Operation Persistence

[southernyahoo]

 

^^^At the very least, you'd think that putting an end to at least a lot of those ("there's no evidence;" "they bury their dead;" they're human;" etc.) would be an incentive all of us could get behind for pushing for mainstream involvement in this question.

So how would you put an end to those questions DWA? There's evidence already right?, killing one wouldn't prove whether they bury their dead or not. If you kill a human, should you need science to tell you that? Could you live with that if you did?

[Guest DWA]

Um, I was talking, if we peruse the post, about "mainstream involvement in this question," not about killing one, which I would prefer not happen but if it leads to proof and protective measures for the species I might not mourn excessively.

[Airdale]

I don't have a huge problem with the 'Wood Ape' moniker. However it does have political undertones. Politics and BF really irks me but that's for another thread...

Without trying to derail this thread or stray into one of the forbidden topics (and I do not disagree with the prohibition), virtually any subject of substance and many of suspect substance acquire political undertones. This is not a new phenomena. Venturing into areas that attract public notice without taking that into account is akin to wandering into a minefield without a magnetometer.

[Guest]

Bipto,

Concerning the Ketchum report, no I do not think it has proved to be valid. I used it as counter evidence because certain camps would see it so. Also, dry humor does not play well, blog wise.

On the issue of ape color, here is an interesting article: http://www.livescience.com/37445-snowflake-albino-gorilla-inbred.html

[Guest]

I'll employ your post, DWA, to inject myself into this particular issue.

 

 

First, the tracks are more human-like than ape-like.

 

Actually, no.  The appearance is superficial.  It would be more accurate to call them "ape tracks, with a human-like great toe."

 

Second, the original reveal that resulted in the coinage of the term sasquatch, the Canadian articles by J.W. Burns in the 1940's, the sasquatch were described by the local Native Americans as fellow Indians, fellow humans, from a tribe that spoke the Douglas Indian dialect.

 

Third, even today the sasquatch is known as human by those who allegedly know them best, Native Americans. Paulides' forensic sketches based on Native American eyewitness input present portraits decidedly human. The literature of the subject is replete with Indian testimonies; for instance, in the Agassiz-Harrison THE ADVANCE newspaper, May 5th, 1961, the reporter asked a Native American what exactly is a sasquatch, and the answer was, "They have hair all over their bodies, but they are not animals. They are people. Big people living in the mountains." 

 

Forth, if you want to ignore Native American statements, as John Green did early on to convert sasquatch people into an American version of the yeti of the Himalayas, hence the birth of America's Abominable Snowman, then all I have to say is that I personally heard the owner of land in or around Area X, Charles Branson, state emphatically that the Bigfoot he knows of around the area are, to quote, "nice people."

 

"Orang utan" (man of the forest) and "orang pendek" (short man) are names given to animals that the natives specifically recognize as not being human.  Further context on the above, I think, would reveal that they don't think they are talking about Homo sapiens.  They're just expanding their concept of "people" in the same way I once read a dedicated pet owner insist that her dog was a person...while making it very clear that she didn't think he was human but an individual with an individual "personality" and perspective.

 

Fifth, there are occasional accounts describing sasquatch as wearing clothes. For instance, Betty Allen recounted a report made to Peter Byrne from the Willow Creek area, an event from 1958, in which a man answered a cabin door knock to find a huge giant man standing on his porch seeming to want food. Given a candy bar, the visitor mumble something and left. Allen writes that the eyewitness "said it looked as though he was wearing a jacket-thing with no sleeves in it. Something loose like a vest,"

 

Well, that's one report.  I'm not down for the clothes thing; I go with a preponderance of consistent reports.  Could have been a huge giant man.

 

Sixth, are we forgetting Dr. Ketchum's contribution, both through her DNA paper and her own eyewitness account, that sasquatch is human?

 

Ketchum is barking up something I strongly suspect to be the wrong tree.  Where'd that DNA come from?  It's a contaminated human sample, I suspect.

 

And seventh, most hair samples attributed to sasquatch have apparently been deemed human.

 

Again, where'd they come from?  People.

DWA,

Consult your Meldrum, LMS, page 236., image at bottom. Meldrum may tell you it is an ape's foot, but the image he provides is very human looking and not really ape-like at all.

I would think you might be on better footing (pun alert) by arguing that any bipedal ape would have human-like feet, due to evolutionary requirement.

As to your assumptions concerning Native Peoples' view of Bigfoot as pseudo-human, I'm not sure you've got it right. Consider the following article by Troy Hudson. He has investigated the Bigfoot question in and around the Area X area for years. I've read another article by him where he speaks about how he had his own sightings in SE Oklahoma, and saw the "Irish setter red" Bigfoot others have claimed to see. Read the following to find how he utterly contradicts your assumptions, as well as the "wood ape" designation of NAWAC.

http://www.bigfootbuzz.net/we-only-know-so-little-by-troy-hudson/

[Guest DWA]

Well, I don't have to consider Troy Hudson the last word on all things bigfoot, particularly if he disagrees with NAWAC.  I'm down with the latter because I'm pretty convinced that the case they make has the science behind it (that it agrees with my take is pretty much a bonus).

 

I'll go with what people who have made a closer study of the tracks say over what an image looks like (which always has a big helping of subjectivity in it). 

 

Read that recent article (a couple threads on it here) about how one in thirteen people have "ape-like feet"?  That's what sasquatch appears to have.

 

Of course, I await a specimen so that this discussion can happen based on a little more up-close than we have right now.  I'd rather focus on search protocols than debate what this is in the absence of a specimen.

[Drew]

Do you think the Oklahoma Wood Ape, is more closely related to the Asian Apes, or the African Apes, based on your observations?

 

or, do you think it is a case of independent evolution and split off from the New World Monkeys?

