I'm Giving A Persuasive Speech On Bigfoot!

[Guest HarryAbe]

Hey Gang,

On October 8th I will be a giving a 6-8 minute speech on BIGFOOT for one of my classes in school. I plan on using my personal experience (along with my videos for visual aid) to explain why I believe in bigfoot. There has to be an introduction followed by 2-5 main points and a conclusion in the speech.

I was hoping to get some help from all the people on here. Not in a cheating sort of way, but in a way that hits all the major reasons why most of us think bigfoot is real. My plan is the following:

Introduction

I will explain the different names (yeti, sasquatch etc) of bigfoot and use bigfoot as the last name I say, to get people interested. I will give a brief history of how these names came to be. I will then explain my personal experience at my old house with possible bigfoot evidence (using my videos as visual aides),

My 2-5 main points will be:

1. the patterson gimlin film, why it could not be fake (the way bigfoot walks, the way bigfoot moves, the size of bigfoot and the time it was filmed.)

2. the thousands of sightings people have had over the years, detailing a creature that has nearly the same description from all different kinds of witnesses

3. fur samples, stool samples and many different castings of footprints

4. the size of bigfoot, the strength of bigfoot and the intelligence of bigfoot

5. why bigfoot has been so impossible to catch over the years (seem to hunt in packs are excellent at staying stealth etc)

Conclusion will explain that not everyone can be lying or hoaxing that bigfoot is indeed real.

All of they above will be in much more detail BUT I wanted to give everyone my initial thoughts. Does this seem like a good list to everyone? Also, does anyone know of a cardboard lifesize cutout of patty for sale anywhere??? How tall was Patty? I want to use that as a visual aid as well to give the class an idea of how HUGE these creatures can be.

THANKS!

Edited September 25, 2012 by HarryAbe

[Guest Transformer]

What grade are you giving your presentation to and are you going to give equal time to the contrary views to what you will be saying? I don't think it's right to gloss over the lack of scientific rigor and the obvious mistakes in logic you will presenting to your class.

[NitroSquatch]

It sounds like HarryAbe's assignment is to give a Persuasive Speech, for which he would not be expected to give equal time to contrary views. In fact, he may be graded poorly for presenting contrary information. It's just a class exercise, and there really isn't that much at stake.

Good luck HarryAbe!

[Guest HarryAbe]

It's for a college speech class I am taking. I do not have to give contrary views. My plan is to give the views that make ME think bigfoot is a real thing.

Edited September 25, 2012 by HarryAbe
Please don't quote the post directly preceding yours

[Guest]

Harry, I'm a university professor and I have some advice for you.

As a bigfoot skeptic, it's difficult for me to condone the lack of critical thinking displayed in the list of points you'd like to address. While it is correct that you needn't address all views in a persuasive speech, it is very much incumbent on the speaker to provide honest views and accurate information. I have no problem with you giving a persuasive speech on why you think the matter deserves study, my objection has to do with what you're supplying as your reasons to get your audience to agree with you:

"1. the patterson gimlin film, why it could not be fake (the way bigfoot walks, the way bigfoot moves, the size of bigfoot and the time it was filmed.)"

Dangerous ground - There is nothing about the movement, the walk, the size, etc. of the subject that rules out a human in a costume. Many people who've really examined the film and its associated features (e.g., development timeline) are 100% convinced that this film is a hoax perpetuated by Roger Patterson. You may think otherwise and you are not obligated to discuss the opposing view, but it would be at best intellectually dishonest of you to present as fact things that are quite rightly disputed or cannot be determined.

"2. the thousands of sightings people have had over the years, detailing a creature that has nearly the same description from all different kinds of witnesses"

While not true that there's "nearly the same description" in those anecdotes, this probably would provide you with the best fodder for your persuasive speech.

"3. fur samples, stool samples and many different castings of footprints"

None of which have been conclusively shown to have been collected from an otherwise undescribed species, although most have been conclusively shown to have come from known and described species.

"4. the size of bigfoot, the strength of bigfoot and the intelligence of bigfoot"

The fact that the Incredible Hulk is described as large, strong, and moderately intelligent is not a persuasive argument for the existence of the Incredible Hulk.

"5. why bigfoot has been so impossible to catch over the years (seem to hunt in packs are excellent at staying stealth etc)"

How does the impossibility of proving something exists work to persuade a thinking person that the thing exists?

"Conclusion will explain that not everyone can be lying or hoaxing that bigfoot is indeed real."

Not everyone has to be lying or hoaxing for reports of bigfoots to be produced. Some people might simply be mistaken. They may see something they think is a bigfoot, they may see someone intentionally hoaxing a bigfoot (as we recently learned with the tragic death of the guy in Montana, people actually do this), or they may have experienced some kind of hallucination that makes them absolutely positive that they saw a bigfoot, even though they didn't. (Hallucinations are real; I urge you to do some research on how frequently they occur.)

As for your own videos of bigfoot, unless you've got something of this level of quality you won't be persuading anyone of anything.

Here's what I recommend for you:

1) Do a thorough job of presenting the case for creatures resembling our general idea of "bigfoot" (i.e., bipedal, hairy, ape-men) from cultures all over the world and dating back through the centuries. (There is no need to invoke Roger Patterson's 1967 film as proof of bigfoot, so just don't go there.)

