N A W A C - Field Study Discussion

[Guest]

Makes your Coors taste funny now doesn't it?

[Guest DWA]

 

 

Why doesn't Jeffrey Meldrum take some of his Blimp Budget, give it to a Field Biologist from ISU, and send him down with a pair of grad students to confirm this?

Surely Area X is going to provide far more tangible results than a flying Blimp with a camera array.

 

Would BIPTO and the NAWAC be open to an actual University Field Biologist conducting a site investigation at Area X?

 

I would guess the answer to be 'no'.

 

 

Are you going to believe what the University Field Biologist says? Would "he/she" need to drag one out of the woods to make any difference?

 

Well, there's the question.

 

Why I think putting a skeptical biologist with real cred in X would be beneficial is that that scientist would not have to have proof positive in her hot little hands to say, hey, there is something here worth funding and pursuing.  That's the goal.  That scientist won't have to convince Drew or me; she'll just have to persuade her colleagues.  "I was there folks; and I say we're missing something."   If you have somebody with you who's just gonna call everything she sees hooey until she's looking at a body, not sure what the bennie is.

Makes your Coors taste funny now doesn't it?

 

Bigfoot Pooped Here.  Doesn't Get Any Wilder.  _tm

[Guest Urkelbot]

^^^

This isn't really true at all

 

The lab I am working in found a evidence for a new type of virus recently a RNA-DNA hybrid virus which had never been seen before or even thought to exist.  It wasn't being looked for but it was discovered.  

 

It was also published and accepted, by biologists no less!  There was only DNA evidence no  live virus or host.  http://www.biologydirect.com/content/7/1/13/abstract

[Guest DWA]

Oh, no, it's true.

 

New virus.  Big deal. 

[Guest]

Makes your Coors taste funny now doesn't it?

 

I was referring to the freshness Rocky Mountain Spring water

[Guest DWA]

One science doesn't fit all.

 

Astronomers don't blink, OK, not hard, when they find a black hole eating planets.  Microbiologists are always braced for new stuff.

 

Zoologists?  With large mammals?

 

Not so much.

 

Makes your Coors taste funny now doesn't it?

 

I was referring to the freshness Rocky Mountain Spring water

 

So was I.  ;-)

[Guest DWA]

The point people really don't seem to get about those Three Bad Things I posted up there that happen when science denies something is:

 

The society's entire confirmation machinery gets shut off.  Just like a power outage.

 

A scientist sees a bigfoot.  OK, my career is toast if I tell anybody about this, he thinks.  So, suddenly - no matter who he knows, whom he is connected to - he becomes the janitor at the high school or the telephone lineman on the road or you or me.  Science stops working.

 

I see one.  Well, science just stopped working right there, because I'm not an Internationally Renowned Scientist of the kind who would never admit to seeing one of these things because there would go I.R.Sci, right down the tubes.

 

In short...it doesn't matter who sees something the mainstream denies.

 

(The mainstream doesn't deny viruses.  Or torrent frogs.)

 

Every witness is an island of one.  The connections are shot; the information goes nowhere.

[Guest]

According to the NAWAC website, their Board of Directors is chaired by a "biology professor" and two others are described as "professional anthropologist" and "wildlife ecologist".  That's at least 3 guys (43% of the Board) with degrees and experience directly related to the ostensible mission of the organization. Meldrum's celebrity notwithstanding, it doesn't look to me like his input would increase the chance of success for NAWAC in collecting a type specimen.  Meldrum's been at this game for quite some time, and his track record in that regard is no better than anyone else's.

 

Of course this brings up another observation of mine, and a question:  Isn't NAWAC yet another example of science investigating bigfoot? How can we keep complaining that science won't examine bigfoot in a thread about some scientists claiming to be doing their level best to collect one?

[Guest DWA]

So, bigfoot's real?  I mean, everybody's good with what these guys are doing because they're pretty sure they're going to be successful? The mainstream is funding this?  I mean, they have a few cool million from the American Museum of Natural History; National Geographic Magazine; World Wildlife Fu....THEY DON'T?!?!?

 

Nope.  They're using the money and VACATION time from their real jobs.

 

This is what I mean by the society's confirmation machinery being shut down.  Who cares if they're scientists?  They're looking for bigfoot.  [snort] 

 

Nobody can prove to me that the mainstream takes this at all seriously.  I'm still waiting for that.

When the mainstream is taking this seriously is when everybody in Area X is being paid to be there.

 

Right, bipto?

When science is taken seriously, scientists are PAID for doing their JOB, and the job is confirming sasquatch.

[WSA]

 

I've come to see Drew that your argument (and that of many others) is frequently based on what I'd characterize as an erroneous premise. It is: A bigger animal should always be easier to find than a smaller one. Most often, the skeptics point of view is premised by the boilerplate description of a "800 lb. primate", or some such similar description. The impression intended, I think,  is this critter is so big you couldn't HELP but stumble on it if it were real. If so, this focuses on the wrong characteristic, and it assumes no large animal could also have the ability to be stealthy, good at evasion,  furtive or quick....but these are the very characteristics Bipto and his colleagues are reporting. A 1 to1 comparison of this animal to a frog, on mere size alone, is a rather reductionist approach, don't you think so? 

