The Ketchum Report

[Guest]

If we use the same data, what conclusion would the people in the loop say a BF is?

As I understand it, the people they agree that it's a new, previously undocumented higher primate, but they aren't sold on it being a hominid or hominid-hybrid.

My guess is (and I must stress it is MY guess, as my source didn't elaborate) is that their conclusion is a developmental offshoot of another branch of ape that has developed independently towards a state similar to the Homo line.

That's my question. If it really has human mtDNA, it has to be hybrid (assuming the DNA came from an actual BF and not a person). I'm not sure how you can draw any other conclusion.

Or that it is sufficiently similar to humans that the parasitical hosts of mtDNA are compatible with its biology as well as ours.

[Guest knappster007]

I don't think this is been posted here yet, but Dr. Meldrum linked to this TV news interview with Dr. Ketchum.

http://www.click2houston.com/news/Does-Bigfoot-have-human-DNA/-/1735978/17568802/-/5pkab/-/index.html

Glad to hear her say that there were multiple labs involved.

[Guest VioletX]

Thanks Mulder, so is there a disagreement that a human woman mated with whatever the Unknown "creature" is?

edit-sp.

Edited November 28, 2012 by VioletX

[Guest slimwitless]

Or that it is sufficiently similar to humans that the parasitical hosts of mtDNA are compatible with its biology as well as ours.

Are there any known examples of that in nature? To me that sounds even more controversial than Ketchum's hypothesis.

[Guest]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/27/bigfoot-dna-proves-creature-exists-genetic_n_2199984.html

HuffPost has a interview with Dr.K and she say's this;

''

"We split the samples with another forensic lab -- one worked on it manually while the other did it robotically, extracting the DNA -- and we ran several tests to confirm there was no contamination. And we ended up getting human sequences on many samples."

[Guest]

...we ran several tests to confirm there was no contamination.

That doesn't make any sense to me. In the past, when I've been privy to the collection and submission of samples for DNA analysis, we also sent along buccal swabs of everyone who handled it specifically to screen out for our own contamination. How can she have tested for that without screens?

[Guest BFSleuth]

The mantra for serious scientific research should be: "You don't even know this is going on until we are ready for the press conference presenting the final, peer-reviewed findings."

Agreed, but in this case the collection of samples did require submissions from independent bigfoot field researchers and therefore required public announcements in order to obtain samples. Once that is done then there is no controlling the level of interest and speculation on public forums, blogs, and media. Dr. Sykes is also confronted with this conundrum in that he also made a public announcement to solicit samples, which created a flurry of media coverage.

Ketchum interview from what looks like yesterday:

http://www.click2hou...ab/-/index.html

Kudos to Click2Houston for doing some actual journalism, to actually interview Dr. Ketchum instead of regurgitating content from a Google search.

Interesting that she said forensic DNA researchers were used initially to confirm lack of contamination of the samples, and the number of labs used for blind comparison of results. It is also noteworthy that she stated the press release was certainly not planned, but a response to premature outing of some results.

[Guest]

That was a good interview with dr.K, She just slammed the door on the people saying that it's contaminated, and same results with 13 labs,

even goverment labs.

[Guest]

The question remains, if they had whole bodies, why waste time (at that point) with the DNA testing. Put the bodies out there for the world to see! Why dance around the mess of interpreting DNA when you could just dump the monkey on the slab and say "Here's your bigfoot!" ?

Well sure that's what you and I would prefer, but from her perspective, why not release the whole thing as one pretty package with a bow on it, making yourself the world's foremost expert on Bigfoot? You only get one chance at that sort of thing.

Would it be possible for Ketchum's paper to prove the existence without conclusively proving whether it's a human or an ape? In other words, could where it fits still be open for interpretation with everyone agreeing that it DOES exist?

[Guest VioletX]

That doesn't make any sense to me. In the past, when I've been privy to the collection and submission of samples for DNA analysis, we also sent along buccal swabs of everyone who handled it specifically to screen out for our own contamination. How can she have tested for that without screens?

If I have you correct, it sounded like Dr K said in the video linterview that they did compare the DNA of submitters and lab personnel.

@Gray jay,thanks you always find the best links.

I wonder if this is a current statement from Meldrum??

ugh...why do my post sometimes have double quotes lately,lol?

Edited November 28, 2012 by VioletX

[Guest]

Thanks Mulder, so is their a disagreement that a human woman mated with whatever the Unknown "creature" is?

I'm not sure, to be honest.

I WILL point out that there is an alternate explanation of how "human" nuDNA could be found in a non-human/Homo critter.

Bear with me for a moment.

The alternate explanation has to do with the concept of convergent evolution, that is, that species of entirely different origins are similar physically and genetically because they developed to fill similar ecological niches.

A simple example, using the trait of bipedalism.

Consider that, a long time ago, there was a split between ape and Homo. We went and developed bipedal traits, which we passed on in our genes, and apes retained arboreal traits and passed them on.

Now, at some point after the ape/Homo split, another split occurred in apes, where another group of apes developed bipedalism BUT retained more "ape" features (diet, appearance, etc) than Homo did. Now we have TWO groups of bipeds, Homo, and the new biped.

Form follows function, so if both have the function of bipedalism, then it would necessarily follow that their DNA would take the same form to encode for bipedalism.

That would make it appear that the bipedal ape had at least one set of "human"/Homo genes, when in fact it was not from Homo.

[Guest slimwitless]

None of the media outlets have picked up on the Sierra Kills contribution to this study. That's when things will get...um, interesting.

[Guest]

"They're not any of the large apes -- they branch off as a separate lineage," Ketchum said. "My personal theory is that it probably branched off and evolved in parallel with the rest of the primate lineage."

Wow that's a mouthful. I don't see how this comment jives with Paulides said on Coast, as well as the claim that they have the same chromosome count as us. I seem to be missing something here because the only thing I've heard here is that the stock species via The Y chromosome is outside the range of Neanderthal and Denisova.

[Guest]

That doesn't make any sense to me. In the past, when I've been privy to the collection and submission of samples for DNA analysis, we also sent along buccal swabs of everyone who handled it specifically to screen out for our own contamination. How can she have tested for that without screens?

That's what they did, anybody that handled the samples, had given a sample to compare it to the study samples.

Edited November 28, 2012 by zigoapex

[Guest DWA]

Agreed, but in this case the collection of samples did require submissions from independent bigfoot field researchers and therefore required public announcements in order to obtain samples. Once that is done then there is no controlling the level of interest and speculation on public forums, blogs, and media. Dr. Sykes is also confronted with this conundrum in that he also made a public announcement to solicit samples, which created a flurry of media coverage.

I'd think, however, that this shouldn't be a big issue. Any scientific study that requires the cooperation of the public requires this, and all queries "what did you find?" can be simply answered, when the results are out, you'll know. Sykes seems to have done that.

Does the mainstream have any issues like this when they do this? Not saying they can't, and of course we do have a different animal here than most scientific studies, which are simply plowing the furrow of the known an inch deeper and a foot farther.