Simple Challenge For Bigfoot Supporters

[Correa Neto]

Humm....very very good question and difficult at the same time. I would say that I'm torn. My heart says yes, but my brain says no.

It's sort of like the flood stories. I just finished the book "Indian Legends from the Northern Rockies" by Ella Clark where she repeats traditional stories from the 1800s and there are 10 flood stories from the Nez Perce, Shonshoe, Kutenais, Flatheads, Coeur d'Alenes, etc. Now, of course, I realize that the stories are likely there because of contact with missionaires, etc., but I can't help but think that maybe there was already something in their original beliefs that caused the tribes to latch onto the biblical flood story, remake it into their own, and hold so dearly onto them.

So, evidence? I'm torn. Stories by themselves, probably not. Combined with bigfoot images in very old masks, totem poles, songs, baskets, and rock art...? Maybe.

OK, I can perfectly understand your point. Actually I find it quite reasonable. Personally I would say yes, they are evidence, but not reliable evidence.

The paralell with (also nearly universal) flood myths is quite good. However, they may as well have appeared due to some fear of a storm -or a flood- that is/was or will be too big, for example. Its not that far-fetched IMHO to think people could fear such thing after experiencing a severe storm or a flood. Of course, they may as well be a memory from one of the large floods at the end of the last ice age.

Same is valid for "wildmen". These myths may have been created by our fear/desire of breaking the barrier that separates humans from animals. But they may also have used other elements, such as real bipeds -apes, monkeys, other tribes considered as "less-human-than-we-are", individuals with hypertrichosis, etc.

That's why I consider myths may be evidence indeed, but not reliable evidence (when it comes to provide backing to the bigfeet are real claim).

 

[William Parcher]

Parcher: What error in your mission statement are we talking about? Is it this?...

If so, who would have caught it and why would they think that it was an error?

Yes, that's the error. NA's haven't used the word "sasquatch" for centuries because it's an Anglized (sp?) spelling of Sesquac (so modern). Who should have caught it, well, I would have hoped anyone reading it...but alas, I think no one has...

Thanks, but I still have questions. That portion of the mission statement contains two statements:

1) Native Americans used the term Sasquatch for what we now call Bigfoot.

2) Native Americans have used that term for centuries.

Is one of those wrong, or both?

 

[Hairy Man]

Very good point (evidence vs. reliable evidence)

Speaking of human/animal barriers. You may find it interesting that stories from the south tend to be more "sexual" in nature. There are several stories of ceremonies being conducted to turn the bigfoot into a human so that he could marry a woman and have legitimate children (vs. most of the rest of the U.S. where any "relationship" is forced and any children produced shunned).

 

[VulcanWay]

Are these myths evidence of some real humanoid but non-human pipe-smoking trickster? Or they are just psichological responses, ways to "explain" certain things (people getting lost at places they know well)?

If I interpret these myths as evidence for cryptohominids, I am seeing the myths under my biased googles, cherry picking the details that I feel "fit" with my interpretation. Note that when I present them to back a point against their use to back cryptohominids, I am also making an interpretation under my biased googles and cherry-picking details... Welcome to the slippery but fascinating world of myth interpretation!

Well said! Yes, this is anecdotal evidence at best. Once we discover the truth of a thing, though, we then do have a better starting point for research into these legends.

My point was not to help prove Bigfoot's existance with posts related to legend and lore, more to point out that for such legends to spring out from a real sighting or a misinterpreted sighting (as in the case of a bear or person in animal skins) are not beyond the bounds of reason.

 

[Hairy Man]

Thanks, but I still have questions. That portion of the mission statement contains two statements:

1) Native Americans used the term Sasquatch for what we now call Bigfoot.

2) Native Americans have used that term for centuries.

Is one of those wrong, or both?

Well, a mix...NAs have used many terms for centuries, but not "Sasquatch"!