 

Terrestrial Mammals are much easier to locate than other creatures.

In North America, the abundance of roads makes this a simple matter of finding tracks and following them until they poop or leave hair.

 

It is a simple fact.  Unless you are applying magical abilities to the creature of course.

 

 

I agree that is true Drew, yes, but it still overlooks another simple fact: Some mammals are harder to locate than others, and some are not easy to locate at all. Wouldn't you agree? 

 

As well, some mammals are harder to locate than some other life forms? Would you agree with that as well?

Edited July 16, 2013 by WSA

[Cotter]

Drew, do animals leave tracks in all substrates?

 

How often does a BF poop anyway?

[WSA]

 

I've come to see Drew that your argument (and that of many others) is frequently based on what I'd characterize as an erroneous premise. It is: A bigger animal should always be easier to find than a smaller one. Most often, the skeptics point of view is premised by the boilerplate description of a "800 lb. primate", or some such similar description. The impression intended, I think,  is this critter is so big you couldn't HELP but stumble on it if it were real. If so, this focuses on the wrong characteristic, and it assumes no large animal could also have the ability to be stealthy, good at evasion,  furtive or quick....but these are the very characteristics Bipto and his colleagues are reporting. A 1 to1 comparison of this animal to a frog, on mere size alone, is a rather reductionist approach, don't you think so? 

I agree with you for the most part WSA, but size alone I do not think is the only factor being compared. At least not size as in stumbling across a live specimen as you say. Does it not make sense that a larger animal would leave more sign behind? More waste, more hair, more saliva, more tracks, more signs of passage such as bent or broken foliage, etc?  No doubt the Wood Ape is very ninja-like. But even forest ninjas must eat and poop?

 

It would seem so, yes. But then again, I don't know the nature of this proposed animal, really. I would have to say the probability is higher, based on assumptions drawn from other large animals, but do we know enough about this world to say this is ALWAYS true?  Without going back into the whole "BF evidence is this... no it isn't"  roundabout, I will just go so far as to ask: Would nature be capable of evolving a creature who could defeat these expectations?

 

After all, "more" is on a relative scale. More than what? Some are proficient at doing that, some are not at all. If you have beings on that wide a scale, why not consider one who is an outlier? I think everyone here subscribes to Darwinian evolutionary theory. The abilities of organisms to evolve in that crucible is astounding.

 

Same old argument from me really: I anticipate always to be surprised by nature. So far, it seems to be the smart money bet. Too, those who expect to be surprised are more often able to discover what is not expected by others, no?

[Guest]

How much poop would a Wood Ape poop if a Wood Ape was real and pooped? How much scat would a sasquatch scat if a sasquatch ate nuts?

[Guest DWA]

 

 

I've come to see Drew that your argument (and that of many others) is frequently based on what I'd characterize as an erroneous premise. It is: A bigger animal should always be easier to find than a smaller one. Most often, the skeptics point of view is premised by the boilerplate description of a "800 lb. primate", or some such similar description. The impression intended, I think,  is this critter is so big you couldn't HELP but stumble on it if it were real. If so, this focuses on the wrong characteristic, and it assumes no large animal could also have the ability to be stealthy, good at evasion,  furtive or quick....but these are the very characteristics Bipto and his colleagues are reporting. A 1 to1 comparison of this animal to a frog, on mere size alone, is a rather reductionist approach, don't you think so? 

I agree with you for the most part WSA, but size alone I do not think is the only factor being compared. At least not size as in stumbling across a live specimen as you say. Does it not make sense that a larger animal would leave more sign behind? More waste, more hair, more saliva, more tracks, more signs of passage such as bent or broken foliage, etc?  No doubt the Wood Ape is very ninja-like. But even forest ninjas must eat and poop?

 

It would seem so, yes. But then again, I don't know the nature of this proposed animal, really. I would have to say the probability is higher, based on assumptions drawn from other large animals, but do we know enough about this world to say this is ALWAYS true?  Without going back into the whole "BF evidence is this... no it isn't"  roundabout, I will just go so far as to ask: Would nature be capable of evolving a creature who could defeat these expectations?

 

After all, "more" is on a relative scale. More than what? Some are proficient at doing that, some are not at all. If you have beings on that wide a scale, why not consider one who is an outlier? I think everyone here subscribes to Darwinian evolutionary theory. The abilities of organisms to evolve in that crucible is astounding.

 

Same old argument from me really: I anticipate always to be surprised by nature. So far, it seems to be the smart money bet. Too, those who expect to be surprised are more often able to discover what is not expected by others, no?

 

And one doesn't have to speculate about the animals not leaving sign.

 

Bigfoot sign has been found, of all kinds other animals leave, under compelling circumstances, by witnesses who had good reason to believe that what they saw left that sign.  (Like:  they saw or heard it leaving it.)

 

Only one problem:  science doesn't recognize any of it.  They're not gonna find and catalog what they don't recognize.

[the parkie]

According to the NAWAC website, their Board of Directors is chaired by a "biology professor" and two others are described as "professional anthropologist" and "wildlife ecologist".

I know you will say that you're only using quote marks in that sentence because you are quoting their website directly, but it still reads as if you are skeptical of these 3 titles. Do you doubt their veracity? If so, why?

Edited July 16, 2013 by the parkie