A Question(S) For Skeptics....

[hiflier]

Hello Cervelo,

 

Oooo......I want these:

 

http://www.bigfootcasts.com/

 

 

 

I may even go to Eugene and have a little "fun". All kidding aside, this is relatively modern stuff. Not to say older hoaxes don't exist but in the longer history the evidence still stands pretty strong. There was something about Ivan T. Sanderson faking tracks way back when...Any truth to the claim that yoiu are aware of? 

Edited June 23, 2013 by hiflier

[dmaker]

How did I come to my conclusion Norse? I have examined the "evidence" --at least as much as is practical for me. I don't have access to foot print casts, nor do I think it necessary to do so when a picture will suffice well enough. I have no expertise or equipment with which to examine samples collected in the field such as hair or other samples.  Again, I don't really need to when qualified labs perform analysis when contracted and the results are shared.  So that leaves us with eye witness reports and public domain video--of which there is no shortage of either of those. 

 

All attempts to use biological samples to identify or classify a Sasquatch have failed rather comically to date. How many reports of dog, carpet, bison, human, bear, etc do we need before one can start to see a pattern? Video and still photo evidence to date has been similarly less than satisfying. It does not convince nor does it compel. 

 

My own experiences while being in the woods, or places that others would declare "squatchy"?  Nada. Zip. Nothing to make me think a population of 800lb apes exist undetected. 

 

Moving on to eye witness reports. Well there certainly are quite a few of those, aren't there? Even the ones that seem more credible than others are still just cool stories. They may lead some to believe that there MAY be an unknown ape running amok in North America. For me, they do not. And the main reason for that is that not a single one of those reports means nothing more than someone SAID they saw a Bigfoot. Which means nothing more than someone THINKS they saw a Bigfoot. And we are now reaching the crux of this whole thing for me. I think all of the evidence to date can be either attributed to a mistake or a deliberate hoax. Why? I'll tell you...

 

We have no monkey.  What we have is a monkey myth machine that is kept alive and fed new fiction constantly. This allows those that make money from BF to continue doing so. This also keeps the believers interested. There is little to no regulation or parameters to this myth machine. You have folks like Matt Moneymaker making up "facts" on the spot one week that become part of Bigfoot canon the next. The "real" Bigfoot lives in this circus. That is where his creation is on going. In the hoaxes, the lies, the con artists and the genuinely convinced that eat it all up, hook line and sinker. 

 

But again, this is just my succinctly put opinion. 

Edited June 23, 2013 by dmaker

[dmaker]

"Well a little testiness is gonna happen with me when my position - which can be summed up in those three words I typed - gets constantly misrepresented." DWA

 

Well DWA with all due respect, I find this hard to believe. You contribute to this misrepresentation constantly. On the one hand you seem to want to appear non-committal and say "I don't know" because you want to be seen as a "true skeptic". Yet you constantly say things like proof is coming, I'm happy to wait. Or if the right people went to the right spot for 3 weeks they would come back with proof, you are positive of it. In fact you will not even admit to the possibility that all of this "evidence" points to anything other than an unclassified ape in North America. ( I know, I tried for days in a thread once to get you to just concede that one single point and you steadfastly refused to do so).

 

So how exactly is that " I don't know?".  It seems to be me that you are sometimes among the most strongly convinced people on this forum.

[Guest DWA]

See?

 

"Proof will come when it comes" means, well, proof of whatever is doing this.  I mean, I expect that sooner or later somebody is gonna decide that talk is cheap, and make a compelling enough push for a serious search that it happens.  And we find out.

 

One way or the other.

 

Gotta say though.  When there is all this never-seriously-challenged evidence that a large undocumented primate is doing all this ...well I'm sure not gonna assume that people, Mothman, dragons, or anything else are doing it instead.

[norseman]

How did I come to my conclusion Norse? I have examined the "evidence" --at least as much as is practical for me. I don't have access to foot print casts, nor do I think it necessary to do so when a picture will suffice well enough. I have no expertise or equipment with which to examine samples collected in the field such as hair or other samples.  Again, I don't really need to when qualified labs perform analysis when contracted and the results are shared.  So that leaves us with eye witness reports and public domain video--of which there is no shortage of either of those. 

 

All attempts to use biological samples to identify or classify a Sasquatch have failed rather comically to date. How many reports of dog, carpet, bison, human, bear, etc do we need before one can start to see a pattern? Video and still photo evidence to date has been similarly less than satisfying. It does not convince nor does it compel. 

