How to Analyze Cryptid Assertions

[captain koolaid]

I dunno... seems to be some dancing around the subject. It would require a pretty specific set of conditions for a genuine "mistake" involving an "obvious" Bigfoot. If someone states that they saw something that they suspect may be Bigfoot, but, they can't be sure, then that may not be a fib. But, how many reports are like that, anyway? In that sort of case, perhaps "belief" or emotion can carry the argument. With the cases where they're attributing Bigfoot to just something... they're making stuff up. If it's not overtly Bigfoot, they're just calling it Bigfoot. If it's not just "something", and they've seen 9 foot Bigfoot, in their face... they're making stuff up.

If it's an up close and personal, obvious Bigfoot encounter, it's a tale. If it's a certain encounter that involves ambiguity, they're making stuff up and they know it. Making stuff up, fibs, tales, whatever. A lie by any other name...

The cases of ambiguity, with an uncertain conclusion are the possible non lies. However, even these, at least some of them, could still be porkies. They're just more cunning about the fib... "It might have been Bigfoot" is still a good yarn. WP's estimate of around 90% sounds about right.

 

[Night Walker]

Is the cross-cultural Old Hag phenomenon a lie? Are the stories and folklore that surround it fibs? If not, then why couldn't there perhaps be something similar - something that we've all missed - to the whole Bigfoot thing?

If we change the judgmental and needlessly derogatory language used to describe Bigfoot and it's proponents then we may also change the way in which we think about it all. Change can be hard but it may not be such a bad thing when the best Bigfoot skepticism has to offer in way of explaining Bigfoot in 2015 is 90% Lies, 10% Mistakes...

 

[captain koolaid]

Is the cross-cultural Old Hag phenomenon a lie? Are the stories and folklore that surround it fibs? If not, then why couldn't there perhaps be something similar - something that we've all missed - to the whole Bigfoot thing?

If we change the judgmental and needlessly derogatory language used to describe Bigfoot and it's proponents then we may also change the way in which we think about it all. Change can be hard but it may not be such a bad thing when the best Bigfoot skepticism has to offer in way of explaining Bigfoot in 2015 is 90% Lies, 10% Mistakes...

Not going to speak for anyone else, but, yeah... it's fibs. That being said... I don't care. I don't consider it derogatory. Just calling it what it is. What's the point in getting hung up on technical hair splitting over "lies"? Folklore, stories, pranking, hoaxing, it's all a big fib and it's funny as hell. I'm not really putting them down. I get it. Just be honest about the BS when it comes to the crunch. Don't rip the gullible off and don't insist it's not fibs when it counts. Spin the yarns, but give us a wink when you do it if it looks like you're going too far. As chain yanking goes, it's fine. But it is a lie and all the cultural/social handwaving won't change that.

 

[The Shrike]

Indeed. The "best Bigfoot skepticism has to offer" is that there's no such thing as Bigfoot. The most parsimonious explanation - by far - for a claim that someone has seen a Bigfoot is that the claim is a lie told for any of the myriad reasons people tell lies. When those reasons include "bilk gullible out of their money" and "promote an anti-science agenda" then bigfootery crosses over into the same kind of dangerous woo as psychics, ghosts, and other nonsense.

 

[River]

Not going to speak for anyone else, but, yeah... it's fibs. That being said... I don't care. I don't consider it derogatory. Just calling it what it is. What's the point in getting hung up on technical hair splitting over "lies"? Folklore, stories, pranking, hoaxing, it's all a big fib and it's funny as hell. I'm not really putting them down. I get it. Just be honest about the BS when it comes to the crunch. Don't rip the gullible off and don't insist it's not fibs when it counts. Spin the yarns, but give us a wink when you do it if it looks like you're going too far. As chain yanking goes, it's fine. But it is a lie and all the cultural/social handwaving won't change that.

I like this because I think a lot of skeptics feel the same in some ways as this post. "We" as a whole get the whole theater aspect of it. The live play... The perspective of lets scare the crap out of them har har har!!! Some even attempt it for profit. (camping trips what? where they guide you for 200-300 per weekend and you bring all your own supplies and tents etc)

Well now, you also have the other aspects of the bigfoot industry. Put it in the fiction section and everyone is happy. it's when you start duping people out of their money (or their wits?! haha) is when it crosses the line, of reality or theater. A prank is when you tell the person after haha gotcha wink wink! But it's not a prank when you try to pass off THE BOOGIE MAN MUWAHAHAH as reality. lol?

