I hate to sound like one of those UFOologists, but this one has me wondering. Maybe I just got duped by a tv show, but this program I saw on Discovery Channel: Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science, certainly seems more respectable the Leonard Nimoy’s In Search Of… Apparently it was an honest scientific effort to answer the question of actual existance of this creature. I’ve watched many shows on Bigfoot, Loch Ness, UFO’s whatever. Most seem to be on level level of crediblilty of Nimoy’s rediculous show from the early '80’s. This one didn’t seem to fall in that category. But I’m sure many people here also saw the show and I would love to know what other skeptics think about the evidence.
I’ve noticed genuine scientist (like the ones on the show) favor the view of the creature’s existance, such as Dr. Jane Goodall.
This news item came out before the show and speaks of one of the scientists involved in it and his skepticism. He even sat down the his Dean as to whether he should participate.
This article (unrelated to the Discovery Program) is of yet another prominent scientist. It is only a cached view of page 1 of 4. Apparently Discovery.com’s liscence to use it has expired. Here’s an exerpt:
Are more and more scientists accepting the concept of an undiscovered primate?
I am fully prepared to allow for the fact that I was simply gullible and the hasty research I did only makes it appear to be a recent trend, since I’ve never before searched for Bigfoot evidence on the internet before. although I don’t recall any respectable scientist putting so much credence to any other such myth.
Dang! Forgot to add this:
I did not put this in the GD forum because I am not trying to debate the existence of Bigfoot, only whether or not it is becoming an acceptable scientific study.
Nah, the cable networks just like to re-dig this stuff up once in awhile. Dress it up a bit and it gets ratings. These shows are really cheap to make so the return on investment must be pretty good.
If anything, what’s plausible is that running around the woods in an ape suit is easy to do & great fun, especially when there are lots of tourists with handicams everywhere these days.
I know it’s a tired old question, but if you were the OP, would you say, “Oh, jeepers, them Dopers is smarter than me, so I guess if they say NO, I guess I’ll believe 'em?”
Yes, it’s true that Big Foot is just as fringey as he ever was, and it’s a typical tactic of the pseudoscience mongers (Discovery Channel, I am looking in your direction) to try to associate some bit of nonsense with real scientists. BUT . . .
Can anyone comment on Jane Goodall’s involvement? (She was quoted out of context, she has Gone Over to the Dark Side, she was a crappy scientist all along . . . what is it?)
Does anyone know of a scientific take on this “we couldn’t identify the DNA” thing? Is it true that, “We have never encountered any DNA that we couldn’t recognize before?” Is the tester really as reputable as the article makes him out to be? DNA’s not my thing, and my Google search didn’t turn up anything useful.
Podkayne, thank you so much for your reply. As I’ve said, I’m not trying to verify the validity of Bigfoot. It just seems to me that scientists put more stock in this claim than all the others myths. I’ve noted that Anthropolgists seem to be the first (among scientist) to accept such a possiblilty. But I don’t have a cite for that, it is purely anecdotal.
***ALL ***scientists should be willing to accept the possibility but, as a group, they’re no more open-minded than any other group. (Okay. Most other groups, anyway.)
Personally, I find Syke’s comments intriguing, although he was actually talking about the Yeti, not Bigfoot. I won’t actually believe in the existence of either one till a specimen is obtained, but Syke’s is a professor at Oxford, which is not exactly known as a hotbed of quackery. “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
This may or may not help, but when I was studying boiology at Iowa State University one of my BIO101 profs mentioned that Jane Goodall was a bit of a joke in the community because she tends to anthropomorphize animals.
LOvely lady that she is, Jane Goodall was NOT quoted out of context. file://C:/WINDOWS/Temporary Internet Files/Content.IE5/26DHCMQ0/GoodallInterview[1].ram should be the interview with Ira Flatow, the Science Guy, on NPR. She absolutely says that “she believes” that they exist.
She, at the end of the interview, allows as how she is a Romantic and that they may not.
It’s a short clip. Make up your own mind. Her opinion/wish in no way validates the existance of Bigfoot.
Well, I would use caution in assuming that anyone at a prestigious institution is immune to charges of quackery. People get tenure, and people get wacky. I’m not saying that that’s the case here, of course. People also sometimes make honest mistakes. And as James Randi often says, scientists are often not very good at detecting trickery. Though I don’t see how trickery would come in to play here, maybe someone who knows more about DNA would have some ideas. Or, heaven knows, perhaps we can take those quotes at face value–but what exactly is their implication?
If it was genuine Yeti hair, what would we expect testing to show? Would the sort of test Sykes was doing allow him to say that it’s a primate? Could he say how closely it was related to humans or chimanzees? Or is he limited to going just down a list of animals for which he has samples to compare: Nope, it’s not a dog, no it’s not a monkey, no it’s not a wildebeast, etc, etc, etc.?
I provided a link to the interview to which you are refering. The sound quality is not very good (or, at least, it wasn’t for me-damned Army wrecked my hearing a bit). I did not pick up on the last part, but I believe you. I was just suprised by the number on seemingly reputable scientist hold such views. The show is coming on again tonight and I will re-watch it. I also agree that the Discovery Channel does indeed seem to covet ratings over fact. But this show was still better done than any other I’ve seen. One thing I wish I had known before watched it was that their main evidence (The Skookum Cast they called it ) was their own discovery. But they still presented the evidence, and that of other evidence they felt worthy, to skeptical scientists.
I’m just trying to find a refutation to the evidence presented on the show I guess. I was hoping more people saw it.
If it’s the same show I saw recently…it was really old as they didn’t mention the fact that the Patterson film has been known as a hoax for many years.
Not only is Bigfoot NOT being taken more seriously of late, the recent death of the original Bigfoot hoaxster has led to numerous recent front-page stories about how silly the whole idea was, and how gullible people were to fall for the hoax all along.
You might want to check out www.bfro.net, the Bigfoot Field Research Organization. They keep a database of sightings. They look at the evidence objectively. They are the ones that did the Skookum cast.
caracal Sorry! YOu did, indeed, provide a link for the Goodall interview. My browser is set poorly(my fault) and doesn’t always highlight links.
As to the Sykes/DNA story–I’ve googled for some half hour and there isn’t much out there. Sykes is certainly respectable, but his original pronouncement doesn’t say that Bigfoot exists. Only that the sample provided to his team wasn’t identifiable. Whatever that means. I didn’t take it to mean that it was some kind of new creature. He and his lab have been strangely silent since the initial story about the results. I’d also love to know if there was ever a scientific journal article about the results of their analysis?
