Bigfoot Research – Still No Evidence, But Plenty Of Excuses To Explain Why There’S No Evidence

[Guest Particle Noun]

Find me the 19th and early twentieth century reports of Unicorns and Dragons from the published historical accounts then please.

The skeptical side loves to bring up Dragons and Unicorns, but this is the worst type of straw man argument.

[Guest BFSleuth]

That's a good point, PN. While I'll be the first to admit I don't have RSS feeds for sightings of dragons or unicorns, nor have I searched for modern sighting reports of them, I think it would be difficult to find a sighting report database for dragons and unicorns that approaches the level of bigfoot sightings in modern history. If anyone has knowledge of such databases it might be kind of fun to compare them with the current BF databases.

[bipedalist]

Did they witnesses make claims that the butterflies were flying at 40 mph, went invisible, were psychic, or were plentiful but impossible to photograph? Did the witnesses claim fleeting glimpses of butterflies through thick forest at night? Do you think the scientist's opinion about the sightings might have been different if they had?

Tell you what you put out the sugar cubes or sucrose soaked cotton balls and stake it out, BF likes sweets too. With any luck you will find some new 40mph high fliers on the jet heading to Mexico (Monarchs) while you are waiting. You will need binocs more than likely though. Either way the weather is right.... BTW when is the last time you saw a sleeping butterfly at night? Maybe butterflies do have something in common with BF then huh?

[Cotter]

I would like to say that there were many reports of dragons on several islands....explorers reported back to civilization these existed.

After a time, these dragons were proven to exist.

Now, they weren't the winged, flying, fire breathing type.......

[Guest]

Reason 1.

Most Bigfoot researchers are out of shape. Most bigfoot researchers have no woodsmanship.

Reason 2.

Most bigfoot research seems to take place within an area man has been frequenting for some time. Traveling to very near the research site by car can hardly be considered optimum.

Reason 3.

Groups are bad. They will alert all animals in the area. Unless they are used to people?! See reason 2.

Reason 4.

Whenever convincing looking evidence is found it, drama always seems to follow. Not revelation

Reason 5.

You can make money off of bigfoot! That might end when the mystery does. Probably greatest reason for reason 4.

Reason 6

The people most likely to encounter BF and have the shot at gathering GOOD evidence are not the people who have the best tools or tools at all!

Reason 7

Common sense, logic and insight are rarer than Bigfoot, when discussing bigfoot.

There are more I am sure. This is my proposed pathology of the disease that plagues the efforts to bring this animal into scientific reality. DNA race? Really? I just mailed off my hair samples today. The guy I sent them to said it would only be days. I have alot more samples!

[southernyahoo]

The first step would be defining evidence and the very next thing would be to have standards to sort the evidence. To verify evidence it has to be repeatable within reasonable limits.

Yeah, the evidence is defined, tracks, sightings, hairs, vocalizations, fossil record, video etc. Define the standard that tells you the tracks are real or fake. Define the standard that tells you the defference between real sasquatch vocalizations and hoaxed or misidentified. Define the standard that says the hairs belong to nothing other than an uncataloged hominid. How many times do researchers have to repeatedly find these things and note their similarity to each other? Is it really a lack of cogency in the evidence or lack of repetition?

[Guest RayG]

Though unicorns went extinct in the 19th century, they had such a historical impact that their iconic usage is still evident today.

I myself wore a unicorn on the sleeve of my cadet uniform back in the 70's.

It looked like this:

RayG

[Guest thermalman]

Extinct?

[Guest RayG]

Sure, how else would you explain all the unicorn evidence over the past 1000 years, but the lack of a body?

Coins, crests, folk tales, sightings by credible people (Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, etc.), tapestries, flags, coat-of-arms, drawings, carvings, statues, paintings, and books?

Unicorns were impossible to capture, hence the lack of definitive evidence (proof).

What, you think that was all fake?

RayG

Edited September 12, 2012 by RayG

[ohiobill]

Tell you what you put out the sugar cubes or sucrose soaked cotton balls and stake it out, BF likes sweets too. With any luck you will find some new 40mph high fliers on the jet heading to Mexico (Monarchs) while you are waiting. You will need binocs more than likely though. Either way the weather is right.... BTW when is the last time you saw a sleeping butterfly at night? Maybe butterflies do have something in common with BF then huh?

