Mail fooled by photo of 'ghost' created with iPhone app (again)

The MailOnline reports on a 'ghost sighting' in Gloucestershire:

The article by Graham Smith explains:

A couple claim their house is haunted after capturing what they believe to be an apparition of a baby ghost on camera.

Shocked John Gore, 43, was taking photographs of his pet cats when he noticed the bizarre outline of a small ghostly figure.

The shape - which looks like a toddler or baby - appears to be stand next to an armchair in the living room of the house Mr Gore shares with his girlfriend Sonia Jones in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

The couple have now given the ghost the nickname 'Johnny Junior'.

Neighbours have since told the couple that a baby died from cot death in their home a number of years ago.

Mr Gore and Miss Jones have also noticed the room’s lights turning on and off and the television changing channels on its own in a series of spooky goings-on at the house.

There isn't much scepticism in the report, which is a repackaged version of a Gloucestershire Echo article, which began:

A ghostly figure has been captured on camera in a Cheltenham house.

It has?

Well, no. Yesterday, a follow up report in the Echo revealed it was a fake:

it turns out the image taken at his home...was altered by an application for an iPhone. 

According to some ghost-watching websites (see here and here), the application used to create the picture was GhostCapture (the 'ghost' used is the figure in black on the right-hand side of this image).

If GhostCapture sounds familiar, it's because the Mail (and the Sun) were fooled by an image created using the same app over two years ago.

But will the Mail follow the Echo's lead and now admit it is a fake?

The Mail's 'wildly speculative' claims about a Chinese city 'mirage'

On 26 June, the Mail website ran this headline:


The byline is Daily Mail Reporter - probably because no-one would want to admit to writing this:

Residents in a Chinese city have been stunned after a giant mirage of a 'ghost city' towered across the skyline.

The apparition appeared earlier this month after heavy rainfall and humid conditions along the Xin'an River in Huanshan City in East China.

Tall buildings, mountains and trees appeared to rise up through the ghostly mist that had descended over the river at dusk. There is usually nothing buy sky across the horizon.

'Usually nothing buy [sic] sky'? Really?

The pictures have baffled experts who visited the city to check that there were not actually any of the building already there.

It is believed that the sight may have been a mirage - a form of illusion that is common in in humid weather...

Although they happen occasionally, the mirage in China is believed to be one of the clearest ever recorded.

All of which makes it sound as if this 'ghost city' really did appear from nowhere - there's not a hint of doubt in the mind of Daily Mail Reporter that this 'mirage' did happen. Yet you don't need to be an 'expert' to think the buildings might actually exist.

The Chinese woman speaking in the video - a silly ITN report that the Mail repeats without question - says:

It’s really amazing. It looks like a scene in the movie, in a fairyland

Looking like a 'fairyland' - because the buildings are surrounded by cloud - is rather different to a 'mirage'. Moreover, there are several comments under the Mail article claiming there was a problem with the translation in the original video.

Here's Australian journalist Auki Henry:

The 'Huangshan city mirage' generated some wildly speculative claims amidst a whirlwind of media misinformation and hype. In a nutshell the reality was bad chinese translation combined with hyper-sensationalist reporting. All the buildings in the footage are real buildings, not visions, mirages or illusions, they actually physically stand exactly where they were filmed. The only thing out of the ordinary here is they are surrounded by floodwater and mist.

And Henry produces a graphic, clearly showing the buildings are indeed real.

Which might go some way to explaining why this is such a 'clear' recording of this, ahem, 'mirage'.

(Hat-tip to Tim Ireland)

Shock as ghost doesn't actually sell house

Tuesday's Daily Express contains an eye-catching headline on its front page:


It sounds more like a headline from the Sunday Sport than something found in the, ahem, 'world's greatest newspaper'. Anne Diamond was 'sold a house' by a ghost?

Well, although she does claim that the ghost of the previous owner opened the front door when she visited the house for a viewing, that's it.

In fact, that claim of the front page headline doesn't even survive the first two paragraphs of Nathan Rao's article:

Anne Diamond has revealed she was once scared off buying her dream home after coming face-to-face with the ghost of its previous owner.

The TV presenter said she could not bear to live in the house with her children ­knowing it was haunted and so gave it up even though it was perfect in every other way.

And just in case that's not clear enough, there's an actual quote from Diamond:

'I decided not to buy the place after all.'

The story comes from a forthcoming TV show called Celebrity Ghost Stories UK. Surprisingly, it isn't a Channel 5 show, but that doesn't stop the Express mentioning that Diamond is:

a regular guest on Channel 5’s current affairs show The Wright Stuff.

The headline on the online version of the article, incidentally, is 'Haunted house that spooked TV's Anne Diamond'. At least that reflects the content of the article - unlike the attention-grabbing one they've put on the front of the paper.

Houses that look like Hitler, pet-killing poltergeists and saucepans that cause the menopause

There have been some eye-catching headlines in the papers over the last week.

Yesterday the Metro came up with:


Someone took a photo of the house and posted it on Twitter. Jimmy Carr saw it and passed it on to his followers. Some papers then ran the photo, making it yet another 'news story' originating from Twitter. But the Mail added the all important question:

Do you know a house which looks like someone famous? Phone the Daily Mail tnewsdesk [sic] on...

The Sun, meanwhile, didn't need to ask a question in this headline because it was sure that this happened:


Somehow, there have been seven articles (so far...) in the nationals about this nonsense, each one including a video which claims to be evidence of the 'poltergeist' moving a chair. It's not.

The Sun ran a story under the 'Staff Reporter' byline on 28 March and then a follow-up by Gary O'Shea the next day. Today, O'Shea reported that Derek Acorah had 'banished' the poltergeist, who was called Jim.

The Mail has, as usual, been quick to, ahem, 'borrow' these stories from the Sun and run their own not-very-sceptical versions of them. The Mirror and Telegraph have also covered it.

And finally, there was this headline:


It could, of course, only be from the Daily Mail. The article by David Derbyshire begins:

Gender-bending chemicals found in non-stick pans and food packaging are linked to early menopause, scientists say.

And then, mid-way through:

Dr Sarah Knox, who led the research...stressed that the study had not shown that higher PFCs actually cause earlier menopause.

Oh.

NHS Behind the Headlines give their verdict:

The Mail’s focus on saucepans may give the impression that saucepans or other household objects were analysed in this study. However, the study actually assessed levels of PFCs in people in the US whose drinking water may have been contaminated with high levels of the chemicals...

These findings do not prove that PFCs cause early menopause, and they need to be interpreted with caution. The study has several limitations, and further, high-quality research is required to assess whether PFCs affect human female hormones.

And:

The findings of this large cross-sectional analysis should be interpreted with caution. It is not possible for this kind of study to prove that PFCs cause earlier menopause. As the authors point out, it is possible that the findings are due to “reverse causation” and that PFC concentrations were higher in postmenopausal women because they are no longer losing blood through menstruation. This possibility is supported by the fact that women who had had hysterectomy had higher-than-average levels of PFCs compared with those who had not (although as the authors say, this might still be cause for concern).

In addition, the information about the menopause came from survey data carried out by a separate company. The data was not independently confirmed.

The researchers only looked at whether women had gone through menopause, and they categorised these women into one of three different age brackets they belonged to at the time of the survey. As such, the study cannot tell us how old the women were when they reached menopause and whether those who had early menopause (i.e. before the age of 40 or 45) were associated with higher PFC levels.