99% Sure Sasquatches Do Not Exist

[Guest RedRatSnake]

Yep, absolutely no evidence here....

Just to clarify my position, and for the humtinth time on this forum, put all the footprints and tree breaks aside cause they prove nada, what is left to honestly suggest a BF, Sightings ?

Now if you put my head in the sand how am i going to keep a look out for possible BF evidence that might sway my position ~

Tim

[Guest MikeG]

To me, a cryptid is like bigfoot, i.e., a species long-reported, a species that continues to be reported, and a species that scientists have repeatedly looked for but failed to find......... mokele-mbembe

Sorry to drag just one tiny thing out of your whole long post, but this is one thing that I do know something about. I may well be the only person on the forum who has crossed what was then Zaiire (where Mokele-mbembe lived) overland, so I have taken an interest in this for a while. Apologies also for taking this thread slightly off-topic.

It is pretty likely that the creature referred to as mokole-mbembe (in one local language....there are around 900 languages in the DRC) is actually a rhinocerous.

The rhino (strictly, the northern White Rhino) is a creature of the savannah.........open grassland with occasional trees. As the climate has changed over time in the centre of Africa, rainforest has expanded and contracted. This means that in some areas which are now dense rainforest there were once plains creatures, including rhino. This change of fauna has left cultural memories, one of which is of the rhino, which hasn't actually be seen by the local forest dwellers (including pygmies) for many many generations. I have seen film of locals being shown photos of plains (savannah) animals, and naming the rhino as "mokele-mbembe". That was an absolute clincher for me, and when I can eventually find a clip of this, I shall post it here.

I also asked one or two of the guys we met as we crossed Zaiire, and they just laughed. It's a rhino, they said (in French).

In the meantime, how do you get whole lot of people who want there to be an unknown creature behind the "legend" to realise that there is in this case actually a perfectly simple rational explanation which doesn't require something new to science?

Mike

Edited December 19, 2011 by MikeG

[Guest HucksterFoot]

Linnaean classification. :]]] ...I'll be Alright. All's (morphologically similar/subjective/opinion) good.

Snip

good ol' Carolus Linnaeus was kind enough to include Homo troglodytes in his tenth edition of Systema Naturae, to find a precedent for our favorite cryptic primate, BF.

Snip

Bigfoot.

Edited December 19, 2011 by HucksterFoot

[Guest]

There you have it folks: I'm "naive" for asserting my opinions from a position of fact and still we've not seen one justifiable example of a cryptid from Exnihilo that meets his own definition of the term. We have seen more double-speak, misdirection, and obfuscation, however. Carry on.

[Guest Biggie]

I believe in sex. It's been keeping us alive as a species for as long as we have been around. Perhaps I'll walk right on into some awesome sex soon.

As long as you have enough money, just watch out for the cops though.

[Guest RedRatSnake]

Stay in there "Saskeptic" Most folks know what's going on.

Tim

[Guest exnihilo]

There you have it folks: I'm "naive" for asserting my opinions from a position of fact and still we've not seen one justifiable example of a cryptid from Exnihilo that meets his own definition of the term. We have seen more double-speak, misdirection, and obfuscation, however. Carry on.

Au contraire, mon frère.

I have asserted that one is "naive" only if they presume that a human institution (such as science) can be expected to be exempt from the constraints of all prior observations of other human institutions. And no human endeavor is exempt from transpersonal passions and devotions, even though we may look at ourselves in the mirror and reassure ourselves with the platitude "I am objective; it is all those other dolts that are not." To quote one of your fellow scientists:

Concerning the Archetypes, With Special Reference to the Anima Concept

Now religious ideas, as history shows, are charged with an extremely suggestive, emotional power. Among them I naturally reckon all représentations collectives, everything that we learn from the history of religion, and anything that has an “-ism†attached to it. The latter is only a modern variant of the denominational religions. A man may be convinced in all good faith that he has no religious ideas, but no one can fall so far away from humanity that he no longer has any dominating représentation collective. His very materialism, atheism, communism, socialism, liberalism, intellectualism, existentialism, or what not, testifies against his innocence. Somewhere or other, overtly or covertly, he is possessed by a supraordinate idea. […]

[…] Any one who alleges that he is not can immediately be suspected of having exchanged a known form of belief for a variant which is less known both to himself and to others. Instead of theism he is a devotee of atheism, instead of Dionysus he favors the more modern Mithras, and instead of heaven he seeks paradise on earth.

A man without a dominating représentation collective would be a thoroughly abnormal phenomenon. But such a person exists only in the fantasies of isolated individuals who are deluded about themselves. They are mistaken not only about the existence of religious ideas, but also and more especially about their intensity. The archetype behind a religious idea has, like every instinct, its specific energy, which it does not lose even if the conscious mind ignores it. Just as it can be assumed with the greatest probability that every man possess all the average human functions and qualities, so we may expect the presence of normal religious factors, and this expectation does not prove fallacious. Any one who succeeds in putting off the mantle of faith can do so only because another lies close to hand. No one can escape the prejudice of being human.

