[pct-l] Re; Bigfoot

Thu Feb 2 14:38:16 CST 2012

Come on people, use science.  First of all, real science examines evidence and forms a hypothesis.  Bigfoot hunters have a hypothesis, and they try to find the evidence, without being objective and seeing what else the evidence might suggest.  You know, like finding footprints, and discovering that they don't meet any physiological gate, because the feet don't bend correctly.

Since it's a logical fallacy to attempt to prove the negative (like someone saying that there's a teapot floating around the dark side of the moon...impossible to disprove, but of course, they can't prove it either).  As Carl Sagan once said, "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."   So let's just examine what would be required for me to stop being a skeptic:

There is NO evidence of hominid species in the Americas prior to the invasions of Homo sapiens, approximately 13-50 thousand years ago.  If there were a giant hominid (or other hominid like species) in the area, we would have found fossils, since the assumption is that it's not extinct (at least those making those extraordinary claims). 
A viable breeding population in the northwest (from say northern California to British Columbia) would need to number in the 5-10 thousand range, unless they are apex predators, then it could be somewhat less.  Anything less, given the amount of space and how ALL hominids interact socially, anything lower than that would mean a non-breeding population, and none would exist anyways. 
Modern European settlement of the area (where populations skyrocketed) occurred around 150 years ago, so there should be a lot more interaction than even the mythmakers and scammers are stating.
Where are the dead ones?  Though the area is wild, there are still people running around.  PCT thruhikers should stumble upon some evidence over the years.
Google earth can pinpoint my car parked in the driveway.  The military has better satellites than that, and somewhere, someone would have seen something.
Where is the evidence that is incontrovertible?  It's like what Neil deGrasse Tyson says about alien visitors–why haven't they accidentally left a communicator?  A toilet?  A lost glove?  Because they're not.

Even if they are highly intelligent apes, they can't hide their fossils and other evidence.  They just don't exist, but as opposed to the sasquatch "believers", I'm open-minded to real evidence.  It is more closeminded to ignore evidence and accept a myth.

Michael
michaels at skepticalraptor.com
http://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php

On Feb 2, 2012, at 10:00 :10PST, pct-l-request at backcountry.net wrote:

Message: 28
Date: Wed, 1 Feb 2012 18:58:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Edward Anderson <mendoridered at yahoo.com>
Subject: [pct-l] BIGFOOT ?
To: "gschenk1 at roadrunner.com" <gschenk1 at roadrunner.com>,
	"pct-l at backcountry.net" <pct-l at backcountry.net>,	CHUCK CHELIN
	<steeleye at wildblue.net>,	Scott Williams <baidarker at gmail.com>, Greg
	Hummel <bighummel at aol.com>
Message-ID:
	<1328151490.9029.YahooMailNeo at web111618.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1

Anything about Bigfoot or Yeti or Space Alians or Loch Ness Monster- - - always sparks interest.? 
?
Here are a couple of stories?from my memory:
?
?In the early 1960's?I met Norman Darenforth - a Swiss?climber who, I think. had climbed Everest. He had told of alleged Yeti sightings while in the Himalayas. He was also a film maker. When I met him he was organizing a serious Bigfoot Expedition that was?to spend, I think, about two weeks, at various locations in Northern California where there had been reported Bigfoot sightings. As I recall, there were about 10 or 12 on the expedition; probably all volunteers.?Some were scientists. There were also experienced hunters and trackers. Norman had assembled quite a team.?They had state-of-the-art film technology and set several cameras in various locations?that could film at night - sensing the heat (infa-red radiation)?of animals. Of course, they interviewed everyone who had claimed to have seen Bigfoot, or signs of bigfoot..They looked for tracks, fecal deposits, bones, and especially hair - anything that would indicate the possibility of
Bigfoot. Of course,?Norman felt that if bigfoot existed there would have to be a breeding population - not just?one. Here is what they found: Nothing. Of course, not finding?something is not proof that it does not exist. Norman made a documentary film and sold it to T.V..?
?
The other Bigfoot story that I recall was told to me by a professor friend, a vertebrate zoologist who taught at Humboldt State University in Arcata, California. His name is Jake Houck.?I had originally met him when I was helping to put together the first Whale Festival in Mendocino. It was during the mid-1970's?We had several speakers, including myself, all save-the-whales environmentalists. I was, at that time, a media spokesman for the Greenpeace Foundation.?I felt that we needed a respected scientist to speak about whales.Someone told me about Dr. Houck. He was, then, one of the worlds leading experts on the sperm whale. I got his home number and called him. I explained that we needed him to speak at our Festival. I invited him to stay at my home in Mendocino. He checked his schedule the next day and agreed to come. Now we come to?something that?he told me about Bigfoot during the couple of days that he stayed at my home for the Festival:?He
had been invited, along with about 20 other scientists, to view the film of Bigfoot that everyone has undoubtedly seen more than once on T.V.. The footage, was taken from horseback by one Roger Patterson.?Dr. Houck, and almost all of the other scientists had the opinion that, based on the gait, etc,, it was a man in a suit. He said that there were one or two who thought that there might be something there, perhaps a large primate. Those, the one or two, who bought into the hoax, were the only ones that were ever mentioned on the T.V. film that followed. Since then a person has admitted that he was the man paid by Patterson to wear the suit and be Bigfoot. It was a well-crafted hoax.
?
MendoRider-Hiker

________________________________
From: "gschenk1 at roadrunner.com" <gschenk1 at roadrunner.com>
To: Greg Hummel <bighummel at aol.com> 
Cc: pct-l at backcountry.net 
Sent: Wednesday, February 1, 2012 5:45 AM
Subject: Re: [pct-l] Bigfoot in 1986 on the PCT?

There have been many reports of Bigfoot in the upper Kern over the years. It's a huge trench and not visited much.

I've always thought a good trip would be to start in Kernville and follow the Kern to its headwaters.

Gary

---- Greg Hummel <bighummel at aol.com> wrote: 
> 
I've never heard of seen this before . . . the lore continues . . .

http://fresnofamous.com/01/25/12/fresno-bee-reported-bigfoot-sighting-1986 

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