The line reads: The Alliance of Independent Bigfoot Researchers is a non-profit organization of individuals dedicated to the research and conservation of the species of animal known to the Native Americans for centuries as "Sasquatch", or more recently by many others, as "Bigfoot."

It should read (or some form that the BOD wants to approve): The Alliance of Independent Bigfoot Researchers is a non-profit organization of individuals dedicated to the research and conservation of the species of animal known to the Native Americans for centuries by various names but more commonly called "Bigfoot" in modern times. or something along those lines.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

Combined with bigfoot images in very old masks ......Maybe.

Are you referring to a mask that just represents a face of some kind ?

How would you begin to infer ' Bigfoot ' , from any type of mask ?

 

[William Parcher]

Well, a mix...NAs have used many terms for centuries, but not "Sasquatch"!

The line read: The Alliance of Independent Bigfoot Researchers is a non-profit organization of individuals dedicated to the research and conservation of the species of animal known to the Native Americans for centuries as "Sasquatch", or more recently by many others, as "Bigfoot."

It should read (or some form that the BOD wants to approve): The Alliance of Independent Bigfoot Researchers is a non-profit organization of individuals dedicated to the research and conservation of the species of animal known to the Native Americans for centuries by various names but more recently known as "Bigfoot." or something along those lines.

I guess that improves the statement for accuracy. But I still wonder about one of my first questions:

...who would have caught it (the name error) and why would they think that it was an error?

And a new question: Why did the person that wrote it not know they were making an error?

 

[Hairy Man]

Are you referring to a mask that just represents a face of some kind ?

How would you begin to infer ' Bigfoot ' , from any type of mask ?

Yes, a mask that depicts a face (and worn by a human during a ceremony to represent that character in the event).

The masks I'm referring to have been identified by the creator as being what it is (i.e., like the dancer I posted above called the mask he's wearing D'sonoqua (Wild Woman of the Woods). I wouldn't call a mask (or totem pole or basket) a bigfoot (or a traditional name) unless it was previously identified as such by the creator. The identifications and photos can be found in various books, those are the ones I'm referring to.

 

[LTC8K6]

Why isn't anyone searching for dragons or dragon bones?

 

[Hairy Man]

I guess that improves the statement for accuracy. But I still wonder about one of my first questions:

...who would have caught it (the name error) and why would they think that it was an error?

And a new question: Why did the person that wrote it not know they were making an error?

It was written by committee, so I don't know the answer to question number 2. I don't think it's a huge error...it's just a poorly written sentence (or maybe just the wrong place for a comma - Sasquatch and Bigfoot could go together as well). I would have thought someone else before now would have noticed...but no big deal, we'll get it fixed.

 

[SweatyYeti]

Correa Neto wrote:

1) Witnesses' sincerity. It means nothing. Uri Geller looks "sincere", doesn't he? So does many conmen and politicians. Many people can pull a lie right in front of your face and seem to sincerely telling the truth. Quite often the "Mr. X has no reasons to lie" line is pulled by "investigators" to improve the report's credibillity. There's absolutely no way to probe an individual's motivations. Sure, in some cases, the motivations are obvious. To this aspect, one must add that the witness may be sincere. The person may really think he/she saw a bigfoot. He/she may not be telling a lie and still have not seen a real bigfoot. Mistakes, false memories, etc.

I don't agree that a person's sincerity means absolutely nothing.

People who are rational and sane always have some motivation behind their actions. People just don't do things due to purely random thoughts......if they're mentally well.
As for Uri Geller....his motivation is money. He pretends to be sincere because he's making a living off of his act.
Politicians lie, and many times are obviously lying, in order to either keep their job, or to get elected. The motivation being money and/or power.
kitakaze had mentioned "telemarketers" a while ago as an example of people who call strangers and lie to them....but they also have money as a motivating factor for their actions.
While it's true that we can't "probe someone's mind" to determine their motivations...the fact that there IS some motivation behind every sincere person's story, lends some credence to them as a whole....and also individually, in cases where there's no apparant reason for them to be making it up.

