Stories and content in Weird Darkness can be disturbing for some listeners and is intended for mature audiences only. Parental discretion is strongly advised. Oh my God! My friend Arnie Cunningham cried out suddenly. What is it, I asked? His eyes were bulging from behind the steel-rimmed glasses. He plastered one hand over his face so that his palm was partially cupping his mouth and his neck could have been on ball bearings the way he was craning back over his shoulder. Stop the car, Dennis, go back! What are you- go back! I want to look at her again! Suddenly I understood. Aw, man, forget it, I said. If you mean that thing we just passed, go back! He was almost screaming. I went back, thinking that it was maybe one of Arnie's subtle little jokes. But it wasn't. He was gone, locked stock and barrel. Arnie had fallen in love. She was a bad joke, and what Arnie saw in her that day I'll never know. The left side of her windshield was a snarled spiderweb of cracks.  The back bumper was a skew, the trunk lid was ajar, and upholstery was bleeding out through several long tears in the seat covers, both front and back. It looked as if someone had worked on the upholstery with a knife. One tire was flat, the others were bald enough to show the canvas cording. Worst of all, there was a dark puddle of oil under the engine block. Arnie had fallen in love with a 1958 Plymouth Fury. From the novel Christine, by Stephen King. I'm Darren Marlar, and this is Weird Darkness. Welcome, Weirdos. This is Weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved, and unexplained. If you're new here, welcome to the podcast and be sure to subscribe so you don't miss future episodes. If you're already a Weirdo, please share the podcast with others. Doing so helps make it possible for me to keep creating episodes as often as I do. Coming up in this episode... Is it possible that the human soul has actual weight? One doctor tried to prove exactly that. 50 years before Roswell was the reported crash of a flying saucer in Aurora, Texas, and it remains as much of mystery today as it was then. What would cause a father to have his daughter arrested for a nonviolent crime? We'll make our way back to September of 1880 for a story of forgery, murder, and suicide. But first, the list of places that are supposed to be haunted might be ingrained into your mind. We have abandoned areas, scary old buildings, and any place that holds to it close some memories of a tragic tumultuous past. Ghostly phenomena certainly run the full range of the weird, and it is all largely certainly unsolved in many respects. We can only guess at what's going on beyond cases of hauntings and frightening apparitions. Yet, can some things be haunted that we don't traditionally think of as being such? Does this include vehicles as well? Can cars also become spectral anomalies that haunt and spook those who would encounter them? We begin there. While listening, be sure to check out the Weird Darkness website. At WeirdDarkness.com, you can sign up for the newsletter to win monthly prizes. Find paranormal and horror audiobooks I've narrated. Watch old horror movies for free. Plus, you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you're struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com.  Stephen King's Christine made for one heck of a terrifying book and movie. But what if there really is a car so haunted, so possessed that it's known for killing dozens and dozens of people? Meet the 1964 Dodge 330 Limited Edition dubbed The Golden Eagle, the most evil car in America. The Dodge was originally purchased as a police car for Old Orchard Beach, Maine, but was sold to an elderly local man after the car began generating a creepy reputation. All three officers to ever drive the car died in bizarre murder suicides, killing their families and themselves. The car later became the everyday driver for current owner Wendy Allen's family, but this proved to be problematic, as the car would randomly fling open its doors while going down the highway. Oddly enough, The Golden Eagle never turned on the Allen family as violently as it did so many others. Wendy Allen reports the car has killed 14 people to her knowledge, but it seems the number might actually be much higher. In the 1980s and the 1990s, members of different local churches vandalized the car, and apparently each of the lead vandalizers died in horrific car crashes from 18 wheelers decapitating them. The car's current owner even claims all 32 people from the two groups died under strange circumstances, four of them being hit by lightning. Of all the strange stories related to this car, the deaths involving children are by far the creepiest. Two children, one in the 60s and one in the 80s, were hit by cars and flung across the street to land either under the bumper or on the hood of the Golden Eagle car. Both died before paramedics could reach the scene. The last story is the most chilling. In 2008, a kid was dared to merely touch the Golden Eagle, and a couple weeks later he murdered his entire family, even the dog, and burned his house to the ground. Today the car is in pieces after another church group decided a demon was living in the car back in 2010. The group stole the car, chopped it up, and distributed it to various junkyards. But Wendy Allen's internet cries for help were heard, and most of the parts were found and returned. That same church group has harshly labeled her as the sea witch of Old Orchard Beach, and claims that she uses the car to cast death spells. Allen takes offense to people labeling her and the car as dark and demonic. I say it's just a car that's been passed down in my family for years and people are reading too much into the things that have happened to people around the car. Because look at me, my family, my friends. We're fine, aren't we? If the car was hell-bent on killing everyone, well why isn't everyone dead? There's a wide range of ghostly phenomena out there, ranging from hauntings to spectral apparitions to other even weirder things, and there's no common explanation for any of it, and it all swirls out there beyond our understanding. One very bizarre type of phantom encounter is that of mysterious vehicles that don't seem to be firmly angered within the world as we know it. They cruise about on the periphery of our understanding, inviting many questions but answering few. One of the most well-known of the phantom cars is one that originates in the former Soviet Union and which involves a phantom black vehicle that has come to be known as the Black Volga. Tales of this spectral vehicle go back to the 60s and 70s when in intimidating jet black Volga limousine with white rims, tinted windows, curtains, hoarse on its rear view mirrors and often described as completely spotless or with the ability to accelerate way faster than a normal car was said to roam about all over the Soviet Union and in some cases even Belarus, Ukraine, Poland and Mongolia, terrorizing locals wherever it went. The tale goes that the Black Volga would appear from seemingly out of nowhere to pull up to people, mostly children, and abduct them. Anyone who tried to interfere in this dark business or to even come too close was said to either drop dead on the spot or within 24 hours of the encounter, making the mysterious vehicle a sight that instilled great fear in anyone who laid eyes upon it. In some stories the car is said to be completely impervious to damage as well. One harrowing 1960s report from the Ukraine told of this mysterious black car pulling up to two young girls, after which the doors opened and the two were seemingly sucked in to the vehicle as if it were a vacuum cleaner. The witness, a middle-aged man, ran to their aid and pried the driver's side door open, notably not dropping dead like the law suggested he should. When the door was open the witness was able to see that indeed there was no one behind the wheel at all and the front of the car was completely empty. That was about all that he was able to ascertain before there was allegedly a blinding white flash and the man woke up 24 hours later with a terrible headache. Throughout these spooky incidents no one was ever able to see who was driving the car or cars and this led to rampant speculation over who could possibly be behind the wheel. Some theories claimed that the victims were killed so that their organs could be sold on the black market. Others pointed to a shadowy group trying to sow social unrest while others blamed government agencies or Satanists or some other dark cult. Many locals went as far as to claim that the devil himself was driving the black Volga. In recent years there have even been suggestions that it was none other than the men in black themselves on some nefarious no doubt UFO related mission. Considering that the Volga was an extremely expensive luxury vehicle at the time, only driven by the most affluent, it was thought that whoever was in there was wealthy and or well connected. After the 70s accounts of the mysterious black Volga dropped off considerably so it's hard to ascertain how much truth any of the eerie stories hold if any at all. What was the black Volga? Was it as has variously been speculated some possessed car powered by a mysterious force, the KGB, black market organ dealers, a secret organization, the men in black, Satanists, demons or even Satan himself or is it all government propaganda, fearmongering or merely an urban legend? No one really knows but the tale has sown terror throughout the area. A more modern version of the black Volga from the same region involves a black BMW or Mercedes often described with horns coming out from where the rear view mirrors should be. The car is driven by a mysterious man who will ask for the time only to kill the person when they approach or whisk them off to who knows where. Moving over to the United Kingdom, we have tales of an enigmatic phantom car from the villages of Athleek and Mount Talbot in Ireland. In the 1920s there was frequently reported a spectral motor car that went far faster than anything available at the time and which could phase through whatever got in its way. One article from January 2, 1927 said of the mysterious vehicle witnesses in the locality state that on many occasions about midnight a mysterious vehicle somewhat like a high-powered motor car ablaze with light dashes noiselessly through the roads. There was apparently no driver but seated in the car are a number of white-robed figures. Walls, ditches, fields and plantations present no obstacle to the car. The superstitiously inclined connect the visitation with a tragic occurrence in a neighboring estate when during the recent troubles a landlord and his wife were driving from their homes and died afright. Local inhabitants are afraid to leave their homes after nightfall. In later years we have reports from the 1950s of a ghostly car said to terrorize a stretch of desolate road in Kent County in southeast England. The car was usually described as black and of a very old-fashioned make and model but was said to have the speed, handling and capabilities of something far more advanced. While a driver was usually not seen to be present in the vehicle which seemed to be driving itself there are other reports of a fog-like wraith said to be the driver. One report from October of 1950 said of such an account, driving through Hildenborough at 7am on Sunday a motorist observed another car parked by the roadside in a deserted spot. He saw the shadow of a man outlined against the mist in the driving seat. He got out of his own car and shook the other car violently but the huddled figure did not move. Tonbridge police were told but on investigation they could not find a car on that particular stretch of road and now take the very material