Professor: Bigfoot exists, and science should care

[William Parcher]

Professor: Bigfoot exists, and science should care

Whether the large, hairy hominid known as Bigfoot truly roams the wilderness of Humboldt County hasn't deterred scores of enthusiasts and a television series from joining a nearly 60-year quest to find signs and footprints of the ever-elusive creature.

But one local scientist and professor says the search for Bigfoot opens a larger discussion about what the science world deems worthy of research and what happens to those fields that fall into what he calls "the crackpot realm."

At a free event this Friday at the Freshwater Grange in Eureka, Humboldt State University physics professor emeritus Richard Stepp is set to discuss and answer questions as to why he thinks Bigfoot exists and why the science world should take a serious look at the subject.

"People have to understand so that if they come into the talk and make assumptions that scientists have looked into this in a big way and found nothing and therefore very likely there is nothing to find, they would be making a mistake," Stepp said in an interview with the Times-Standard. "Science has not gone into this in a big way."...

http://www.times-standard.com/general-news/20160411/professor-bigfoot-exists-and-science-should-care

Yippee! We have a physicist talking about zoology. He's in his native realm - not.

 

[LTC8K6]

There seems to be an awful lot of groups looking for bigfoot, with quite a few scientists involved, and quite a lot of money being spent. They seem to be taking the subject somewhat seriously.

How do people get away with claiming that it's not taken seriously?
Or that no efforts are being made?

 

[Rincewind]

How did a Bigfoot become a professor?

Lied about his feet?

OK - I'll go now, after (deliberately) misreading the OP...

 

[Mike!]

It's been years since I lived there but, when I was in Sacramento, the very best pot came from Humboldt County. Not saying there's a correlation, just thought it was worth mentioning.

 

[Axxman300]

Okay, he's a scientist. He should get off his butt and just do the research. If he has problems getting funding he can amend his paperwork to state he is making a survey of large mammals in the area. This way it's useful, serious work is done, and he might get lucky.

Whining about it solves nothing.

 

[Resume]

"People have to understand so that if they come into the talk and make assumptions that scientists have looked into this in a big way and found nothing and therefore very likely there is nothing to find, they would be making a mistake," Stepp said in an interview with the Times-Standard. "Science has not gone into this in a big way."...

Professor Crackpot Stepp hasn't been paying attention.

 

[dropzone]

I have more qualifications than he and find the femur length in the Patterson-Gimli film interesting (that hip joint is a little too low compared with its butt, isn't it? There goes THAT hypothesis. ), and I still don't care.

 

[MikeG]

Okay, he's a scientist. He should get off his butt and just do the research. If he has problems getting funding he can amend his paperwork to state he is making a survey of large mammals in the area. This way it's useful, serious work is done, and he might get lucky.

Whining about it solves nothing.

So, you'd like a physicist to do the work of a biologist? This could prove interesting for science. Chemists doing the work of geneticists could be fun, or astronomers working on say neural connections in the human brain during various activities........There would certainly be a few new perspectives opened up, but we might have to wait a while longer than usual for the new flu jab.

 

[Axxman300]

So, you'd like a physicist to do the work of a biologist? This could prove interesting for science. Chemists doing the work of geneticists could be fun, or astronomers working on say neural connections in the human brain during various activities........There would certainly be a few new perspectives opened up, but we might have to wait a while longer than usual for the new flu jab.

He can put together a team filled with Biologists and Biology undergrads.

Met a young man a few years ago doing research at Hopkins Marine Station on Tuna, he planned to switch from Marine Bio to researching Wolves. My guess is that his work with Tuna migration might reveal insight to land mammal migration.

Plus, having a physicist along would shut down the whole inter-dimensional being, invisibility crap. And maybe the physics department has a little extra money...this last one is clearly a joke...

 

[fuelair]

There seems to be an awful lot of groups looking for bigfoot, with quite a few scientists involved, and quite a lot of money being spent. They seem to be taking the subject somewhat seriously.

How do people get away with claiming that it's not taken seriously?
Or that no efforts are being made?

Because no one has found one (or parts/scat, etc. of one.. even though everyone should know they are real!!!!!!

