My two cents

I have watched and read all about these supposed, sensationalized discoveries and shootings and bodies and lies and hoaxes etc, etc..over and over again.

I have to admit, I view almost all things with a great deal of suspicion. Increasingly so in this area.

It's like watching a special brand of madness being manufactured for you.

I see a similar thing happen in New York City. It's called the shell game. One person has a portable table and the shells and ball. You have to guess where the ball is. When you watch someone play this game, and you pay real close attention, you begin to notice not where the ball went but that the guy with the table, the guy playing AND the five people standing around watching it are ALL involved in playing a game on YOU. You're the ONLY person they're doing it for because they are working together to create a scene to draw you in. They're all in on it. They want you to play this game because you're the sucker. The game appears easy and they all encourage you to play it. That's how the game works. It's all in the set up.

The other thing all of this reminds me of is junior high school. Everything is a rumor mill and it's 'he said this' and 'now they're saying that' and frankly 95% of the time I don't really even care. I don't get my hopes up expecting anything. I'm not getting drawn in and don't feel compelled to.

The reason I don't follow all of it is because I don't trust half the people involved from the start. No one who is 'known' in the supposed bigfooting world has anything special over anyone else. If there are people who film every expedition and investigation and put it out for people to see, it becomes obvious that they want others to view them as somehow gifted with some special knowledge or insight. After a time they begin to feel an added pressure to produce something and so they begin to manufacture evidence or a sighting . No one I've ever seen who does this sort of thing has any kind of special relationship with the sasquatch. No one has an inroad to the evidence everyone seeks. No one.

I respect a few people involved in bigfoot research. People like Prof. Meldrum, Dr.John Bindernagel and Prof. Esteban Sarmiento among others. I also like some of the lay people doing video analysis and serious and humble researchers that are out there trying to find something and don't need the world to know about it.

The people I don't tend to identify with are all the ones running around with cameras posting daily or weekly videos finding a bigfoot behind every tree, people with podcasts and websites and facebook pages trying to create the latest sensation, and there's a lot of them.
This is where it ceases to be serious endeavour and starts to resemble a circus. 'There's money to be made so let's get our faces out there and claim some inside knowledge and some expertise '. I have no time for most of these people. You can easily see where THESE types are dragging it all. Dragging everyone through the mud in the name of their own questionable celebrity.

Ignore the majority of them. The actual evidence, if any is forthcoming, will be found by an ordinary person, unexpectedly, or maybe a credible science professional. It's probably a lot more likely.

So, just remember as you're watching where they're manipulating the ball in front of you this time, the really important thing being manipulated through all of it is you.

Bigfoot, and the entire sub culture around it can ONLY make sense if Bigfoot does not exist.

If there was a monkey out there, things would not play out how they do.

If you read my post you will see a couple of other situations it reminded me of. So it does tend to happen in many circumstances. Charlatans and rumor mills always exist.

Monkey or no monkey, people exploit things very well and will continue to do just that. If this thing becomes a documented fact, I could easily see a circus created around it as well. I won't enjoy it any more then either.

BurdenOfProof wrote:Bigfoot, and the entire sub culture around it can ONLY make sense if Bigfoot does not exist.

If there was a monkey out there, things would not play out how they do.

This post and the entirety of the logic behind it can only make sense if it is expanded upon beyond two lines of syntax. The vague and generalized nature of this post draws a conclusion without any consideration of the topic in question beyond a very dismissive, and superficial level.

Please expand on your viewpoint and enlighten the rest of us on your sage and all encompassing realization.

NobleSavage wrote:

BurdenOfProof wrote:Bigfoot, and the entire sub culture around it can ONLY make sense if Bigfoot does not exist.

If there was a monkey out there, things would not play out how they do.

This post and the entirety of the logic behind it can only make sense if it is expanded upon beyond two lines of syntax. The vague and generalized nature of this post draws a conclusion without any consideration of the topic in question beyond a very dismissive, and superficial level.

Please expand on your viewpoint and enlighten the rest of us on your sage and all encompassing realization.

Its a realist viewpoint.

There is no evidence of the creatures existence (stories are not evidence). The notion of such a creature existing is nonsense (1000lb 10 foot ape in North America, not exactly an ideal location for such a creature, based on the food sources / climate). For a creature to exist there HAS to exist a breeding population, and it HAS to be of a size that is large enough that inbreeding leading to severe genetic defects does not occur. So where are all these thousands of creatures and where is a shred of evidence of even a single one? As technology improves the excuses get more and more laughable as to why we cant get any evidence. Theres no bigfoot out there, its pretty much that simple.