view that the silent driver was waiting for the mist to rise before proceeding. In other countries we come to Australia which also has its report to phantom vehicles especially in an area near a town known as Canilla. Here there is said to be a spectral car that tears along the roads at great speed only to vanish into thin air without warning. One incident in 2012 allegedly happened to three MotoGP race car drivers heading from an event at Phillip Island, Victoria back to their hometown in Adelaide, South Australia, a journey of about 560 miles meaning they would drive all night in shifts. At the time of their incident one of the drivers was asleep in the back while the other two were awake in the front. It was about 4.30 am and they were between the towns of Nil and Caniva and the witnesses would explain, I had only seen a handful of cars between Horsham and Nil so I was surprised when I saw a car way off in the distance behind us. It was catching up to us too. I was surprised at the speed this car was catching up. I was already going over the speed limit by 30 km per hour. I estimated it going probably 160 km per hour. Nathan suggested it might be the police so I dropped back to 100 km per hour, kind of futile I know but at least we'd know if it was a copper. Eventually the car caught us up but just sat behind us. There was no street lights being country Australia so neither me nor Nathan could accurately identify the car. But I did notice the headlights on the car were very old like what you'd find on a Model T Ford or Brun if you've ever watched that TV show. They were round and fairly dim. By this stage we'd worked out it wasn't a cop but why wasn't it trying to overtake us? It was a single lane each side, two-way road, so there was plenty of room to pass and I hadn't seen a car going the other way in about half an hour. An overtaking lane approached us so Nathan suggested I move into that lane so the car behind us can overtake. I move into the lane and guess what, the car followed. I then slowed down to 80 km per hour to try and convince him to overtake but he doesn't, he just stays behind. Although now I can't see his headlights at all, the car is that close to ours. The two increasingly worried men decided to open their windows to see if they could discern anything from the vehicle's engine noise but were surprised to hear that although they were tearing along at 80 km per hour and the car was a mere inches from their bumper, they could hear no noise at all emanating from it as if it were completely silent. The witness would go on to explain, back at 130 km per hour and the car is still behind us, matching our speed, still inches away from our back bumper. Both me and Nathan were freaking out a bit now. Why wouldn't the car pass us? Why was he driving so close? We were approaching Caneva by this stage. There's a big street light right on the edge of the town and then street lights all throughout the main street. Finally, we'd be able to identify the car. We pass through the street lights and look behind us. The car had stopped following, right before the street light. It had simply stopped in the middle of the road. We still couldn't work out what kind of car it was but we didn't want to turn around and find out. Interestingly, there is said to be a ghostly 1940s-era big-rig truck said to haunt the same roads near Caneva. Indeed, according to a news report in a 1951 edition of the Argus newspaper, the mysterious truck even managed to run a truck driver clear off the road after it came heading right for him, only to pass through as if nothing was there. The reports would say there was no crash. The maniac truck fused briefly with the big diesel outfit passed through and out. It's hard to say if this phenomenon has any connection to the ghostly car of the same area but Caneva seems to be a fairly scary place to drive at night, either way. Of course, the United States also has its share of frightening accounts of mysterious cars up to no good. One is a mysterious car that is said to prowl around the area of Nixon, Missouri which actually purportedly ran a sheriff, Frank Jones, off the road in 1932 to cause his tragic death and which has, on occasion, also caused other near crashes. Another one is said to haunt the NC 49 which meanders through the low hills between Ashborough and Charlotte, North Carolina. It is said that in the 1940s this two-lane remote road was being navigated by a family late at night when they were approached by an angry vehicle acting very aggressively toward them when a truck came out of nowhere and smashed it clear off the road to leave it a twisted wreck killing the driver. It was not long after this that the stretch of road gained a reputation for having a very fast, very aggressive, phantom car that would pull up behind other drivers at high speed. Most cars will pull to the side to let it pass and, as it does, they will notice that it is a vintage 1940s style Ford which even more oddly doesn't seem to have a driver. This Ford will swerve and veer around to completely freak out other drivers before dissipating into thin air as if it were never there at all, leaving one to wonder if this is the phantom remnant of that long ago crash. A very weird account comes from Kailua, Hawaii in 1982 and was posted on the site Castle of Spirits. The witness claims that at the time she had been out with her visiting cousin just cruising around the area along a stretch of lonely beachfront road, Atlanta Ki. There were no other cars out at the time, but at some point while driving along this road, they looked back and the witness would say, behind us loomed a huge, black, very shiny car. I can only say it was completely out of place and had so suddenly appeared that we were both shocked into silence. We turned from the rear view mirror and looked at each other, not saying anything but both with our eyes wide and the unspoken question between us. That took all of a second. Then we both turned our heads to look out the window and the car was gone. There was no way that car could have gone anywhere. There were no cut-offs or turns or even driveways the car could have ducked into, just one long narrow road. Even if there had been a place for the car to go into, it wouldn't have had time. This all happened in a second. I honestly don't remember what we did or said next. We just got out of Lanakaya as quickly as possible. When I think back on it now, I can't remember having seen any driver of the mysterious black car. More recently still are two accounts given on the site Your Ghost Stories. The first comes from August of 2006 and supposedly takes place in Sunland, California. The witness says that he and a friend had been driving along the isolated Big Tejanga Canyon Road when they had a very bizarre encounter. At one point, the witness says that they stopped by his friend's house to pick some things up and as he waited outside in the car, there would be some weird happenings indeed, when he noticed the indistinct shape of a car speeding down a sharp turn in the road with no headlights on. The witness would say of what happened next, thus. It is a notorious highway for being treacherous for careless drivers, even during daylight hours. No one can possibly drive without headlights.  My first thoughts were that this person must be desperate to try and get out of the canyon like this. Maybe they had trouble with their car's lights but were still attempting to drive this impossible way. Perhaps they were hunched over the dashboard or something. I couldn't believe it and I watched it drive right by my car. When it passed by directly parallel to my side of the car, I looked to see who was driving and I saw that no one was in the car. It was moving very slowly and without any sounds of a motor or wheels and like a silhouette practically see-through. It looked like an old and grayish colored four-door sedan type vehicle. I kept just staring at it in amazement and looked back to see if maybe it had rear brake lights. No, it did not have them either. Then it disappeared like all the other cars into the darkness of the highway. Also rather strange is a case from 2011 in the state of North Carolina. The witness in this case says he was driving home from work one afternoon on a beautiful sunny day. Although the road was smack in the middle of nowhere, in his words, it was such a clear day that he would not have had any sort of sinister or scary vibe from the road. However, all of this would change rather quickly. As he approached one of the few intersections along the route, he claims he saw an antique car coming up off of one of the farm roads, which he described as brown and from the 1930s. He passed the car and says he was admiring the restoration work that must have gone into it, with no feel of anything supernatural at this point. However, he would explain, after about a quarter mile, perhaps a half mile, I looked in the mirror and was surprised to see that the car was no longer there. In most cases, and in most places, this would come as no surprise, but here, the middle of nowhere, there was no place the car could have gone. I came to a place where I could turn around and backtrack to see if the car had fallen into the deep ditch, really the only place it could go. I found nothing. In the ensuing years, I've seen the car on the same road several times, and every time I've seen it, it disappears. This is not to say I've actually seen the car vanish, but I'll be watching the car. My attention is called elsewhere and when I look back, the car is gone, and there is no place it could have gone to. I've told several people and nothing. I've looked for the car parked in a yard or open barn and again, nothing. My wife, who does believe in ghosts, thinks I'm seeing a ghost car. I have no explanation. Up next, some supposedly haunted cars seem to have a mysterious ghostly history that has imbued and permeated them for years. And a recent widow discovers that she's not alone, after all. These stories and more when Weird Darkness returns. WeirdDarkness.com Some supposedly haunted cars seem to have a mysterious ghostly history that has imbued and permeated them for years. From the forum of Unsolved Mysteries comes an account from Halifax, Nova Scotia, where a young man found himself needing a new car right away in order to make his long commute every day after his own car broke down. Across the street from the house of a friend of his was a car that was apparently in good working order, but had been sitting out on the lawn for years. The witness approached the owners of the house about it and they were extremely quick to get it off their hands for a very cheap price. The witness took this as lucky, but it would soon prove to be far from it, as all manner of issues began to surface with the vehicle, such as the electrical system going on the fritz, the radio turning on and off by itself, the speedometer stopping and other minor technical annoyances. However, when he brought the car to a mechanic, nothing could be found wrong with it at all. The witness just sort of chalked it up to the car's age and ignored it, but this is when stranger incidents began to occur, which would graduate into paranormal bizarreness that showed something was very wrong with this vehicle beyond just mechanical issues. The witness says, I started ignoring it and one day on the way home from my girlfriend's house, I heard a weird noise in my back seat. It sounded like paper crumpling up. I looked back and nothing. I also looked around at each window and none were opened. I thought it might have been the wind. I then heard the same noise in between the two front seats. I looked down and nothing. Very confused, I started trying to figure it out. Now I was just coming to a top of a hill and in my