2) Describe carefully some of the human and ape ancestors that could match descriptions of bigfoot, e.g., Gigantopithecus, Paranthropus, Australopithecus, etc. We know for a fact that multiple species of "ape-men" lived in the past; our modern concept of "bigfoot" could represent encounters with relic forms of these species.

3) Homo floresiensis is known to have existed until just a few thousand years ago. There is controversy regarding the taxonomic status of this creature, but it makes an excellent case to consider that relic forms can persist until much more recent times than we generally appreciate.

4) Many people report seeing such creatures today. Which explanation for their reports is more plausible? A) People really are seeing such creatures. People are not seeing such creatures, but are lying, being hoaxed, misidentifiying other animals, or hallucinating.

5) You are advocating for option A. Propose a testable hypothesis to provide evidence for A, making sure it's falsifiable, and convince your audience to join you in calling for the USFWS to conduct research to test that hypothesis.

If you do your homework on 1–5, I promise you'll give a great speech, entertain and enlighten your audience, and get an A for the assignment. Good luck!

~Saskeptic

[CMBigfoot]

How about the unknown vocalizations from an animal with large lung capacity in areas people have seen BF. If we know all there is to know about all the animals in our forests why can't they identify some of these recordings. True, to my knowledge no one has seen a BF make the vocalization on these recordings, but what other unknown large animal are people claiming to see.

Good Luck HarryAbe

[Guest HarryAbe]

Holy cow saskeptic! Thanks. All good points but keep in mind if i go over 8 minutes i get points taken away.

Maybe i picked the wrong subject to cover in just 6-8 minutes....

My personal belief is that the pgf is the best evidence, especially the research conducted by bill.

[Guest]

I don't think Saskeptic is adding time to your speech, he's offering points to tighten it. Length doesn't have much to do with quality. Your speech needs more girth, not more length

[Guest HarryAbe]

Lol. I will practice it and see how much timeit is.

[Guest toejam]

Footprints are just as good as the PGF because they give a plethora of info like the size, weight and height of an animal.

You can mention that many sightings are corroborated with footprints. Footprints with a stride that are too big for humans as well as the trackway of a squatch being unlike the staggered walk of a human.

They walk one foot in front of another.

If someone mentions about the PGF being claimed to be worn by hoaxer Bob Heironimus, you can tell them that he could never reproduce the prints or produce the suit,

From my understanding, local news asked him to show how he made the prints. He failed miserably at every attempt.

[Guest]

. . . he's offering points to tighten it.

This. You were all over the map with all things bigfooty, and there's no way you could've done any of them justice. I'm recommending that you focus on ONE idea, and the one that will have the best chance getting your audience to really think about the phenomenon. You'll be much more effective (and persuasive!) if you spend your 7 minutes on the history of reports as opposed to one minute each on 7 different aspects of bigfootery.

There's one facet of the bigfoot phenomenon that cannot be obliterated by a couple of simple questions from a skeptical viewpoint: people keep claiming to see bigfoots and have been doing so for a really long time. Stick to that and you're onto something. Delve into the minutiae of Bill Munns' analysis of the PGF and you'll raise more questions than you can answer. Anyone who knows anything about bigfoot knows that multiple Hollywood effects artists have weighed in on the PGF and are convinced it's a dude in a suit. If you spend 7 minutes defending Bill's analysis against others' you won't be persuasive. Maybe you could do that for an informative speech, but not a persuasive one.

edited for rogue apostrophe

Edited September 25, 2012 by Saskeptic

[Guest mdhunter]

Harry, I would listen to Saskeptic. He's giving you an inside look at how a professors mind works. IMHO it will be much easier to persuade people to "needs further professional investigation" than "it exists" . It's easier to get somebody to look over the edge of a cliff than jump off.

A few skeptics could probably tell you best what keeps them interested. For me it's the couple hundred years of witness reports/legends first.Some of my own "unexplained" experiences are second. The blobsquatches don't do much for most people. If it comes up in conversations,witness accounts/legends is where I start. I'm a skeptical proponent by this forums definition. For me to be a 100% believer it would take close range encounter, some VERY compelling video of several minutes of natural behavior (like some grooming or feeding), or a toe tag and bodybag full of bigfoot.

[Rockape]

It's for a college speech class I am taking. I do not have to give contrary views. My plan is to give the views that make ME think bigfoot is a real thing.

Saskeptic gives some good advice but I think instead of taking a pro/con approach on each point you can qualify your speech as "opinion" and simply state all your point can and in fact are debunked by many others, but it is only opinion by them as well.

Also, I would search here for some of tirademan's (whatever happened to tirademan anyway?) posts that include older news accounts of BF. These are all stories well before PGF put BF into the public's eye and are some of the most convincing evidence to me that there is something out there that science hasn't discovered.

Edited September 25, 2012 by Rockape

[Guest]

All good points to cover. You also have permission to use my comparison video on the Jacob creature. Right here on the BFF we discovered the hump was a shadow. This was the main reason some skeptics thought it was a bear. That concludes it was eather a hoax or Sasquatch do really exist and are still reproducing. You can get the link by searching the Garret photo thread.

[Guest HarryAbe]

Thanks Kerry! Will do!