The giant squid prior to 1857 meets my definition of a cryptid most assuredly -- reported, undescribed, controversial, scoffed at by large segments of the scientific establishment. Yet it was described, only because it had the misfortune to live within a medium that, with the agitation of weather and tide, literally churns the detritus out of its depths and onto the shore for any fool to observe. It's not very different from panning for gold, only it requires no human effort beyond the idleness of a beachcomber.

If only the ground swirled and heaved with the power of Poseiden, who knows what skeletons might be cast out of the infernal depths and onto our doorstep! Yet, the inherent difficulties of the search should be evident to any reasonable contemplation, for BF is alleged to live in an area where even something as large and messy as a fiery airplane crash might vanish without a trace, never to be seen again.

Edited December 19, 2011 by exnihilo

[JDL]

Just a quick reply..

Saw one of the creatures while metal detecting with two FBI Agents back in 1995. Didn't see a man in a suit or bear. Was a flesh and blood Bigfoot/Sasquatch creature. Everyone's journey through life is different, mine changed that day in 1995. 16 years and tens of thousands of dollars later that sighting is still fresh in my mind, the creatures do exist and I'll keep looking for evidence until my last breath. Searching for evidence of existence has been fun and educational, plus you learn a lot about yourself along the way. Whatever your true journey is, go after it with all you've got!

I have learned that these creatures are elusive and there's not many of them, but they do exist! 100%

Frustrating, isn't it? Reading all of these theoretical arguments going back and forth when you've had that singular experience that reveals the reality of the matter. Sadly, I think that when someone suggests that every one of 5000 reports on a database is fraudulent or mistaken, it's a waste of time for any of us who have had face-to-face encounters to offer them as evidence. They need to see one for themselves.

[bipedalist]

Sadly, I think that when someone suggests that every one of 5000 reports on a database is fraudulent or mistaken, it's a waste of time for any of us who have had face-to-face encounters to offer them as evidence.

Word!

[Guest RedRatSnake]

I would welcome a sighting, it seems to be mostly by chance and area, i ain't about to pac up the family and move, so best one can do is pour through the info and pull the weight of doubt along until something happens.

Tim

[Guest exnihilo]

Frustrating, isn't it? Reading all of these theoretical arguments going back and forth when you've had that singular experience that reveals the reality of the matter. Sadly, I think that when someone suggests that every one of 5000 reports on a database is fraudulent or mistaken, it's a waste of time for any of us who have had face-to-face encounters to offer them as evidence. They need to see one for themselves.

It's quite simple for them, actually. The way they see it, there are two types of people in this world, those who have seen BF and those who have not. They wonder how those that have not seen BF could possibly have missed a primate so huge and remarkable for so long, then shift gears and ruminate about the lying, bear-misidentifying, mentally unstable rubes that have the gall to claim to have witnessed the phenomenon. It helps them keep it all nice and tidy, doesn't it.

[Guest StankApe]

And it's the skeptics who get accused of being mean spirited and snarky...........

[Guest]

The giant squid prior to 1857 meets my definition of a cryptid most assuredly -- reported, undescribed, controversial, scoffed at by large segments of the scientific establishment. Yet it was described, . . .

Oy vey . . . First, I suppose you should decide on what you at least think is factual to avoid such contradictions. (Hint, for the severalth time: Pliny described a giant squid in the 1st Century.)

I also loved the "prior to 1957" bit. You certainly moved those goal posts farther than I can kick the ball. By the way, do you have any evidence of those ostracized scientists who expressed their interest in studying giant squid?

[Guest KentuckyApeman]

Oy vey . . . First, I suppose you should decide on what you at least think is factual to avoid such contradictions. (Hint, for the severalth time: Pliny described a giant squid in the 1st Century.)

I also loved the "prior to 1957" bit. You certainly moved those goal posts farther than I can kick the ball. By the way, do you have any evidence of those ostracized scientists who expressed their interest in studying giant squid?

"Pliny described"...yes. But scientifically cataloged? No.

The Kraken lurked among the oceans deep, swallowing ships and their crew.....

Even Jules Verne had heard the tall tales. We now call it the giant squid.

[Guest exnihilo]

And it's the skeptics who get accused of being mean spirited and snarky...........

Ok, I do apologize for that. Not all skeptics are scofftics, it's the scofftics I have a problem with. I myself am fairly skeptical about a physical creature, sometimes more than others. But I think a dismissive attitude towards the phenomenon is unwarranted.