left ear, I heard my own name whispered to me gently. I immediately froze and popped my car into neutral so I could coast home. My home was at the bottom of the hill and when I rolled into my driveway, I jumped from the car, leaving the keys behind and crawled through a window to get into my house. Now, there were three incidents, that being the first. The second incident accrued when I was driving my car to my friends to pick up an instrument. I see another friend of mine walking along the side of the road so I pulled over and asked if he needed a ride. They said yes, jumped in and I continued along the way. I arrived at my friends whom I was getting the instrument from and the friend I picked up said that he would wait in the car and they didn't know my other friend that well. I went into the house and my friend started talking to me. I wasn't in there for more than a couple of minutes when I heard the front door bust open and my friend who was waiting in the car come running in yelling for me. Now I was quite shocked as they didn't even know my friend and they busted in like they owned the place. They finally found me and I asked what's wrong. They said they were in the car and they heard the sound of paper being crumpled up and then the same noise in the front and then the seat belt pulled tight and something grabbed their hair. I was absolutely shocked as I had told no one about my incident. Now this proved there was something going on in that car and the final incident occurred when I arrived home one night. I plopped myself on the couch and turned on the TV. I suddenly felt as if something was watching me. I slowly turned to see a tall man in a black suit with a large brimmed hat. Their face was smudged out with no facial features, though it felt like his eyes were peering into my soul. I froze for about 30 seconds, which felt like forever and it slowly disappeared. I rose to my feet and said out loud, I don't want no trouble, I'm just going to bed. I was nearly scared to death. I suddenly seen the apparition appear at the base of my doorway. As I froze, it disappeared. Now the scary thing about this story is that I realized that there is an intelligence behind these spirits. They're conscious. Oh yeah, and I sold the car the next day for a few hundred bucks. Never seen the spirits again. Considering these frightening experiences, one wonders if the previous owners knew about the haunting of the car and that's why it had been abandoned to that desolate lawn to gather dust. The witness does not mention approaching them to ask about it, so we'll probably never know. From the Quora comes some other spooky accounts of haunted cars, the first being from a Stacey Panter who says she once owned a car that seemed to be pervaded by a ghostly force. Immediately upon purchasing the vehicle, she says she could never relax in it, always feeling as if someone were riding in there with her even when she was alone, and she says she even often caught glimpses of movement in the rear view mirror just out of comprehension, but she mostly thought this was just her adult mind playing tricks on her. However, she would soon realize that this was anything but. She says, One night a friend of mine needed to go somewhere, so I allowed him to take my car. When he returned, he was very pale and asked me why I didn't inform him my car was haunted before we left it. Well, I explained to him what I've just said here. He said something very bad happened to someone in that car and felt like maybe someone had killed somebody and transported them in it. I have no real evidence that anything happened in the car, but the fact that I felt that I wasn't alone when so many times I was in it. Interestingly, the same witness claims that a friend of hers also had a haunted car, but seems to have tethered it to a spirit that could not escape. She says, My friend owned a Jeep Cherokee. That's sort of a different story. He allowed me to drive it to visit a friend of mine after he first got it. My friend wasn't home, so I was going to write her a note. I had pen and paper and desperately tried to write her a note and couldn't. My hands would violently shake when I tried to write. I told my friend and when I said I was going to write her a note, he interrupted and said, You couldn't write it, could you? You couldn't do it. I asked him how he knew that and he told me he had the very same thing happen to him. He said he'd been to Walmart the week before in the neighboring town to where I live and a lady approached him and wanted to see his vehicle. He allowed her to check it out and she told him her husband had committed suicide in that car. He'd written an extensive suicide note. The Jeep seemed to drive itself quite a bit and it's hard to explain. As I said, there's more of an explanation as to why the Jeep was haunted than the one I had that time. My friend didn't keep the Jeep very long after that though. Can a ghost be tied to a car just as surely as to a place or building? There's the case of a witness on the same site who says that shortly after purchasing a relatively new red Toyota Corolla, it became obvious that the vehicle was abnormally prone to accidents and it would also get inexplicable scratches on it for no apparent reason. This would all soon take a turn into the realm of the supernatural when he began to see a ghostly figure lurking about the car and sometimes appearing within it. He explains, I remember one day my dad, sister and I were driving to the library. I saw an old man get on the road as we were passing. My eyes widened and my heart came to a halt when I realized my father was not stopping the car. I nearly shouted, fully expecting to hear a thud at any moment. Nothing happened. I looked back but there was no one on the street. Didn't you see that guy? I asked my father and sister. Neither of them had a clue what I was talking about. Ghost pedestrian? Who knows. What really spooks me is what I have been seeing in the car since then. Back in our old house, the kitchen overlooked a living room with large bay windows pointed straight at the driveway. Every now and then, I turn around and see someone's figure in the driver's seat. I'm not talking about a creepy shadow in the night either. I mean, I was doing the dishes after making lunch and there would be a silhouette in there. It didn't disappear when I blinked. I'd usually get distracted for a moment and look again, only to find the car then empty. This happened all the time, at least twice a month. One night, I was driving back home and looked in the rearview mirror.  I very, very clearly saw a man sitting in my back seat. I turned my head but, of course, there was nothing there. I recently moved and the car cannot be seen from any of my windows. I see the car when I get out of the bus and when I take out the trash. When I do, oftentimes I'll see a figure in there. Heck, just last week I went to the grocery store and on my way back to the car, I got this weird feeling. I looked up and there was someone in the driver's seat. It doesn't matter what angle the car is in, either. I've seen the silhouette straight on, from the back and from the side. So, what do you think? Can cars become haunted? Is my car haunted?  This case is rather interesting in that the car itself had no history of violence or death, no discernible reason for why this paranormal activity should happen.  I mean, it has had a few bumps and bruises along the way. That's all. So why should this particular vehicle have this supernatural force attached to it? Who knows? It's an odd case to be sure if it is all true. Some of the entities supposedly haunting cars take on an even more malevolent atmosphere. It almost suggests that these are not the ghosts of the living at all, but rather, perhaps something more demonic in nature. A witness from Canberra, Australia told your ghost stories about a Ford Falcon that she'd recently purchased used, and which was in fairly good condition except for some odd stains on the upholstery, which the dealer wrote off as coffee stains. The strange rather ominous activity happened almost the first time she drove it. She says, I went to pick up my friend from his house and we drove into the Canberra City Center. We were listening to 87.6 FM, a techno radio station, pretty loudly. We started talking about the blood stains, and very shortly after while driving, my steering wheel started to shake. I let go of the wheel and me and my friend were watching in amazement at the event occurring. After about 10 seconds of that, my car decided it would try to ram the car next to me. At this point, I grabbed the wheel to stop the oncoming collision and immediately after the radio cut out with the sound of when an older TV can't find a channel, white noise, I believe it's called, well then after about 3 seconds of white noise, the radio changed to 6.6 AM. Now it might be coincidental, but in my own opinion of the experience, it wasn't. Changing to AM radio is not just a simple change of the signal. You actually have to press a button for it. Me and my mother later found out when trying to get the car registered in Canberra that it was involved in a crash and written off. I know God was watching over me at this time, so I changed my bad ways. And or he was protecting me from the bad spirit in the car, because after this experience the car did not pass inspection as it was rusted. We checked the car, engine, etc. before buying and there were no signs of rust. It did not pass inspection, so we sold it back to the dealers in Sydney for a loss of $500. Ghost? Demon? Or just a wild imagination? A similar story with demonic undertones on the same site comes from a witness called Melinda A. from Atlanta, Georgia. She claims that she always kept a cross dangling from a leather string on her rear view mirror. Yet although she was the only one who used the vehicle and indeed the only one with keys to it, she began to find that cross tossed to the floor when she got into the car each day, after which things would escalate. She says of the strange sequence of events. I found it to be really odd, because you would need to lift the metal cross and leather string that it was hanging from to get it off the mirror. About six months later I found the cross wrapped around the mirror as if the car had rolled several times. It isn't possible to have this happen from driving. The cross has weight to it and it would physically have to be lifted to wrap several times around the mirror. This time I started to get concerned about what could make this cross move like this. I moved about a year later and the same thing happened at my new house. I considered putting up a camera to catch it on film but I never got around to it. The year or so later I was with my twin on vacation and we were in her new Porsche and when we stopped for lunch and when we came back out to the car, her cross had done the same thing. We were both taken aback but just dismissed it. It's been about eight months and she just called to tell me it's happened again when the car was in her garage. At this point I'm really wondering what is going on. In another case we have a report from a Reddit user who, if her account is to be believed, seems to have had a car displaying a full-on demonic possession. It started when her new car began to break on its own at the most inopportune of times. While at other times it would accelerate or slow down without warning or reason, sometimes almost causing accidents. She also began to notice unexplained handprints on the windshield that were made from the inside of the vehicle on the passenger side, even though she was the only one who ever drove in the car. She began to hear the strange sound of water dripping or sloshing about in the car, even though there was no apparent