Back to my original point, do you really think if there was actually a real creature out there the community looking for it would be a complete circus show the likes of which we are currently witnessing? Not a chance.

There is no evidence for this creatures existence. Acknowledged. We're both realists. It makes no sense for it to exist. O.K.

Got anything else to add to the discussion?

It's comments like these that shine the light on how ignorant you truly are when it comes to this subject. To say there is not a single shred of evidence for Sasquatch/Bigfoot is just as extreme as the habituator types you lament in your prior post. It's been obvious to me since you arrived here that you are a scoffer, not a true skeptic, and the post above only provides more evidence of that.

Your favorite thing to do here is throw out some ridiculously obtuse pronouncement such as this with very little supportive argument for your own point. It's lazy, as I've said before, and you always come to debate not on merit, but by seeking the most easily defended position. It's pretty obvious, that your only interest in the subject at all is in perching above those of us who would gather to discuss our experiences only to peck and catcall from your sanctuary of pseudo skeptical arrogance.

I'm sure there are those here that will indulge you. I'm not one of them. I have no need/desire to persuade you off of your island of certainty.

NobleSavage wrote:It's comments like these that shine the light on how ignorant you truly are when it comes to this subject. To say there is not a single shred of evidence for Sasquatch/Bigfoot is just as extreme as the habituator types you lament in your prior post. It's been obvious to me since you arrived here that you are a scoffer, not a true skeptic, and the post above only provides more evidence of that.

Your favorite thing to do here is throw out some ridiculously obtuse pronouncement such as this with very little supportive argument for your own point. It's lazy, as I've said before, and you always come to debate not on merit, but by seeking the most easily defended position. It's pretty obvious, that your only interest in the subject at all is in perching above those of us who would gather to discuss our experiences only to peck and catcall from your sanctuary of pseudo skeptical arrogance.

I'm sure there are those here that will indulge you. I'm not one of them. I have no need/desire to persuade you off of your island of certainty.

Have no rebuttal to my post then?

You are here to debate the likelihood of existence, as always. I'm here to enjoy fellowship with those who have an interest in this subject beyond debating that tired old dead horse you conjure up every time you are here. It gets old Bop. It's circular, and boring, and just plain uninteresting to the bulk of us that are here. You are entitled to your opinion but what exactly is your objective? You've stated in the past there is zero likelihood of bigfoot's existence. It's nonsense you say above. Your extremism doesn't exactly invite a willingness from those of us here to participate in the back and forth, you so obviously desire. Your motivations are obvious to all.

It bores you that you can not argue against logic? Fair enough.

Does it seem logical to you to spend so much time and energy on a website and forum devoted to an animal that you deem non-existent? A complete fantasy? Wouldn't interest wain at some point for something in your own mind, cannot and will not ever exist? Yet you've a healthy portion of your time and energy on discussion of the impossible. Where is the rationale in that? It's one thing to doubt the creatures existence, and question the merits of the evidence for such. It's another thing altogether, to eliminate any possibility of the subject's merit from the outset, in a very declarative fashion I might add. To then label it a fantasy/complete creation in the minds of those here, and then follow that with countless hours, and innumerable posts belaboring the point. That doesn't strike me as logical BOP.

Classic attacking the person rather than the argument. The last tactic left when you have no arguments to support your position.

You know maybe you could give some kind of argument to support your views that would change my mind on the whole thing. If you really think theres an ape there then whats your reasoning? It seems like you have given up because you know there are no valid arguments to support the existance of bigfoot.

BurdenOfProof wrote:Classic attacking the person rather than the argument. The last tactic left when you have no arguments to support your position.

You know maybe you could give some kind of argument to support your views that would change my mind on the whole thing. If you really think theres an ape there then whats your reasoning? It seems like you have given up because you know there are no valid arguments to support the existance of bigfoot.

You say No Evidence.
Please tell me what the Countless of Foot casting that have been taken are called?
Let me guess that isn't evidence?

ev·i·dence
[ev-i-duhns] Show IPA noun, verb, ev·i·denced, ev·i·denc·ing.

noun
1. that which tends to prove or disprove something; ground for belief; proof.
2. something that makes plain or clear; an indication or sign: His flushed look was visible evidence of his fever.
3. Law. data presented to a court or jury in proof of the facts in issue and which may include the testimony of witnesses, records, documents, or objects.

verb (used with object)
4. to make evident or clear; show clearly; manifest: He evidenced his approval by promising his full support.
5. to support by evidence: He evidenced his accusation with incriminating letters.