[Guest DWA]

Well, this is just it:  I don't think the fossil record is adequate to make the determination.

 

It's interesting though that when Meldrum simply scaled up an P. robustus skull, he got a fairly decent match with Patty.  I've never been an utter fan of the Giganto Hypothesis, although I do consider it still a viable possiblity.  But evolution and resizing of P. robustus or another robust australopithecine is not exactly implausible.

 

Here's an interesting article:  http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-04/fyi-why-are-there-no-native-monkeys-america

 

"Primates came to the New World (meaning North and South America) from, we think, Africa. As improbable as it sounds, scientists think early primates crossed the Atlantic Ocean and landed on the shores of both continents tens of millions of years ago, probably on some kind of vegetation raft."

 

Now apparently climate change killed them all off.  Is it a possibility that a species or so of apes evolved and actually managed to adapt?  With the Eocene primate abundance, it's hard for me to say it's impossible.  But so far, the fossils aren't there.  The key words being "so far." 

 

Well, as it says in that article, anything is possible in evolution.

 

If I had to bet money on a scenario, this would be it:  robust australopithecines spread from Africa through Asia, and got here via the land bridge (most of Beringia being underwater a good excuse for not having more fossils).

 

Wow, and there it is.  When I first heard of P. robustus as a possible sasquatch ancestor, I went, no way.  But that's what evidence can do.  They had a generalist dental/jaw battery, and might have been able to do better than Giganto in more environments.

 

The fossils aren't there.  But again the key words are "so far."  And I'd rather figure out what is causing all these people to see this than to presume that fossils rule it out...which they never do.

 

[dmaker]

"I'll go with what people who have made a closer study of the tracks say over what an image looks like (which always has a big helping of subjectivity in it). " DWA

 

And there is nothing subjective in an anonymous eye witness report that you read on the Internet?

[Guest DWA]

One?  Yeah.

 

Thousands of them, reporting something so consistently that I tend to tick off five "frequently reported" markers every time I see one?

 

You aren't curious about that?  At all?

 

OK.  Some are.

[Drew]

 

Here's an interesting article:  http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-04/fyi-why-are-there-no-native-monkeys-america

 

"Primates came to the New World (meaning North and South America) from, we think, Africa. As improbable as it sounds, scientists think early primates crossed the Atlantic Ocean and landed on the shores of both continents tens of millions of years ago, probably on some kind of vegetation raft."

 

 

 

 

North America was still connected to Europe at the end of the Mezozoic.  

Early primate-like creatures could move back and forth to North America.

 

South America was still floating by itself at this time.

[dmaker]

One?  Yeah.

 

Thousands of them, reporting something so consistently that I tend to tick off five "frequently reported" markers every time I see one?

 

You aren't curious about that?  At all?

 

OK.  Some are.

But do you think you are the only person that is capable of noticing 5 major trends in something?  Surely, liars and hoaxers are not capable of the same basic skills of observation? Or even less insidious is the notion that sometimes ideas filter into people's conscious simply through watching tv or consuming some other form of media. That people may have the basics for a matching idea of Sasquatch that would fit your mental report template without even knowing it.

[MIB]

In the context of Beringia / land bridge the discussion has focused on 15,000 years ago vs 10 million years ago, but the picture seems to be very much more complicated.  

 

Please go to http://weber.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/arch/beringia.html ... there is an interesting chart lower on the page showing when the land bridge was believed to be open and when it was not.  Also http://archaeology.about.com/od/bcthroughbl/qt/beringia.htm

 

I've noted several references to 4 separate glacial peaks during pleistocene time (2.6 million years ago to 11,700 years ago) which should potentially include land bridge "events", however, I can't find specific dates except for the most recent beginning 40-60 thousand years ago.   If someone with better "google fu" could find timelines for the earlier 3, it might illuminate more possibilities we haven't considered..

 

MIB

[Guest DWA]

 

One?  Yeah.

 

Thousands of them, reporting something so consistently that I tend to tick off five "frequently reported" markers every time I see one?

 

You aren't curious about that?  At all?

 

OK.  Some are.

But do you think you are the only person that is capable of noticing 5 major trends in something?  Surely, liars and hoaxers are not capable of the same basic skills of observation? Or even less insidious is the notion that sometimes ideas filter into people's conscious simply through watching tv or consuming some other form of media. That people may have the basics for a matching idea of Sasquatch that would fit your mental report template without even knowing it.

 

Well if you are telling me that all of this evidence is the result of people comparing notes ...combined with people who are visually or mentally impaired....combined with people who are innocently mis-identifying known animals

 

(none of which could reasonably be mistaken for a huge bipedal primate)

 

and that all of this is being tied up in a neat package that a primatologist or an ecologist or a wildlife biologist could buy, a package good enough to be fooling qualified scientists applying their science

 

...well, let's just say I'm skeptical of presumptions like that.

[norseman]

In the context of Beringia / land bridge the discussion has focused on 15,000 years ago vs 10 million years ago, but the picture seems to be very much more complicated.  

 

Please go to http://weber.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/arch/beringia.html ... there is an interesting chart lower on the page showing when the land bridge was believed to be open and when it was not.  Also http://archaeology.about.com/od/bcthroughbl/qt/beringia.htm

 

I've noted several references to 4 separate glacial peaks during pleistocene time (2.6 million years ago to 11,700 years ago) which should potentially include land bridge "events", however, I can't find specific dates except for the most recent beginning 40-60 thousand years ago.   If someone with better "google fu" could find timelines for the earlier 3, it might illuminate more possibilities we haven't considered..

 

MIB

 

Here is a series of maps that might be helpful.

 

http://eas.unl.edu/~tfrank/History%20on%20the%20Rocks/Nebraska%20Geology/Cenozoic/cenozoic%20web/2/Timescale.html