N A W A C - Field Study Discussion

[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".

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?

 

Correct, those are direct quotes (though I'm not sure I capitalized them as represented on the website).  I have no reason to doubt their veracity.  My point is merely that the NAWAC is another (of many) examples of scientists taking bigfoot seriously.

[Guest DWA]

"Taking bigfoot seriously" isn't happening when "Finding Bigfoot" is the most serious consistent treatment of the topic in the mass media.

 

There is more than enough evidence - as NAWAC can tell you - to justify the full-time investment that they would be giving it had they not other jobs to go to, that are financing their research.

 

When large institutions are funding sustained research efforts we're there.  'til then...not even close.

[Guest Urkelbot]

The yeti scat thing was from 1959.  They didn't have a very large database of microorganisms back then, at least compared to now.  Most metagenome studies come up with lots of unknown microorganisms and even more unknown sequences of DNA.

 

I like the scat idea and I think it could provide good evidence.  If you had the bacterial or viral metagenome from supposed bigfoot scat you could compare it against that of  primates, bears, humans, etc.  It wouldn't be a slam dunk but could lead to more scientists taking it seriously and funding.

[WSA]

One thing I do find remarkable about the NAWAC operation Saskeptic, and it is not the lack of credentialed scientists on staff. Yes, money, or the lack of it.

 

You could say the NAWAC has mounted one of the longest, if not THE longest, on the ground study effort of this problem we are all so interested in seeing resolved. But what are their available resources? As Bipto has said many times, and which has been remarked about here many times, they rely on membership dues, donations, personal/vacation time and other personal equipment/resources. Not that I think the NAWAC has its hand out, looking for a dole. But c'mon. Is this operation being  treated seriously by those who have the wherewithal to fund it? As you've noted previously, everyone is scrambling for research money, grants and financial validation. Still, if we as a society regarded this quest with any, any degree of legitimacy, would they be operating on this shoestring?  I have to think they wouldn't be. The fact that they are does give some legitimacy to the argument we have not yet taken the other hand from behind our back in this "fight" to date, don't you think?

 

You could argue the effort doesn't deserve funding as it is chasing an improbable, and some do, but I've always understood you to say you feel science IS treating this question seriously. Or is it just being treated as seriously as you feel the evidence warrants?

[Guest]

 

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?

 

We have people with expertise in related scientific areas, but we do not have the resources of, say, a university, zoological organization, or similar institution. Nor do we have the standing to apply for and receive grant money. We're part-timers doing what we can on a shoe-string. Less than a shoe-string. On whatever those plastic things are at the ends of shoe-strings. 

 

"

." 

 

Honest questions and comments, for perspective - no "gotchas":

 

1) Is there an administrative reason that you could not obtain those "resources"?  Aren't 501-©(3)s able to compete for some of the same pots of money as anyone else? 

 

2) Doing field work on one's own time and one's own dime is actually quite common for wildlife ecologists like me.  I very often conduct unfunded research - usually in the field on weekends, in my own car, etc.  I'm also only paid for 11 months out of the year and have many colleagues on 9-month appointments, yet that doesn't stop us from being in the field or the office as necessary to do the things we need to do to be successful.  It's often the case that the preliminary data generated by such unfunded projects is the key to getting a proposal funded that actually will provide a budget in the future.  So I feel for you that you'd certainly like to be better funded (who wouldn't), but I don't see that your project is all that different from what a lot of field biologists are doing.  (The funding part I mean; obviously your objective to kill a bigfoot is quite a bit different!)

 

3) With respect to costs, I'm sure you would like to have a budget that would help enormously to keep boots on the ground for longer periods of time, allow you to deploy more gadgets to track your quarry, etc., but the heart of what you're trying to do should be pretty cheap, right?  I assume your marksmen are providing their services, weapons, and ammo gratis?  Compensation would be terrific but you technically already have what you need to meet your objectives.  It isn't like you're trying to study microtubules in animal cells but you lack an electron microscope.

 

4) Has NAWAC applied for any grants or written letters to political/agency representatives to encourage the funding of the research?  I couldn't get a grant to go collect a bigfoot either, because there's no call to do that from the agencies that fund my research.  The only way I could leverage the advantages of my research institution to collect a bigfoot would be something like hitting one with my truck on the way to the field to be working on something else.  The real key to mainstreaming bigfoot research would be to convince the NSF (for example) that there's a bigfoot out there to discover.