So where does it cross the line? Santas make money at the mall by letting like 300 kids a day sit on their laps and give them germs. (hey those beards and gloves might help protect you in some ways hahah) So everyone knows the Santas are fake except the kids when they are super young. How many kids above the age of 12 believe in Santa Clause as a reality?!

So where is the rub? I say it's when you try to pass it off as real and never give the haw haw you fell for it dance. It's OK to prank people but it's not OK to write scientific papers declaring a new species based on the footprints and getting funding to look into the phenomenon. (and using university space/property to study and store those things in some cases) I would say it may also not be cool to Get yerself a dang ole gun and go shoot yerself one of them thar critters. You might just end up shooting something else that walks around on two feet, and that might not be too cool or funny either.

So, there are times when its funny or a prank, and clearly times when it's not. I'm pretty sure we don't have to explain the difference here right? So why not the eye roll and giggle or golf clap when you see some silly bigfoot nonsense, but NO!!! They want to be taken seriously... and have tax free organizations to help save the beasts!!!! lolll

Seriously, I hope you can tell the difference between what's OK and not OK.

 

[Resume]

If we change the judgmental and needlessly derogatory language used to describe Bigfoot and it's proponents then we may also change the way in which we think about it all. Change can be hard but it may not be such a bad thing when the best Bigfoot skepticism has to offer in way of explaining Bigfoot in 2015 is 90% Lies, 10% Mistakes...

Lying is always going to carry a negative connotation. And it should, no matter how deep you are into the BLAARG or how much effort is expended in trying to dress it up in pseudo-academic jargon.

 

[comncents]

In regards to Reported Sightings:

I think that giving "mistakes & hoaxes" 10% is overly generous. To expand upon Capt Koolaid's point. Read the reports. How many say "I saw something that might have been bigfoot" (almost none). They always give detailed descriptions of how tall, hairy, human-like, ape-like, glowing eyes, pig throwing, etc the sighting was. Although these may be exaggerations of something they really didn't see well - a mis-identification - based on the details given in most reports I've read, I don't think that is true. How many bears or ass-ends of a moose do people actually see AND turn into a Bigfoot sighting?

As for hoaxes, while some people certainly do put on Bigfoot costumes and hang out on the side of a road, how many sightings reports match this story? I find it hard to believe that anyone would pack a costume way back into the woods and just hope to find someone to hoax. Think about the set-up, the hoaxer would have to find a place where he would be seen, but only for a brief glimpse and then be able to get away.

I am one skeptic who will say that the percentage of bigfoot sightings that are reported being lies is close enough to 100% To reasonably say ALL.

I would also say that that in ALL cases of bigfoots being filmed, the camera operator is in on it.

 

[Gilbert Syndrome]

My opinion is that more than 90% of sighting reports are fabricated lies. The remainder are mistakes of various kinds.

I agree, if people aren't genuinely mistaken, or haven't been intentionally fooled by others, then they're chatting bollocks. It really is as simple as that.

 

[William Parcher]

Thanks for that.

I disagree. Though there clearly is no objective evidence that Bigfoot exists, I think many here are too judgmental in the language used to explain the Bigfoot phenomenon - like "lies" which implies dishonesty when we're really talking about a fictional subject. Can you lie about Star Wars, faeries, and Santa? Is writing a song about Bigfoot (or any other subject if it really didn't happen) also lying?

For me, "fabrication" is fine because Bigfoot is created - both consciously and unconsciously - as a subjective experience rather than an objective reality. The experience may be real but the creature is not...

I reckon that more people have unconsciously fabricated their Bigfoot experience than is generally acknowledged here - perhaps there is even some instinctual mechanism that, under the right circumstances, prompts us to see potentially dangerous things that are not really there. After all, it is evolutionarily better to see a thousand false tigers lurking in the bushes than to miss the one real one...

However, the situation is complicated - people who may have had a "real Bigfoot experience" may also consciously fabricate others. Maybe conscious fabrication is a means to achieve a "real Bigfoot experience" (unconscious fabrication). False memories are also "real" and sincere even though they never happened. Unfortunately, it is hard to discuss such things when many are hung up on the lies-and-cons approach to people who are doing nothing worse than hoaxing (which is a time-honoured tradition), storytelling, and legend-tripping...

