The woo artists are at it again

Johnny_L.A · February 10, 2014, 3:06am

DNA Analysis Of Paracas Elongated Skulls Released. The Results Prove They Were Not Human

Oh, the pain. My head hurts.

I’m so sick of ‘ancient aliens’. And bigfoots. Feet. Whatever. And please, nobody mention falling buildings. :rolleyes:

running_coach · February 10, 2014, 3:16am

Did you know a large group of Bigfoots were spotted pushing over the WTC?

susan · February 10, 2014, 3:35am

That’s what the Zionists would have you believe.

Lucas_Jackson · February 10, 2014, 3:44am

That’s why Bush ordered missiles to blow up the towers, to hide the bigfoot evidence.
.

thelurkinghorror · February 10, 2014, 7:09am

BIGFEET!

It’s amazing that they otherwise look like humans. Oh wait, [del]A Wizard[/del] Ancient Astronauts did it. That part of the world was full of messed up cultural practices, so head mushing is pretty minor and cromulent. In North America, people also messed with their skulls. The Salish and Kootenai Tribes were known as “Flatheads” because the weirdos didn’t mess with their heads. A lot of European “barbarians” did it too. But this one is unique, I guess.

GuanoLad · February 10, 2014, 7:43am

So the man who suspects they aren’t human is the expert who did the DNA testing.

Sounds legit!

Rick_Kitchen · February 10, 2014, 7:59am

Yeah, the DNA sequencing was done by “Dr.” Melba Ketchum, a veterinarian and Sasquatchian.

thelurkinghorror · February 10, 2014, 8:53am

Melba eh? So one is twice-baked, the other is half baked?

dasmoocher · February 10, 2014, 10:04am

I read a review on a science blog that toasted her Bigfoot DNA sequencing results.

I’ll see if I can find it.

In the meantime, from CSICOP: The Ketchum Project: What to Believe about Bigfoot DNA ‘Science’

Who is Melba Ketchum? She is a veterinarian who graduated from Texas A&M veterinary school. She did not complete a PhD.2 While not an academic, she runs her own genetics lab and has been a coauthor on several published papers but never a lead author.3 With such a complicated and extraordinary claim as the discovery of Bigfoot DNA, her lack of experience in the specialized field of primate genetics hurt her credibility with the members of the scientific community who have actually expressed an interest in this project. She notes that she does have experience in forensics because she worked on DNA evidence from crime scenes, which was vital in assuring these study samples were not contaminated.4 There remains the murky area regarding the origin and history of the purported Sasquatch samples, the validity of her data, and how one can so definitively conclude “Bigfoot” from this one study prior to review by the scientific community. I found that these big ideas about Bigfoot precluded the data. Many other red flags obscure the view as well.

zoid · February 10, 2014, 10:06am

Peach of a gal.

dasmoocher · February 10, 2014, 10:27am

That link now has this update:

UPDATE (09-Feb-2014): Mr. Foerster has indicated to me, on his Facebook page, and in a followup interview that the geneticist quoted is not Ketchum. However, there is still admission that she is involved, with different samples. The quote is “These results are not from Melba Ketchum; she has other samples.”

That doesn’t help the situation much since anonymity of the geneticist is a no-no in presenting your results. So, while Ketchum may not be officially presenting results, the fact that she is involved is damning for credibility. Unfortunately, the whole thing still lacks all credibility. This clarification in no way changes the impropriety of announcing results this way – extremely unscientific and highly questionable. It’s not worth serious consideration until a paper is submitted and peer review is conducted.

I did find this critique of Melba’s DNA sequencing “expertise” and “methodology”:

How the attempt to sequence “Bigfoot’s genome” went badly off track

But my initial analysis suggested that the “genome sequence” was an artifact, the product of a combination of contamination, degradation, and poor assembly methods. And every other biologist I showed it to reached the same conclusion. Ketchum couldn’t disagree more. “We’ve done everything in our power to make sure the paper was absolutely above-board and well done,” she told Ars. “I don’t know what else we could have done short of spending another few years working on the genome. But all we wanted to do was prove they existed, and I think we did that.”

How do you get one group of people who looks at the evidence and sees contamination, while another decides “The data conclusively prove that the Sasquatch exists”? To find out, we went through the paper’s data carefully, then talked to Ketchum to understand the reasoning behind the work.

Askthepizzaguy · February 10, 2014, 3:55pm

Melba Ketchum is clearly the daughter of one of the most famous trappers and catalogers of wild creatures of all time, known throughout the world as Ash Ketchum.

Melba is simply on a related quest to catch 'em all. Meaning Sasquatch pokemon.

Here’s an Abomasnow. (Not pictured: an Obamasnow, found only in the Pokemon Red State version. You can trade him for a McCainosaur)

This specimen is one of the mightiest of all the non-snowbound Sasquatches. Slaking. Sadly, Slaking can be defeated easily by any pokemon that knows Protect. Oh, overpowered pokemon, why do you have exploitable weaknesses that make the game oddly balanced?

The search for an even more powerful Sasquatch-mon continues. Hopefully it will be of the Dark-Ghost type, which will make it beyond cheesy because that’s only weak to Fairy-type Sasquatch, which we all know aren’t real. I mean, whoever heard of a Fairy-type Sasquatch. Ridiculous.

Askthepizzaguy · February 10, 2014, 4:19pm

I just realized Slaking looks exactly like McCainosaur. I paid good money for both versions. I’m getting ripped off!