Originally Posted by Huntster :
Again, I clearly stated that it was possible. I then outlined how I thought it wasn't likely:
And by explaining HOW you thought it wasn't likely, you implied it was too complex (too many steps, etc. etc.) for a hoaxer to accomplish....
Not necessarily too
complex, but with too many other factors which made the hoax dangerous, or would leave evidence of the hoax (like sliding down the bluff in the fake feet, starting/stopping the trackway in snow without leaving sign of human arrival/hoax set-up/human departure, etc).
If you had said it wasn't likely because Marx never left Dahinden's side, then that would be evidence to support your feeling. Would you agree that you can't imagine how Marx may have been able to conduct a successful bigfoot hoax at Bossburg?
That's correct. I can't imagine how
anybody conducted a successful bigfoot hoax at Bossburg, in accordance with what I've read about the event. That doesn't mean I proclaim that it couldn't be done, but that I don't know how they did it.
Do you?
Why don't you properly "estimate" the length that a hoaxer
might go, then definitively pronounce that the Bossburg event was a hoax.
No, I don't think it's "underestimating the length (or at least distance) that some hoaxers might go to." I think it's a reasonable consideration.
Again, I did not write that it was impossible.
But you simply can't imagine someone doing it.
As the event was recorded, that's correct.
From your link:
The argument from ignorance, also known as argumentum ad ignorantiam or argument by lack of imagination, is a logical fallacy in which it is claimed that a premise is true only because it has not been proven false, or that a premise is false only because it has not been proven true.
You read the wrong section. I was referring to:
The argument from personal incredulity, also known as argument from personal belief or argument from personal conviction, refers to an assertion that because one personally finds a premise unlikely or unbelievable, the premise can be assumed not to be true, or alternately that another preferred but unproven premise is true instead.
One of the two common versions of the argument is summed up as:
"I can't believe this is possible, so it can't be true"
(Here's a better link to the particular info on that same page.)
That's very similar to your statements that:
"I simply can't imagine somebody walking 20 miles into the mountains, packing whatever gear they needed to perpetrate such a hoax,"
and
"I can't imagine how the sign in the soft sand created by the hoaxed photography scene, then the sign of human activity placing the fake footprints could be hidden well enough for Titmus not to see"
I've never written that "I can't believe this is possible, so it can't be true."
I
have written that I don't see that as likely, so I don't believe it.
If you can't imagine how something is possible, you've usually underestimated the people that made it possible.
That's only if it is established that it was, indeed, a hoax. Otherwise, you are overestimating the length people will go to perpetrate a hoax.
Until it is established that it is, indeed, a hoax, people cannot fully review their previous opinion on it.
Again, I make no such claims. I have consistently used words like "doubt", "unlikely", "I can't imagine", etc. I have not used words like "is not", "does not", "cannot", etc. When I have, you've caught me and rightfully asked for evidence, clarification, or reversal.
I think we'd both like things left open to possibility, but just because you or I can't imagine how something was accomplished doesn't mean it wasn't.
That's correct.
It's also true that until it is firmly established that it was, indeed, a hoax, we would be premature to judge it so.
I still have strong doubts that Patterson could have pulled off such a hoax, complete with such a "suit" in that day, as well as the associated prints, especially after seeing a number of animal suits both from that era as well as today.
And so?
So calling him 'hokey', a 'rural bumpkin', or an 'average horse wrangler', seems to be questioning his intelligence and ingenuity, NOT the technology available to him.
I meant to compare his background with that of, say a Hollywood special effects insider; someone who has knowledge, experience, and assets to create such a suit. Someone like, say, Dfoot.
Oh, yeah. We know about him, don't we.
It has been established beyond a reasonable doubt that he's a hoaxer, hasn't it?
By labelling him in such a manner you're underestimating the ingenuity he may be capable of.
I'm calling a spade a spade, and a hoaxer a hoaxer.
