'Paranormal' battery draining

[cj.23]

Hello

A colleague is working on a (sceptical as it happens) study of a supposed paranormal location and has discovered a consistent pattern of claims of digital cameras, vidcams and other battery powered equipment losing charge. She has a hypothesis this may be related in someway to the situation, temperature variations within the building and outside, or some other entirely mundane factor. However she needs to establish what this is, and if possible reference it correctly - she has looked through the literature of parapsychology and has googled the obvious search terms but to little effect, as most manufacturers deny any problem with batteries in any temperature variation likely to occur.

Can anyone on this forum think of a good reason for this? I suspect that batteries fail all the time, and devices lose charge, but people do not notice unless they are in a "ghost hunt" situation. I wondered if anyone could think of any rational cause and supply a supporting reference (a decent website would be ideal owing to time pressures before deadline.)?

thanks!
cj x

 

[CFLarsen]

Tell her to come back with a replicable experiment.

 

[Denver]

Other possibilities:

1) Since this is a hobby for many people, there is a lot of used equipment being bought and sold. Some may not be in the best shape (including the batteries).

2) There seems to be a trend of using these cameras while walking (and sometimes rushing) around in the dark. One could reasonably assume this causes a lot of dropped and banged-up equipment. (I have a digital camera I've dropped, and sometimes the display goes out, until I whack it).

3) These things can have a lot of buttons on them. If someone is not familiar with all their functions (and even if they are, but are fumbling around in the dark), they could hit a power-down button. Since there is lore in the paranormal about 'power-drains that recover', they could assume this is what happened, and tell everyone about their power-drain that recovered (when they turned it back on).

 

[TsarBomba]

As a first step, I would suggest a detailed study of the electronics involved in how the devices sence the amount of power left in a battery. I have had numerous experiences where I have turned on a cellphone, camera, camcorder, etc and getting a full battery indication, only to have it go to very low power almost instantly. My speculation is that the default is to show full battery power until the machine can run through whatever diagnostic process is needed to determine how much power is left, which seems to take 5-30 seconds, but this is just my speculation. Before I would do any study of what can effect the power of the batteries, I would want to know how the device's power sensor worked.

 

[Fnord]

How I see it...

In most fundie churches, religionists expect miracles. This expectation is so great, that they attribute 'miraculous' status to ordinary, mundane events. Especially if those events occur at 'holy' sites.

In a similar vein, wooists expect paranormal events. And their expectations are so great, that they attribute 'paranormal' status to ordinary, mundane events. Especially if those events occur at 'spiritual' sites.

So, when a battery fails at a 'magic' location, then it must be because the 'magic' drained the batteries, right?

No, it's called...

Confirmation Bias: This refers to a form of selective thinking that focuses on evidence that supports what believers already believe while ignoring evidence that refutes their beliefs. Confirmation bias plays a stronger role when people base their beliefs upon faith, tradition and prejudice. For example, if someone believes in the power of prayer, the believer will notice the few "answered" prayers while ignoring the majority of unanswered prayers (which would indicate that prayer has no more value than random chance at worst or a placebo effect, when applied to health effects, at best).

 

[Rodney]

How I see it...

In most fundie churches, religionists expect miracles. This expectation is so great, that they attribute 'miraculous' status to ordinary, mundane events. Especially if those events occur at 'holy' sites.

In a similar vein, wooists expect paranormal events. And their expectations are so great, that they attribute 'paranormal' status to ordinary, mundane events. Especially if those events occur at 'spiritual' sites.

So, when a battery fails at a 'magic' location, then it must be because the 'magic' drained the batteries, right?

No, it's called...

Confirmation Bias: This refers to a form of selective thinking that focuses on evidence that supports what believers already believe while ignoring evidence that refutes their beliefs. Confirmation bias plays a stronger role when people base their beliefs upon faith, tradition and prejudice. For example, if someone believes in the power of prayer, the believer will notice the few "answered" prayers while ignoring the majority of unanswered prayers (which would indicate that prayer has no more value than random chance at worst or a placebo effect, when applied to health effects, at best).

And, if you're still not sure what confirmation bias is, see http://whatstheharm.net/

 

[krelnik]

A colleague is working on a (sceptical as it happens) study of a supposed paranormal location and has discovered a consistent pattern of claims of digital cameras, vidcams and other battery powered equipment losing charge. She has a hypothesis this may be related in someway to the situation, temperature variations within the building and outside, or some other entirely mundane factor.

First thing I would look at is battery chemistry to see if there is a pattern. Many consumer electronics use rechargeable batteries, often Lithium Ion. But you also see Nickel Metal Hydride and Nickel Cadmium batteries in some devices. Some devices use standard battery sizes that let you swap in cheap alkalines. See if you can find some commonality amongst the incidents.

If you can't find out for sure the exact battery brand & type, you might make do with the brand & model numbers of the devices affected. Usually a particular camera or laptop is shipped with batteries of a particular chemistry. This is easy to research on the web if the devices are still available for sale.

See if you can find out the ages of the batteries. Again, you could assume they are the same age as the device they are used in if you have no other data. Some battery chemistries lose capacity as they age.

If there is no commonality, and a small number of incidents, I think we're probably in confirmation bias territory. But if you can get a decent number of incidents all involving the same chemistry of battery, then there might be something more to investigate.

Research the performance characteristics of the suspect battery chemistry. Some batteries are fine with being deep discharged, for others that is a big nono. Some have issues with being stored for a long period of time. Each battery type has its own optimal operating temperature range. Find out how much capacity they tend to lose as they age.

