Book/Movie/TV ghosts

[matt819]

In books, etc., ghosts are almost always portrayed as being able to walk through walls, or alive people are portrayed as being to walk through ghosts, etc. You get the idea.

And, yet, they are able to stand on the floor or sit in chairs, without "falling" through either.

Is this a paradox?

Discuss.

Oh, and totally unrelated but still coursing through my mind, why is it that plastic bags - the ones for chips, pretzels, etc. - can no longer be crumbled up. You crumble and crumble, and they still open up flat. Kind of hard to hide the evidence from, say, one's spouse.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. I assume they just sort of levitate. nt

[cyclonefence]

2. I think your two questions are somehow related

Maybe ghosts are made of the same plastic as potato chip bags? Or potato chip bags are made of ectoplasm?

A hint: a flattened potato chip bag can live undiscovered for weeks under a chair or couch cushion. Probably a ghost can, too.

[Warpy]

3. In order

Ghosts aren't real. They're a device of fiction and as such, can do whatever the writer wants them to do--or not do.

Mylar doesn't crumple. You can drive a forklift over it and unless it's pumped full of air and pops at the end, it will return to its original shape.

[matt819]

5. Not real?

Tooth fairy? Santa Claus? Speaking of which, chimney. Easter bunny?

[longship]

4. Shirley Jackson's "The Haunting of Hill House"

No floating ghosts walking through walls. However, lots of banging on doors and audible manifestations.

Robert Wise's 1963 film version, The Haunting has a cold spot -- that's called ghost cold (according to ghost scammers Ed and Lorraine Warren). It's still one of the most frightening horror films ever made. And one never sees any ghosts.

"Whose hand was I holding?"

R&K

[lunatica]

6. You're pondering the unponderable

Only a ghost can tell you the answer to that!

And the place for an undestructible chip bag is behind the couch. You can hide stuff there for years.

[surrealAmerican]

7. You can fold those bags into a strip ...

... and tie the strip in an overhand knot. They're much stealthier that way, and take up very little space in the garbage pail.

Fictional ghosts do whatever the author wants - just like fictional zombies, fictional vampires, fictional talking animals, etc. If they seem too implausible for you to suspend your disbelief, maybe they're just not well written.

[Donkees]

8. I'll go with Einstein's ''Spooky Action at a Distance'' :)

[Leith]

9. They Have to Learn It

Like in the movie Ghost. The subway ghost gave Patrick Swayze the key on how it is done. He practiced a bit and got good enough to inhabit Whoopi Goldberg's body.