 

My own experiences while being in the woods, or places that others would declare "squatchy"?  Nada. Zip. Nothing to make me think a population of 800lb apes exist undetected. 

 

Moving on to eye witness reports. Well there certainly are quite a few of those, aren't there? Even the ones that seem more credible than others are still just cool stories. They may lead some to believe that there MAY be an unknown ape running amok in North America. For me, they do not. And the main reason for that is that not a single one of those reports means nothing more than someone SAID they saw a Bigfoot. Which means nothing more than someone THINKS they saw a Bigfoot. And we are now reaching the crux of this whole thing for me. I think all of the evidence to date can be either attributed to a mistake or a deliberate hoax. Why? I'll tell you...

 

We have no monkey.  What we have is a monkey myth machine that is kept alive and fed new fiction constantly. This allows those that make money from BF to continue doing so. This also keeps the believers interested. There is little to no regulation or parameters to this myth machine. You have folks like Matt Moneymaker making up "facts" on the spot one week that become part of Bigfoot canon the next. The "real" Bigfoot lives in this circus. That is where his creation is on going. In the hoaxes, the lies, the con artists and the genuinely convinced that eat it all up, hook line and sinker. 

 

But again, this is just my succinctly put opinion. 

 

I agree 300 percent with you that there are people out there that make money from the phenom by perpetuating it.

 

But the circus has absolutely nothing to do with Sasquatch if he exists and everything to do with humanity. Someone claiming Sasquatch does this or that, or has this ability or that ability has nothing to do with the creature itself. It simply has to do with our own perception.

 

In Vietnam Navy SEALS (among other units) were known to the Vietnamese as "Green Faced Men". And they represented a type of boogie man if you will, and the Viets would even claim they had magical powers. This type of a reputation was also observed concerning Ninja's in feudal Japan. 

 

I think the human mind tries to fill in the blanks with stuff it doesn't understand, is afraid of and or both. And generally that fill is nothing more than superstitious fantasy, no matter if Sasquatch is a real biological creature or doesn't exist at all. Because if he did exist? He would still be forced to follow the laws of physics.

[Guest JiggyPotamus]

Before I had my encounter I was leaning towards existence. That stemmed from reading about sasquatch growing up I suppose. But I cannot say that I was convinced, but I "figured" they were probably out there. I think there is one key thing that most skeptics cling to. It is the fact that they view all evidence as fake, and therefore claim there is no evidence for the existence of sasquatch. IF sasquatch is out there, why is there no evidence? But to that I say the evidence is out there. If someone is not going to believe that any evidence is authentic, then I don't know what to say.

 

I suppose that there is a valid point to their argument, being that sasquatch should have been proven to exist by now. I can look at the picture from the skeptics point of view, for sure, but skeptics have a hard time understanding a witnesses point of view. Having seen a sasquatch, there is no room for doubt in my mind. Therefore instead of focusing proof, I am on a completely different page, where other witnesses are located. We are focused more on understanding as opposed to proof. But we cannot escape the skeptics who abound, who constantly question the existence of sasquatch and thus turn a debate focused on the "how" into an argument of "existence."

 

But I feel I should mention that not all skeptics should be lumped into this category. This board is full of skeptical individuals who are the epitome of tact and who will not stoop to thinking that all witnesses are dishonest individuals. But this still begs the question...Do you believe that all witnesses are lying? Because all witnesses must be wrong for sasquatch to not exist. There only needs to be ONE good, sane witness for this animal to be real. That is not a very tall order at all. 

 

I really believe, wholeheartedly, that the idea of every single witness being a hoaxer, or misidentifying a known animal or being hoaxed themselves, is just preposterous. 100%. THAT is insulting to the intelligence of mankind in my opinion. I can understand someone getting mixed up in the details, but as far as telling the difference between an 8 foot tall, bipedal, hair-covered "thing," and a quadrupedal animal of any kind, the level for error is not acceptable to conclude that all these witnesses are wrong. I would say that this even goes beyond my personal opinion, but I cannot be certain, since personal bias will always be present. I admit that. But I will not admit that I was wrong about what I saw. 

 

But another thing that must be said, so as to avoid being hypocritical, is this...If I was not convinced of the existence of sasquatch before having an encounter, then I cannot condemn those who disbelieve because they have not had an encounter. I suppose that it is not fair to confuse disbelief in sasquatch with calling a person a liar, as I insinuated previously, but it is quite hard to escape that claim, any way it is viewed. 

