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Scabby, hungry, mangey Bear fresh out of hibernation would certainly be quite the sight.

I do wish we hoomans would hibernate. Whilst Spring, Summer and Autumn are delightful in the UK, Winter is sodding miserable.

To broaden this up into a general Fortean topics discussion, I love books like Jerome Clark’s Unexplained that categorize these experiences into patterns and explore them. Some are timeless, like Bigfoot, alien/faerie abductions, fish falls, weird smells/mad gassers, ghosts, the Oz factor, sea or lake monsters, black dogs, objects in the sky, and so on. Humans across many times and cultures seem to experience similar ‘events’ and then process them according to local expectation.

Then you have the really weird ones that occur in one big wave and then fade away, like Springheel Jack, Mothman, the Dover Demon, and such. Makes me wonder if something really unusual (physical or psychological) happened in those cases, that they didn’t result in the stock human “weird experiences”.

 Nevelon wrote:
But now we are post-phones everywhere, and into AI generated deep fakes. Did we have enough time with phones everywhere before the tech to make casually easy fakes?

this reminded me of the metal gear solid 2 ending cutscene. The choice of words I mean. Thank you for indirectly reminding me of that great scene

 Vulcan wrote:
I forgot where I saw it, and it's correlation not causation, but a recent study determined the more bears live in a given area of the United States, the more bigfoot sightings occur in that area.

This reminds me of a time when we were staying in Oregon. Each of us felt like we were being watched while hiking, so we went to the sporting goods store to get some bear spray and ammo for a pistol. In California, that feeling is always attributed to mountain lions. In Oregon, the lady at the store and two other people swore up and down it was Bigfoot. Local expectation or tourist baiting?


(It was a mountain Lion with two cubs. We saw her passing by the driveway two nights later.)

For ease of reference? Fortean is a term to describe a “willing disbeliever” when it comes to things like the supernatural.

That is, I’m open to things having a supernatural explanation - but first we need to be rigorous in ruling out natural explanations. And even then, acknowledging not knowing the answer currently doesn’t mean therefore the supernatural.

There’s a monthly magazine called Fortean Times devoted to the subject I’d highly recommend to the curious minded.

I think this thread is becoming more interesting than I expected, nice to see such fun and thoughtful discussion.

Regarding the similarities of modern UFO abduction cases to ancient tales of the faefolk; that was Jacques Vallee (the guy I mentioned in a previous post)

But as the talk is now entering the kind of areas I think are really worthwhile thinking over, that very gentleman felt strongly what human beings are experiencing here is something that appears to be very real but ‘deceptive’ in nature.

He hints at some kind of psychological manipulation at play.

How convenient it is then for much research into these matters to be funded by groups with an expertise in psychological warfare.

For instance, has anyone seen the excellent documentary ‘Mirage Men’? It’s a great example of this kind of thing.

I believe the idea is based around exploiting what is called ‘The Kantian Rift’. Basically, the fear of the great unknown provides a vacuum into which various entities can be inserted to inspire wonder or doubt among groups of believers etc

Well, skirting the fringe of conspiracy theories? It does make genuine, non-sinister sense that those who’s job it is to understand hooman beans and how that wrinkly grey thing works would be invested in understanding….what make that wrinkly grey thing work.

Otherwise they’d be pretty useless at their job.

It’s also a useful and beneficial discipline for disaster response. The more you understand about humans and their psychology, the better you can plan effective disaster relief, because you understand and can account for irrational actions in the face of adversity etc - and what things could be easily provided but aren’t immediately obvious and so on.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Well, skirting the fringe of conspiracy theories? It does make genuine, non-sinister sense that those who’s job it is to understand hooman beans and how that wrinkly grey thing works would be invested in understanding….what make that wrinkly grey thing work.

Otherwise they’d be pretty useless at their job.

It’s also a useful and beneficial discipline for disaster response. The more you understand about humans and their psychology, the better you can plan effective disaster relief, because you understand and can account for irrational actions in the face of adversity etc - and what things could be easily provided but aren’t immediately obvious and so on.