origin for the sound. And when she brought the car to a mechanic, he was surprised to find water inexplicably pouring down from under the glove compartment. Things got odder still when the car experienced a sudden infestation of ants that seemed to have come from nowhere and for no reason she could figure out. Ants were apparently everywhere no matter what she did to get rid of them, and despite the fact that she never ate in the car and kept it very clean, and this caused her to confide in a friend about what was happening. She says of what happened after that, he thinks my car is haunted. With all the handprints, the sudden automatic braking system, the water and the insects, he even brought up a dream I told him about a year ago, which I regret telling him now because he is so sure that a ghost is in my car. The dream is about me and a friend who is a girl, who I know now as my new classmate whom I met at January and now I am giving her a ride home, driving home. I asked my friend who is sitting beside me in the car where we should go next and she tells me that we can hang out at her apartment. A little girl behind us suddenly spoke up and I looked at her. I saw her eyes turn dark as night and she grinned at me, I wouldn't do that if I were you. She said it in a playful voice and I glared at her before snapping. And why not? The demon girl just leaned her head on my friend's shoulder and told me, because a demon is obsessed with you and if you're not home in a couple of days, he'll be mad. That's when I woke up. I only got my car last January as an early gift and I only met my friend last February. The dream happened last year September. I'm just looking for a good explanation for all this because I drive home alone now after my internship ends by 11pm and I seriously don't want to imagine a ghost or whatever invisible it is sitting beside me in the dark. Could this be demonic forces at work? What's going on here? Although we have looked at nothing but frightening cases so far, it seems that that's not always the case. Cars can be haunted by more benevolent forces as well. Take the account of a commenter on Quora who claims to have had a car which she calls Bessie and viewed with a ghostly presence that seemed to want to help. The commenter explains, when you hopped into this car you felt at home, happy at peace. We had Bessie for 12 years and she was a station wagon who loved to travel. My father said he could feel her take over the steering if there was heavy traffic. She kept us safe, she avoided animals safely. Bessie was a perfect lady. She never leaked oil or lost her cool. You could push on the accelerator all you wanted. Bessie kept to the speed limit. The day she stopped and wouldn't move, turned out the boat trailer was loose on the back coupling. My father had time to fix the problem and save a highway disaster. Such cases seem to show that the phenomenon of ghostly hauntings seems to expand beyond just the usual suspects of dilapidated old buildings and locations entwined with the dark past. Such mysterious occurrences seem to be able to pop up in the most unlikely of places, including your own car. So what is going on here? Is this ghostly or even demonic forces at work or is it all just misunderstandings and overactive imaginations? The next time you are in your car, be sure to keep an eye on the rear view mirror and that unoccupied seat behind you. It might not be as unoccupied as you thought. This is the truth. Cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye, spit in my hand, and never mind, that's gross. I'm 65 years old and a recent widow. I've known for some time that there is a ghost or ghosts in my house. We moved into the house in September of 1991. It has three bedrooms, four if you count the little room in the basement, and a full finished basement. We used the basement as a library and a family-slash-playroom. The second week we were here, my little girl of four years and I were downstairs in the family room watching children's programs. We heard footsteps in the hall upstairs, going towards the bedrooms. She asked, who's that? I told her maybe it was her dad coming home early. Easing my way up the switchback stairs and calling hello, I got no answer. I slipped through the hallway checking the girl's rooms and finally the master bedroom. No one. And the front and back doors were locked. I told my daughter that it was the pipes cooling off and she was okay with that. Our cat's squirt liked to stretch out in the hall in such a way that everyone had to step over him. He loved to reach up and grab at our feet as he flipped to his other side. One night at supper I watched him where he lay in the hall facing away from me. Suddenly his ears perked up and then he rolled to his back pawing at feet that I couldn't see as they went over him. He seemed to be watching someone continue toward the kitchen. A couple minutes later he repeated this performance, flipping the other way.  My son chose the small windowless corner room in the basement for his bedroom. For once we could have the total dark to sleep in. About two weeks after the first incident he came up the steps looking just a little puzzled. I thought Squirt was in the library but he vanished when I turned the light on. He further explained that he'd seen a small, dark something on the floor a couple of feet from his bedroom door in the dim light from the stairwell window. Once he saw a basketball-sized orb float through the patio door around the living room furniture and through the closed hall door. As he was on his way to the bathroom he finally went through that door. No orb. He told me about it the next morning. I think we're haunted, I said. My son and I were actually a bit pleased. No one else was. One time while sitting at the kitchen table reading I heard noises in the laundry room pantry which is next to the kitchen. I turned enough to see into the room and my older daughter was in there. I figured she was looking for something. After a bit I asked her if she couldn't find what she was looking for. The only problem was she was at the other end of the house in her room. No one was in the laundry room. Now that everyone's gone but myself and my five cats, we have an agreement, ghost and I. No scaring the living daylights out of me and no burning sage in the house on my part. I may have to rethink that. My bed is queen-sized, plenty of room for me and one or two cats. The room is dimly lit by a small night light so I don't have to turn on a light if I have to get up in the middle of the night. I have poor eyesight without my glasses which I always put on the nightstand. That Friday night I dressed in my favorite knee-length night shirt with just a sheet over me, slightly curled up on my left side, burrowed my head into my pillow and sleep overtook me. My cat, Sorrow, joined me, curling up in front of me. Smudge was snoring on my husband's dresser. A rather odd-balled dream woke me. Lifting my head a bit, the red numbers on the radio clock were visible, 12.04 am. I settled back down to deconstruct the dream as I was thinking through the bits and pieces of it, and it suddenly felt as if the sheet was being slowly pulled down. My legs were bare and I could feel the sheet slide ever so slightly. Goes just putting one over on me, I thought. Then there was a slight pressure on my feet, pushing them down. Not good went through my mind. The pressure spread slowly upward. There was a tingling sensation in my legs as if they were hooked to an electrical nerve stimulator. I didn't feel as if I could move them, was kind of afraid to try. I had that feeling you get watching horror movies when you know the monsters right around the corner about to jump out, all goosebumps. Gradually the feeling eased up over my knees.  The air seemed to be heavy and thick. My breathing was deep and rapid, and my heart was pounding. All I could see was the dimness, the blurry shadows cast by the tiny nightlight. I could hear smudges small snores as he slept on. The pressure and tingling crept to my waist. Every muscle in my body had tensed without my willing it. I had the distinct impression that if I didn't do something it would take my whole body. I couldn't move, so I did the next best thing. One deep breath. QUIT IT. My voice was hoarse, unrecognizable to me. Another deep breath. The sensations had stopped creeping, but the lead blanket and tingling feeling were still there, seemingly waiting for me to give in. A third deep breath. QUIT IT NOW. The sensation slowly crept back down and was gone. My muscles relaxed, and when I spoke to Sorrow, it was in my own voice. One little part of me wanted to pull the sheet over my head and wait for Don. The bigger part of me slapped it, moved Sorrow, and got up to check the house with a quick stop at the bathroom. All was well. Except when I got back in bed, I checked the clock again. 2.24 AM. I know it had read just past midnight when I woke from the dream, because I remember thinking six more hours of sleep, and the whole thing only seemed to last a few minutes. As an after effect, my right shoulder, elbow, hip, knee, and ankle ached for three days, along with a headache in the right side of my head. Let's not meet like that again, ghost. When Weird Darkness returns, 50 years before Roswell was the reported crash of a flying saucer in Aurora, Texas, and it remains as much a mystery today as it was then. Plus, what would cause a father to have his daughter arrested for a nonviolent crime? We'll make our way back to September of 1880 for a story of forgery, murder, and suicide. But first, is it possible that the human soul has actual weight? One doctor tried to prove exactly that. That story is up next.  The lights are out, and you're listening to Weird Darkness. But suddenly, you get that feeling you're not alone. You don't know what might be under the bed, or in the closet, or in the attic, or in the room with you. You don't dare try to sleep now. You're too scared to.  That's just one more reason to have Weird Dark Roast Coffee in the cupboard, because you just never know when you might need it. Weird Dark Roast Coffee contains deep notes of cocoa, caramel, and a touch of sinister sweetness. Each bag is fresh roasted to order by Evansville Coffee, and delivery is free for your first order. Just use the promo code Weird, you can find a link to it at WeirdDarkness.com. Grab a bag before something else grabs you from the dark. On April 10, 1901, an unusual experiment was conducted in Dorchester, Massachusetts. Dr. Duncan McDougall was going to prove that the human soul had mass and was therefore measurable. Dr. McDougall conducted this experiment on six dying patients who were placed on specially made Fairbanks weight scales just prior to their deaths. Dr. McDougall's intention was to weigh each body before and after death to determine any differences measured by the delicate scales. The patients were selected based upon their imminent death. Two patients were suffering from tuberculosis. Five were men, one was a woman. In the company of four other doctors, Dr. McDougall carefully measured the weight of his first patient prior to his death. Once the patient died, an interesting event occurred. According to Dr. Duncan McDougall, suddenly coincident with death, the beam end dropped with an audible stroke hitting against the lower limiting bar and remaining there with no rebound. The loss was ascertained to be three fourths of an ounce. The experiment continued on the next patient with the same results. Dr. McDougall felt he was onto something extraordinary. A quote from the March 11, 1907 New York Times article captures the historic moment. The instant life ceased, the article said, the opposite scale pan fell with a suddenness that was astonishing as if