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Stop twisting my words. I said person, not human. Not at all the same thing. What she is, biologically, I'm unsure. I suspect very much closer to us those in the ape camp are willing to accept ... even with a "specimen" on the table. I don't know that for a fact. That's really an irrelevant tangential question, though: I'm interested in just how much PERSON she is, not whether she's HUMAN. You can't learn the quality of another's mind after you've just shot them dead. I'll ask you the same question I posed to UPs: how are you going to react when you walk over to the big hairy "thing" you just shot the life out of and realized that you were WRONG, it was a PERSON after all, and you've just snuffed out a sentient life? Are you going to whine? "But I didn't know.". Are you going to rationalize? Or are you going to man up? In the context of murder, what exactly does that mean? You can't apologize for a bullet. Once sent, there is no calling them back. "Sorry" has to happen before the trigger is pulled, not after. Look at it in the balance. If I'm wrong, what harm is done? If you're wrong, what murder is done? MIB

There should be a thread on how people become skeptics. I don't know about other skeptics, but I used to be a firm believer. In fact, I was just emailing back and forth with an xmember here and we were discussing just that and here is the summary of how I went from believer to skeptic. "Wow, that is interesting about the mermaids. It is the same formula. It seems people want to believe. That has a lot to do with how I started becoming a skeptic. Back in the day, I was completely sold. I had read everything, had a recorded from TV version on the PGF. Belonged to some newsgroups that came by mail (still have this stuff in storage), was corresponding with Green and Krantz. Met up with a local investigator named Thomas Steenburg (he was in Calgary then), and on and on. When I was in university (studying Physical Anthropology), we even had an older prof (no longer teaching but still kept his office) named Vladimir Markotic who I met with a few times to discuss BF, he even gave me a signed copy of his book. Like I say, I was 99% convinced. Looking back, that mermaid formula likely applied to me. But it was the Internet that changed it for me. I was on the early forums, more like a newsgroup back then, heck, maybe it was even the earliest incarnation of the BFF. Anyway, once I was on there and started to get a sense who the people into BF were (aside from the real players putting out books and appearing on TV shows), and more importantly, where they were geographically . I started to see people claiming to have set up research groups in places like Kansas, Texas, New York, Ohio....and all over the eastern states. These guys were all serious and putting up the same type of claims that we were seeing in the PNW and Alaska. That really made me sit up and second guess my own thinking. I was able to accept BF in the PNW or Alaska (talking NA here) but no way in the east. I even had a hard time with Steenburg's claim for the eastern side of the Rockies, though I suppose, because he was an intelligent well spoken dude, I was able to come around to it. Plus, one of the highlighted sightings he investigated (referred to as the Crandel Lake sighting) from Waterton Park was really quit interesting, given the number of people involved. But there you go, I bit on that one too. But overall, the fact that people in the areas I refused to accept BF could be were claiming serious BF activity, well, that made me stand back and second guess my own thinking. Maybe I was just wanting to believe in BF, and I had formed this ideal scenario in my mind that let me go on believing in such a thing. But that, and life, cooled my interest for a few years. The next thing that affected my BF stance was maybe even more of a BF downer haha. I worked in the mountains for a few seasons at a place called Lake O'Hara Lodge (awesome spot, best hiking anywhere). I became good friends with a wildlife biologist staging out of the same staff accommodations I was in. He studied bears all summer and wolves all winter. We discussed BF a lot, I tried to convince him, using all the standard BF believer arguments, but he would not budge, in fact, he gave me a large dose of the reality behind such a thing being possible or not. That really had an effect, though it took me a while to let it sink in. So I ended up moving on from BF, and anthropology, and into a new degree and new career path, which had no relation to primates and such. BF went to the back-burner, but not quite into the trash just yet. In fact, for quite a while. I floated in and out of the BF world. Whenever I saw a new book, or something on TV, I would check it out. I was the go to guy among friends and family for anything BF haha, and I knew all the classic stories, which was great for freaking out the wife on camping trips. But I had really lost any passion for most things BF. Fast forward to a few years ago. For some reason I had wondered what Steenburg was up to, whether he was still in the game or not. So I hit the Google search and started reading up on his status, watched some YouTube video on presentations, and somewhere in all that ended up on the BFF. I had a bit of a resurgence. I delved in to find out if there was anything new, any new evidence in the last ten years. Nothing! But still, I was believing again, I even got pissed at Kit when I read his posts...'who does this guy think he is?' But as I read Kit's posts, and got past my bias, I started to see what he was saying made sense. And he was backing things up, laying it out there so people could follow along. Most didn't, they just piled on, I did, it made me think. And it wasn't just Kit, it was other skeptics too. And it was the believers who really turned my off BF. Their arguments seemed so hollow, so devoid of substance. And slowly I turned from mostly believer to skeptic. If someone took the time to go through my posts on the BFF they could see the transition taking place. " It is what it is. You seem like more of a bystander that has been swayed by argument, than anything else, yes? From this point of view? I have no doubt your a skeptic. Look, in the overall scheme of things skeptics and science have Bigfootdom bent over a barrel........ we have very small victories like Bill Munns on our side. But over all.........it's not even comparable. So from a bystander standpoint it's like rooting for the New York Yankees versus the Omaha Jackrabbits. Rooting for the Yankees is a safe bet..........it's also the popular bet as well. But unfortunately for some of us.............we are not just bystanders. We have experienced something that is beyond the normal human experience. Many peoples walks start there............unlike you. Minding their own business, having no opinion on the issue and suddenly? They have something happen to them that changes their lives forever. I wasn't impressed with Kit's argument, although I thought he was a swell guy personally. But I unlike many many many Bigfoot "researchers" take Science very seriously. And Science has told us for over a century of what they need from us to prove the existence of a new species. As a community? We have failed miserably on this front...........the most important front. Instead we insist Science changes it's rules........just for us...........and accepts our word for it that their is a undiscovered species out there. My mission in life is to first of all, convince the Bigfoot community that they are mistaken and not being realistic in the matter of proof. And for two help that community to gear up to prove the existence of Bigfoot to skeptics and science. That's not an easy job. And like you I'm not 100 percent sure they exist either. But I have seen enough to suspect they are out there, and realistic enough to know what needs to be done to prove they exist. And remember this............just because Sally is seeing one on her postage stamp lot in New Jersey............DOES NOT MEAN that they don't exist in some remote valley in British Columbia. It doesn't negate that hunter or loggers sighting...........it only means that humans by nature are impressionable. And if a BC hunter is seeing one in the wild..........then what is that out my back window at two o clock in the morning in anywhere, USA?

Would you support an alien biologists right to kill me to prove that humans exist so that the earth is not turned into rubble and hauled off to make a galactic parking lot for the Glarcon galactic space council??? I know what I would say if I were you.............. noresman, As a man, I'd stand beside ya ta fight, as a Canadian, I'd have a beer in one hand, my pocket knife in the other(gun restrictions here are a bitch), if...we were ta loose...I'd just hope they'd find you more interestin' ! Pat...