 

[dropzone]

Met a young man a few years ago doing research at Hopkins Marine Station on Tuna, he planned to switch from Marine Bio to researching Wolves. My guess is that his work with Tuna migration might reveal insight to land mammal migration.

Am I weird because that idea fills me with more curiosity than most CTs?

 

[Axxman300]

Am I weird because that idea fills me with more curiosity than most CTs?

Not really.

He was a bright young man from Australia doing his post-graduate work. He said that the fish were kind of boring to him.

You're an ocean person or you're not.

 

[Pterodactyl]

I'm starting to lose track of all the academics who've now come out of the bigfoot research closet. Whether this should be taken to mean that science is finally paying proper attention to the subject, or merely that the pitifully-gullible can still hold down full-time professorships, is open to interpretation I guess. But one thing is for sure... these people are not coming to the conclusion that bigfoot is real based on any careful, objective review of the available evidence.

The statement "Science should care" really in this context just means "Science should abandon its stringent demand for evidence and instead just take peoples' word for it." and that's exactly what these professors are doing. Buying anecdotes and selling their credibility.

It is disturbing that a genuinely curious student could now google up various journals (RHI, Denovo, NM Museum of Natl. History, etc. ), academic institutions (ISU, Humboldt State), professors (Meldrum, et al.) and complete a research paper coming to the conclusion that this might have some validity.

It's sort of like Trump. The more crap gets debunked, the stronger the belief in the phenomenon grows. How do you win?

 

[MikeG]

He can put together a team filled with Biologists and Biology undergrads.

How would a physicist do that? He wouldn't even understand their CVs. Seriously, you have no idea what you are suggesting.

Met a young man a few years ago doing research at Hopkins Marine Station on Tuna, he planned to switch from Marine Bio to researching Wolves..........

So, a biologist planning to switch from studying one large animal to another. Not quite the same thing, is it?

 

[The Shrike]

http://www.times-standard.com/general-news/20160411/professor-bigfoot-exists-and-science-should-care

The writing/lack of editing on display here might even be as shoddy as the content.

 

[Axxman300]

How would a physicist do that? He wouldn't even understand their CVs. Seriously, you have no idea what you are suggesting.

At my college, the physics professor would walk downstairs to the biology department, run the idea by them, ask for a few good under-grads, and then beg for funding with everyone else.

The single greatest problem in science is the lack of communication between the disciplines and sub-disciplines. Out here at MBARI, the building was designed to force physicists and engineers to mingle with chemists and marine biologists.

It hasn't worked as well as they've hoped.

Engineers hang with engineers, botanists hang with botanists, geologist with geologists, and so on. This is the main reason science moves as slow as it does. Everyone sticks to their branch instead of reaching out.

Example: A Marine Geologist at the Moss Landing Marine Labs has made huge strides with mobile laser scanning. This is technology that had been around for over a decade before this man discovered its existence while stuck in traffic and observing the Cal Trans engineers using it. He had he not got out of the lab and been stuck in traffic this off-the-shelf technology would have remained unknown to him. Worse is the fact that the lab has a small engineering department to build ROVs and instruments for deep sea data collection, and anyone in the department could have told him about the technology had he bothered or thought to ask.

While I think looking for Bigfoot is a waste of time, getting biologists and scientists of any stripe into the woods to collect data is a smart thing.

 

[Giordano]

I have no problem with scientists looking for Bigfoot! A scientific approach to this issue would be great (not new, but okay by me). But they should actually do so, using the best technology available to them, and if they find one, then let the rest of us know and document it with the same convincing evidence as expected for such a scientific endeavor. I am tired of the "foreplay"- Bigfoot "researchers" talking endlessly about how Bigfoot might exist and about the "tantalizing" (but ultimately unconvincing) evidence that sought-of, maybe is there. We are not discussing convincing people to fund a 140 million dollar probe to Jupiter- according to many of the advocates, Bigfoot is everywhere. We even have "hotspots" of alleged activity. Just do, don't talk!

In common with all self-styled Bigfoot hunters- get on with it!

 

[William Parcher]

At my college, the physics professor would walk downstairs to the biology department, run the idea by them, ask for a few good under-grads, and then beg for funding with everyone else.