CMcMillan wrote:You say No Evidence.
Please tell me what the Countless of Foot casting that have been taken are called?
Let me guess that isn't evidence?

They're very, very bad evidence. For a start many of them were recorded by amateurs who didn't take down sufficient data to make the records useful. For a second many MANY of them are misidentifications of tracks left by other animals. But the main reason they're not good data is this:


There's been a whole bunch of people admit that they've been hoaxing footprints, all the way back to Ray Wallace's original Bigfoot footprints found in 1958. Many of those prints obviously look fake but experimenters have found that when using fake Bigfoot feet it's possible to have a "midtarsal break" effect (especially if the substrate is somewhat loose and moist) and evidence of dermal ridges might just be artifacts from the casting process.

The main issue for me is that Bigfoot researchers' collections of casts will necessarily have a significant percentage of faked footprints and as far as I've seen none of them have done anything to take this into account. (I've gone on about this before in relation to Henner Fahrenbach's footprint analyses.) Drawing conclusions when you know a chunk of your data is fake is really poor science.

Footprints are really, really bad evidence.

Thanks squatchmaster that sums up footprints nicely.

We know for a fact that footprints can be faked.

We DONT know for a fact that there is a 10 foot ape running round making footprints.

Therefore why should we assume this "bigfoot" creature is making them?

So you dismiss EVERY single FOOT print ever casted by people?
Just because several seem to have been faked.

Just becaue you don't accept the evidence doesn't mean it is NOT evidence.

Lets also state It could be Good or could be bad.
It depends on your point of view. But IT IS EVIDENCE.

BurdenOfProof wrote:Thanks squatchmaster that sums up footprints nicely.

We know for a fact that footprints can be faked.

We DONT know for a fact that there is a 10 foot ape running round making footprints.

Therefore why should we assume this "bigfoot" creature is making them?

Knowing that something can be faked, DOES NOT prove that all of them are fake. That is a poor correlation.

Man can fake the call of a duck...does that mean that there are no ducks?

CMcMillan wrote:Lets also state It could be Good or could be bad.
It depends on your point of view. But IT IS EVIDENCE.

It's evidence that footprints were found but it's no real indication of what or who made the footprints. It's junk.

DPinkerton wrote:Knowing that something can be faked, DOES NOT prove that all of them are fake. That is a poor correlation.

No but it does call ALL of that type of evidence into doubt. Some of them might possibly be real but which ones? No ones knows. Could they all be fake? Possibly.

DPinkerton wrote:Man can fake the call of a duck...does that mean that there are no ducks?

If there was no hard evidence that ducks existed and all we had was recordings of duck calls then yeah, that'd be a pretty safe bet. But there's overwhelming evidence for ducks, all of which has been scientifically confirmed. This was not a valid comparison.

We've got records of Santa Claus footprints left around Christmas trees (usually outlined in talcum powder or fake snow) from all over the world over many decades, I guess at least some of them might have been real as well, hey?

You can decide that footprints are unreliable evidence. Or you can decide they're good evidence. They don't stand up for some people and I'm not Prof.Meldrum and I haven't seen them.

My take on this whole thing is that there is no evidence that is irrefutable. If you need that specific kind of evidence to entertain the possibility of this cryptid, then that's fine. I don't. I can entertain the possibility of this cryptid without much to go on. Simply because I choose to.

If you want to keep defending your position for allowing it to exist as a possibility then keep defending it. I don't feel the need to defend it. I am completely comfortable sitting on the fence allowing this thing to possibly exist. I certainly don't believe every story I hear or picture or video as proof. In fact, I am fairly certain that at least 70% of what I see is willfully manufactured. This still does not dissuade me from thinking this thing could exist.

So far I see no hard proof. I'd like to see some. I actually wouldn't be surprised if something turned up as evidence. The arguments for it NOT existing have been no more compelling to me than the arguments for.

I know that a lot of people love certainty. I just don't need feel the need for certainty every time I entertain a possibility. Stranger things are to be expected than the information we've gathered regarding our world to be sure.

As far as science goes, let science be science. The academia of science aren't convinced of this creatures existence. I acknowledge that. Can't argue that point. I'm also not foolish enough to believe that science is somehow infallible. Science as an art is imperfect. It can only provide so much information, one thing at a time. Regarding so many subjects that aren't well funded, science is often very slow moving.

I can entertain this creatures possible existence, I just don't need the concrete evidence to exist beforehand. I accept what information I've gathered as adequate to think it at least possible.