Bigfooters themselves will refer to the sighting fabrications as "lies". They talk about hoaxers being liars. They freely say that about Dyer, Marx, Biscardi, Standing, Mary Green, "Paranormal Bigfooters", etc. Of course you can disagree with all of them too.

 

[barehl]

namely that no one has been able to recreate the film. And eventually, that fact will tell.

This ignores the glaring fact that there has never been a second film like the PG film in over 47 years. The only two choices are either to conclude that the PG film was fake or that bigfoot has become extinct since PG. Someone who doesn't understand the statistical significance of no second PG film is not likely to understand the significance of a recreation no matter how well done.

 

[barehl]

Investigator: "What would convince you that bigfoot is not real?"
Bigfooter: "Nothing."

I think you are understating this somewhat.


BF Enthusiast: "What would convince you that bigfoot is real?"

Biologist: "A tissue sample with good DNA of an unidentified animal would get my interest."

Zoologist: "A reliable observation or video footage followed by evidence that any normal animal would leave behind including footprints, hair, dung, and indications of foraging for food would get my interest."

Skeptic: "Any interest by a genuine scientist would get my interest."


BF Enthusiast: "Then you should be convinced already; we have all of that."

Zoologist: "I don't think you understand. You can't take a track from one location and hair from somewhere else and then claim that they are related. An animal weighing hundreds of pounds would need to eat a lot and they would poop a lot. Where are the foraging sites and where is the dung? If I find where elk or black bear have been foraging I won't have to look 50 miles away to find droppings or tracks. Find these in one location and I'll be there to look at it."

Biologist: "Also, if you found a foraging site then there would be a chance of finding DNA left behind that was brushed from the gums or lips. Dung might also contain DNA. Bring me anything that might contain DNA and I'll analyze it. Thus far, samples have been studied in the US, UK, and Switzerland but none turned up any unknown animal."

Skeptic: "There hasn't been any recognition from a genuine scientist. Melba Ketchum claimed that bigfoot had human mitochondrial DNA. She didn't share samples, didn't have any peer review and didn't publish in an actual professional journal. That isn't real science."


BF Enthusiast: "What about Jeffrey Meldrum? He's a real scientist."

Zoologist: "Meldrum has analyzed casts of supposed bigfoot tracks. These casts have short toes, long toes, straight toes, splayed toes, deep tracks, shallow tracks, wide tracks, narrow tracks, pronounced ball impression or none, sometimes two ball impressions, and sometimes with that famous mid-tarsal break and other times without it. I'm not sure I've ever seen two that were alike. With real animals, this doesn't happen. You can easily identify raccoon, beaver, opossum, bear, and mountain lion tracks. Once in awhile you might see a track with a missing toe or other injury but the tracks are more alike than different. With so-called bigfoot tracks we see the opposite where instead of samples converging over time into a bell curve, the distribution is nearly random. That doesn't happen with real animals."


BF Enthusiast: "You just deny the science because you don't want to rock the boat."

Zoologist: "That isn't true at all. It wouldn't even have to be bigfoot. My colleagues would be excited over any new primate in North America even if it was the size of a Marmoset."

Biologist: "Sure you would have some skepticism over the first couple of results but that is what peer review and repeatability is all about. I wouldn't have any trouble getting others to confirm results if I had something to show them."

Skeptic: "Why would I deny science? People make discoveries all the time like finding out that Pluto is not the only dwarf planet or that there are particles smaller than electrons. Finding out something new is always interesting."


BF Enthusiast: "Well, I don't know. You seem to be throwing out a lot of good evidence."

Biologist: "What evidence? Are there any DNA samples showing an unknown animal?"


BF Enthusiast: "Uh, not yet."

Zoologist: "Has anyone found a foraging site with tracks and dung?"


BF Enthusiast: "I haven't heard of any."

Skeptic: "Are there even any videos where the frame doesn't shake and it shows more than a distant, blurry image of something moving in the vegetation?"


BF Enthusiast: "There's the Patterson Gimlin film."

Skeptic: "That was almost 50 years ago."


BF Enthusiast: "Yeah, but what about all those sightings? They can't all be fake."

Zoologist: "Most of those sightings were of people or black bears. There was even a time when people were releasing grown-up pet primates like chimpanzees and orangutans into the wild. Those sightings could have been pretty startling."


