A few Sundays ago, I attended the Long Island Society for Paranormal Research’s second lecture in its history. Because the library in Sag Harbor where the lecture took place was recently deemed by the Society to be haunted by at least three spirits, this event was almost guaranteed to be the most entertaining activity to partake in at two p.m. on a Sunday. The lecturer, Alexis Camarda — nanny, student, paranormal investigator and media consultant — is a lovely 24-year-old girl who had not actually communicated with spirits herself, but has the utmost respect for the Long Island Society’s “scientifical methods.”

I arrived a few minutes late, and entered the room in the middle of an explanation of the photographic phenomenon known as Ghostly Orbs. Apparently, when a ghost has his or her picture taken, they will appear as a bright, round orb, with an appearance strikingly similar to those blemishes on photographs where a speck of dust or water droplet has found its way onto the negative. Traveling orbs, which form either when the ghost is moving or when a spirit is trying to form, resemble the mark left when an eyelash or other thin fibre has gotten onto the negative. The orbs were quite impressive, as was our lecturer’s “debunking” of other Paranormal Societies’ photographs, which often cite semi-transparent “dust orbs” as actual ghost orbs, which the Long Island Society has found to be more opaque. One little lecture attendee asked Ms. Camarda what an Orb actually was, to which the lecturer responded, “It is any round shape really.”

After the orb discussion, we moved on to Paranormal Mist, which is the breath-in-the-cold-like trail or cloud left by a ghost who is trying to form. Ms. Camarda showed us how, although the mist looks identical to someone’s breath or cigarette smoke, actual ghost-mist does not come from the side of the picture, but is centered in the frame of the picture. She then showed us how her fellow investigator had used Photoshop to overlay his own cigarette smoke on a photograph to create a ghost-mist-like effect. She assured us that none of their other photographs had been retouched in order to enhance the ghosts’ appearances.

The third method of ghostly detection presented was EVP, or Electronic Voice Phenomena, wherein the ghost uses the “white noise” of a tape recorder to construct its own voice (because ghosts don’t have vocal chords) and utters one or two garbled, breathy syllables, occasionally in response to a question posed by an investigator. Although most of the EVPs sound much like a live, human exhalation, once Ms. Camarda told us what the ghost was trying to say, it became mush easier to distinguish their words. The curious nature of these sounds is that they are not audible to the human ear at the time of the recording, and are only evident when they are magnified many times on a tape.

Although Ms. Camarda has never made contact with a ghost herself, she told us that she had heard footsteps and been “poked in the hip” by a ghost while sleeping with a friend in a haunted hotel room. Unfortunately, Ms. Camarda did not see the ghost because she was frightened of uncovering her face and “seeing some little ghost-boy in the corner.” Ms. Camarda’s assistant, George Mendoza, however, related one of his own recent experiences with the paranormal; he earnestly told me that when he was providing the music for a funeral at the Catholic Church where he works, he felt a hand rest on top of his, and then, moments later, the granddaughter of the deceased began to weep, unprovoked. Mr. Mendoza believes that the girl’s grandmother was saying goodbye to her family during the funeral, and had placed her hand on top of his to thank him for providing her with such beautiful accompaniment.

Although she was not present, Jaret Segovia’s name came up many times in the lecture. As the “sensitive” of the society, Jaret can sometimes feel, see or hear spirits. Although the scientifically photographic and tape-recording methods have never supported Jaret’s feelings, the thermometers sometimes spike or drop in the same region where she believes a ghost to be. Jaret has been seeing ghosts throughout her life. Although she says that she is never told the history of an investigation site, she often knows the histories of those who have passed on in a house as soon as she enters, and exhibits strong emotions when she enters a space where tragedies have taken place.

When Jaret entered the John Jermain Memorial Library in Sag Harbor, she began to laugh as she sensed the spirits of two little boys playing on the children’s floor and running around her; she also sensed an adult man standing in a corner of the library’s basement. And, though the librarian admitted to requesting the investigation of the library because she “wanted to do a program like this for Halloween,” she also said that she and the other librarians have often felt like they were “being watched” when they were alone in the library.

When I asked the Society’s director, Peter Franz, why he believes that a spirit would haunt a house or cemetery in the hopes of being photographed or taped, he explained “everyone’s like a battery, everyone has their own energy. When we die, what becomes of that energy?” Other more historical and revered experts have echoed this sentiment, utilizing proven scientific methods to determine that not only can energy be neither created nor destroyed, but that the human body loses exactly 21 grams of weight at the moment when life is lost. While it seems difficult to fathom that these 21 grams could speak to a tape recorder, or turn into a swirling orb of light when the camera flashes, it is not so far-fetched to think that this weight, this energy, lingers somehow.

The Long Island Society for Paranormal Research conducts investigations free-of-charge; if you believe your home or office to be inhabited by spirits, please visit www.lispr.com to arrange a meeting.