Tracks and footprints could be great evidence. I would just have to believe that Meldrum can't be fooled easily. However, of course he could. He himself would tell you that. It's not outside the realm of possibility. At the same time, I'd have to think that he was pretty slow in brain to be continuing in this endeavour and be so invested in it for decades if he was not thoroughly convinced himself.

'Uncertainty is an uncomfortable state of mind, certainty an absurd one' - Voltaire

I'm highly skeptical of most of the 'evidence' for Bigfoot but there's a whole bunch of firsthand reports that are fairly compelling and can't easily be dismissed. If it wasn't for those I'd be completely dismissive of the entire idea of Bigfoot and I would have lost interest decades ago but as it is I'm a Bigfoot agnostic.

I would dearly love for Bigfoot to be real but that doesn't mean I'm going to go easy on the 'evidence'. If I'm going to be further convinced by any video or photograph I'm going to put it through the skeptical wringer before I get behind it. I'm assigning a really really low probability that Bigfoot exists but I'm not completely giving up hope on the Big Guy and if actual evidence turns up I'm going to make sure that I've got an arsenal of skeptical/scientific/rhetorical tools at my disposal to defend it against the inevitable scofftics.

I guess you could say I lean much more towards René Dahinden than I do towards Jon-Erik Beckjord. YEAH, OLD SKOOL SQUATCHIN'

again you miss using the term Evidence.
What is this "Actual Evidence" you speak of?

Having a Dead or a Live Body shows proof of 1 creature.

Like Doll Said just because Man can Mimic things doesn't make it no credible evidence.
Just like in a trial Evidence can be read differently depending on your point of view.

CMcMillan wrote:again you miss using the term Evidence.
What is this "Actual Evidence" you speak of?

Having a Dead or a Live Body shows proof of 1 creature.

Like Doll Said just because Man can Mimic things doesn't make it no credible evidence.
Just like in a trial Evidence can be read differently depending on your point of view.

Just because you choose to use a really, really loose definition of the word doesn't mean that you can expect everyone else to adhere to your usage. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence so sloppy evidence isn't helping anyone.

A body would be accepted by science as a type specimen and would be sufficient evidence for defining a new species.

Saying fake footprints starting with Ray Wallace in 1957 proves all others are fakes, or that Sasquatch must be non-existent is foolish.
There are sightings, and newspaper accounts going back to the mid 1800's. Was Ray Wallace's great grandpap running around the country hoaxing back then too?

If people don't believe or refuse to even open their mind to the possibility of Sasquatch existence, then why waste your time and energy posting so often on a website or forum that explores it? I don't follow or like NASCAR, yet I dont find the need to go on a website dedicated to it to mock those who do. I dont believe in zombies or fairies/pixies/brownies/sprites, and wouldnt waste my time going on forums to debate their non-existence with those who hold hope they might really be, I'd rather watch TV (Monster Quest/Finding Bigfoot) or read a book by John Willison Green.

I think there is a lot of circumstantial evidence out there - video, pics, audio, eyewitness accounts, print castings, hair, etc. But it's like a giant jigsaw puzzle, and people are looking at a few pieces and we havent put it all together yet. I just really wish an actual cadaver would be found and shown to the public and not hidden away in what some would say was a Govt or Scientific coverup.

Squatchmaster G wrote:

CMcMillan wrote:again you miss using the term Evidence.
What is this "Actual Evidence" you speak of?

Having a Dead or a Live Body shows proof of 1 creature.

Like Doll Said just because Man can Mimic things doesn't make it no credible evidence.
Just like in a trial Evidence can be read differently depending on your point of view.

Just because you choose to use a really, really loose definition of the word doesn't mean that you can expect everyone else to adhere to your usage. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence so sloppy evidence isn't helping anyone.

A body would be accepted by science as a type specimen and would be sufficient evidence for defining a new species.

I am not using a loose definition I am using the actual definition.
Evidence can be seen 2 different ways. Or explained multiple ways. Hence why we have Trails.

SassyCrotch wrote:Saying fake footprints starting with Ray Wallace in 1957 proves all others are fakes, or that Sasquatch must be non-existent is foolish.

Well I guess I'm lucky that I never said that, eh?

SassyCrotch wrote:If people don't believe or refuse to even open their mind to the possibility of Sasquatch existence, then why waste your time and energy posting so often on a website or forum that explores it?

What on earth makes you think that I'm not open to the possibility that Sasquatch exists? I said earlier in the thread that I definitely was open to that possibility. You need to work on your comprehension skills.

CMcMillan wrote:I am not using a loose definition I am using the actual definition.

You're using a non-scientific definition to argue against a scientific viewpoint. In this context the definition you are using is inadequate.