The problem with the Ruby Creek event, one that makes it difficult to reconstruct, is its recorded variation. It seemed to grow with the retelling, and from its earliest use as “evidence” for sasquatch, it was solely in the hands of advocates with a pro-bigfoot axe to grind.

Your assertion concerning the improbability of bear tracks appearing bipedal over a distance fails to convince me. First, we have no photographic evidence or even a mapping of the trackway. We do not know if it was broken up by grass, gravel or rocks at places, or even how distinct the tracks may have appeared. We do not know how well the investigators reported the tracks, or if later remarks by investigators were influenced by pro-bigfoot researchers. On the other hand, we do know the surviving tracing is not inconsistent with overlapping bear spoor, and it really doesn’t look like alleged tracks of a bigfoot.

Second, you make the assertion that bears would not leave bipedal appearing tracks for any lengthy distance. This is an assertion that I doubt you can definitive demonstrate. But even if I grant your assertion as true for sake of argument, there is nothing in the Ruby Creek reporting that I have seen that would make me think this trackway was too distanced to rule out bear.

I think we should entertain the thought that bigfoot does not exist, a controversial idea among bigfoot “true believers”. This, of course, is not the same as a dogmatic belief in “Nonexistence.”

And for you to suggest you are a skeptic on the bigfoot issue, even while you have already posted previously that you would bet all your fortune on the existence of bigfoot —- well, what can I say except that you use words in your own special way and are thus bound to be misunderstood.

P.S. The “stick it” remark was meant in jest, hence the “Smile!!!”.

I think your REACTION to dispassion gets a little, well, I never have used the phrase “stick it” on this forum.

And the idea that bears produce TRACKWAYS that look like a bipedal animal made them (the investigators clearly thought they looked bipedal) is absurd. The occasional track overlap will happen. But you will never find a bear TRACKWAY that looks anything like anything but a bear made it. (That’s the mistake I made up there, not using the word TRACKWAY when that is what I meant.) A quadruped cannot leave tracks that look bipedal over any distance. Not if it is actually moving on four legs, it can’t.

Adios, amigo! [SMILE!!!!]

P.S. I’m a SKEPTIC. But people who Believe in Stuff like Nonexistence tend to have trouble with that.

I asked you about the “physical evidence” that gives you confidence in the Ruby Creek affair as a bigfoot event. Your reply: “HER SAY SO THAT IT WAS.” Sorry my friend, but testimony is not “physical evidence.” (I’m assuming, amigo, that you really are not a close reader of words from a skeptic.)

You say “Natives don’t turn bears into apes.”
Funny, but Mrs. Chapman never said she saw an ape. John Green turned Mrs. Chapman’s sighting into an ape encounter, not the witness. YOU have turned her sighting into an ape encounter; she never claimed to have seen an ape. (Since Sanderson believed sasquatch was human or proto-human, he no doubt believed Mrs. Chapman’s testimony was confirmation of his view.)

We get into some really weird stuff in your address about overlapping bear tracks. Here we go:”Overlapping tracks don’t look two-legged; they look like one track of a two-legged animal, kinda but not really.” What In The Hey? I had to read your dissertation on overlapping tracks several times to even get to a sliver of comprehension concerning what you are saying. Then, I figured it out!

You actually seem to be thinking I am positing that in the Ruby Creek event, a large bear walked on its hind legs all around the homestead, and when I refer to “overlapping”
bear tracks, I’m arguing that the bear put one back foot into the track of the other back foot.
Is this what you are thinking!!

No, my friend, you are not comprehending. Mrs. Chapman only “glimpsed” a standing bear. When she moved away from the area, with her children, the bear would have advanced on the cabin and shed, ON ALL FOURS, with its back right foot stepping into the track of its right
forefoot, and same on its left side, creating elongated tracks that seem not only human-like, but bipedal.

I quote you: “you will never see a trail of overlapping bear tracks looking like a bipedal critter made them. That’s wilder than a bigfoot. Or a unicorn.”

I quote Nicholas Saunders from his 1995 book ANIMAL SPIRITS, concerning Yeti tracks: “…the photographic evidence is not conclusive as very large footprints are sometimes produced by mountain bears. When travelling at a lope, bears place their hind feet partly over the imprints of the fore feet to produce tracks which look as if they were made by a large bipedal animal.” (p. 144)

I really don’t know how you might think a bear negotiates a 4 ft. fence if it doesn’t step over it, but you seem to think that is impossible. We know tracks led to the fence and were found on the other side. Does this really preclude any consideration of a bear as the Ruby Creek culprit. I don’t think so.

You suggest one “COMPELLING” sighting really
“AIN’T NOTHIN” as far as its evidential value.
But, you apparently believe an accumulation of
“NOTHIN” means somthin. Compiling “NOTHIN” (sightings) gives you “COMPELLING” evidence (oops! sightings) after all. This is your “strictly-scientific approach.”