Haha. How diplomatically put.

I agree, for sure, that in order to gain quality ‘unpolluted’ data on hoomans might mean an imaginative use of the notion of informed consent, but in that case I’m not the only one skirting fringes…

Besides, if it was just something as mundane as the eggheads of our world I thought was behind all of this I wouldn’t be as interested. Like I’ve alluded to, it’s not half as innovative as social scientists and their brethren in the genetic branches of various mathematical fields seem to think it is to plant false beliefs in cultures in order to study public reaction, it’s actually as old as time.

No, in this instance, there is more than that going on.

When it comes to studying behaviour patterns, I’m not sure consent is actually necessary, very generally speaking.

If it’s just studying and analysing our behaviour in our natural habitat? No real harm done. Provided you blur my face and disguise my voice in video? I retain my anonymity.

But, if you’re engineering situations to see what happens? That would require consent.

I think I’d favour the former. The results then aren’t tainted by artifice. After all, if you tell me I’m going to be studied in a series of purposefully stressful situations and/or environments? You risk wonky results, Because I’m aware I’m being watched.

No. Not in a quantum physics way. Just a general way. I’ll be on guard one way or the other. Trying to spot what’s for real and what’s part of the plan.

But as I said? That’s not valid reasoning for deliberate interference in an unsuspecting spod’s day to day life.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
When it comes to studying behaviour patterns, I’m not sure consent is actually necessary, very generally speaking.

If it’s just studying and analysing our behaviour in our natural habitat? No real harm done. Provided you blur my face and disguise my voice in video? I retain my anonymity.

But, if you’re engineering situations to see what happens? That would require consent.

I think I’d favour the former. The results then aren’t tainted by artifice. After all, if you tell me I’m going to be studied in a series of purposefully stressful situations and/or environments? You risk wonky results, Because I’m aware I’m being watched.

No. Not in a quantum physics way. Just a general way. I’ll be on guard one way or the other. Trying to spot what’s for real and what’s part of the plan.

But as I said? That’s not valid reasoning for deliberate interference in an unsuspecting spod’s day to day life.

Seems solid reasoning to me. The effect Air Force Intelligence officers have had on certain people’s lives by covertly encouraging false belief of alien technology has been demonstrably negative for sure (see the documentary I mentioned for one sorry example)

I feel in one sense we’re all unsuspecting spods though; even the brainiac unsuspecting spods. Lol

It’s a good thing to contemplate really. Encourages humility.

Superintelligence doesn’t require our consent to exist.

As I say about almost all Supernatural and Cryptids. They are not real, but it is a lot more fun to pretend they are.

Ocean and sea going Cryptids I am much more inclined to "believe" than others like the Dinosaur in the Congo, Sasquatch/Yeti, and even Phantom Kangaroos in cities.

 Gitzbitah wrote:
I suspect it goes deeper, into an almost visceral instinct we have.

Fear of the unknown in earlier societies, mutated into fear that 'yes, life is that banal' in other societies (including modern ones). Some people violent resist the idea that humans can have all the answers, so they're constantly looking for an 'out there' explanation for perfectly mundane things. It makes them feel important, brushing up against the Unreal, in a way that their 9-5 day job and coming home to burgers, beer and 3 hours of television... doesn't.

A psychology study of people who want to believe might be enlightening, but while Fox Mulder was a pop culture icon for a while, he was both a terrible scientist and a terrible FBI agent.

Voss wrote:


Fear of the unknown in earlier societies, mutated into fear that 'yes, life is that banal' in other societies (including modern ones). Some people violent resist the idea that humans can have all the answers, so they're constantly looking for an 'out there' explanation for perfectly mundane things. It makes them feel important, brushing up against the Unreal, in a way that their 9-5 day job and coming home to burgers, beer and 3 hours of television... doesn't.

I’m not really sure I agree with you here.

A ‘fear that life is universally banal everywhere’ says far more about the capacity of a person’s imagination than it does the existence of supernatural phenomenon. It’s a description of an attitude and not much more really.

