Leaderboard

I'm going to reply to this from a Project Grendel mindset. Reports: Individual reports are misidentified and faked, no two ways about it. But there is very little useful data in a single report anyhow. What becomes interesting is report clusters by different people that seem to support each other. An added bonus is seasonality of these report clusters as we work on predictability. We have really smart guys working on this. Moon cycle, elevation, date are very important in order to plot the pins on the map. And where do the pins go through out the year? Anothet major factor one must take into account is that the Sasquatch is only one half of the report. With the human representing the other half. No human equals no report. So I'm sure there are very good remote areas where humans just don't venture into often. And yes we find consistency in the reports. Elevation can be predicted fairly accurately from month to month for example. Evidence: Basically there are two types of evidence. Trace and physical. Trace evidence is sign of the creatures passing, which hopefully aids in tracking the creature. Such as footprints or broken foliage. Physical evidence is things like hair or scat. Which could lead to proof through discovery, but may not based on limitations of the specimens themselves. For example Sasquatch hair seems to lack a medulla. Conclusion: So between the report maps worked up by our numbers guys and trace evidence observed in the field. We go out alone or in small groups in our local area in order to collect a type specimen. My own MO is either driving logging roads or riding a horse behind locked FS gates or trails in the back country. We are after a type specimen because we feel it's the most expedient way to provide proof to science. None of these other methods have seemed to have produced results for one reason or another. I have been working with caloric intake numbers for a large primate recently and what I have concluded is that I don't think where they live is conducive for large groups of them to remain in one place long and remain undetected. They must be dispersed loosely and travel often. An 800 lbs primate eats 10% of its weight in vegetation per day. Meat consumption would be in the low teens lbs per day. Any winter prep would be above those numbers per day. We are searching for a needle in a haystack.

Several on this site have maintained that the consistency of existing evidence should lead to the conclusion that there is a cryptid primate, the Sasquatch, extent in North America, and perhaps other places. Existing reports may be of creatures, track ways, casts, other imprints, stalking behavior, tree shaking, rock throwing, calls, scat, hair, blood and other things. These may be documented through personal recollections, trace evidence collection, photographs, videos, sound recordings, thermal images, old newspaper reports, native stories,and various other means. The reports may be due to: 1 – fraud fraud by the informant fraud by other parties 2 – mis-identification and other mistakes mis-identification due to pareidolia and perceptual distortion, poor viewing conditions, wishful thinking, overly brief sightings mis-identification of vegetation, natural formations mis-identification of other known animals mistaken reports due to apparent mental incapacity second and third hand distorted reporting of events 4 – real creature it only takes one real report of a real creature for the cryptid to exist I would like to examine what this claim of report consistency entails, and where it might lead us. My initial thoughts are to look at the following: Types of evidence When eye-witness evidence is useful, and its limitations The pervasive nature of anecdotal evidence in life The real meaning of proof and its (limited) role in science The role of controlled studies in wildlife field research What it means to be consistent To what extent the evidence is consistent What mechanisms might account for any observed consistency What patterns are evident in the reports Evaluation of odds derived from thinking about the evidence What does the evidence and consistency imply for the existence of the creature This could be a big project, and although I have ideas on this, I imagine others have better ones. I will be disappointed to get a rehash of the Patterson-Gimlin film backstory, or evidence-free assertions that it is a "bloke in a suit." I would expect that those who have a good understanding of the existing literature, current and historical, will be able to make the most valuable contributions. If no one else participates, I will have to talk to myself I suppose.