BF Enthusiast: "You can't prove they were all fake."

Zoologist: "That isn't my job. My job would be to prove that one is real."

 

[barehl]

Read the reports. How many say "I saw something that might have been bigfoot" (almost none). They always give detailed descriptions of how tall, hairy, human-like, ape-like, glowing eyes, pig throwing, etc the sighting was. Although these may be exaggerations of something they really didn't see well - a mis-identification - based on the details given in most reports I've read, I don't think that is true. How many bears or ass-ends of a moose do people actually see AND turn into a Bigfoot sighting?

This account is a case in point: http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=13038

He only saw it briefly in the light of his snowmobile. This brief sighting from someone startled is considered Class A, the highest level.

Compare that with this: http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=8792

He said something was following them and throwing things at them. This is considered Class B.

So, let's look at this classification system more closely. It states that:

Class A reports involve clear sightings in circumstances where misinterpretation or misidentification of other animals can be ruled out with greater confidence.

This is clearly false. In the first report, there was snow on the ground and whatever was in the light of his snowmobile was casting shadows. This would easily allow for mistakes in size and shape in the brief view that he had. This could easily have been a moose, elk, or bear and is far more likely but it is listed as though the bigfoot identification is nearly certain.

Incidents where a possible sasquatch was observed at a great distance or in poor lighting conditions and incidents in any other circumstance that did not afford a clear view of the subject are considered Class B reports.

This classification also includes cases where someone heard something that they thought could be a bigfoot such as an owl or fox. In the example listed, I am certain that what was following them and throwing snowballs was a fellow human rather than a bigfoot. However, the database is setup with the assumption of a bigfoot rather than something far more likely.

Class C is for second-hand accounts, something that shouldn't even be in the database.

I think it is clear that these accounts have a vastly overestimated confidence rating. In a real database, a brief observation by one person at night in a headlight would be low confidence, about a 1 on a scale of 1-5. The following and throwing things account would not even be included.

 

[comncents]

^^ I would probably rate both of these as just "stories". There are a lot of questions about the first one, such as why such an elusive beast as bigfoot didn't hear four snow machines coming and hide long before the guy was right on top of him? He may have misidentified a bear, but then he is giving details like "angled arms". My vote would be just a made up story.

Second one, again my vote is just a made up story - I wonder if it was throwing Good-N-Plentys?

 

[Night Walker]

I like this because I think a lot of skeptics feel the same in some ways as this post. "We" as a whole get the whole theater aspect of it.

Saying that you understand theatrics while then referring to it as "lies" demonstrates that you don't understand theatrics beyond, perhaps, a superficial reductionist manner. It's very similar to Bigfooters saying that they understand science but demonstrating otherwise by insisting Bigfoot is real...

Bigfooters themselves will refer to the sighting fabrications as "lies". They talk about hoaxers being liars. They freely say that about Dyer, Marx, Biscardi, Standing, Mary Green, "Paranormal Bigfooters", etc. Of course you can disagree with all of them too.

I disagree with them on this matter as much as I disagree with you guys. If you think that you guys are reasonable about all things Bigfoot and not at all head-strong (like DWA) then I encourage you to think again. Critical thinkers should also be critical of their own position and thought processes, should they not?

There are many Bigfoot hoaxes yet there are very few confessions of hoaxing. I think the major obstacle in rectifying this is that the two most interested groups in the Bigfoot phenomenon (believers & skeptics) take such a hardcore judgmental approach to hoaxing - ie hoaxing is bad, deceitful, lying, etc. Friendships are terminated because of it. People are branded as "liars" for life. Who would want to own up to that?

Such condemnations, however, are way beyond the broader community understanding and appreciation of hoaxing as a bit of fun; as folk-theatre; the time and effort that goes into it as demonstrations of love and/or affection (or rites of passage) rather than malice...

There is also some evidence from the days before mass entertainment that hoaxing (particularly tall stories and paranormal hoaxing) was an important part of the community bonding process - even prominent citizens engaged in it without this modern stigma of shame.

Skepticism works well as the watch-dog of scientific orthodoxy but is not really applicable as the watch-dog of broader community morality. By framing hoaxing as immoral both Bigfoot believers and skeptics are engaging in the same form of role-playing. By all means - tell it like it is just lose the unnecessary shades of Judgement Day and stick with the science...