something had been suddenly lifted from the body. Immediately all the usual deductions were made for physical loss of weight and it was discovered that there was still a full ounce of weight unaccounted for. All five doctors took their own measurements and compared their results. Not all the patients lost the same weight, but they did lose something that could not be accounted for. Unfortunately, only four of the six patients results could be counted due to mechanical failures or the patients dying prior to the test equipment being in place. But what about that consistent weight loss? Everything was taken into account, from the air in the lungs to bodily fluids. It still could not be explained. An interesting variation occurred on the third patient who maintained his same weight immediately upon death, but after one minute he lost about an ounce of weight. Dr. McDougall explained this discrepancy as follows. I believe that in this case that of a phlegmatic man slow of thought and action that the soul remains suspended in the body after death during the minute that elapsed before its freedom. There is no other way of accounting for it and it is what might be expected to happen in a man of the subject's temperament. Following the experiment and consulting with other attending physicians, it was determined that the average weight loss of each person was three quarters of an ounce. Dr. McDougall concluded that a human soul weighed 21 grams. Dr. McDougall conducted the same experiment on 15 dogs. The experiments showed zero change in weight following their death. McDougall concluded that this might signify only humans have souls. H. Lovey Twining, a physics teacher at Los Angeles Polytechnic High School, attempted the same experiment on his mice in 1917. His conclusion was in line with that of Dr. McDougall. There was no deviation of weight when the mice died. Dr. McDougall was a respected physician of Hamerl and the head of the research society that was conducting work in this field for six years prior to the experiment. Although this experiment would be considered unethical in modern times, it is still a peculiarity that sparks a lot of criticism ranging from the methodology used to various religious implications. Dr. McDougall admitted that more research needed to be done, but following these experiments, Dr. McDougall diverted his attention to obtaining the ability to photograph the soul as it left the human body. Unfortunately, following his soul weight experiments, Dr. McDougall failed to establish any further scientific breakthroughs. He passed away in 1920. Those who study the UFO mystery are always asked for proof, and the proof is hard to find. The enigma of UFOs is different than any other phenomena, and the proof is elusive. There have been many reports of crashed UFOs, but most of those rely heavily on circumstantial evidence and not solid physical proof. Sometimes, there are eyewitness accounts of physical evidence, but that evidence has been removed, lost or stolen. Such is the case of the Aurora Texas UFO crash of 1897. The case bears many similarities to the Roswell crash of 1947, 50 years later. Because of ever-changing railroad lines and Texas highways, it is a miracle that the small town of Aurora Texas is even still there. And not only that, but it is a legendary historical site, as designated by the state of Texas. Why would a small farming community get such a distinction? One reason, an alien spacecraft crashed there in 1897. At least that is what the residents say, and what the newspaper reports claimed. Although it would be five years or so before the Wright Brothers would make the first controlled aircraft flight, this pre-flight era would become known as the Great Airship Period in Ufology. Whereas many of today's unexplained UFO sightings are assigned to conventional flying craft, that luxury did not exist in 1897. Anything flying that was not a bird, blimp, or balloon could be extraterrestrial. These early ships were a slow moving craft, and so was the one that crashed into an Aurora windmill on April 19, 1897. According to the legend, the craft was destroyed, and the remains of an alien pilot were discovered among the remains. Also found among the scattered debris was a strange material with hieroglyphic type etching. The alien creature was given a proper burial in the one and only cemetery in town. The alien body has long since disappeared. For the time period, news of this event was spread wide and far. Many new visitors made their way to the little town to see what all the gossip was about. Second and third hand stories would soon morph into eyewitness accounts, where the information came from that supplied newspaper accounts is anyone's guess. Local newspapers carried this story. About six o'clock this morning, the early risers of Aurora were astonished at the sudden appearance of the airship which has been sailing around the country. It was traveling due north and much nearer the earth than before. Evidently, some of the machinery was out of order, for it was making a speed of only 10 or 12 miles an hour and gradually settling toward the earth. Meanwhile, United Press International printed worldwide this story. Aurora, Texas, UPI. A grave in a small north Texas cemetery contains the body of an 1897 astronaut who was not an inhabitant of this world, according to the International UFO Bureau. The group, which investigates unidentified flying objects, has already initiated legal proceedings to exhume the body and will go to court if necessary to open the grave, director Hayden Hughes said Wednesday. UPI also picked up the story and the legend was spread far beyond the borders of Texas. There were a number of eyewitness accounts of the incident later published and they all agreed with the basic facts. An unknown craft had crashed into the town, strange debris was found, and a being not of this world was found in the wreckage. One intriguing account, although second hand, came from a 15-year-old girl. Her parents had visited the site and claimed that the alien pilot was a small man. There is also evidence of a military cover-up. Soon after the crash, military personnel came to Aurora. Could they have been responsible for the removal of the alien body? For a time, there was a headstone for the body, but even that has disappeared. All the remains are photographs of the headstone. There has been, at times, lobbying to dig up the alien grave and see what evidence might remain, but townsfolk have kept that from happening. What excitement would run through UFO circles if alien DNA was found there? Maybe it's best to leave the grave alone and let the Aurora mystery remain. Anne C. Chapman went to the First National Bank of Warsaw, Indiana, in September of 1880, to cash a check for $300. The cashier did not hesitate. The check was signed by her father, the director of the bank. During the course of business that day, her father came across the check and immediately pronounced the signature of forgery. He reported the crime and had his daughter arrested, refusing to bail her out of jail. Mr. Chapman was a wealthy man who kept a tight hold on his money. The Daily Interocean newspaper said he was as penurious as a man could be and not starved to death. Reportedly, Annie needed money because her father denied her the basic necessities of life. When friends of the family tried to persuade Chapman to release his daughter from jail, he refused, saying she would only elope if he let her go. After three days in jail, Annie Chapman broke down and confessed that G. L. Smith, an agent for the Singer Sewing Machine Company, had been the forger. Smith was a married man and the nature of their relationship was unclear. Public sympathy was on Annie's side and some believed he had forced her to cash the check under threat of death. G. L. Smith was arrested for forgery, but after four days, he was released on bail. When he left jail, he vowed to have his revenge on Annie for squealing. Smith proved true to his word. On September 28, he climbed the high-board fence that surrounded the Warsaw Jail and waited for Annie to enter the jail yard. When she entered the yard, Smith rushed her, revolved her in hand and shot her once in the heart and once in the head. As Annie Chapman collapsed, Smith raised the revolver to his own head and fired. Their bodies were found lying side-by-side, the blood and brains of both mingling in one common sickening pool. Thanks for listening. If you liked the podcast and you haven't already subscribed, be sure to do so now so you don't miss future episodes. And also, please, tell someone else about the podcast. Recommend weird darkness to your friends, family and co-workers who love the paranormal, horror stories or a true crime like you do. Every time you share the podcast with someone new, it helps spread the word about the show, and a growing audience makes it possible for me to keep creating episodes as often as I do. Plus, telling others about weird darkness also helps get the word out about resources that are available for those who suffer from depression, so please, share the podcast with someone today. Do you have a dark tale to tell of your own? Packed or fiction, click on Tell Your Story on the website and I might use it in a future episode. All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true unless stated otherwise, and you can find source links or links to the authors in the show notes. The Ghost I Know was written by Sonia Robinson for the ghost attic. The weight of a human soul is by Jim H. from Historic Mysteries. The 1897 UFO crash in Aurora, Texas was written by Billy Booth for liveabout.com. Forgery, Murder and Suicide is from Robert Wilhelm for Murder by Gaslight. And Phantoms Behind the Wheel is by Brett Swancer for Mysterious Universe and Austin Coop for Road Trippers. And the selection I used at the beginning of this episode is from Christine by Stephen King. Weird Darkness Theme by Alibi Music. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. Proverbs 17, verse 28. Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent and discerning if he holds his tongue. And a final thought, everyone you meet has something to teach you. I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness. A more modern version of the Black Volga from the same **** A more modern version, virgin car? Yes, no, I don't think so. A more modern version of the Black Volga from the same region, which even more oddly doesn't seem to have a driver. This Ford will swerve and veer around like heck.  It would seem to me the values of one **** It would seem to me the values of one Christian's belief system would keep stories of **** It would seem to me the values of one's Christian belief system and the selection from Kerry and the selection at the beginning of this episode from Christine and the selection used at the beginning of this episode from Christine is of course from Steve and the selection and the selection used at the beginning of this episode is from Christine by Stephen King, unaccounted for all five doctors.  By a muffler. Hey Weirdos, there is a new social media platform in town and I'm inviting you to follow me there. You can find it at WeirdDarkness.Locals.com. Again, that's WeirdDarkness.Locals.com. This is a new page that I've set up specifically for my official Weirdos, where you'll get the commercial free version of the podcast each day, exclusive news and content. I'll be uploading videos there, scheduling live stream events and live chats, and you can make your own posts and interact with me and other official Weirdos. It's bringing all the best parts of YouTube, Facebook and Twitter together in one place. Join me at WeirdDarkness.Locals.com. That's WeirdDarkness.Locals.com. Looking forward to hanging out with you.


