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SUSPENDED JUDGEMENT: I have never seen a ghost and have absolutely no reason to believe in the existence of a spirit world. Where, however, spirits are claimed to manifest themselves in some way, usually for the benefit of a communion of like minds gathered together at a séance, it may be assumed that those taking part in the proceedings have been conditioned to participate in a state of receptivity or expectation which, if not permitting the entry of hallucinatory material into each individual consciousness, at least permits a degree of such material to affect someone, if only the medium.

Taking this contention at face-value, it would appear that the self-discipline necessary for the attainment of the requisite atmosphere is of consummate importance in determining the extent to which one opens the door, as it were, into one's own 'spirit world' and thereupon deceives oneself as to the extent of that world's objective reality. For if one wasn't sufficiently disciplined (or deceived) to begin with, there would be very little chance of either audibly or visually fostering an hallucinatory condition that would fully satisfy the demands of the occasion.

As, however, for those comparatively eccentric types who inherit or develop a perverse hankering after such impalpable entities as spirits, and who have, to be sure, encountered these entities during the course of their individual travels - can one not simply presume them to be especially susceptible to this particular form of hallucination? After all, the human world is undeniably sympathetic to diverse manifestations of insanity, stupidity, self-deception, etc., and - if I am not equally deceived in contending this - it is fairly common knowledge that the human mind is capable of believing what it chooses or wants to believe, not necessarily what it ought to!

Of course, the debate between spiritualists and rationalists will doubtless drag on for some time to come. But, in the interests of rational investigation, I can at least posit the hypothesis that what is commonly taken for a spirit by the spiritualistic fraternity is nothing more nor less than an apparently external recognition of internally-induced phenomena, or some such similar quasi-holographic derangement.... Perhaps, in seeking confirmation of this, one would do well to consult the writings of Carl Jung for a thorough diagnosis of what the subconscious mind is capable of engendering!