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

[Guest BFSleuth]

The ratio of sightings (many) to actual bigfoots (zero) does not make sense. You seem to be inappropriately influenced by the former and not influenced at all by the latter, and because doing so fits your world view.

So, once the number of actual bigfoots is proven to be greater than zero, then and only then will all the sighting reports "make sense"? Until then they can be conveniently ignored?

[Guest]

So, once the number of actual bigfoots is proven to be greater than zero, then and only then will all the sighting reports "make sense"? Until then they can be conveniently ignored?

Who says they are ignored? I read them rather frequently and consider anecdotal accounts to be among the most interesting purported bigfoot evidence out there. The problem is simply that we can't do anything but duly note each new alleged eyewitness account. I can't write out a specimen tag and describe a new species based on a mountain of stories from people who claim to have seen said species. Jeff Meldrum would tell you the same thing.

If physical remains of a bigfoot could be confirmed, however, that would tell us that at least some of the stories contained in that proverbial mountain of anecdotal accounts are likely to have been factually accurate. How many and which ones would still be untenable, of course, but presumably whatever information might have been associated with the physical remains could help us sort that out to increase the likelihood of picking out the accurate stories from the inaccurate ones.

[Guest BFSleuth]

Are there witness accounts that you think might be accurate portrayals of sightings, or perhaps come "close to" being accurate portrayals?

[Guest DWA]

I'm not sure what else I can share with you, DWA. If the only way you can make sense of my position is to assume that I'm somehow ignorant of the real evidence for bigfoot, then I'm not the one with the problem.

If you can intimate specific questions you'd like me to address I'll do that, as I have for others in the thread. I cannot make out anything specific like that in post 1409, however.

I am wondering how anyone could take the stance that we need to wait for not-even-charitably-called-part-time amateurs to keep pecking away at this until one of them comes in with a body, rather than saying (as it appears from subsequent posts you might actually think) "this is interesting. Why not start planting the seeds of mainstream interest rather than sit on one's hands and say, 'no body'?"

Edited December 12, 2012 by DWA

[Guest]

Are there witness accounts that you think might be accurate portrayals of sightings, or perhaps come "close to" being accurate portrayals?

Sure, there are plenty of accounts that read like what one might expect when an uninitiated person encounters a fantastic creature in the woods. William Roe's is in this category. In contrast, I find Ostman's account to be complete horse-hockey. But even if we had 1000 stories of Roe's quality, that wouldn't tell us anything other than 1000 people have claimed to have such-and-such an encounter. The stories don't lead anywhere. No bigfoot has ever been tracked to its lair based on information in a eyewitness encounter story, or for that matter, from following its prints. The suggestions from the stories that there is something physical out there have not panned out in terms of leading us to a physical thing.

In contrast, we now know a lot about false memories, hallucinations, and the general unreliability of eyewitness testimony. We know that people rather commonly don furry suits (or ghillie suits) and intentionally run across the road to hoax bigfoot sightings. We know that guys like Ray Wallace and Paul Freeman fooled some really sharp people with the footprints they laid down. We know that for the past couple of years, folks who report bigfoots actually have a shot of appearing on Finding Bigfoot and enjoying a few minutes of national recognition, to the cheers and backslaps of their friends.

Thus, the "real bigfoots" explanation has so far not been demonstrated by a real bigfoot, but we've got multiple explanations for things that could help to convince someone that they had seen a bigfoot or provide the impetus to make up a story whole cloth. Without physical evidence confirmed to be from a bigfoot, the latter explanations are far more parsimonious than the former.

[Guest DWA]

Sure, there are plenty of accounts that read like what one might expect when an uninitiated person encounters a fantastic creature in the woods. William Roe's is in this category. In contrast, I find Ostman's account to be complete horse-hockey. But even if we had 1000 stories of Roe's quality, that wouldn't tell us anything other than 1000 people have claimed to have such-and-such an encounter. The stories don't lead anywhere. No bigfoot has ever been tracked to its lair based on information in a eyewitness encounter story, or for that matter, from following its prints. The suggestions from the stories that there is something physical out there have not panned out in terms of leading us to a physical thing.

In contrast, we now know a lot about false memories, hallucinations, and the general unreliability of eyewitness testimony. We know that people rather commonly don furry suits (or ghillie suits) and intentionally run across the road to hoax bigfoot sightings. We know that guys like Ray Wallace and Paul Freeman fooled some really sharp people with the footprints they laid down. We know that for the past couple of years, folks who report bigfoots actually have a shot of appearing on Finding Bigfoot and enjoying a few minutes of national recognition, to the cheers and backslaps of their friends.

Thus, the "real bigfoots" explanation has so far not been demonstrated by a real bigfoot, but we've got multiple explanations for things that could help to convince someone that they had seen a bigfoot or provide the impetus to make up a story whole cloth. Without physical evidence confirmed to be from a bigfoot, the latter explanations are far more parsimonious than the former.

Well, at least I've figured this out: you decided that this was a "fantastic" creature at the start, and have a "conviction" that it isn't real, that apparently precedes your acquaintance with the evidence (which does not support either the "conviction" or the "fantastic" nature of what sounds like a temperate great ape, an extremely not-fantastic critter). I have never been convinced of anything before reviewing the evidence.

