The Ketchum Report

[Guest]

^

Not if the bulk of genes for for coding the olfactory receptor proteins that we have lost since the LCA are still intact in these samples. You can be assured that the study will focus on this area because it accounts for ~45% of our gene loss if my memory is correct.

[Guest Cervelo]

Maybe they should hire this guy to explain it

[Guest]

Mulder, if Dr. Meldrum does not accept the results of the DNA study, how will your opinion be affected?

That is a very interesting question. I would have to know more about the nature of said objection before I could comment.

Right back at ya Mulder!!

Translation: you can't answer my challenge.

Tim,

Have no idea what your talking about at this point and will gladly concede the goggle wars to you my friend we all know how this ends after the same old tired exchanges are done on both sides.

Translation: You can't answer Tim's challenge either.

If you think there is enough precedence for a creature such as Bigfoot to be declared real by the scientific community and the masses just on DNA only great I just happen to disagree and have stated my position as such. And yes I can have both ways

Not and maintain any pretense of objectivity or intellectual honesty. You are freely admitting that science that backs Skeptics is science, but science that backs the proponents is somehow not science.

Your bias now stands clearly revealed to all.

How is chain of custody, or the opinions of credentialed people, Meldrum or other, whether deemed "admissible in court" or not, not another instance of the ol' Appeal to Authority or Ad Hominem fallacies? I would hope that science requires an unimpeachable standard of evidence.

No authority should be regarded as automatically correct and infallable based solely on his authoratative status. That is "appeal to authority".

However, a credentialed expert acting within the bounds of his expertise shouldbe granted the benefit of his credentials barring reason to believe otherwise.

Put another way: If Stephen Hawking made a professional statement about a matter of cosmology, barring any evidence of equal or greater weight that the statement is incorrect, one would be well served, and entirely justified in accepting the validity of the statement.

IF there is a bone or other body part that can provide a DNA signature that identifies a heretofore undescribed species of extant hominim then why are people jumping to the conclusion that scientists wouldn't accept that result? I would.

Blood and hairs are "body parts" as well, sas...no bone required.

Well, the Minaret skull in Cali. apparently was a pretty big "hear of" incident?

I would call that more than a "hear of" incident. The individuals are specifically names, records were kept, and specific findings noted.

Edited April 2, 2012 by Mulder

[Guest Cervelo]

Mulder,

It's not a war.... Well maybe for you

[Guest]

Zigoapex,

Sasceptic has very clearly said that is NOT his position. I think the following makes his position on the subject very clear:

Mike

I wasn't rebutting what he posted, I was asking him why some feel that Dr.K's work(pending) will not be enough

[JDL]

The BLM is only responsible for human remains and archaeological sites/artifacts on BLM lands, just as the Forest Service is responsible for those items on their lands, and Park Service, etc. on theirs. Private lands have different laws dictated by State law. We do have many artifacts that are not on display because hardy any BLM unit or National Forest have the space to display them. NAGPRA would prohibit the display of human remains anyway.

As for Lovelock, I believe the Phoebe Hearst has most of the human remains. The Nevada State Museum has many artifacts as well.

Hairy Man,

Thanks. I gather that you have a relationship with the BLM. Next time I go out to the Bay Area I'll try to get over to the Phoebe hearst Museum of Anthropology.

It would be interesting to have a DNA analysis of the Lovelock remains done. They clearly were much taller than the average Paiute, or other ethnic human of the time, and averaged somewhat taller than most Americans today.

The excavation of the Lovelock cave revealed arrows, but no bows, and the arrows were from the topmost layer, consistent with the Paiute account that they trapped the Si-Teh-Cah in the cave then fired arrows into the cave and set a fire at its entrance. There were, however, pleanty of both darts and atlatl from the upper layers on down.

The fact that the Si-Teh-Cah were still using atlatls when the Paiutes transitioned to bows is interesting and consistent with their name, the stick-thrower people. It also indicates that racially, they probably were taller and longer armed than the Paiutes. An atlatl dart, thrown by a 6'6" Si-Teh-Cah with long arms would certainly have greater force and distance than one thrown by a 5' Paiute, and would likely compete well with a Paiute bow.

For the Si-Teh-Cah to retain the atlatl when others were using bows indicates that they must have perceived some advantage to doing so.

[Guest]

Mulder,

It's not a war.... Well maybe for you

Attempt at evasive action noted, not that it does you any good.

Where does dna come from if not from a critter of the type described by that dna?

