Most of us are quick to dismiss claims of the paranormal because of our conviction that healthy skepticism always trumps superstition. Yet the belief in ghosts persists, aided by a culture that fully embraces the unexplainable. An Augustana professor is offering a new theory why ghosts seem to be more popular than ever.

The approach of Halloween proves it's good to be a ghost. They adorn front yards poised to scare trick-or-treaters. Ghost hunters, armed with high-tech weapons, try to flush them out of haunted dwellings like metaphysical pheasants. And they frighten movie audiences on the big screen. The low-budget "Paranormal Activity" has become a box office hit by offering a theatrical taste test of our ability to swallow the spice of spookiness.

"A little bit like the fiery hot sauce that people put on food and it doesn't taste like food anymore, it's just like I can stand more hot sauce than you can, I can stand more horror than you can," Augustana Professor of Religion Richard Swanson said.

Swanson is no believer in ghosts.

"Are there unexplainable phenomena that do indeed occur? Yep. But I expect that there will be a scientific explanations for them," Swanson said.

Swanson says the glorification of ghosts takes on a life of its own, in part, because of our inability to fully accept the reality of death.

"I cherish remembering my grandparents and my friends who are gone, but I don't think that my grandma is going to come and rattle the windows on my house when it's Halloween," Swanson said.

Ghosts are even gaining in the polls. A 2005 survey by CBS News found that nearly half of a respondents, 48 percent, said they believe in ghosts. Twenty-two-percent said they've had personal experiences with one.

"My great uncle's house was built by our family and there's always like noises and creaks and you sometimes hear people talking, I believe like my grandpa is still there," Augustana student Britani Felten said.

Tales of the paranormal have been with us for centuries. But the ghosts popularized in today's culture don't rattle around in some medieval castle. Instead, they inhabit the house down the street: a place where ordinary family life intersects with the unimaginable.

"And they suddenly find a horribly dangerous force that confronts them. That describes exactly what I felt on the morning of September 11th," Swanson said.

Swanson believes much of today's fascination with ghosts is rooted in our deep-seeded fears of terrorists striking out of the blue again.

"So at the very least our nervousness about plots that we can't detect and forces that we can't see or protect ourselves against probably makes us susceptible to stories that allow us to think about that," Swanson said.

To Swanson, the echoes of 9-11 that trigger our ghostly imaginations force us to come to terms with the terroristic demons from our not-so-distant past.

Swanson also dismisses technology's contributions to ghost hunting. He says devices like thermal cameras, digital audio recorders and electro-magnetic field detectors offer no proof of the paranormal.