Professional or Amature - What's in a Name?

First I'd like to thank A Lady Named Bob for bringing this subject up. 

What is a professional?  Can you be a professional ghost hunter? 

Yes, you probably can, but by accepted definition you would have to meet the following criteria to be considered a Professional:

1. You have pursued your field via long years of intensive and extensive study at academic institutions, and have successfully met all qualifications for graduation at the undergraduate, graduate, and probably post graduate levels. 

So basically, you go to school to become something: teacher, culinary chef, journalist/writer, actor, engineer, research scientist, doctor, etc.

2. You have met the qualifications and requirements of the union, guild, state or federal board, or other self-governing body for your specialty or field of endeavor, and have been granted license or permission to practice your profession – i.e. you have passed all the tests.

You pay your dues, join the club or union, get a certificate or license, and find a job or start your business.

3. Because of your expertise you are expected to conduct your business and/or research responsibly and ethically.  It is expected you will adhere to the best practices for your field because you are qualified and certified.  Utilization of independent judgment is expected.

You are supposed to know what you are doing. And after all of this education, you really should know right from wrong, and be able to "do the right thing", whether or not it benefits you financially.

4. You speak the lingo of the field.  You know and use the specific and specialized terminology for your profession. Also, in some fields, you publish at least a paper every few years just to prove you are up on your qualifications and education.

5. Finally, while many individuals pursue a career out of a yearning or love to do that kind of work, some pursue it out of a yearning or love of the potential for income.  Professionals may or may not have the "fire in their belly", and that fire may or may not die as years go by.

Here are some famous professionals (by definition) who followed the general rules above:

• Florence Nightingale – Nurse, Educator, Activist
• Louis Pasteur – Chemist/Microbiologist
• David Livingstone – Physician/Missionary
• Niels Bohr - Physicist
•  Isaac Newton – Mathematician/Physicist
• Marie Curie – Physicist/Chemist
• Nikola Tesla – Electrical Engineer
• Arthur Conan Doyle – Physician/Writer (He was a professional physician, started writing and selling stories in college, and became a well known Spiritualist and Paranormal Researcher)

Now, here are some famous professionals who didn't follow the rules, but are still considered professionals in the end:

• Peter Jennings – News journalist (high school dropout)
• Steven Spielberg – Director/Producer (studied but never graduated)
• Bill Gates – Microsoft Founder  (studied but never graduated)
• Jane Austin – Novelist  (in her day women just didn't go to college)
• Nicholas Copernicus – Astronomer (dropped out of Canon Law studies in Bologna)
• Charles Darwin – Naturalist/Scientist (Med School dropout who studied Divinity at Cambridge)
• Thomas Edison – Inventor (grade school dropout, home schooled, prodigious reader, suffered from deafness)
•  Albert Einstein – Theoretical Physicist (Considered retarded in elementary school, but received a diploma in teaching; he worked in the Patent Office because he couldn't get a teaching position.  He finally got his physics degree while working in Patents, but wrote on the subject from childhood.)
• Ben Franklin – Printer/Publisher (Inventor, Scientist, Philosopher, Politician  – Renaissance Man!)
• Orville and Wilbur Wright – Bicycle Building & Repair (two men who wanted to fly like birds)
• Arthur Conan Doyle – Spiritualist Researcher (He was a professional physician, started writing and selling stories in college, and became a well known Spiritualist and Paranormal Researcher)

The list goes on, but lines between professional and amateur get blurry.  During their early lives many professionals were considered amateurs in their fields.

What is an amateur?  By definition of the word alone, it is French for "one who loves" something.  Amateurs aren't generally educated in what they pursue, but they love the subject so they become self-educated in it.  In general, amateurs live by other means and pursue their "love" as a hobby.  But that doesn't mean they aren't serious!

We don't take amateur scientists too seriously these days, but, if you look at the lists above, you might notice that there are some very famous people who got their start as amateurs!  During the 17^th, 18^th, and 19^th centuries, it was very fashionable to have a serious hobby which would be considered amateur scientific endeavor.  We may "Pooh! Pooh!" these types today, but a lot of good solid science, invention and discovery has to be attributed to people and their hobbies.

Having said that, if you want to think of yourself as amateur because you don't ask for pay for your passion… OK.  But, if you do study, research, think, consider, think again, and continue to pursue education and information in the name of your "hobby" and it does provide you that "fire inside", then you could be blurring the line between professional and amateur.  The final result is really how the world will view you in the end, not how you define the importance of your pastimes.

I am an amateur at many things and a professional at a couple, but, I pursue my hobbies with professional vigor; I research and study and try to improve my understanding and technique.  You don't need a piece of paper to tell you that you know something, you just need to be able to use what you know to do what you need to do in order to research and discover for yourself.  That's an amateur behaving professionally.


Do you believe in ghosts? 