I’m also fairly certain that somebody who wishes to ‘feel important’ has a million ways to achieve this that don’t involve embarrassing themselves by submitting their observations to the ridicule of peers who ‘have all the answers’ (which is also an attitude and not a fact, and a very telling one at that)

Then of course there is the fact our scientific paradigm has become over represented by the religious fundamentalism of scientism; which is not the same thing as science at all and more a radical ideology of psychotic nihilism.

These bored people, some of whom I’ve spoken too in private, are also often not very excited at all by their experiences. I’d use words like ‘traumatized’, ‘disturbed’ or ‘unsettled’ to describe them. Often, they are reluctant to talk with anybody at all, for reasons that should be pretty apparent by now.

Of course there are liars and charlatans, but seeking attention is the exact opposite agenda in many (not all) cases.

I can relate to the broad idea you are trying to convey, but I think this view misrepresents the phenomenon.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Scabby, hungry, mangey Bear fresh out of hibernation would certainly be quite the sight.

I do wish we hoomans would hibernate. Whilst Spring, Summer and Autumn are delightful in the UK, Winter is sodding miserable.

Honestly, they don't even have to be mangey. Black bears especially look like a human in a fursuit, and often walk on their back legs to investigate things.

Laughing Man wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Scabby, hungry, mangey Bear fresh out of hibernation would certainly be quite the sight.

I do wish we hoomans would hibernate. Whilst Spring, Summer and Autumn are delightful in the UK, Winter is sodding miserable.

Honestly, they don't even have to be mangey. Black bears especially look like a human in a fursuit, and often walk on their back legs to investigate things.

There’s a few videos online of them doing this over great distances; there was one bear who did it exclusively due to some condition I can’t remember, kind of sad to watch really.

No doubt this behavior is responsible for countless ‘Bigfoot’ sightings.

It's a fact that all Bigfoot sightings are accompanied by On Sight by Kanye West.

We also can’t write off simple economics. Please note I’m not knocking that. But a local Cryptid can be quite the tourist draw, bringing money to the area.

Room and board, cafes, restaurant, nature trails, local museums etc.

Provided it’s all a bit of fun, I don’t see the harm.

I wanted to add; from what we know of the intelligence community and their interest in and connections to the ‘supernatural’; much of the alleged ‘research’ is undertaken in order to direct outcomes within a broader paradigm of worldview building.

For instance, efforts made to encourage mystical visions of the Virgin Mother and other ‘miracles’ that bolster religious attitudes in locations thought to be at risk of socialism/communism during the Cold War era. Theatrical use of superstition surrounding ‘Cryptid’ creatures has also been employed by the military in operations where manipulating local superstition yields tactical advantages.

Modern uses of these types of doctrines are likely deemed useful in order to encourage faith/discussion/acceptance around technocratic models of post-humanism.




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 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
We also can’t write off simple economics. Please note I’m not knocking that. But a local Cryptid can be quite the tourist draw, bringing money to the area.

Room and board, cafes, restaurant, nature trails, local museums etc.

Provided it’s all a bit of fun, I don’t see the harm.

Almost certainly true too! Good point.

Loch Ness does this every so often, to good effect!

I'm on the fence about Bigfoot. I really want to believe, as a world with Bigfoot is a whole lot more interesting than a world without them.

In a world where we have just in the last couple years discovered a new whale species it is possible.

As for catching and/or taking pictures of one? I live in a semi-rural area of western Iowa. Mountain Lions are rare here, but there is definitely a small breeding population. They aren't common enough to make us worry about letting small children run wild outside, but they are around. Every year someone will post picture of a footprint they find on a hiking trail. About every other year one gets killed on the highway. I've literally never seen one in the wild though, and I spend a good amount of time outside at dusk/dawn, prime Mountain Lion roaming periods.

And what about the area Squatches are supposed to inhabit? Much of it makes western Iowa look like a metropolis in comparison. There might not be a single human within 200 miles of you and with heavy forresting. Add that to an animal that is both reclusive and with great-ape levels of intelligence and relative coloristic camouflage and it very well might not be an easy animal to find. A group of Japanese soldiers after WWII ended stayed hidden for 30 years on an island with a relatively high population density.

