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I think this thread is just another opportunity for you to tell us what folly the subject matter is. Maybe you should save us all the trouble and answer your own questions. To stay on topic... The Giants are in New York and San Francisco

Well as many of you know I claim to be a believer in Bigfoot, I claim to have heard them, and I claim to have experienced activity, well all that being said what if I was 100% honest. Fact of the matter is I would have to say I seriously have my doubts as to the creatures existence anywhere much less in my surroundings here. That is an honest statement from an honest believer in this creature. I wish I could say I have had that definitive moment, I have had moments that fostered the belief no doubt, but like many of you I am just a believer, not a knower. I have not seen it with my own eyes, nor have I touched it to know what I was seeing was actually real. Ok, well then why just not give up the whole shooting match and lay the idea to rest. Well if it were that easy I sure would have liked to do it sooner, yet I have nothing at stake in this, only more to loose by holding onto the belief, more time, energy, my reputation, my sanity perhaps. If you are honest you might share this feeling and thought process. The power of belief is stronger than we humans can imagine, it can make a strong man cower and a weak man tower. I submit that such a belief, experiences or not, can cloud the mind, or make it see things that it wants to see. So is that all this is? No, if it were just that I would be free simply by relying on the rational mind and the facts. The rational mind is what is not letting this go, because you can see here I have reason to desire to let it go, it is the fact that what I heard in 2013 cannot be explained, what my wife heard also, what recordings seemed to confirm was activity, it all is compelling my rational mind to find another explanation, so far I cannot. That is the issue. To the skeptics I say enjoy your world free of such experiences that would force you into this quandary, but be clear that many of us are here not by our own choice, but by circumstances that most of us wish never happened. The compulsion that accompanies those experiences is what leads people here looking for answers. Of course many of us have not compulsion other than we think this is entertainment. I wish I were here simply for entertainment, simply to blow off some steam or to enjoy a good joke. I am here simply out of a compulsion to find answers to something I thought could not exist, and honestly in many ways wish it did not.

This is how it happens, when you least expect it :

LOL. Hard to argue with that You have whooping cranes in your neck of the woods. It just seems to me that if you hear a whooping noise in a known whooping crane habitat area, that the parsimonious conclusion should be whooping crane, not bigfoot.

My apologies. I thought I had read where you found tracks in your backyard, but it was a sound in your backyard that you could not identify? I'm a bit confused, LCB. Are you a believer, or not? " I am here simply out of a compulsion to find answers to something I thought could not exist, and honestly in many ways wish it did not." "Now factually I have never found any prints to substantiate anything, so until I do, and I know they are beyond hoaxing, until then I remain skeptical of any conclusions I may be tempted to believe." Those two statements don't strike me as clearly congruent. Again, correct me if I'm mistaken, but you reside in semi-rural, semi-suburban Chicago. You heard a noise in your backyard that you cannot ascribe to a known animal, in your experience. You jump from that to bigfoot, yet somehow think this is the rational part of your mind that keeps dragging you back to bigfoot as an explanation?

There will be no final outcome. That is the ultimate comfort zone of the bigfoot claimant. No one can prove that bigfoot does not exist. There will be no moment of reckoning for proponents. The bigfoot charade will continue ad naseum. It will, no doubt, fluctuate in popularity, but it is not likely to go away any time soon. Anyone can easily fabricate a report that ends up on the BFRO one day and in DWAs proof pile, the next. It is not difficult to keep the bigfoot wheels spinning.

I guess the thread was meant to be a place for belief to go by the wayside and for the rational mind to retreat. Not that I am faulting belief, but that I think when it comes to the quest of determining the reality of these creatures we must not be swayed by belief. I started out as a doubter, I was not on the fence, I had religious beliefs that precluded such a creature in my opinion. Slowly I began to consider the possibility a bit more honestly, and I guess I became intrigued by the possibility but it never evolved to more than that. Winter leaves a golf pro pretty bord and I thought I would go ahead and put this topic to rest in my mind, I started reading some books on the subject. Finding Bigfoot was just getting off the ground and I caught myself watching it for entertainment, still I had no strong opinion either way, only a little fascination. This is how belief starts, it creeps into your mind, you entertain it, eventually it persuades you however irrational it seems. The rational mind contests, but it is just too easy to give into fanciful thoughts, now for the most part that is what we see in the bigfoot community, not that many knowers and a whole lot of believers. Some who want to prove they are knowers, say Todd Standing, and others, well they allow that belief and some vested interest in their own reputation concerning that belief to lead them into hoaxing. Hoaxers are generally not people blatantly seeking gain, though some are... you fill in the names....the majority are believers seeking to prove to the world that their belief it true. You would have to say that many sightings might fall into this category, believers who are overly zealous and misconstrue something to be a Sasquatch...and then you have the plain old attention seeking story tellers, any time in this community and you see this stuff over and over, and yes as with Crowlogic you can predict the outcome. Skepticism is the rational position in my opinion, we should be skeptical of this creatures existence, to activity, to anything concerning them. However, when we do encounter a rational and solid piece of the puzzle, as in real tracks we cannot explain other than a living creature making them, well we have to acknowledge that as being rational to consider and leave it at that. This is the approach I see more and more investigators employing, it is what is needed for moving beyond belief and getting down to the brass tacks of what is real and what is construed. So I acknowledge that I am a believer in this creatures existence, but I realize that belief is not substance. Substance is evidence which speaks for itself, the type the rational mind cannot ignore. Does such evidence exist, you decide, I would say it does although in rare cases. The least usable evidence is eyewitness sightings, although they seem to paint a pretty consistent picture. More interesting than the actual sightings is the overall consistency of sighting locations to annual rainfall amounts. The best evidence we have to date is foot print casts and trackway finds, such as Meldrum's first exposure while visiting with Paul Freeman. There are some tracks that defy hoaxing completely. The rational mind knows that something left the print, that is the rational conclusion to seeing a trackway off in a secluded area and out of normal sight. That is the most rational reason to hold onto any belief in the creature, while I am intrigued by the PGF subject, it is hardly something we can prove was a real creature, no matter how many angles we examine that seem to point to that, however, the tracks we look at are tangible and need to be explained. I concur that sounds and vocalizations, no matter how intriguing and unexplained cannot be submitted as evidence. Now do I entertain the belief that they could be real, of course I do, and I have a thread or two devoted to that. I think you see where I am going with this, it simply is pairing this all down to what is a basis for belief.