I kind of do because there is enough evidence out there to make  them a possibility, and I have had some experiences that can only be explained by saying, there is something more - something unseen and extraordinary living in the universe with us. (Well, maybe living isn't the right word, but… you know what I mean.)

With every breath of our lives we see the knowledge of our universe and our place in it expanding.  We also see more questions because it's really like a giant labyrinth: all the twists and turns and long corridors have doors on every side and in every dead end.  You open a door and suddenly you learn something new and wonderful, but you also see more long halls of closed doors ahead through that portal you've just opened.  For every answer we find, a thousand new questions just burst forth to confuse and confound the issues yet again.

A person has to be very careful about how they approach this kind of thing as well.  In our modern day, American culture, psychics, mediums, ghost hunters and the like are considered aberrant by many; we are just a step away from being the old medieval witches, and some states go out of their way to prosecute anyone who dares stand out and say, "I can do these things", or "I like to hunt for dead people".  (If you want to be a psychic medium or a professional ghost hunter, you need to know the laws of the state you plan to live and work in, especially if you want to make a living doing so.)  For example, Colorado is lenient, Montana is catch-22, and North Carolina is absolutely Inquisitional!)   If you want to fulfill your curiosity, you can look up the various laws concerning paranormal hobbies and psychic abilities on a state by state basis.  The problem is that everything is frequently classified in with the old "Fortune Telling" trade.  Even among legitimate paranormal organizations there is a great ambivalence.

As an example in Ghost Hunting and other paranormal stuff, AAPI, has opted not to take any form of remuneration or to ask for such for any part of their services because of the stain scammers have brought to the field.  We will accept donations (usually stuff or equipment we can use), but they must come by free will, not any feeling of gratitude or fear.  We feel it is an outright Flimflam to demand money of people to investigate possible haunting, let alone claim to be able to get rid of the problems if we find them.  Life just doesn't work that way.  Also, too may Con Artists over the centuries have scammed too many people out of their life savings.  Our motto is: "If they ask for money, RUN AWAY!!!"


I know we could all use the cash for tools and supplies, gas and housing when hunting away from home, but there is something very unethical and immoral in making money off of peoples fears. Taking people on a Tour or a Ghostwalk, or compiling and writing books about investigations, or selling stuff on your website to those who chose to buy it (and it better be real stuff), or doing the long lab hours of analysis for those who don't know how or don't want to learn how (for a fee) is one thing, but charging people to learn the hobby is wrong.  Serious people spend their money getting their own tools and taking classes to make themselves better hunters; they don't make 'coffee money' charging others for the privilege of watching them hunt.  (That would be considered a tour, and we even teach people how to use the tools on the tours we give, so ….) I know we would like to get remuneration for giving tours somewhere, but we are NOT going to SELL ghost hunting as a tourist attraction!  There shouldn't have to be a reward (a t-shirt with our logo) for all paying customers who complete the tour!  (Blah! Blah! Blah!)  Having been a teacher, I would much rather run an educational Ghostwalk, something that lets people learn and come to terms with their own fears about the unknown.  It's a lot more fun and a whole lot more interactive believe me!  (I also find the ghosts are sometimes more cooperative as well.)

I personally think less highly of those "proclaimed and self-proclaimed" psychics who want to see the money first before doing their mystical thing.  I know from personal experience that probability is against the fortune teller.  A reasonable psychic can always pick up things from the past or present, but the future changes with every decision and breath we take, so future predictions can never be more than 50 or 60% probable.  Now, if a number of people all give the same prediction, watch out, something big is bucking the probability and it will happen.  Studies have shown this works!  But individuals cannot create this kind of channeled, pre-determined event.  This is something that is picked up by sensitives – a biggie, like 9/11. 
 
As mentioned previously, I've had the great good fortune to know some very good psychics.  I have also met some real LOSERS!  If you want to prove yourself as a psychic ghost hunter then just tell us where to point the cameras and the equipment.  Getting direct results based on your directions is a very good proof of psychic capability.  And I still say anyone can learn how to do it in varying degrees.

Finally, for a dose of reality on psychics, I always like to recommend the Southpark episode where Kyle learns the 'tricks of the trade' and goes head on with John Edwards.  Everything they say in there is true and you should consider the possibility when dealing with professional psychics (especially if they seem shady or too good).


Is it wrong to charge a fee for ghost hunting? Can you be a 'professional' ghost hunter and NOT charge a fee? 

How about Psychics, Mediums, Intuitives, etc.? Should they or can they be a part of paranormal research? Can you use a living thing as a tool, like your recorder? Can the sucess of an intuitive be corroborated by recorded or other observed proof?


Is there some kind of line of demarkation between moral and immoral practices in paranormal research? What is the dividing line between amateur/professional and passion/study/hobby?

Can you even be a professional without some kind of private or government grant to help support your research?