The "false memories, hallucinations, and the general unreliability of eyewitness testimony" are a common skeptical canard that doesn't wash. We are the nonpareil observers in nature. People are coming forward to talk about things they've suppressed for months and years, and I guarantee you "backslaps from their buddies" were not what generally awaited those who were foolish enough to tell people they knew. That's not coming from false memories and hallucinations; to presume it is, without testing the premise, is just not what scientists do.

Nothing donning a furry suit or a ghillie suit is clouding this discussion. People aren't describing what you see on YouTube. That's the easy way to rule them all out as factors in this discussion. As I like to say: if it's proportioned like a human, and looks like a human, it is one. People are describing an animal that looked to them human-like, but no more Homo sapiens than a gorilla is. So nope, suit hoaxes are not in the discussion. That kind of intelligent culling is just what scientists do.

People didn't get away with fake prints for long. The hoaxes got exposed as scientists with directly relevant expertise examined many prints and found the earmarks of hoaxing on a tiny minority. To presume they are wrong on all of them, without testing the premise? Not what scientists do.

The vast majority of people reporting this did not want to do it. They sure didn't want to (and most of them didn't get to) appear on TV. To presume that's a major motivation, without testing the premise, is not what scientists do.

[Guest]

Why not start planting the seeds of mainstream interest rather than sit on one's hands and say, 'no body'?"

Why not do some reading to find out with whom you are communicating rather than assuming what I have or have not done?

For example, are you aware that I've delivered an invited presentation about bigfoot to a state chapter meeting of The Wildlife Society? (It wasn't a purely skeptical presentation either.) Are you aware that I've delivered a similar presentation in an hour-long public seminar on the campus of a Tier 1 research university? Are you aware that I have gone "squatching" myself? Are you aware that I've had my own "not sure" encounter in the field?

I've provided lots of advice down through the years to hopeful bigfooters who think they've got one staked out. Few people would be as thrilled as I to learn that bigfoots were really real.

These conversations always bog down, however, when it comes to what folks would like "mainstream science" to actually do: Do you want scientists in a well-funded effort to go looking for bigfoot somewhere? Great - where? Once they get there, what would they be doing, hunting for one? If so, then you don't need scientists for that, you need good, active hunters. But why should we think that would work, when all the hunters everywhere have failed to bring in a bigfoot carcass. What about the money? If you convince the NSF to put money toward the search for bigfoot, they're going to want to see a project deliverable, i.e., a monkey on a slab. If the scientists fail to produce a bigfoot (and that's what we guess would happen since that's what's happened to everyone who's ever tried), then they've got no paper to publish and the American people start complaining that the NSF just wasted $X million on a bigfoot/snipe hunt.

So calls for mainstream science to look for bigfoot are nice, but I find them to be a lousy way to go about proving the existence of something like a bigfoot. The Ketchum/Sykes approach of soliciting disparate samples for DNA analysis is far more likely to produce a type specimen than an organized scientific expedition somewhere - so is sifting through riverine sediments (something folks do every day) and driving logging trucks through places bigfoot is supposed to live (ditto).

^Heck yeah, bigfoot would be fantastic. If bigfoot is a giant, bipedal, hairy, hominid of temperate North America then we know of no other extant creature like that, and nothing in the fossil record quite like it either.

As for the rest of post 1416, I tire of your misplaced ad homs. How 'bout you let me tell you what scientists do, seeing as how I am one? Again, in all my years on the BFF, your arrogance is off the charts.

(edited for a glitch that made one big textberg)

Edited December 12, 2012 by Saskeptic

[Guest BFSleuth]

Some of the witness accounts do have physical evidence in the form of trackways, hand prints, saliva, hairs, and even video or photos (albeit less than National Geographic documentary quality). I agree that Mr. Roe's account is detailed, but it has no physical evidence other than his drawing.

While no witness report rises to the level of proof, many are "interesting" enough in detail and length of observation and correlation with other similar reports that they begin to paint a picture of bigfoot anatomy and behavior.

[Guest RayG]

Jeff Meldrum would tell you the same thing.

He already has.

"I should reiterate my acknowledgment that the conventions of zoological taxonomy require a type specimen to establish the existence of a new species." -- Dr. Jeff Meldrum, Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science, page 273 (2006)

RayG

[Guest DWA]

Here is all I want mainstream science to actually do:

Talk about this as if it's an unsolved mystery rather than a cause for laughter. And no they're not. Look where this is being discussed: here and not in the pages of Nature or Scientific American. Until those and similar journals are discussing this seriously - and not, as the latter once did, ruling sasquatch out because fossils or other remains hadn't been found yet (huh!?!?) - and beginning the assembly of search protocols, "cause for laughter" is the official scientific position on this topic.

Sorry if you think I'm arrogant. I'm not changing. And I've been responding to ignorance posing as arrogance for way too long (don't mentiion the words "Ben Radford" around me) to tone down now.

Why do I see no inkling of your professed positivity in one of the posts you've put up before that last one? Like Oscar, I do judge books by their covers.