My challenge stands unanswered.

[Guest Cervelo]

Mulder,

Oh we're back to the DNA comes from something question. The answer is obvious.....of course it comes from something!

I didnt think you actually wanted me to answer the question, thought it was like you tag line or

something

There ya go the "challenge" has been answered!!

[Guest]

I wasn't rebutting what he posted, I was asking him why some feel that Dr.K's work(pending) will not be enough

Sorry - mobile device mix-up on formatting.

I have no idea what Ketchum's work entails, and I won't until such time that a paper describing it is published. So neither I nor anyone else could determine that it would "not be enough" to prove the reality of bigfoot.

[JDL]

I didn't bring my post above back around to the thread, so it appears off-topic. Point is, there've been scores of reports of very tall indian skeletons excavated from mounds throughout the 1800's, all of which were spirited off to various institutions and never seen again. It suggests that there was a race of tall native Americans that went extinct. These remains are lost in the bowels of various academic and scientific institutions and may never again see the light of day.

With advances in DNA we've been able to sequence the neandertal and denisova genomes, and in the case of denisova, this was done with very little to go on. Yet here we have evidence of a possible new species already in possession by academic institutions who have access to technology that could easily tell if they were simply tall humans, or another species and no one's checking it out.

The Si-Teh-Cah skeletons may be of the same race. Their height indicates the possibility. They could also be unique unto themselves. Either way, their remains exist and an enterprising academic could make a name for himself by tracking them down and sequencing them.

It seems to me that the larger scientific community does have some inherent bias when it comes to such remains collected almost a century ago or more. Neandertal were very clearly not modern human so they got special attention, but others, that were close to modern human, but still consistently anomolous have been looked upon as simply tall people. If someone excavated a mound today and they were found today, they would be all the rage, but now that the science of DNA has caught up to the bones found a century and a half ago, no one seems interested in revisiting them.

Why is that? Do the attitude toward this particular set of type specimens and the attitude toward bigfoot evidence stem from a common root bias among thought leaders in the related disciplines?

"Bring me a body to prove you have a new hominid species."

But academia has bodies that are probably from at least an uncatalogued native American race, and possibly from an uncatalogued hominid species. All they've got to do is locate them in the basement and apply modern science. Why isn't this being done?

[Guest]

I've shared this link several times on the BFF; here it is again: Brian Dunning's investigation of strange skulls and giant skeletons from North America. I can't recommend reading Dunning's work on this topic strongly enough.

In case after case, reports of giant skulls or other anomalous skeletal parts can be traced to a newspaper or magazine article and no further. This indicates that such artifacts never really existed in the first place, not that there's some sort of scientific conspiracy to cover them up. So the first thing to establish - really establish - is if such-and-such a skeleton or skull ever actually existed.

For those artifacts that can be traced to a legitimate physical specimen, it's a matter of tracing the provenance from discovery to the most recent curator. It's important too, to seek out actual scholarly publications on such artifacts. If they are real and if some university or museum had them in their care, then it's quite likely that publications on those items exist.

Finally, we need to be vigilant to avoid the "must be bigfoot" logical fallacy. In other words, just because something is unusual doesn't mean it's bigfoot. Certainly, Maasai and Dinka peoples in Africa can be quite tall, and at least one analysis suggests that equestrian "Plains Indians" in the 19th Century were on average the tallest people in the world.

[Guest spurfoot]

In case after case, reports of giant skulls or other anomalous skeletal parts can be traced to a newspaper or magazine article and no further. This indicates that such artifacts never really existed in the first place,

Saskeptic, that seems like a non sequiter . The conclusion does not follow from the premises. Further, in the era when those skulls and skeletons were being reported, Darwin's theory had just been published and caused enormous grief for the public and for the proponents of that theory. It would not be surprising that artifacts supporting existence of other species of mankind might have been destroyed or suppressed.

You are correct about the Plains Indians. I've met some, and they are enormous and highly intelligent.

[Guest]

Saskeptic, that seems like a non sequiter .

That's why I recommend reading the linked material.

[Guest Jodie]

I'm a living, breathing example of a giant skeleton debunker, don't believe everything you hear and read about. They had the skeleton I investigated listed as being seven feet tall after supposedly being examined in a law suit filed by the local NA claiming the skeleton. It was only 5'10" when I got there.

[Guest vilnoori]

LOL There indeed are some pretty big people around. I remember meeting my first Maori! They are BIG!