My name is Yolanda Dixon. I am a Titan super fan, the Titan goddess. About 10 years ago, I went to my first Titans game and it was a love affair ever since then. When you sit with the guys and they're always talking about football, they're always talking about what the team can do better. Right, so me as a woman, I'm thinking, well, what can we do better as fans? And then I started looking around and there wasn't very many female super fans.  Normally I start getting ready in about three hours before it's time to head to the game. The first piece that I made in the costume was the skirt. And it's actually made out of bedsheets. My shield, this is made out of foam, foam paper. I kind of piece red paper until I got the perfect shape of the flames and then I painted it and put glitter on it. The blue hair, because we do everything two-tone blue, I bought it off of Amazon. I bought the corset and sewed Titan pieces on it but everything else is made from scrap. Of course, being the Titan goddess, I have to roll up to the game in style. So I roll up in my chariot, the Titan mobile. It has lights when you open the doors. It has a Titan symbol light in the inside. It has blue lights on the floor. It's Titan all the way. I can't see anything else. God is worthy. It brings me to the games in style.  And I feel absolutely honored to be a fan. So a super fan, why not? Titan's Rock, I wanna rock too. And I have one thing I'd love to say to Titan Nation. Titan!


Hi everyone, Joe for JasperJasperysCaseBreaks.com coming at you with a pack of capstone at baseball. Yes, this unlocks the inception promo and, or the inception break, and this group will be part of the promo if we can get that promo done tonight. Remember, I did cancel, we were supposed to do inception six as well. Right, the second half of this case, we don't have to do that anymore. So double check the break schedule that's pinned in the chat. It'll tell you what breaks we need to do. So we cut out a break, same amount of money being given away if we can get it done by tonight. So let's try to, you know, let's try to work together to meet in the middle, try to make this happen. Thanks everybody. Now, for the inception, what we're gonna do, there's a few different dice rolls happening here. First of all, we're gonna give away some extra spots. Put the team list right here as well. So that's our first of three dice rolls. Let's do that first. So top five, you're gonna get extra pack spots. After nine, six and a three, nine times. All right, after nine, top six is gonna be Paul, Eric, Serenity, Travis, Simon, Simon. Sorry, Brian. It's top five, after nine. But don't worry everybody, you're still involved in the rest. It's just that this group, it's some extra things happening there. Electroids, all teams are in. And now let's roll it, randomize it five and a one, six times for names and teams. One, two, three, four, five, and a one, six and final time. Brian down to Simon. And this is just for the pack break. Five and a one, six times for the teams. One, two, three, four, six and final time. All right, there's the first half of the list right here. Second half of the list right over there. And let's just print this out. And let's rip. All right, got a new toner here. Got tone, got good tone. We got a hit. We got a Stephen Kwan autograph, nice. Rookie Otto for the Guardians. Excuse me, losing my voice a little bit here. But Guardians, that's gonna be for Brian. Brian H with that one. All right, so nothing too crazy there. Let's flip back to the list over here. Excuse me, losing my voice a little bit here. All right, so let's gather everybody's names for the third and final dice roll. And it's gonna be the top nine getting teams in that order right there. So top nine after, snake eyes, two times, good luck. One and two. So from 10 on down through 30, unfortunately, sad times. But we'll get him next time. Top nine, you're happy because you are in the Inception Break. Serenity is happy, so is Simon. Evan, Simon, Ryan, Paul, Rex, Simon, and Eric. All right, so let's copy the top nine after two. So there you go, so Eric, you have the Yankees. Simon with the Diamondbacks. Rex with the Padres. Paul with the Reds. Ryan with the Guardian. Simon with the Blue Jays. Evan with the Astros. Simon with the Giants. And Serenity with the A's. And we'll put a cap 181. Next to your name. So that means you won that spot in that particular capstone. Fill or pack. We'll see you in the next video. JaspeysCaseBricks.com. Bye.


Blessed, yes, one, truly blessed are they. Praise to the Lord, shining star of grace. Guide us so far along the way, so far.


The ones who are back from lunch. I'm Hudson Jamison. I work for the foundation doing DevOps documentation, kind of adapt developer, just kind of organizing DevCon, doing all that stuff. So I'm really excited to be here. And if you've seen me online, my nickname is Supertacular on there.  Sure. I'm Piper Mariam. Some of you met me yesterday at the end of the day. I maintain a lot of the Python tooling for Ethereum. I've worked with Vitalik a bit on proof of concept implementations for Casper, and just kind of general Ethereum developer. All right. Well, let's get started. We're going to teach you about Solidity today. So Solidity is a high level language for Ethereum contracts. So what that means is so we don't have to go and do like ones and zeros or like low level assembly code or things like that, we have a high level language that makes it much easier for humans to be able to code at a level they understand and then put it through the compiler into what will come out into the Ethereum network. Solidity looks a lot like JavaScript, but with types. It's sort of this interesting amalgamation of the two. This is a very simple Solidity contract. The highest level thing that we reason about in Solidity is the contract object. You can think of a contract kind of like a class if you're used to object oriented programming. And the contracts expose some number of functions. So the code is compiled to the Ethereum virtual machine. Y'all have probably been hearing about that a lot today. Pretty much it's just like it takes the human readable code and then puts it into a bunch of gargling like ones and zeros and makes it so that the Ethereum network can read it in a way that the computer can understand. Once it's on the EVM, it's completely isolated. So that's something a lot of people forget, but once contract code is on the Ethereum network, it can't do things like go and ping the weather.com and get the latest weather. They have to have a human intermediary because it is isolated. There's no outside network or other types of connections. And the reason for that isolation is that everything that executes in the EVM has to be completely deterministic, which is why you can't generate random numbers easily inside of the EVM. It requires some outside interaction. Contracts are very easy to write, but they're very difficult to write securely, especially if you need to house value or other people's funds. This is a pretty straightforward looking function. We've got a withdrawal function for some wallet contract. It checks to make sure that there is enough in the account to withdraw. It sends the funds that they asked to withdraw and then it sets the balance to the new balance. This will let somebody completely drain this contract of funds. This is exactly what happened to the DAO. I have this line underlined because what actually happens here is that this executes, can execute code on the address this is sending to. And since the account balance is only deducted on the next line, that means that that contract can call back into the withdrawal method, which will execute that line again, and it can do this circularly, at least until it runs out of gas, which means that if it can get through 100 loops of doing this, it means it can withdraw 100 times the amount that it has. Oh, yeah, I guess this is amazing. Public functions, let's go over these. They're callable by anybody.  So you make that function public. That means anyone can call it. As we'll see in a second, internal functions are only callable from inside the contract. So as you can see, there's a lot of parallels to many other programming languages here. Internal functions are good for things that you only want other functions to call so that people can't manipulate them and do weird things with them. Cool. Your public functions are the API that you expose to the world. You can think of these as your API endpoints. They're the things that you allow outside actors to interact with your contract with. One of the interesting things that is happening right now is that some standards are beginning to emerge for how we write contracts. You can think of these like HTTP web standards. This is the ERC-20 standard. This is the standard interface that token contracts should implement. There's this small set of functions, but this interface is implemented across all of the major token contracts that are live on the network right now, and that common interface that standard that has emerged is allowing some pretty awesome things to happen. So if anyone's been to the EtherScan website, it's a very popular Ethereum blockchain explorer. You can go there and they actually have a search feature where if any other contract is using the ERC-20 standard, you can search for tokens within that contract. It'll, you'll just be able to put the contract address and it'll tell you, you know, your balance and give you everything you need because it's a standard that's set across any smart contract that implements it. It's very interesting. What we have right here is actually maker tokens, I believe, as because they implemented the ERC-20 interface. And there's some variations people use to do different things with ERC-20, but for the most part, it's pretty standardized. A lot of people are using the same standard which is great that the community can come together and do something like that. One of the cool things that these kind of standards enable is this, which is a completely decentralized exchange where you can trade token pairs on the Ethereum blockchain. Yeah, so the cool thing about this, like why would we want something like EtherX? The reason is it doesn't have a middleman. It's instant settlement or instant, like pretty close to instant settlement and you control the assets.  