I have butterfly bushes and binocs, just threw some extra apples over the hill. I can't remember ever seeing a butterfly I could state was sleeping but I've seen numerous moths at night - if the witnesses stated they saw butterflies at night would it be reasonable for the scientist to think they might have misidentified a moth instead? Maybe bigfoot sightings have more in common with moths?

[Guest thermalman]

Didn't you know that they morph into Narwhals?

No wonder you're a skeptic?

[salubrious]

But you didn't actually see a sasquatch clacking rocks together, right? What then, convinced you it was a sasquatch, and what prevented you from investigating the noise as it happened?

When I heard the sound I had plenty of time to go through the list of known creatures in the area and what their abilities were to make the very distinctive sound that rocks make. Conclusion: hands needed. I had already had an experience in Colorado with a BF 10 feet tall- the idea of just walking into the dark against that possibility had some daunting aspects.

Yet in your rock-clacking example you apparently made no attempt to investigate what was making the noise while it was happening only 20 feet away. There was no sighting, no horrible smell, no chest-beating, tooth-popping, grunts, or anything else at 12:30am that suggested it was a bigfoot, so what led you to believe it was bigfoot? And might we say then, that your belief was based on an assumption it was bigfoot, rather than any immediate evidence? That since it doesn't seem likely that other humans would be near the cabin, and there seemed to be no other plausible alternative explanations, therefore bigfoot did it?

In a nutshell, yes. It was a windless and very quiet night. If it was a human, they were pretty stealthy! It is the stealth factor that got me thinking about alternatives.

If I understand correctly, instead of claimants proving that their bits of evidence match up to an actual bigfoot, you want skeptics to disprove their claims? Am I on Candid Camera? You're engaging in a fallacy, and you seem to have no understanding of the burden of proof. When skeptics fail, which they undoubtedly will, does that make the claim valid? No, of course not. If I claim I have a werewolf living in my neighborhood, can you disprove it? No, of course not. (and there's no way you can possibly prove there isn't) Does that make my claim true?

RayG

You don't have that right at all. I am not asking anyone to disprove an existing claim! I am saying (now for the 4th time) go out and find the evidence that the data points to- the data points are pretty specific about how to do that. Apply them, find the evidence so its not someone else's. its yours. Then find reasonable explanations that take the experience of your finding the evidence into account. For example a 17" print- you found it, how did it get there??

Hey Sal, was there any other indiction that something might have been there? Prints? Matted down grass or path?

That part of the yard, if you want to call it that, was mostly brush at the time. I didn't find anything conclusive. I have found prints less that 1/4 mile away though.

I might photograph it, make a plaster cast, measure it - so? What do you mean by "subject it to rigor?" You do realize that people have been subjecting big footprints to rigor since the 1950s, right? What could I possibly learn from the footprint that would "satisfy" me?

Its hard to say of course but I am sure that you are aware that any prints you read about could be some kind of hoax- that they may not even exist. But when you find one yourself you have to come up with a good explanation of how it got to be where it is, especially if its in a remote area. For example: who in the heck has 17" long feet and why were they barefoot in this location? Your personal experience is something that no-one can take away from you once you have it. If you did subject such a print to examination, the fact that it has dermal ridges parallel to the foot or something like that would be of interest. Honestly, I would think my answers here to be self-obvious and the tip of the iceberg. If you are a scientist, these things would already be known to you.

Re: rock clacking: Are you positive that you found the rocks that were clacked together? Black Bears will sometime clack their teeth together to make a sound similar to what you described. I was also surprised not long ago by a pair of opossums making a loud, almost metallic clacking sound in a tree in my backyard. Animals - even common ones - can make sounds that are unfamiliar to even the most seasoned outdoorspeople. The due diligence that willinyc referenced means we must be very careful about a rush to judgment when trying to explain an odd occurrence. "Hoax" and "bigfoot" aren't the only potential explanations that could be explored.

Yes, very positive we found the rocks. It would help if you saw the terrain. When we found the rocks, we used them to duplicate the sound. I was in that cabin with my girlfriend, so she was able to corroborate the sound. Rocks make a distinctively different sound from teeth- especially if they are big rocks and hit with some intensity. Try it some time. Bears are rare in the area but they are there. So I can't exclude that as a possibility. However there are other goings on in the area that can't be explained by bears. We found a wood structure that had oak limbs a good 5" in diameter in it. Only problem was, no oak in the vicinity! So wind is not how this structure was formed. The limbs had been twisted off of the tree they were on and carried to that location.