 

[William Parcher]

I am not the person who discourages or shuns Bigfoot hoaxers. I am the person who wants to see more hoaxes but wants them to be of much better quality than what we get. I am one who is of the opinion that the majority of Bigfooters are pretending to believe and don't actually believe that Bigfoot exists. This is how you can have smart people involved in Bigfootery - they are just playing a role that is an enjoyable hobby/pastime and sometimes they make money doing it but most just spend money doing it.

I agree with what you said but we both know that Bigfooters will refuse your reasoning that fabrications and hoaxes are not really lies per se. Try it on them. They will tell you that it is lying. Of course telling you that is just another part of the game that they play.

 

[Resume]

I agree with what you said but we both know that Bigfooters will refuse your reasoning that fabrications and hoaxes are not really lies per se. Try it on them. They will tell you that it is lying. Of course telling you that is just another part of the game that they play.

I would also like to see NW try and explain to footers that what they are doing is legend tripping and folk theater. Yeah, try that on DWA.

 

[Night Walker]

I am not the person who discourages or shuns Bigfoot hoaxers. I am the person who wants to see more hoaxes but wants them to be of much better quality than what we get.

You are actively discourage people admitting to hoaxing via the moralistic language used to describe it just like the 'footers...

I agree with what you said but we both know that Bigfooters will refuse your reasoning that fabrications and hoaxes are not really lies per se. Try it on them. They will tell you that it is lying. Of course telling you that is just another part of the game that they play.

I would also like to see NW try and explain to footers that what they are doing is legend tripping and folk theater. Yeah, try that on DWA.

They won't buy it any more than you guys yet legend-tripping is a far better description of Bigfoot-research than lying. Many here are no less righteous in their beliefs/opinions than DWA yet you mock him while patting each other on the back...

 

[Resume]

They won't buy it any more than you guys yet legend-tripping is a far better description of Bigfoot-research than lying. Many here are no less righteous in their beliefs/opinions than DWA yet you mock him while patting each other on the back...

Nope, lying is lying. Legend-tripping is spin. Spin away.

 

[Gilbert Syndrome]

You are actively discourage people admitting to hoaxing via the moralistic language used to describe it just like the 'footers...




They won't buy it any more than you guys yet legend-tripping is a far better description of Bigfoot-research than lying. Many here are no less righteous in their beliefs/opinions than DWA yet you mock him while patting each other on the back...

What're you even on about here? How many people on these forums or on the BFF are merely playing "folk-theatre?" There's a vast difference between Victorian-style parlour games, played for a bit of fun and mischief, and what the nuggets in Bigfootery do. I'd lump any cold-reader in with Footers any day of the week, mainly because there's lying for laughs, and there's lying for gain.

What we generally see in Bigfootery isn't anything like the "nudge-nudge-wink-wink" of "theatre," because we no longer live in the Gay-Olde times of yore. It's become a whole new beast, and people react accordingly to the insistence of full-grow adults that they saw a 10 foot tall ape-man in the brush of their local woodland.

It really isn't a surprise to see such disdain and weariness here when it comes to those full-blown adults waxing lyrical about the same nonsensical Sy/Fy science, day-in, day-out.

No'one is "discouraged" to admit their tomfoolery, quite the opposite. If you're attempting to attach a negative aspect to the notion of coming-clean about ones yarn-spinning then I have to wonder what you're basing it on...the past?

Hoaxes and pranks are admitted to all the time, and no'one bats an eyelid. This is the age of Youtube Tomfoolery, afterall. On the flipside, take Bob Gimlin, what would it mean for him to admit his part in the PGF hoax? The only people who'd go barmy about such a "revelation" would be the unstable nuts who think Patty is a genuine female Bigfoot complete with boobies.

The rest of the world wouldn't give a toss about Gimlin coming clean about something that is clearly a prank. The PGF is a fine example of how modern Bigfootery isn't as much about "theatre" as it is about "dishonesty."

Knowing what we know about Bigfootery, why should a sceptic extend any kind of benefit of the doubt towards Footers?

 

[Resume]

They won't buy it any more than you guys yet legend-tripping is a far better description of Bigfoot-research than lying. Many here are no less righteous in their beliefs/opinions than DWA yet you mock him while patting each other on the back...

By the way, I'll be righteous as **** all regarding my informed beliefs versus that nitwit's unevidenced opinions, thanks much.

BLAARG on.