And the reason this happened was because it wasn't decentralized. They, Mt. Gox was a Bitcoin exchange. They had a lot of people's Bitcoin and then they got hacked and the Bitcoin stolen. If we were using something like EtherX right here, that is less likely to happen because the contracts just all talk to each other autonomously within the Ethereum network. Let's see. Oh, so solidity is about two years old and since then the communities come together and made a ton of tools. You've seen a lot of these today from other presenters and you're going to see more. What we have here on the left is some integrated development environments. So some of the more popular ones are browser solidity. That's a compiler and basically full solidity suite for debugging and everything within your browser. We also have Ethereum Studio and Visual Studio which are IDEs and plugins. And then if you look at the bottom, if you recognize any of those symbols, that means that your text editor has support for solidity syntax or solidity compilation or things like that. If you look at the right, we have tools. Rain earlier today went over Solgraph which is a really, really powerful tool. We also have Solinium which is a Linter, Truffle, Dappel, Populus and Embark which are frameworks for building Dapps. So really you have a ton of different tools to come in and help you learn because it can be a rough ride at first. So yeah, go ahead. So this is browser solidity. This is magic. You can go to this in your browser right now if you can get the internet to work. And write a contract, compile it here in your browser without any tooling on your machine, deploy it to a test EVM running in your browser without you needing to install anything on your machine and interact with it right here on this website. The browser solidity is an amazing, amazing tool and it is a really easy way to get started tinkering around with Ethereum contracts. Yeah, definitely. So I was gonna put a list of resources like, okay, I'm out there in the audience or watching online. I wanna get started, what do I do? What we've done is you go to the Ethereum subreddit. It's like an online form. There's a post that's at the top of the homepage of the Ethereum subreddit and it has all kinds of links. It has a getting started guide. Some of the things that people are gonna be familiar with and that are real easy to use. We have our own stack exchange. So if you're a developer with different languages and you use stack exchange, Ethereum has its own stack exchange that actually has over 3,000, I believe 3,500 questions answered. We also have ethdocs.org, which is a community-built documentation site. We're looking all the time for people to come in, help out with that effort. And we also have, of course, ethereum.org, which has a short getting started. And then on top of that, we have plans in the future to expand on maybe things like examples, tutorials, and then of course, for solidity, there is a solidity documentation that is constantly updated with every release. So it's very, very good resource. On top of all that, you're in there. It's gonna be kind of a hectic at first if you've never used solidity. There's a little bit of a learning curve. So come to our Gitter chat rooms and that's gonna be, I think, gitter.im slash ethereum. We have developers and different channels there at all times that'll be happy to help you get started with Ethereum. So I think with that, the only other thing I have to remind you guys, go ahead and talk about your thing. So I've signed up about 10% of the conference for DevCon 2 Identities. I'd love to get a much deeper sign up. So send me your information. I don't know if we can get the slide. Yeah, this slide can come up. But I will say this, if you walked out early yesterday, you missed the most amazing announcement because what we have here is a memento on the Ethereum blockchain that you can pull up or you can like... So I am issuing one of these to every person here that wants one. They won't be issuable after Thursday morning at 8 a.m. And the idea is this is an experiment to see what can we do with the ability to let people interact with something knowing that they were here at this conference. There are some interesting ideas that I have for what you could build on top of this. One of them might be if there's another hard fork proposal at some point, we could use this as the permissions for voting in one vote to see what this community thinks about that idea as opposed to the entire community of people who own Ether. Might be interesting to see what the difference between those two votes are. That is really interesting, yeah. All you have to do is send me your information. Yeah, Piper's camped out like outside at a desk with some stickers. And if you come over there with your Ethereum address, you'll be in a once in a lifetime opportunity smart contract to be able to provide your input in future events potentially. So, super exciting stuff. I'm really excited about Solidity. If you need any help with it, find me on Reddit. My name is Supertacular on there. It's a great name, it's my, yeah. And then Piper's on there as a... Piper Mariam. Piper Mariam, find him on there too. He's super helpful. We're nice guys, come see us. Thank you.


Let's talk about fear. Now, what is fear? Fear is an emotion, a primal emotion that's made through the limbic brain, which is a really old part of the brain. It's one of the most primal emotions that we feel and it helps us survive.  Because fear keeps you away from danger. Things that you fear are usually things that are dangerous or threaten your well-being. So the caveman will have fear to save a toothed tiger and run up a tree. This is to protect you. Now the difference between the caveman and modern-day man is the times we're living in. In the 21st century, if you're living in the first world, you generally don't have too much to be afraid of. There's security and a sense of stability in your life. Food is there in great abundance. You have clean drinking water. You don't have killers running around outside or save a toothed tiger.  You don't have to always watch your back. There isn't that many things to be afraid of as opposed to back in the day. Now, however, despite there being a lack of things to fear, the fear is still there. We still feel it, evidently. The thing is, it's taken up a different form. It's manifested itself through different means. Previously, you were afraid of the saved toothed tiger. Now you're afraid of confronting your boss for that new race. Previously, you were afraid of times of drought and famine. Now you're afraid of asking that ghetto out. It doesn't matter what the situation is, that fear or the emotion in its intensity is still there at large. However, us as 21st century human beings with our neocortex can choose to rationally think and make a decision. We have the power to make decisions to feel the fear and do it anyway. We have the choice and we can make it. We can exercise our free will in doing that. So with the understanding that the world we live in is relatively safe, why should you be scared of taking, you know, the next step of taking a little bit of extra risk or being able to take yourself outside the comfort zone? Inevitably, when you take yourself outside the comfort zone, you will feel the fear. It's natural, but you need to understand and think about what is more important to you. You need to know that it's only through going outside your comfort zone that you're able to evolve and prosper as a human being as you're able to potentially reach self-actualization because you're pursuing growth.  They know what's going to happen, but there is no growth. They're not in the right environment. They're not challenging themselves. It's kind of like when you go to the gym. You got to put progressive load on the muscle in order to make it bigger. If you lift the same weights every single time for the same reps every single time you go to the gym, you're not going to make any gains. It's the same thing with life. If you're not afraid to take yourself outside your personal boundaries and do what's necessary, you're not going to make it. Now, in what ways do people fear in their modern age? The greatest fear is the fear of the unknown. People are afraid. It's the fear of asking that girl out in your heart beating because you're not sure about what her answer is going to be. It's the fear of quitting your day job and going all in in that new start company that you and your friend have been daydreaming about for the past 10 years. It's that fear. You need to confront it. Know that it's an indicator. Fear is the greatest indicator that you are doing the necessary things that are required for self-actualization. So when you feel it, give yourself a pound of back and face it head-on.  I'm just telling you to face some of life's adversities and some of life's challenges with a bit more boldness, with a bit more confidence knowing that you're not going to get hurt.  So play the game. Feel the fear and do it anyway. Now, this is a common trait of many successful people that have made that leap of faith and they've reaped the rewards. Think of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Arnold Schwarzenegger was born in a small village I believe it was Kothau. When he was younger, he escaped the Austrian army to participate in a bodybuilding competition. This was against the rules, of course, but he did it anyway. I'm sure he would have been scared, but he chose. He exercised his free will and thought that something was more important than the fear he was feeling and that was attended a bodybuilding competition. As a result, I end up again recognized and winning and started branding himself and gaining some fame. He felt the fear and did it anyway and he got the rewards unnecessary. He got the personal growth that was associated with it. Now, Arnold also had to leave Austria and come to America with limited language skills, with limited friends in America, and once again there's fear here, but he faced it and then there was personal growth. All of this made him a great person. He made him the governor of California, the terminator, Anya as we know it today, because this is someone who was bold in his confrontational fear.  That's what I'm asking you to do. Feel the fear and do it anyway. Just do it!