[bipedalist]

I have butterfly bushes and binocs, just threw some extra apples over the hill. I can't remember ever seeing a butterfly I could state was sleeping but I've seen numerous moths at night - if the witnesses stated they saw butterflies at night would it be reasonable for the scientist to think they might have misidentified a moth instead? Maybe bigfoot sightings have more in common with moths?

Sure but how do we know you aren't color blind and it was really a butterfly and you thought it was a moth, it is that kind of nonsensical game-playing of firey hoops that witnesses must jump through for the pseudo-skeptic operational definition of evidence, or rather lack of evidence.

[Guest]

Reason 1.

Most Bigfoot researchers are out of shape. Most bigfoot researchers have no woodsmanship.

Reason 2.

Most bigfoot research seems to take place within an area man has been frequenting for some time. Traveling to very near the research site by car can hardly be considered optimum.

Reason 3.

Groups are bad. They will alert all animals in the area. Unless they are used to people?! See reason 2.

Reason 4.

Whenever convincing looking evidence is found it, drama always seems to follow. Not revelation

Reason 5.

You can make money off of bigfoot! That might end when the mystery does. Probably greatest reason for reason 4.

Reason 6

The people most likely to encounter BF and have the shot at gathering GOOD evidence are not the people who have the best tools or tools at all!

Reason 7

Common sense, logic and insight are rarer than Bigfoot, when discussing bigfoot.

There are more I am sure. This is my proposed pathology of the disease that plagues the efforts to bring this animal into scientific reality. DNA race? Really? I just mailed off my hair samples today. The guy I sent them to said it would only be days. I have alot more samples!

Generalize much? Let's examine your opinion of people involved in the subject. They're out of shape, display no "woodmanship", greedy, lacking common sense, logic, and insight. Other than that, they are a classy bunch.

And I'm guessing the Ketchum and Sykes studies are just slightly more involved than what your "guy" is doing. Well at least your guy will tell you that you're not bigfoot's father.

Edited September 12, 2012 by arizonabigfoot

[ohiobill]

Yeah, the evidence is defined, tracks, sightings, hairs, vocalizations, fossil record, video etc. Define the standard that tells you the tracks are real or fake. Define the standard that tells you the defference between real sasquatch vocalizations and hoaxed or misidentified. Define the standard that says the hairs belong to nothing other than an uncataloged hominid. How many times do researchers have to repeatedly find these things and note their similarity to each other? Is it really a lack of cogency in the evidence or lack of repetition?

I don't think the evidence is defined as yet and I don't know of any fossil record of bigfoot in NA?

The standard for determining if tracks/trackways are real should include the automatic exclusion of any tracks that fall into a size range possible in humans as a start (I wouldn't necessarily exclude human size tracks if accompanied by footprints outside the probable range of human activity). How about sending the rest to an expert like Dr. Meldrum if there is consensus that the possibility of hoaxing is low? Understand that other experts have to have access to his findings/evidence for objectivity to be observed and the results to be taken as more than one person's opinion.

I think the standard for vocalizations could be as simple as vetting samples here in this forum w/a majority vote by the admins/steering committee/volunteer group prior to sending them to an expert in NA animal vocalizations or human vocal experts. Understand that other experts have to have access to the findings/evidence for objectivity to be observed and the results to be taken as more than one person's opinion.

I would suggest that hair samples should be examined by an expert if the consensus is that the possibility of hoaxing is low. Understand that other experts have to have access to the findings/evidence for objectivity to be observed and the results to be taken as more than one person's opinion (and it should be noted that forensic hair science is suggestive but not used the same as DNA evidence in our courts for a reason).

How many times have researchers followed this type of standard? How often is the evidence/findings made available for inspection by experts? I don't think any of what I've said should be earth shattering to any serious researcher so why is it so rarely followed? What would your criterion be?

Sure but how do we know you aren't color blind and it was really a butterfly and you thought it was a moth, it is that kind of nonsensical game-playing of firey hoops that witnesses must jump through for the pseudo-skeptic operational definition of evidence, or rather lack of evidence.

I'm sorry but I'm not following your logic here? My point is that the witnesses are more likely misidentifying moths at night and not seeing butterflies which is analogous to witnesses more likely misidentifying known animals rather than having seen bigfoot.

Are you trying to say that applying objectivity to bigfoot sightings is nonsensical? Or that because you don't know me you wouldn't trust my observations w/o asking some questions to rule out possible reasons I might have in misidentifying a common animal and believing it to be bigfoot?