Then you have a problem with your biologists. They shouldn't allow the "Bigfoot is out there" idea to "run by them" and then funding results. They should be smart enough to explain to the physicist that it's a ridiculous idea and funding a search or investigation would be even more ridiculous. Somebody has to stand up and be the intelligent one.

The single greatest problem in science is the lack of communication between the disciplines and sub-disciplines. Out here at MBARI, the building was designed to force physicists and engineers to mingle with chemists and marine biologists.

Even putting them in the same room wouldn't be enough if the physicist has an erection for Bigfoot. You have a very serious underlying problem if the physicist doesn't inherently understand that many hundreds of years have passed without any body or even a body part to show for Bigfoot existence. This cannot happen with a gigantic hairy cone-headed apeman running around in America no matter how sneaky they are. This physicist has big problems with rationality and reason, and putting him in close proximity to biologists probably won't help him.

While I think looking for Bigfoot is a waste of time, getting biologists and scientists of any stripe into the woods to collect data is a smart thing.

Collect data on what? Collecting "data" on Bigfoot in the woods is a fool's errand. That's not a smart thing - that's a stupid thing.

 

[William Parcher]

I have no problem with scientists looking for Bigfoot! A scientific approach to this issue would be great (not new, but okay by me). But they should actually do so, using the best technology available to them, and if they find one, then let the rest of us know and document it with the same convincing evidence as expected for such a scientific endeavor. I am tired of the "foreplay"- Bigfoot "researchers" talking endlessly about how Bigfoot might exist and about the "tantalizing" (but ultimately unconvincing) evidence that sought-of, maybe is there. We are not discussing convincing people to fund a 140 million dollar probe to Jupiter- according to many of the advocates, Bigfoot is everywhere. We even have "hotspots" of alleged activity. Just do, don't talk!

In common with all self-styled Bigfoot hunters- get on with it!

Then you should also have no problem with scientists looking for living Tyrannosaurs. We don't really know if they are extinct unless we look literally everywhere and intensively for them.

Your idea has a patina of virtue but it is actually absurd. You see, there were many scientists combing the swamps of Arkansas recently and they were searching for living Ivory-billed woodpeckers. They were not looking for Tyrannosaurs. If you want to find out if T-Rex is extinct you have to start from Square One and go back to those same swamps with a scientist team who is looking for Tyrannosaurs. But then don't expect those guys to say anything if they happen to see Ivory-bills because their job is to only confirm Tyrannosaurs.

 

[Giordano]

Then you should also have no problem with scientists looking for living Tyrannosaurs. We don't really know if they are extinct unless we look literally everywhere and intensively for them.

Your idea has a patina of virtue but it is actually absurd. You see, there were many scientists combing the swamps of Arkansas recently and they were searching for living Ivory-billed woodpeckers. They were not looking for Tyrannosaurs. If you want to find out if T-Rex is extinct you have to start from Square One and go back to those same swamps with a scientist team who is looking for Tyrannosaurs. But then don't expect those guys to say anything if they happen to see Ivory-bills because their job is to only confirm Tyrannosaurs.

I didn't say that I would fund them (myself or through the government) or that I thought it was a great idea. But if anyone wanted to do so (IMHO waste their time) why should I be opposed? They might have a good time in the woods.

I believe that anyone, including scientists, should be able to do what interests them if it doesn't hurt anyone else. Do I think that they will find Bigfoot or T. rex? You can read my other posts in this Forum to see that clearly I think that they might as well look for my Aunt Emma in a strip club (and she is dead). But literally I would have no problem with the idea given it doesn't affect me or most any one else (unless they start shooting at random in the woods.

You may have been mislead by me stating that a scientific approach would be great- in my post I immediately noted that such an approach would not be new or novel, just that any search would benefit from a scientific, versus a hobbyist, approach. You may have thought I was I saying that prior searches didn't find Bigfoot because these searches were not scientific- not at all. Both scientific and non-scientific searches looked in the past, and didn't find Bigfoot because there is no Bigfoot to be found (99.99999%). But if anyone wants to search again, a scientific approach would be better than a non-scientific one; in fact I think that the unscientific searches are more likely to claim to have found Bigfoot.