unclear (how/why energy layers imprint or interact); difficult to falsify; can be influenced by suggestion and tourism framing. |
| Imprinted / Haunted Objects | Objects retain energy or emotional imprint from people who treasured them, which can manifest as activity tied to the object. | Explains repeatable phenomena localized to items; consistent with many heirloom/possession reports and layered ownership histories. | Hard to test objectively; confounded by owner expectation, storytelling, and provenance marketing (tourism). |
| Ghost Communication & Technology (Future Tech-savvy Spirits) | Tech-literate generations may carry their tech-knowledge into the afterlife, enabling clearer communication via modern devices; investigators may interact more easily with tech-savvy spirits. | Case anecdotes where investigator-style spirits “understand” equipment; plausible as culture/technology shapes consciousness and communication methods. | Anecdotal and speculative; assumes continuity of tech-knowledge after death; may privilege investigators’ interpretive frameworks. |
| Spirit Agency / “Leave Me Alone” & Location Exhaustion | Spirits have moods, preferences, and limits; they aren’t obliged to speak and can become “exhausted” by constant attention—activity can vary night-to-night. | Explains intermittent activity and sudden changes (calm → aggressive); matches many investigators’ experiences and accounts of entities refusing contact. | Subjective interpretation of audio/EVP; may be anthropomorphizing unknown phenomena; difficult to differentiate from environmental or human-caused variability. |
| Animal Spirits (Non-Human Entities) | Animals can persist as spirits and behave in character (e.g., ghost cats), sometimes interacting with groups or appearing intermittently. | Numerous consistent eyewitness anecdotes; animal behavior often described as non-threatening and character-consistent (e.g., cat sunbathing). | Anecdotal; could be misperception, expectation, or social sharing; lacks systematic empirical study. |
What Investigators Can Do With These Theories
Once you’re aware of the theories (or hypotheses), the next step is knowing how to use them as a framework for your observations. The following notes/implications can help.
| Theory | Investigator notes / implications |
|---|---|
| Discarnate Agency (Survival / Spirit Hypothesis) | Treat cases with empathy and open-ended questioning; consider corroborating historical records. Beware of confirmation bias and emotional projection. Useful in client-centered work where comfort is important. |
| Psi-Based Theory (Human Agency) | Look for correlations between focus persons and activity spikes. Psychological stress, adolescence, or trauma may amplify effects. Good reason to document emotional states and group dynamics during investigations. |
| Hybrid / Subjectivist–Objectivist (Stone Tape / Place Memory) | Pay attention to environmental factors (stone, water, architecture). Use repeated visits to test whether the “recording” plays back consistently. Helps explain non-interactive apparitions. |
| Simulation Hypothesis | Rarely practical in fieldwork, but prompts creative thinking. Log anomalies as “glitch-like” events—time loops, repeating phrases, distortions of space. Useful as a framing tool when conventional models fail. |
| Neurological / Transliminality ("Your Brain on Ghosts") | Monitor investigator/experiencer physiology (stress, fatigue, EMF exposure). Keep balanced notes on personal sensations vs. environmental evidence. Helps separate subjective impressions from objective data. |
| Parallel / Alternate Universes / Multiverse | Keep theory at high-level. Consider questions of identity (alternate self vs. stranger) and time. |
| It’s all in our head | Strongly consider psychological, social, and cultural factors. Investigators should rule out hallucination, suggestion, group dynamics. |
| Everything is a Demon | Investigate demonology skeptically; extreme demon-focused beliefs can be dangerous. Debunk physical explanations first; rare but possible negative activity has distinct physical/emotional sensations (heaviness, nausea, fight/flight). |
| Haunting in Layers (multiple planes / time-layers) | Be open to multiple time-layers. Research long land history (pre-settlement) and recent events. Don’t limit queries to a single timeframe. |
| Digging Deeper (ghosts unaware of each other / planes overlap) | During investigation, don’t assume all activity belongs to the same entity. Use broad, open communication techniques and multiple hypothesis testing. |
| Ghost communication will improve over time | Consider tech-context of the deceased (generation, skills). Learn modern tech to interpret possible tech-mediated phenomena. |
| Objects & energy imprinting | Treat artifacts as potential evidence; trace an object’s ownership and emotional history. |
| “Leave me alone” (entities not always willing to talk) | Respect entity boundaries; recognize variability night-to-night. Avoid presuming entitlement to contact. Consider that tourism can stress a site. |
| Animal Spirits | Non-human presences can be benign and behave like themselves. Don’t ignore fauna-type phenomena; they can be informative and easing for investigators. |
Why This is Important
We need to be aware of the many different hypotheses about the paranormal to recognize that our current knowledge is still limited, and that no single explanation captures the full picture of these mysteries.
By examining multiple perspectives, we avoid clinging to one narrow interpretation and instead remain open to new evidence and insights, which increases our chances of finding the truth.
More Info: Theories of Psi (Psychic Abilities)
- C.E.
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