3) Detail level. What would we consider more reliable? A detailed report from someone who claims to have observed a bigfoot for 20 minutes or the testimony of someone who claim to have caught the glimpse of a large hairy bipedal form crossing a road?
Short encounters with wildlife as in the second case are more common, but also more prone to misidentifications.

A longer encounter would be more "reliable"....meaning less likely to be a misidentification of a bear.....or a reptile.
Therefore...a longer encounter carries more weight as evidence, than does a shorter encounter.

 

[SweatyYeti]

belz wrote:

Please don't make up stuff that I haven't said to make me agree with you. I just noted that Kita's response was a bit... emotional. I never claimed it wasn't normal human behaviour. Thank you.

Responses which almost always contain insults, accusations, and hostility, are definitely abnormal behavior for a DISCUSSION board...and indicate that there's a problem with the person responding in that manner.

Debating an issue on a discussion board requires LOTS of back-and-forth posts, lots of questions, and lots of in-depth explanations to get to some kind of an understanding between two opposing sides.
kitakaze has way too much going in the way of hostility, false accusations, and insults for all to be well inside his head.

NOW...where'd I leave my helmet......

 

[William Parcher]

It was written by committee, so I don't know the answer to question number 2. I don't think it's a huge error...it's just a poorly written sentence (or maybe just the wrong place for a comma - Sasquatch and Bigfoot could go together as well). I would have thought someone else before now would have noticed...but no big deal, we'll get it fixed.

I agree that it's not much of a big deal. But I'm surprised you made this statement...

...but I'm surprised the error wasn't previously caught...

I don't think you should be surprised that it wasn't caught. First, the entire collective committee didn't catch it (they actually created it). Secondly, virtually everyone associates the term Sasquatch with ancestral NA's and that it is the equivalent of Bigfoot. It would be very rare for anyone to use Sesquac or the K-words, even if they know them.

Hairy Man: Who should have caught it, well, I would have hoped anyone reading it...but alas, I think no one has...

This is the puzzling part to me. When you say anyone, do you mean?...

1) Literally anyone reading the statement, because they will all know that this is an error and recognize that the term should be Sesquac or the K-words.
2) Anyone who specifically knows that the statement is in error, because those people recognize that the term should be Sesquac or the K-words.

I would even imagine that anyone who is a #2, probably wouldn't bother to inform the AIBR of the error, because nearly the whole world of Bigfootery uses Sasquatch instead of Sesquac or the K-words... even when those Bigfooters are talking about the animal in relation to NA's. Given the above, I'm not confident that it would ever have been pointed out as an error - with the exception of Kitakaze who just did it. You are really surprised that it hadn't already been caught?

 

[SweatyYeti]

kitakaze wrote:

Specifically, 'not easily attributable' is determined by taking into account what is known to occur with evidence claimed to have been caused by a real sasquatch. i.e., hoaxing and misidentification.

Your explanation of "how 'not easily attributable to Bigfoot' is determined" is way too vague, kitty.
It's determined by "taking into account what is known to occur"????

So, if ONE person hoaxed footprints....then thereafter...forevermore...ALL footprints found will be deemed HOAXED, right?
That's how it's determined whether possible Bigfoot footprints are legit or hoaxed...by simply taking the first "hoaxed" case and applying that explanation to every footprint found afterwards?

That's good scientific thinkin'!

The concept needs a little more in-depth explanation....if it won't cause you to blow a fuse, that is.

 

[Hairy Man]

Very good points, William. Hummm...I guess I was thinking that it was commonly known that sasquatch was not an NA word itself, but a form of another word (because it's generally mentioned in most bigfoot books including the popular ones - Green, Meldrum, Krantz, etc.). Thank you for making your point though, I'll pass it on to the Board and let them decide what they want.

 

[VulcanWay]

A longer encounter would be more "reliable"....meaning less likely to be a misidentification of a bear.....or a reptile.
Therefore...a longer encounter carries more weight as evidence, than does a shorter encounter.

