The Fukushima Disaster and Ghosts

[PhantomWolf]

So I found this video by science communicator Kyle Hill about the aftermath of Japan's Fukushima Nuclear Plant disaster.



Quite interesting, especially the parts where he talks about the Ghosts. There is a book about the phenomena by Richard Llyod Parry called "Ghosts of the Tsunami", here is an article and interview. Unsolved Mysteries has also done an episode on the effect.

Anyways, I thought it was quite interesting how the mind can create these things en masse, and yes this could have just been in the Science section, but it's about Ghosts!

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

That was an enjoyable video. I may look for the book.

 

[arthwollipot]

I like Kyle Hill. He's done some good stuff.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Ghosts or not it was quite informative as to how the nuclear meltdown in Japan differed from the meltdown in the Ukraine.

 

[Puppycow]

To be clear, the vast, vast majority of people who died in the disaster were killed by the tsunami, not by the disaster at the nuclear power plant. Some people in a care home for the aged died during the evacuation, if that counts. They likely were not long for this world in any case.

 

[arthwollipot]

To be clear, the vast, vast majority of people who died in the disaster were killed by the tsunami, not by the disaster at the nuclear power plant. Some people in a care home for the aged died during the evacuation, if that counts. They likely were not long for this world in any case.

In fact, exactly no people were killed by the disaster at the nuclear power plant.

 

[Puppycow]

Not directly anyway.

 

[8enotto]

Asain culture is big on linking any tragedy to wandering spirits.

Even the sharpest expert in his field may have a habit of just automatically linking them. But it won't affect his ideas on the science of the issue.

 

[Jim_MDP]

I like Kyle Hill. He's done some good stuff.

He's shifted the past few weeks to more and more ~hour long "office hours" podcast type vids so I've been more discerning of late. But I may get to this one after all, though I had already passed on it the past few times.
He had an entertaining half hour series on the TBD channel (iirc) until a couple years or so ago, done in long multi episode blocks on the weekend, often alternating with blocks of that jackass "crazy Russian hacker" goofball. [emoji3525]
But Kyle was alright. [emoji2]

 

[Axxman300]

So I found this video by science communicator Kyle Hill about the aftermath of Japan's Fukushima Nuclear Plant disaster.



Quite interesting, especially the parts where he talks about the Ghosts. There is a book about the phenomena by Richard Llyod Parry called "Ghosts of the Tsunami", here is an article and interview. Unsolved Mysteries has also done an episode on the effect.

Anyways, I thought it was quite interesting how the mind can create these things en masse, and yes this could have just been in the Science section, but it's about Ghosts!

I like his work. His Chernobyl segments are outstanding and he explains nuclear power processes effectively to laypeople like me.

As for the ghost stuff? Like others have already pointed out, this is just Japanese culture, and standard superstition. The stories told in between reactor segments are actually common ghost stories told throughout history, and he ends his piece was a taxi-driver story that anyone knowledgeable about ghost stories would have been known the ending after the first sentence. A good ghost story has a life of its own.

 

[PhantomWolf]

As for the ghost stuff? Like others have already pointed out, this is just Japanese culture, and standard superstition. The stories told in between reactor segments are actually common ghost stories told throughout history, and he ends his piece was a taxi-driver story that anyone knowledgeable about ghost stories would have been known the ending after the first sentence. A good ghost story has a life of its own.

Yeah and at first I was willing to chalk the ghosts up to urban legends, and understand that I'm not saying that they are real with this, but it does seem to go deeper than just being a story. In one of the articles, I found it went into the Taxi claim a bit more, and from the article, this was not a one-off occurrence, but several taxi drivers reported the same thing, and the reporter claimed to have seen logs that indicated that the journies reported did actually happen. At that point, I have to go from "it's just a ghost story rehashed and become an urban legend" to "they actually experienced something" with the most likely thing being a type of mass psychosis or hallucination where such stories are manifesting themselves in the minds of the survivors. And that I do find quite an interesting concept in that our minds are capable of such things when it comes to trying to deal with these types of traumas.

 

[Myriad]

Yeah and at first I was willing to chalk the ghosts up to urban legends, and understand that I'm not saying that they are real with this, but it does seem to go deeper than just being a story. In one of the articles, I found it went into the Taxi claim a bit more, and from the article, this was not a one-off occurrence, but several taxi drivers reported the same thing, and the reporter claimed to have seen logs that indicated that the journies reported did actually happen. At that point, I have to go from "it's just a ghost story rehashed and become an urban legend" to "they actually experienced something" with the most likely thing being a type of mass psychosis or hallucination where such stories are manifesting themselves in the minds of the survivors. And that I do find quite an interesting concept in that our minds are capable of such things when it comes to trying to deal with these types of traumas.

Agreed. Ghost stories aren't just stories about ghosts; in cases like this the story is the ghost, and vice versa.

 

[Axxman300]

Yeah and at first I was willing to chalk the ghosts up to urban legends, and understand that I'm not saying that they are real with this, but it does seem to go deeper than just being a story. In one of the articles, I found it went into the Taxi claim a bit more, and from the article, this was not a one-off occurrence, but several taxi drivers reported the same thing, and the reporter claimed to have seen logs that indicated that the journies reported did actually happen. At that point, I have to go from "it's just a ghost story rehashed and become an urban legend" to "they actually experienced something" with the most likely thing being a type of mass psychosis or hallucination where such stories are manifesting themselves in the minds of the survivors. And that I do find quite an interesting concept in that our minds are capable of such things when it comes to trying to deal with these types of traumas.

Welcome to my world.

Everything changed when I stopped asking if ghosts are real and instead asked why do people see them?

 

[Wolrab]

Ghosts are real as evidenced by reports that millions of people seemingly cavorting on the beaches of the western coast coast of North America when we all know it is now a radioactive wasteland.

 

[Axxman300]

Ghosts are real as evidenced by reports that millions of people seemingly cavorting on the beaches of the western coast coast of North America when we all know it is now a radioactive wasteland.