 

It should be realized that the arguments and points I am using in this argument are of a nature that is independent of analyzing the available evidence itself. And I think that these points should be addressed. Because not only is there the evidence itself, but there are the ideas that touch on human nature, and how we perceive others who do not believe in the same things. I could say that it is common sense that sasquatch exists, but common sense is not really common is it? Because common sense, or common knowledge even, is based entirely on experience. Someone who has not had the same experiences cannot be expected to have the same base of knowledge as another person with different experiences. But I cannot help but wrestle with the fact that skeptics are lacking faith in their fellow man to a large degree, because as I said, only ONE report need be real for sasquatch to exist.

[Guest DWA]

I did say that it's conceivable that it's all a false positive.  It's just that when I think about what would have to be going on, it just isn't a serious proposition, and I have never seen or heard a bigfoot skeptic who has tried to seriously advance a case for it.

 

Sorry.  When one is a skeptic, evidence colors one's thinking.  The proponents have done their job.

[Guest Cervelo]

Hiflier,

99.9% of the "evidence" is malarkey IMO.

Anecdotal reports fall into two categories for me pre Finding Bigfoot (99.9% dismissed) and of no use to prove anything scientifically, other than an excecise in statistical confirmation bias.

Post Finding Bigfoot all dismissed unless of course it's accompanied by a body or significant part.

My interest is based on some personal experience which is completely anecdotal in nature.

But in my lifetime of fishing, hunting ect I've seen nothing that isn't easily explained, this includes visiting numerous sites of Bigfoot reports in Va.

I like being outdoors regardless of the reason and in my time spent outdoors I've seen and heard some strange stuff that many here would consider rock solid Bigfoot experiences but that's just not the case.

Here's a vid from Yellowstone NP/Heart Lake

If I had let my imagination run away with me (almost did) this would be heralded as a classic Bigfoot rock throwing incident...but it was just some evil squirrels

Edited June 23, 2013 by Cervelo

[TD-40]

There have been too many sightings from people who have no vested interest in bigfoot describing their characteristics as consistent, and the history, legend, and lore are too consistent for me to disregard their existence.

 

Does consistency of reports and sightings over time immemorial from people who have not vested interest in them make for compelling evidence, or just intrigue?

[hiflier]

Hello dmaker,

 

 

The Ufo Community has the same issues only much, much worse. The conferences are a joke, t-shirts, mugs, and bobble-head Aliens for your what-not shelf. Books galore by "experts" that have absolutely no answers whatsoever, and worse, key-note speakers who can only give opinion while believers hang onto the edge of their seats in anticipation only to walk away empty- pockets included!

 

 

Oh, I hear you loud and clear for the BF subject too, my friend, but BF in in a fishbowl compared to the enormity of space. If it took 70 years to find the elusive Panda once the search got underway then I'm not worried about the discovery of a possible living U.S. Hominid.

 

 

P.S. This is the last time I will ever bring up the UFO subject for those of you tired of hearing it. I know I am.

Hello Cervelo,

 

99.9%? Nah, that can't be right. But then the "prove me wrong" monster might once again rear it's ugly head and it's never pretty.

[Guest DWA]

Hello dmaker,

 

 

The Ufo Community has the same issues only much, much worse. The conferences are a joke, t-shirts, mugs, and bobble-head Aliens for your what-not shelf. Books galore by "experts" that have absolutely no answers whatsoever, and worse, key-note speakers who can only give opinion while believers hang onto the edge of their seats in anticipation only to walk away empty- pockets included!

 

Well  (SETI aside), that's what happens when there's no science being applied to an issue.  Other stuff hogs all the bandwidth.

 

 

Oh, I hear you loud and clear for the BF subject too, my friend, but BF in in a fishbowl compared to the enormity of space. If it took 70 years to find the elusive Panda once the search got underway then I'm not worried about the discovery of a possible living U.S. Hominid.

 

A lot more effort went into the panda search, to boot.

 

 

P.S. This is the last time I will ever bring up the UFO subject for those of you tired of hearing it. I know I am.

 

They're Unidentified Flying Objects.  No consistency to what is being observed; no plausible theories as to precisely what is causing them.  Wood apes, it ain't.