The evidence says: Mainstream science is the very place to start making it OK for people to tell people they actually saw an animal that actually exists.

(And I'd have to see your presentations to judge them. And as you aren't commenting on any of the cogent points I made in 1416, I'll presume you just agree with me that you could represent the evidence better than you do.)

Edited December 12, 2012 by DWA

[Drew]

While no witness report rises to the level of proof, many are "interesting" enough in detail and length of observation and correlation with other similar reports that they begin to paint a picture of bigfoot anatomy and behavior.

Correlation between reports does not paint a picture of bigfoot anatomy or behavior.

It paints a picture of people reading reports and forums, and finding out which ones are acknowledged as proper bigfoot traits, and then incorporating them into their very own sighting.

Until we can catch a bigfoot, 5,000 reports detailing the swaying of the ape from left to right, means absolutely nothing except that more people read the BFRO sighting database.

Edited December 12, 2012 by Drew

[Guest]

Why do I see no inkling of your professed positivity in one of the posts you've put up before that last one? Like Oscar, I do judge books by their covers.

Because as soon as you figured out I was one of those evil, know-nothing skeptics you starting piling on with the ad homs, assumed you had me pegged, and you couldn't take your blinders off for a moment to actually read and understand the information I was sharing with you. If only I had pointed this out to you earlier . . . oh wait. Nevermind.

[Guest RayG]

DWA, if I understand your argument correctly, you're complaining that scientists aren't or won't look at bigfoot evidence. Would that be a fair assessment?

If so, then which of the following would fit your criteria?

Alley, Baird, Bourne, Brown, Bryant Jr., Cartmill, Ciochon, Colarusso, Coltman, Cook, C00N, Daegling, Davis, Disotell, Fahrenbach, Fish, Gould, Greenwell, Grieve, Groves, Hadj-Chikh, Halpin, Hertel, Heuvelmans, Higgins, Kerley, Kirlin, Markotic, McCall, Mionczynski, Moody, Napier, Nekaris, Nelson, Porshnev, Pyle, Redmond, Rosen, Sanderson, Sarich, Sarmiento, Schaller, Shackley, Sprague, Stevens, Strain, Suttles, Swindler, Sykes, Trevor-Deutsch, Wasson, Wells, Wheatcroft, Wroblewski, and Wylie.

RayG

[Guest DWA]

Because as soon as you figured out I was one of those evil, know-nothing skeptics you starting piling on with the ad homs, assumed you had me pegged, and you couldn't take your blinders off for a moment to actually read and understand the information I was sharing with you. If only I had pointed this out to you earlier . . . oh wait. Nevermind.

And it couldn't have anything to do with the information you were sharing with me. Oh, OK.

A conviction that something isn't real, when the evidence says otherwise, and a continued refusal to....well, respond to the points I make (he says again), is likely to trigger a response that might be suboptimal.

DWA, if I understand your argument correctly, you're complaining that scientists aren't or won't look at bigfoot evidence. Would that be a fair assessment?

If so, then which of the following would fit your criteria?

Alley, Baird, Bourne, Brown, Bryant Jr., Cartmill, Ciochon, Colarusso, Coltman, Cook, C00N, Daegling, Davis, Disotell, Fahrenbach, Fish, Gould, Greenwell, Grieve, Groves, Hadj-Chikh, Halpin, Hertel, Heuvelmans, Higgins, Kerley, Kirlin, Markotic, McCall, Mionczynski, Moody, Napier, Nekaris, Nelson, Porshnev, Pyle, Redmond, Rosen, Sanderson, Sarich, Sarmiento, Schaller, Shackley, Sprague, Stevens, Strain, Suttles, Swindler, Sykes, Trevor-Deutsch, Wasson, Wells, Wheatcroft, Wroblewski, and Wylie.

RayG

The results of the "look at" are as follows:

Many of those names are mainstream scientists whose look told them sasquatch isn't real, for reasons scientifically unsupportable. (For one, Wroblewski needs to learn that elk leave tracks directly beneath them when they stand up.)

The others stepped outside the mainstream when they stepped into this. Were I them I might be regretting it. Fortunately, they don't. Maybe. I don't think. And then there's the question why their influence hasn't moved the needle. And why hasn't it? Again, "it's not proven" is not the best excuse, when we delegate to the scientific community responsibility for proof.

When we see Scientific American call for sasquatch reports for its online database, now we're getting somewhere. When we see their Bigfoot Issue now we're really getting somewhere. When SciAm, Nat Geo, Nature, and a consortium of tech companies support a long-term stakeout to search for evidence (read Survivorman, only not please God sponsored by Todd Standing), now we're really really getting somewhere.

Science only needs to change its attitude. And it has a lot of attitudes to change; and changing those attitudes to moving back the frontiers of knowledge, rather than "it's not proven," is their job.

Edited December 12, 2012 by DWA

[Guest RayG]

So if at least some scientists have looked at bigfoot evidence, that would negate your argument that scientists aren't or won't look at bigfoot evidence.

Could it be the evidence isn't as impressive as you think?

RayG