lvc@cbscc.UUCP (Larry Cipriani) (02/18/84)
In my previous article on "The Skeptical Inquirer" I said:
Sometimes, something very unusual has a suprising explanation. For,
example the patrons of a bar in Ireland claimed to have heard the voices
of ghosts. They were ignored for several years until a scientist heard
about this and went to the bar. He discovered that some of the walls in
the bar were over 500 years old. The material in these walls was rich
in magnetic material, and under the right conditions it was able to
record and play back the sounds in the room. The ghosts were speaking
a dialect of Irish that died several hundred years ago!
This was recalled from a very faulty memory device. The article in "The
Skeptical Inquirer" (Spring 1983) actually said:
Another tabloid, the "Weekly World News", reports: "MYSTERY OF THE TALKING
WALL: Experts record voices from 700 years ago." It seems that the
bricks of an ancient tavern in Wales have allegedly stored the sound
of thirteenth-century merrymaking. After the owner of the pub reported
hearing voices and organ music, two engineers investigated the phenomenon
and reportedly succeeded in making tapes of the eerie sounds. A journalist
who heard the tapes said that he could make out voices and music, adding,
"It certainly isn't a hoax. I heard the voices of men laughing and
talking. It was clear enough, but not a language I could understand.
It must have been in some ancient Welsh dialect." One of the researcers
theorized that "the walls contain a mixture of silica and ferric salts
just like those on recording tape. There is no reason why it shouldn't
be able to record sound."
-- Robert Sheaffer
Boy, do I feel silly! Sorry about that folks. The price of "The Skeptical
Inquirer" is $16.50 a year. If it was not reported or reported incorrectly,
I apologize.
Death to Konstantin Chernenko,
cbosgd!cbscc!lvc
Larry Cipriani