[Guest DWA]

"The real key to mainstreaming bigfoot research would be to convince the NSF (for example) that there's a bigfoot out there to discover."

 

And that would take....proof?

 

Catch-22.
 

[1980squatch]

When large institutions are funding sustained research efforts we're there.  'til then...not even close.

 

Agree.  I'll consider science taking the topic seriously when a anthroplogy/primatology department from a research institution has a grant funded team in the field on a long term search.  A tenured professor in charge, and research assistants with nothing else to do but work on the project.  It would be expensive, but the higher ed research engine spends a ton of money (I would guess 100s of millions) on research that does not pan out already (that is fine, part of the process).

[WSA]

I think those are all legitimate questions to ask Saskeptic, yes, and maybe Bipto can answer some of those. I would agree we can't complain on their behalf until we know that they've attempted to get funding, and been turned down. Oh, granted, you can always undertake research in your own, unfunded way, but you have to admit... your chances of success decline in proportion to the extra resources you do not have at your disposal.  

 

And sure, the price of just putting a man in a blind with a weapon is not going to break the bank, but I know you know it is not that simple. That man has to be transported to/from that area, has to be fed while there, has to have other essential equipment to support his requirements for sleep, data collection, scouting, communication....the list is long. Ask any hunter how much that pound of deer meat REALLY cost him and I guarantee he/she will want to change the subject. It seems deer are a lot easier to kill than this animal, by a longshot.

Edited July 16, 2013 by WSA

[Guest DWA]

 

When large institutions are funding sustained research efforts we're there.  'til then...not even close.

 

Agree.  I'll consider science taking the topic seriously when a anthroplogy/primatology department from a research institution has a grant funded team in the field on a long term search.  A tenured professor in charge, and research assistants with nothing else to do but work on the project.  It would be expensive, but the higher ed research engine spends a ton of money (I would guess 100s of millions) on research that does not pan out already (that is fine, part of the process).

 

And agreed.  And there you go - an ape; an eight-foot, quarter-ton and up bipedal ape, in North America for pete's sake, in the U S of A,  that's been called (by skeptics of course) a "zoological Holy Grail" and a "biological Everest"

 

(um...if it were real)...

 

That the only people looking for it can barely devote part time and almost all of it is their personal time and their personal money tells one, instantly, how seriously the mainstream takes the topic.

[Drew]

"The real key to mainstreaming bigfoot research would be to convince the NSF (for example) that there's a bigfoot out there to discover."

 

And that would take....proof?

 

Catch-22.

 

 

How bout a video similar to this?  This would bring all kinds of $$$ to the scene. 

[WSA]

Patterson thought so too Drew!

[Guest]

If the mainstream took this seriously, sasquatch would have been confirmed.  Long ago.

 

Agreed.

[Guest DWA]

 

And sure, the price of just putting a man in a blind with a weapon is not going to break the bank, but I know you know it is not that simple. That man has to be transported to/from that area, has to be fed while there, has to have other essential equipment to support his requirements for sleep, data collection, scouting, communication....the list is long. Ask any hunter how much that pound of deer meat REALLY cost him and I guarantee he/she will want to change the subject. It seems deer are a lot easier to kill than this animal, by a longshot.

Yes.  And then there is this:  generations of hunters, Native and European alike, have been sharing information since time immemorial about getting your deer.

 

Tell me where to get that info for wood apes.

 

He has to be put - after all that above - IN THE RIGHT PLACE.  Um.

 

Where is that...?

[Guest]

Um, bigger critters are almost always harder to find, since they are in general so much less in number...

 

Good point. Typically (though not always), the smaller you are, the more of you there are. 

OK, if you don't want to track a large critter, do a flyover with a FLIR camera.

 

Leaves. It's the main problem with the Falcon Project, IMO. 

[Cotter]

I don't mean to derail, but in that wiki article DWA posted, there was a citation from 4/7/2013 about unknown DNA found in a hair as reported by destination truth.

 

If true, why aren't scientists clamoring over this?