Let’s look at this logic: “I never take … remarks… by a kid seriously”, “but a sighting made by a child who remembers, decades later, what they saw, precisely, is a different story…” Do I have you right: A fresh sighting account is not preferred, compared to one remembered “decades” later?

Now you apparently do not accept that people may mechanically assimilate events as they experience them with their own personal, internal understanding of the event as rehashed in remembering. You say of this probably everyday occurrence: “normal functioning adults do NOT do that.” Ok, if you say so, Doc.

As to your two points concerning my approach:
1. I do think evidence can be reviewed, which is what I have been doing with the Ruby Creek affair. Of course, I know that you disallow any nuanced consideration of evidence if it does not support your belief in bigfoot. (And please amigo, don’t tell us again that you have no belief in bigfoot and then spend the rest of your post displaying your belief in bigfoot).

2. Your second point is stated prejudicially, but it has some truth. You should always prefer mundane explanations to extravagant ones. It will get you closer to finding the truth. In the Ruby Creek affair; we KNOW bears exist; we KNOW bears exhibit the kind of behavior described; we KNOW bears can leave human like tracks, etc. We “know” NO such thing about an alleged, giant bipedal ape.

And one more thing about Mrs. Chapman’s testimony. We know she changed it over time. Initially, her sighting seemed to be a mere “glimpse” of the animal in question. One version of her story says she thought she spied a bear initially. One could see how she might catch a quick look at what she saw and took it to be a bear obscured by foliage (since it was), only to look back a few moments later to see a frighteningly large, hairy beast standing on two legs. In that case, a hairy giant on two legs was her internal idea of a sasquatch projected onto the event.

DWA, let’s call a truce. I don’t mind you critiquing my posts. But the bragging and the belligerence and the sloppy attempts at ridicule
are really not necessary. I know you are passionate, and I realise you view yourself as some sort of “skeptic slayer” guarding the gait. but I know you are capable of better, more focused, and more sober analysis than you sometimes produce in hasty reaction.
If you view yourself as a person of scientific bent, a little dispassion would be nice.

You have made others uncomfortable and they do not want to post here. Let’s show everyone that Cryptomundians are capable of calm deliberations and gladly welcoming of all views entwined in cryptozoology.

And if you don’t agree, stick it amigo, until next time! (SMILE!!!)

(I do. )

1. Evidence cannot be reviewed, even looked at, until proof is obtained.

2. If it is at all conceivable that something could not be a bigfoot, it wasn’t one.

You may dispute me. But your approach to the evidence typifies, precisely, that of a person who firmly believes those two things. In other words, you could not ACT more that way if you firmly BELIEVED that way. Your approach PROHIBITS considering ANY evidence in ANY way as: might have been a bigfoot. No, it DOES. Regardless what you may THINK.

Now. It would help if you got me right too. I have tried, many times. But you are worth salvaging.

“Importantly, it should also be mentioned that you take “sightings” as literally recounted, probably seeing such events in your mind’s eye almost exactly as recounted. What you do not take into account is the fact that the sighting report is not a virtual replay of events as they were unfolding, but instead are the MEMORY of the events, imperfect as we know they are.”

What you think is EXACTLY, and cold not be MORE, what I think. Just as your first sentence could not be LESS what I think. Here’s what I do that you don’t: I READ THE REPORTS. I never take a toss-off remark about, or by, a kid very seriously. (I saw a big kitty, mommy, does NOT mean the kid saw a kitty – or a cow – unless evidence supports that.) But a sighting made by a child who remembers, decades later, what they saw, precisely, is a different story and must be treated differently. (To imply that adults misremember mundane childhood events as sasquatch implies mental illness. This must be backed up BY EVIDENCE. No, normal functioning adults do NOT do that.)

“As to the physical evidence that convinces you the Ruby Creek event was a bigfoot encounter, I am not so sure why you find such so compelling.”

For one thing, HER SAY SO THAT IT WAS. Natives don’t turn bears into apes; you are presuming something that doesn’t happen in the normal world we inhabit. For another thing, who said I was convinced? She did not see a bear. Unless, of course, she was lying to get attention, which she may well have been.

You’re ignoring my strictly-scientific approach on purpose, I fear. ONE ACCOUNT, REGARDLESS HOW COMPELLNG IT SOUNDS, AIN’T NOTHIN’. Frequency and coherence, uber alles. Unicorn: not real. Ivorybill: extinct. Sasquatch: plausible and worth looking into. Why that one and not the other two? F and C. Period.

“…an overlapping bear trail gives the impression of having been made by two feet, left and right, and thus obscures the fact that the animal is walking on four feet. The track hence appears bipedal.”