Some batteries are easier to "read" the charge of than others. I.e. if the voltage drops in a linear fashion as the battery discharges, its easy to infer the charge state. An interesting example here is Nickel Cadmium batteries, which drop off suddenly at the end of the charge. Some applications like laptops include electronics in the battery pack to compensate for this, they monitor inbound and outbound current to calculate the current estimated capacity. This is called a "smart" battery. Thus if a NiCd pack (that wasn't "smart") suddenly died, I would not consider it paranormal at all. That's what NiCd's do. You just didn't realize how much charge you had left.

Get some information about temperature at the time of the incidents. If it is very hot or very cold at the site, that could easily have contributed. For example, Lithium Ion appears to behave very badly below freezing from what I can see on the web.

I'd also be interested in when the incidents occur relative to the entire "expedition". I.e. do they occur as soon as the person enters a certain room, or after sitting in there waiting for five hours. Simple statistics would dictate that battery failures are much more likely later in the evening, because you've been using the device for a longer period of time. You could probably prove this with some very simple math indeed, i.e. if the incidents all occur 3 to 5 hours in, and the battery capacity is 6 hours plus or minus, whats the probability we've hit the limit at time x?

Good luck with your project!

 

[kerikiwi]

As with all whacky beliefs, the simplest explanation, and most believable, is a choice of:
1. The people making the claims are deluded in some way.
2. The people making the claims are lying.

 

[Olowkow]

Batteries run down for two reasons:
A. Good battery: charge is used up.
B. Bad battery: internal leakage of charge.
Rule: The battery always fails when you need it the most.

 

[RSLancastr]

It seems as though your friend is looking for an explanation for a phenomenon which has yet to be proven to exist. Until it is proven that batteries at this location drain any differently than they do elsewhwere, coming up with explanations is a waste of his/her time.

 

[Soapy Sam]

cj- I think you're right; selective observation.
A similar thing happenes with batteries in flashlights kept in cars or cupboards for emergencies. The emergency happens and the batteries die- because they were put in two years ago. They would have died any time they were used- but of course they were used during a crisis- which makes it memorable when they fail. This is why we have fire drills.

 

[cj.23]

Thanks to everyone who replied, and especially to Soapy Sam for being kind enough to not think me nuts. Especial thanks to krelnik for the superb
information which was exactly what we needed.

A quick clarification - the colleague collected over 150 separate independent testimonies from groups and individuals over a three year period who had stayed in what they believed to be a haunted building following its appearance in a well known paranormal TV show, and then anonymized the data and performed an analysis to use grounded theory to derive categories of supposed 'paranormal instances'. She then rationally looked at how and why each purported phenomena arose, and was related to the version of the "haunting" promulgated by the tV show in question, etc, etc.

It's fascinating reading actually.
cj x

 

[kerikiwi]

She then rationally looked at how and why each purported phenomena arose, and was related to the version of the "haunting" promulgated by the tV show in question, etc, etc.

Wouldn't it make sense to establish first whether any phenomena arose at all, rather than being delusions or lies?

 

[Aerik]

What I want to hear is where is the energy really going?

The funny thing is, the energy has to travel through the body of the device and through the air to get to the ghost who wants to use it. So what we should see happening is cameras melting as a huge amount of heat suddenly flows through them.

Paranormalists have an additional violation of physics to get around and prove is possible, which is that somehow the ghost is able to pull mechanical and thermal energy from one place to another without affecting any matter in between. In the very least I'd like to see evidence of static discharge, since the transfer never seems to be too exact in shape and direction.

Also, since all forces in the universe have strengths inversely proportional to the square of the distance between objects, how come paranormalists can never be found even hypothesizing on how close a ghost must be to affect their equipment?

 

[cj.23]

Wouldn't it make sense to establish first whether any phenomena arose at all, rather than being delusions or lies?

This is independent testimony, and yes i am pretty sure the phenomena occurred as reported. "Crisp packet rustled" and "smell of smoke" (in a smoking hotel) or "orbs in digital camera photo in dusty room" do not require much faith to accept as genuine reports of phenomena!

cj x

 

[cj.23]

Also, since all forces in the universe have strengths inversely proportional to the square of the distance between objects, how come paranormalists can never be found even hypothesizing on how close a ghost must be to affect their equipment?

Try Roll, Can we explain the Poltergeist?, 1979 I think.

cj x

 

[I Ratant]

Try Roll, Can we explain the Poltergeist?, 1979 I think.

cj x

.
1982
.
"Explaining" special effects in a movie is simple.
They're special effects created for the movie, to move the plot along.
Whatever these were in the movie, all of them were choreographed by the director and his assistants, with some camera trickery no doubt.
"Mythbusters" looks at these all the time, because doing these is their bread and butter.

 

[Lithrael]

I have had numerous experiences where I have turned on a cellphone, camera, camcorder, etc and getting a full battery indication, only to have it go to very low power almost instantly.

Many kinds of near-dead batteries, when switched on from a long rest, will give you a decent amount of power for a few moments, which then quickly fades & dies. Not sure why, but I have a lifetime of flashlight use on this one... XD

 

[Soapy Sam]

Years ago, I kept an old Ever-Ready rubber flashlight in the car for emergencies. To stop the batteries leaking, I wrapped them in clingfilm (Saranwrap).
One day, my mother borrowed it, promising to re-wrap the batteries when done with it.

She did.

In aluminium foil.

Whether poltergeists were involved in the destruction of a perfectly good flashlight, I don't know. I'm lucky it didn't burst into flames.

 

[Frankenstyle]

Well, if the electronic devices are being used to discover paranormal activity, then I'd expect their batteries would go dead while the device was being used.

In a "paranormal location".

looking for paranormal activity.

The simplest test would be to see if batteries that weren't being used to power anything lose their charge in that location. I'd bet not.