We also have to consider the possibility that Bigfoot at one time WAS real, but is now an extinct species.

Deep sea creatures of large size are easier to hide because vast areas of the ocean are unexplored and not easily accessible to us. The pressures and darkness of some of the deepest places make them exceptionally difficult to explore.

However land is a different matter. Whilst there are regions that are difficult to explore or are isolated from advanced civilisations, those regions are often remote; isolated and not visited all that often if at all.
Even then many of the species in those regions that are totally new are those which have limited mobility options - often being smaller species or very niche survivalists.


Bigfoot instead roams areas where people already are and have been for generations. It's a very large mammal and today we have cameras everywhere. Phones, drones, cars, plants, helicopters and more. The chances for a larger mammalian species to hide in such an environment is very limited.


Where you see new species of larger creatures in regions where people are active, its often less that the individual animals were unknown and more that a known population is now being split into two distinct classified groups. Often through things like DNA studies. Even then you can get debate in the literature as to if they really are distinct enough to quality as two separate subspecies.




So could Bigfoot be real - its not impossible. However the odds are heavy stacked against Bigfoot in much the same way they are stacked against the Loch Ness Monster.

What if bigfoot is like Aliens? Multi-dimensional beings visiting our world

Where people have lived for generations? My understanding is Bigfoot is not encountered in towns, but on hunting trails or hiking paths near campgrounds. And these are far, far from the population centers. This isn’t England or even Europe we’re talking about.


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 hotsauceman1 wrote:
What if bigfoot is like Aliens? Multi-dimensional beings visiting our world

I love this hypothesis. All the wild things people claim to see can’t all exist on this earth. But if reality is thin in places…

 XvArcanevX wrote:

Voss wrote:


Fear of the unknown in earlier societies, mutated into fear that 'yes, life is that banal' in other societies (including modern ones). Some people violent resist the idea that humans can have all the answers, so they're constantly looking for an 'out there' explanation for perfectly mundane things. It makes them feel important, brushing up against the Unreal, in a way that their 9-5 day job and coming home to burgers, beer and 3 hours of television... doesn't.

I’m not really sure I agree with you here.

A ‘fear that life is universally banal everywhere’ says far more about the capacity of a person’s imagination than it does the existence of supernatural phenomenon. It’s a description of an attitude and not much more really.

I’m also fairly certain that somebody who wishes to ‘feel important’ has a million ways to achieve this that don’t involve embarrassing themselves by submitting their observations to the ridicule of peers who ‘have all the answers’ (which is also an attitude and not a fact, and a very telling one at that)

People constantly embarrass themselves. Routinely now, on camera, filming themselves for views and clicks. In a world where tiktok and reddit exists (particularly r/IamtheMainCharacter), you'll never convince me that a subset of people won't do anything at all for attention, no matter how negative and ridicule-inducing it might be.

Then of course there is the fact our scientific paradigm has become over represented by the religious fundamentalism of scientism; which is not the same thing as science at all and more a radical ideology of psychotic nihilism.

Ah.

Let’s also consider the evidence as it stands.

The most famous of course is that photo. Well. This one.



By today’s standards it grainy and in poor focus. But it was seemingly taken on film in 1967, so fair enough on the quality.

It seems nobody has firmly confirmed or debunked it. But we cannot ignore nor deny they were in the area….filming a mockumentary type movie. On Bigfoot. Awfully, awfully convenient the big fella stopped by for a cameo, eh? Oh, and they’d spent the preceding months, by their own admission, trying to raise funding to continue filming said mockumentary. Which isn’t at all suspicious, is it.

Then there are footprints. Some evidence points to at least some being faked. But some doesn’t mean therefore all. It does suggest it though, but again can’t be taken as truly conclusive.

The fossil record. Whilst incomplete (and expected to be incomplete) there’s seemingly nothing we might consider ancestral to such a creature.