Your analogy is kind of warped. In police line of duty I would think it is appropriate to inquire as to whether a messed up place was natural or the result of a burglary and the claimant would still have to provide legitimate documentation as to what was stolen anyway. Investigating doesn't mean taking what people say at face value, does it? If the claims are documented then it would be a "suspected burglary" not an imaginary one until the goods turn up somewhere, wouldn't it? Yes, typical investigations conducted by people capable of inductive reasoning do not go like that, that was kinda the point. Right. Point totally made. What the police do, scientists should be doing. But.They.Don't. Unlike the coppers, they refuse to assess evidence that is yelling a conclusion at them. Police may investigate further when there is "tangible evidence" there was a crime. An alleged burglary is just a claim - one with no "tangible evidence" that anything was actually stolen so you would expect the police not to investigate further, wouldn't you? It's a bad analogy because the "scientists" have been investigating Yeti/Bigfoot further and the objective physical evidence up to now is a bust. Like it or not that is significant so you have to either explain why it is or explain your way around it. I would prefer the former - to attempt to understand why, wouldn't you? Science has been on the job, DWA, and in this instance you may not be up to speed on it...

I don't claim to be better than you or anyone else here and of course I understand that all I have is subjective - it is what I am espousing. I'm not here to be cynical... We're all as subjective as each other. All my thoughts, experiences, memories - unless supported by "tangible evidence" (Here, boy! Sit!) - are completely subjective and so are yours, JDL. The best Bigfoot evidence is subjective - not objective. That is an important starting place for any potential re-examination of the whole phenomenon... And science HAS been looking at this kind of thing (ie basically, the science of subjectivity in relation to Yeti, Bigfoot, etc) but many here don't seem to be aware of it. Why not broader our understanding of what Bigfoot is or may be?

I came to this site some 8 years ago as a hardcore proponent of BF. As a result of this site plus other research I have moved to being on the fence. My main thought being, given all the groups out there looking for this thing ( BFFO, GCRO, NAWAC + others ). If the best thing we truly have is the PGF at this point for visual evidence that's not enough for me yet. All the anecdotal evidence in the world does not add up to proof to me at this point. In this day and age people can read all the stereotypical ideas of a Bigfoot and make a report that fits the mold of a typical Bigfoot. Now because their report fits the "mold" it's plausible. Sad as it is to say, I believe In the ability of a person to lie than an 8' primate in America.

If the OP posted this to antagonize proponents (troll), then the best way to find out is for proponents to not respond. If that was the OP's motive, the thread will simply die. If his motive was to disrupt, or pull everything back to existence, it will be obvious - when he is sitting here posting to himself, because no one else is. If you don't like the skeptic threads and feel they are simply trolling,,,, don't participate. I can almost guarantee that these types of posts will stop if the skeptics don't get the reaction they were fishing for.

Perhaps the scientist do not believe the anecdotal evidence that is in front them amounts to proof? Believing it does not amount to proof does not necessarily mean they have not considered the evidence. Just because it's enough for you does not mean it's enough for them.

JDL Your thought on this that every ones perspective is wrong? If you are saying this then you are right since not one person here see these creatures the same. It does not matter what part of the earth we see them there is some thing about them we will never understand... I do not even want to try to understand and there is no reason too. There will always be these arguments among us all who believe and who do not. Yet some how these creatures keep on reaching out to us as a whole in humanity.. We do not ask for it yet they choose too and for what benefit to us as humans. All I can say is that if a people have chosen to exist with a creature that others say do not exist . Well then who are we to change them or to force them to give up their beliefs. As long as these people are living in peace with these creatures then there is no need for them to report them. They have learned to let them be .