Norseman - This is a place we likely have some agreement. I don't believe the "Finding Bigfoot" techniques produce anything of use to either of us. A knock or whoop might trigger a response knock or whoop. So? We have those. More of same. The knock or whoop is quickly followed by an exit of the area ... no further evidence. No interaction for me, no "target practice" for you. It is "exciting" for a participant, it makes good TV, it engages the interest and imagination, but it doesn't move the science or understanding forward. MIB

Cleaning the Rust from Old Saws and Sharpening the Toolkit Here are some idea presented on the list from time to time. Some are useful and probably true, some are pernicious and probably false, and some of these are used as thought stoppers, bludgeoning folks so they can't think clearly. I will try to give my take on each of these in turn, in subsequent posts. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence There is no evidence Evidence, yes, but there is no proof Eye witness testimony is unreliable Anecdotal evidence is not part of science Correlation does not imply causation Controlled experiment is the only approach to scientific knowledge Consensus gives truth Peer review is necessary and useful Only quantitative data is useful Data quality is so bad, we can not use it

One of DWA's recurring points, one I agree with wholeheartedly, and which is always important to note: The animal has been observed doing things any other animal has been observed doing, lots and lots of times. There are very few outlier accounts of BF doing anything extraordinary. Walking, running, hunting, watching, eating, drinking, hiding, lurking, shadowing, calling, foraging, intimidating, sheltering...these are things an animal does, and the evidence says this is a typical animal, doing typical animal activities. We seem to overlook this completely ordinary story and get hung up on BUT IT IS LARGE, AND SCARY, AND IT WALKS ON TWO LEGS LIKE US!!!!

Mike, under the "reports may be due to" part, could you elaborate more on number 3? You have some good points worth further discussion; such as "fraud" reports, patterns, plus others.

So here's the thing about that- we are probably related. More: You can walk and run all day using a compliant gait. Just take your shoes off and use your toes. That's what they are for. Some helpful reading: 'Born To Run' by Christopher McDougall So that thing- BobH said he was wearing boots. People that think its a suit don't see human feet in the PGF, they see some sort of footwear that is at the bottom of the 'suit'. Now the foxwalk, otherwise known as the 'compliant gait' was really unknown back in the 1960s. Heck, its still pretty well unknown to this day!! The point is, as soon as any modern human that was programmed by the act of growing-up-while-wearing-shoes will do is they will walk by leading with their heel as soon as they have any sort of footwear. This results in a left-right gait rather than inline. This is what a human would have done if wearing a suit. But what we see is that Patty had an inline gait! The fact that this is going on in such an old film is a ready sign that something very unusual is going on. In any of the 'recreations' this simple fact has been ignored. None of the humans in any of the 'recreations' have bothered with the inline gait, probably because they didn't even know they could do it! But somehow Patty did.

Gigantor, Below are my answers to your questions. I bought the FLIR BHS-XR Command unit that has a built-in video and camera. The built-in video capability is one of the reasons I bought this unit, since I wanted to avoid using an external DVR with dangling cables (as I had previously done with a 2G NV unit attached to a DVR with cables). The new unit has just one button to start video recording and is pretty easy to use. The unit looks like a binocular and is handled similarly. While I have used it hiking at night, I rather use it in a tripod either outside or inside the tent. While I like Randy’s setup a lot, I chose my option to be more portable and flexible. The unit does not have audio recording capability. That is one of its disadvantages. When I use it at night at camp, I always turn on my Tascam DR5 audio recorder to provide the audio. Last time I heard the footfalls, I looked for the potential animal tracks but found none. When I arrive at a new location, I always look for animal tracks in the creeks, ponds, meadows, and also around camp (although soil is not the best for tracks on my site). Right now, my focus is on audio and video, but if I find tracks then I will photograph/video them (I will not cast them). Location was brought to my attention by more experienced and seasoned researchers in the state as a place of interest and supposedly past experiences. I visited with doubt, and only on my 2nd and 3rd solo trip, did I begin to believe that there is a signal there. Not sure yet on how many visits it takes with no measureable results, before I move on to a new location. BTW, I agree with others (who posted above) with the statement that a thermal imager video is not going to provide good evidence for the existence of an unrecognized creature to the scientific community. For me, it is about a tool/instrument that helps me see at night and allows me to capture in photo/video what is present around me. The captured images would be mainly for my own corroboration and confirmation of an objective reality, rather than to provide evidence to anybody.