Of course, other than the fossil record a single film being faked doesn’t disprove the existence of Bigfoot. Anymore than a film like Interstellar is proof the ISS is a hoax and there’s a firmament up there because space is also fake and the earth is flat and there’s an ice wall which They don’t want anyone to know about because reasons and the Antarctic Treaty means nobody is allowed there ever and it’s guarded by a combined military of all the signatory nature no not that Antarctic Treaty which is easily readable online the other secret one the [insert racial boogeyman of your choice] don’t want you know about but only Crazy Dave and his Tinfoil Daisies know about.

I would like to throw one argument against the "nothing in the fossile record" argument. For the longest time we thought there were only two branches of modern human evolution ever, and that we were solely from one branch and that Neanderthals died out. It wasn't until genetic testing that we learned that most humans have some Neanderthal in them.

Then we learned there was a third branch, Denisovians. We have very, very little in the fossil record about them, and we know more about them through unexplained gaps in modern human genetics.

Add to that there there was likely at least a forth modern human species that contributed to our modern society that we know even less about.

At one point in the not-so-distant past humans were on the decline in population, almost to extinction. There were less than 10,000 of us on the planet, mostly geologically isolated. Could a similar fate have fallen on Bigfoot?

Perhaps Squatch is just an isolationist former NBA player with a severe wolfman syndrome.

Well that’s a tricky one. Because the fossil record isn’t complete, on account various conditions are required for fossilisation. So any species which largely lived snd died in a small area unfavourable to preservation is not going to be detected.

The interesting thing is so far as I’m aware (not an archaeologist, I’d position myself on the lower left slope of dunning Kruger, exploring the foothills) no bipedal hominids are believed to have been furry in the way of Bigfoot?

Even Lucy is at least depicted as having body hair rather than fur. Now, because im happy here in the foothills I have to assume that’s the result of an informed decision, but I accept it could also be artistic flair etc.

By and large, the absence of fossils does not disprove the existence of anything. The conditions that lead to fossilization is literally one in a million, if not even worse. And erosion in all its forms destroyed millions of fossils before we even evolved and created paleontology.

I, too, am very curious as to when, where, why, and how humanity lost it's fur in the course of our evolution. Our closest surviving relatives - chimpanzees - have fur.

Hippos and cetaceans lost their fur as they adapted to aquatic lives, but (as far as I know) there's no evidence elephants did the same between the evolution of the African and Asian elephants and the very furry Mastodon and Wooly Mammoth.

"tis a very curious thing, and I'm not aware of any scientifically satisfactory explanations thus far.

Not every species will be in the fossil record. But, from those that are? We can track changes over the course of time, and make educated assumptions as to when certain traits were developed, or indeed lost.

So for Whales? We may have fossils over ancestor species where fur is evident, but by the next ancestor in the record, it’s gone.

Applying what we know about fur loss from other species, some idea of when it happened can be come to.

But my point here, which admittedly I think I did fudge, is that at least since Lucy, there’s no evidence of furred bipedal apes as Bigfoot is posited to be. Indeed I don’t think there’s any evidence of indigenous great apes in what is now North America.

Primates, yes. But no Apes. Which rather questions where Bigfoot, if indeed it is real and a hominid or great ape, actually came from evolutionary speaking.

Cursory googling shows all known Apes evolved and exist in central Africa, until us smelly hoomans and related hominids went for a wander.

Well, camels are originally a North American animal. It only got introduced to Asia with the Alaskan land bridge. At that time a lot of animals developed heavier fur, and also species gigantism.

If Bigfoot, hypothetically, was real I'd assume it was a great ape. But what if it wasn't? What if that bipedal nature is just a fluke of convergent evolution? For all we know the damned thing is a large mutant ground sloth.

Thing is? We know where Camels evolved from the fossil record.

Could it be a Sloth or similar? Sure, that’s a possibility. But again, being bipedal is super rare and requires adaptation from quadrupedal, such as a locking knee and a change to the shape of the hip bone.

With seemingly no fossil or other remains to suggest that change began to manifest in another species? That’s a super long shot.