A new poll shows that a majority of voters think Keir Starmer should resign as Labour leader. Among all voters, 37 people think he should stand down now, 28% of people don't. Now you might say that doesn't mean much when it's Tory voters anyway, but it's the Labour voters that I think matter here. 40% of Labour voters who voted Labour in 2019 want him to stand down, 35% of people want him to stay in the job. You can see that the only group of voters who want him to remain Labour leader are Lib Dems. Unfortunately for Keir Starmer, there weren't very many of them in 2019. We can go to the question slightly different. Should he be replaced before the next election, so before the 2024 election? This one is quite significant, I think. So here, let's just focus on Labour voters. 49% of Labour voters want him to stand down before 2024. Only 16% of people oppose that happening. So it's a very small amount of people who are committed to Keir Starmer standing to be the next Labour Prime Minister. Now alongside the disastrous results in Hartlepool, it's polls like these that might explain why the party's Blairites are getting ever more desperate to purge the left. Why? How does the logic work? Because if Keir Starmer has to resign, he'll clearly be replaced by someone else, that goes without saying, and they don't want that to be a left-winger. They don't want left-wing members to be able to vote for that left-winger. They basically want to destroy the power of the left in the party so that if Keir Starmer falls, another right-winger will replace him. I think this is the context in which we should read one particularly deranged op-ed which was published by the political director of the Tony Blair Institute in The Times. So it's titled, Labour Must Encourage Open Debate or It Will Die. Now from that title alone, I wouldn't have guessed this was calling for a massive purge of the left in the Labour Party. Debate purges don't normally go together. However, this is a particularly incoherent article by Ryan Wayne, as I said, political director of the Tony Blair Institute. And after blaming the left for Labour's loss in Hartlepool, which was a seat obviously held under Corbyn, the author writes of the left that wrapped up in identity politics. Their views become incontestable. Arguing against them is a political minefield of terminology where it's very easy to get blown up by the wrong word. The consequences can be fatal. We end up with a so-called progressive party unable to tolerate different points of view, a party where preaching has replaced debate. Whether it's the endless propagating of an anti-Western worldview, fighting over the rights of biological women to have safe spaces, or tweeting a picture of the Ku Klux Klan alongside the Sewell Report, Labour's backseat drivers are drowning out moderate voices. A lot to say about this. So first of all, Labour did not lose Hartlepool because of trans rights. They probably lost it because of Brexit. Also, what's obviously ridiculous about this is to suggest that Keir Starmer is drowned out by people on the left talking about issues he's not necessarily campaigning on. The people who get airtime on the radio and on television, and the news bulletin, most importantly, that's not left-wing backbenches. That's Keir Starmer. What this writer is talking about is Twitter. He's saying there are lots of backbenches who say things on Twitter, which Keir Starmer doesn't agree with. That's not how votes are won or lost. Clearly though, this guy is looking for someone to blame. He goes on. The aggressive left just doesn't get it. Their prescription following the Hartlepool defeat involves resurrecting the spirit of Corbanism and fervor entrenchment in the retweet-inducing, self-affirming world of identity politics. There is only one solution if Labour want to win. This wing of the party must be removed from the front line. No ifs, no buts. Firing Rebecca Long-Bailey and removing the whip from Jeremy Corbyn saw a bounce in the polls, but this isn't just a popular thing to do. It's the right thing to do. Labour must be about much more than internal battles and self-serving, introspective cultural issues. It should be prepared to debate. Again, lots of things to say about this particular passage. First of all, the idea of this poll bounce doesn't really stack up. Obviously, Jeremy Corbyn was suspended from the whip in November. Labour were doing reasonably well in the polls that winter, but that was more because of the deftile which was piling up because of the Tory's catastrophic handling of coronavirus. If you don't believe me, let's abstract Labour's polling from Tory performance and just look at how people were thinking about Keir Starmer, whether or not he was performing well or badly in his job. When the whip was withdrawn from Jeremy Corbyn, the Keir Starmer's ratings really start to plummet. In fact, it was that decision which I think we can probably infer really damaged Keir Starmer in the polls far from pleasing the electorate.  That all for starters a paragraph saying the left have to be purged and then he ends up saying we have to be prepared to debate. The two are not consistent. They are not compatible with one another. If you want to have a party where you have open debate and say, look, Keir Starmer is the leader, he sets the direction of the Labour Party, but we're not scared of having people like Jeremy Corbyn or Rebecca Long Bailey or John McDonnell disagreeing with us because we're an open party. We have the confidence in our ideas as Keir Starmer and the leadership that we can have a grown-up debate. No, this guy is saying, you've got to kick them all out. That's the opposite of a debate. He goes on to say, this is a key tenet of progressive politics and ability to hear different perspectives build on them and reach a new unifying position rather than just sitting on the fence. His main argument is the left must be purged. Labour's leadership must act quickly and decisively, taking a stand against the aggressive left. If they can't debate, disagree, but fall into line. They must leave. It will be painful, which will be an unedifying spectacle and officials will likely be permanent. I mean, for a start, he's kind of talking about democratic centralism. So it's sort of a bit of a Stalinist principle in a way. No, it's probably some good arguments for it, but it's not an argument that he seems to want to make. He's saying, you have an internal debate and the argument is one.  Every single person in the party has to spout the party line. Even on Twitter, you can't say something which the leadership hasn't approved. That's a really, really centralizing idea. Very, very disciplinarian, very Stalinist, yet he seems to think this is consistent with saying the Labour Party needs to be open. What do you think is going on here? What's going through this guy's mind? So, I mean, it's his job to come up with an argument to fit the line, right? So by hook or by crook, no matter how incoherent, he needed to find a way of looking at what's happening right now in the Labour Party and using it as an excuse to purge the left. But look, the notion that the left is making Labour into a party that cannot tolerate disagreement and is dishing out fatal consequences to those who divert from a particular line is so delusional, especially in the context of the Labour Party. Jeremy Corbyn and Corbynism itself actively courted, some would say too much, and tried to include people from across the different traditions in the Labour Party. There were many people in his various cabinets that did not come from the Corbynite or the McDonald tradition, and it was they who tried to destroy him, not the other way around. If you think about this idea of, oh, we have discussions within the party and even if you disagree with the outcome, you take it on board, sorry, is that not what Jeremy Corbyn did with nuclear disarmament? Jeremy Corbyn's one of his most passionate positions is for nuclear disarmament is for ending trident. But when there was a debate within the party and party members, I think it was party members, maybe it was the PLP, said no, we want to be in favour of trident. He said, okay, it's not my position, but it's the party democracy, and I have to respect that. The position on the EU referendum, Jeremy Corbyn is not massively pro-remain. He's historically a Eurosceptic, but that was the party position. That was the way that the members voted. He did that. That's what he respected. And it wasn't Corbyn that purged swathes of the party membership who were seen to divert from the position of the Labour Party establishment at the time. And it was Keir Starmer who, let's not forget, suspended Jeremy Corbyn and Sacked Rebekah Long Bailey because of a tweet. So who here is actually punishing diversity of thoughts? Who here is intolerant of other views and is dishing out fatal consequences for those who depart from the party line or depart from even just the establishment line within the party? And also, who here is invested in identity politics and cultural issues as if cultural issues are not part of what a political party should be invested in. But is it the people who are fighting for better infrastructure, for universal access to services, or is it those who spend every waking moment frothing at the mouth about metropolitan North London elites with their cappuccinos, while providing no concrete policies and no concrete program whatsoever, but just trafficking off this kind of very superficial lines of division that they're trying to outline? So this kind of story that is being told here, it's not grounded in reality, but unfortunately, this kind of flipping of the reality, this direct inversion where people who are incredibly tolerant are being portrayed as deeply intolerant is and people who are deeply intolerant are positioning themselves as bastions of tolerance. It actually is seeming to cut through a little bit. And so I think the left needs to be far more confident in sort of pointing out this hypocrisy and this projection and not acting shy when accused of things that are clearly not true. Let's focus on who this guy is, because I presume, you know, we can get something published in The Times, Connected Guy, political director at the Tony Blair Institute, I presume, well, I mean, you can basically assume, right, that he had Tony Blair's blessing to write this. We know Keir Starmer is fairly close to people around Tony Blair, Peter Mandelson, for example. Another thing we know about this guy, and this is thanks to Solomon Hughes, who's an investigative journalist, is that he formally launched a party, launched a third party. And no, it wasn't even Change UK, because Change UK compared to the party this guy started, was a roaring success. He started the new centrist party called United for Change. I think this is from his LinkedIn, where it's showing that he was the CEO and co-founder of United for Change. Less successful than Change UK, because while they got obliterated in general election, this party never got to the point of standing in a general election.  And now he's saying, what Keir Starmer needs to do is not have any policies. There wasn't a single policy mentioned in that article. He just needs to purge the left and hope for the best.