To me, neither is "evidence" at all without another source to corroborate it, preferably unrelated to the initial observer.

If one person comes to me and tells me that they saw Bigfoot at a specific place, just off a road while they were hiking through the forest for example, and I find that another person who happened to be driving by in a car past this specific place saw something as well at the same time. Now I'm willing to put that in my pile of potential evidence. Still doesn't prove either saw Bigfoot, just that they both saw "something." Now add onto that other things like one of them taking a picture or video, a pile of feces at that site sitting between two huge footprint tracks, the tracks leading to a cave that has signs of habitation, etc. Now we have something to examine!

Now we can send that feces to a lab to see if it contains DNA that we can't correlate to a known animal. The footprints might just have epithelial cells in them from which DNA can be extracted (and if it matches the DNA from the feces, we're building a serious case!). Maybe the cave contains shed fur that we can also test and compare. And so on and so fourth. After examination and study then I feel comfortable calling it "evidence."

If all I have is a guy telling me a story of a sighting, whether it for 20 minutes or 20 days and has no corroborating evidence that I can test, it's all about Occam's Razor. Is it more likely that this person observed a fantastical creature that no one has been able to prove exists for certain...or he's lying/misobserved? I'll go with lying/misobserved every time even if it was my own mother who made the claim...

 

[SweatyYeti]

kitakaze wrote:

More importantly to the point of Sweaty's obfuscations, while he can get away with claiming not to get the point of my addressing his question....

I got away with sumpthin'!!......I got away with sumpthin'!!.....

And....a partial quote, too!! I'm SO bad.

 

[SweatyYeti]

VulcanWay wrote:

If one person comes to me and tells me that they saw Bigfoot at a specific place, just off a road while they were hiking through the forest for example, and I find that another person who happened to be driving by in a car past this specific place saw something as well at the same time. Now I'm willing to put that in my pile of potential evidence. Still doesn't prove either saw Bigfoot, just that they both saw "something"

In the case of Joyce's sighting report...her daughter was also in the car, and reportedly saw it too.....very analogous to your example.
You said it "proves they saw something". I'll agree with that!!
(Actually, it's not "proof", just "strong evidence".)

 

[VulcanWay]

In the case of Joyce's sighting report...her daughter was also in the car, and reportedly saw it too.....very analogous to your example.
You said it "proves they saw something". I'll agree with that!!
(Actually, it's not "proof", just "strong evidence".)

It is only somewhat analogous (in the sense that more than one witness exists) but deviates from it in that the two observers were at different vantage points and (infered though it was) were strangers.

I'd indeed be willing to lend at least some credence to a sighting if another person witnessed it - it goes on my "worth investigating to find more substantial corroborative evidence" pile. I'd be more comfortable if it wasn't the observer's daugher or if that other person saw the thing from a different angle, though. So they did see "something" (or they're lying). Was it Bigfoot, a bear, a guy in a poncho, a tree? Again, without something else to corroborate this story that I can look at and test all I can say is that they did indeed see something (or again, they could be lying).

The question that I would ask the Bigfoot Believers is, do you assume that all reported sightings of Bigfoot are genuine? Are the numbers for sightings representing every report that's ever come in to you, or is there a "no way they're being honest" pile? And how many sightings are follow up on to see if you can find other corroborating evidence? In the witnessed sighting above, did anyone go to the site and look for tracks, et al?

 

[SweatyYeti]

VulcanWay wrote:

Again, without something else to corroborate this story that I can look at and test all I can say is that they did indeed see something (or again, they could be lying).

That's pretty much what I said, quite a while ago, about the "possible" explanations for her sighting...or better said...the "plausible" explanations.
Those are:
1) They saw something...which, based on the length and clarity of the purported sighting, could NOT have been a Bear. And that leaves only Bigfoot as the "something" that they saw.
2) They made-up the whole story. It's a total lie.

Take your pick!