[dmaker]

I do not understand why proponents get to summarily dismiss the liars and hoaxers and say they are irrelevant to Bigfoot. They are not.  To date we have many proven liars, many proven hoaxers. We have scenarios that must have been misidentifications because the evidence, when tested, proves to be from a bear, or a dog, or a bison, or something else.  So of my proffered source of BF evidence, we have much that is proven. From the proponents, we have absolutely ZERO that is proven.  So I'm just going with what is proven so far. And after time, makes the most sense. 

See?

 

"Proof will come when it comes" means, well, proof of whatever is doing this.  I mean, I expect that sooner or later somebody is gonna decide that talk is cheap, and make a compelling enough push for a serious search that it happens.  And we find out.

 

One way or the other.

 

Gotta say though.  When there is all this never-seriously-challenged evidence that a large undocumented primate is doing all this ...well I'm sure not gonna assume that people, Mothman, dragons, or anything else are doing it instead.

And we find out one way or another? Ok, so we either find the monkey or admit there is no monkey? That seems to me the only way to read that comment.  It's not like a single species is at the heart of the misidentifications ( if indeed they are). So no one is going to drag some poor bear out of the bush and say here is your Bigfoot! So I can assume you mean what I stated? Which means that you must believe in the evidence of absence is absence of evidence after all. Otherwise, how would we know " one way or the other"? other than dragging a BF or declaring the failure to drag a BF must mean there is no BF? In other words, the absence of BF means there is no BF.

 

So you do, after all, accept absence of evidence as evidence of absence? Just not yet...?

[norseman]

I do not understand why proponents get to summarily dismiss the liars and hoaxers and say they are irrelevant to Bigfoot. They are not. To date we have many proven liars, many proven hoaxers. We have scenarios that must have been misidentifications because the evidence, when tested, proves to be from a bear, or a dog, or a bison, or something else. So of my proffered source of BF evidence, we have much that is proven. From the proponents, we have absolutely ZERO that is proven. So I'm just going with what is proven so far. And after time, makes the most sense.

They are from the standpoint of a real biological creature. If I go around hoaxing grizzly bear tracks how does that effect the species itself?

Also we have had hair samples come back as unknown that where not a deer, bear, etc

[dmaker]

Unknown or unclassifiable due to contamination? 

 

Hoaxing a Grizzy track does nothing for the argument for the animal's existence because that argument was settled by science long ago. But when trying to convince the world that an animal is not a leftover myth or a man made construction, a steady stream of hoaxes does little for your credibility.

Edited June 23, 2013 by dmaker

[Guest DWA]

I do not understand why proponents get to summarily dismiss the liars and hoaxers and say they are irrelevant to Bigfoot. They are not.  To date we have many proven liars, many proven hoaxers. We have scenarios that must have been misidentifications because the evidence, when tested, proves to be from a bear, or a dog, or a bison, or something else.  So of my proffered source of BF evidence, we have much that is proven. From the proponents, we have absolutely ZERO that is proven.  So I'm just going with what is proven so far. And after time, makes the most sense. 

 

Yep.  When bigfoot is proven, we'll just go with it.  'Til then, the liars and hoaxers are utterly irrelevant.  Science is about sorting bad apples from the bunch.  Way it is.

See?

 

"Proof will come when it comes" means, well, proof of whatever is doing this.  I mean, I expect that sooner or later somebody is gonna decide that talk is cheap, and make a compelling enough push for a serious search that it happens.  And we find out.

 

One way or the other.

 

Gotta say though.  When there is all this never-seriously-challenged evidence that a large undocumented primate is doing all this ...well I'm sure not gonna assume that people, Mothman, dragons, or anything else are doing it instead.

And we find out one way or another? Ok, so we either find the monkey or admit there is no monkey? That seems to me the only way to read that comment.  It's not like a single species is at the heart of the misidentifications ( if indeed they are). So no one is going to drag some poor bear out of the bush and say here is your Bigfoot! So I can assume you mean what I stated? Which means that you must believe in the evidence of absence is absence of evidence after all. Otherwise, how would we know " one way or the other"? other than dragging a BF or declaring the failure to drag a BF must mean there is no BF? In other words, the absence of BF means there is no BF.

 

So you do, after all, accept absence of evidence as evidence of absence? Just not yet...?

Not even sure what you mean by that.

 

A search doesn't prove bigfoot isn't real unless it systematically debunks all the evidence - shows that what we thought was X, is actually Y.

 

Otherwise, question remains open.  Way reality is.