No it doesn’t.

As I said above: Overlapping tracks don’t look two-legged; they look like one track of a two-legged animal, kinda but not really. A bear can’t go on like that for any distance any more than you or I can run on one leg, so a trackway that looks two-legged, IS two-legged. Occasional track overlap may happen. But you will never see a trail of overlapping bear tracks looking like a bipedal critter made them. That’s wilder than a bigfoot. Or a unicorn.

“No, amigo, a bear can step over such a fence, without assistance I dare suggest. (I once owned a beagle that could literally, from the ground, climb over a five foot hurricane fence, a feat one wouldn’t believed if not witnessed). ”

He ain’t, that is AIN’T GONNA, STEP over it, like nothing happened. And leave, as the account clearly states, a track that looks bipedal. Your beagle, I am so sure, left a trail after climbing that fence that looked like a bigfoot did it.
Sasquatch, however, have been reported by eyewitnesses casually stepping over four and five-foot fences, many times. A biologist with an open mind would say: given choce, probably a sasquatch. Sorry, science at work there. Unless, of course, you just blithely take all the sasquatch evidence and toss it in a dumpster without a glance. Science not so much at work there. Science taking a brain vacation, there.

“One last thing. I have always thought your virtually unquestioned acceptance of “sightings” is blindingly naive.”

Amigo, you gotta read what I post, man! For the 500th time (do I get a prize?): when the sightings stand unchallenged by any sensible alternative explanation, they deserve review in the field to substantiate what is causing them. Saying that it could have been a bear hopping around on one foot is NOT a sensible alternative explanation.

But of course I forget your blind belief in numbers 1 and 2 at the top of this treatise.

“Now, I realize you are not alone. Upon reading other advocates, Moneymaker comes to mind, I realize you (and others) rig the discussion in your favor by accepting such evidence at face value and by making it illegitimate, in principle, to challenge such evidence by interpretative means.”

Wrong, amigo. We “rig” the discussion by noting ALL the evidence in our favor, and NONE of the evidence in yours; and noting also that bears hopping around on one foot kinda has to be supported by evidence.

(Doctor’s Note: “Interpretive means” can’t include or be limited to smoke screens; implying mental illness in normal people; Laying On of Hands; divining rods; What I Want To Think, No Matter What: or any other kind of “interpretative means.” This is science. Where is your EVIDENCE?)

“By this I mean, you accept Mrs. Chapman’s sighting without question, and will not accept any interpretation contrary to your acceptance of its literalism. You demand “evidence”, but such a clause is really just a resort to unrealistic demands…”

Nope.

She could have been lying. She could have been deranged. She could have been told to see a bigfoot by aliens. Or bears. You tell ME. But there’s no reason to say she didn’t say what she says she did, unless you have EVIDENCE.

If you are saying it is unreasonable to provide EVIDENCE…well, this is why I put so little stock in bigfoot “skeptics.”

My view is that bigfoot phenomena is an open mystery. While I doubt the existence of a giant native American ape, I do not say it is impossible and I leave open the possibility of such an animal in the remote Pacific North West.

I do not accept or understand scofticism, which I define as someone who is more interested in scoffing, in disbelief, at the phenomena rather than in trying to understand it. Similarly, I am puzzled by contra-scofticism, the advocate’s counter scoff aimed at any possible mundane explanation alternative to the advocate’s belief that the phenomena can be understood only by accepting the idea of a breeding population of bipedal apes in the American countryside.

There is nothing inherently and rationally prohibitive in considering the Ruby Creek account a bear event. Of course, there is no way to say definitively whether or not it is a bear event. All I wanted to show was that Ruby Creek could possibly be seen as a bear event, given that the posted topic concerned bears maybe being taken for bigfoot.

My posts above concern the possible reconstruction of Ruby Creek as a bear sighting. For the moment, let’s take Mrs. Chapman’s description of the animal out of discussion. What are we left with?

The first person who saw the animal, a juvenile, thought it was a cow. This implies that the animal was moving initially on four legs.

Investigators (not scientists) who responded to a call thought it was a bear event, judging so based on the evidence they saw.

The behavior of the animal inferred from evidence such as a raided and broken fish barrel, is consistent with known bear behavior.

A tracing of one print was made on sight; apparently no one could or thought to make a plaster cast. This tracing was determined to be a bear spoor by a qualified scientist who later examined it.

While the tracing was as large as a bigfoot track, it does not otherwise resemble the type of spoor allegedly made by bigfoot.

Now, let’s add Mrs. Chapman’s account. She said she saw a large, hair covered man and she was terrified. We should not lose sight of the probability that she had a but a very brief look at the animal in question.

You feel she should have known what a bear looked like. My point made in above posts is that we do not know if she had ever seen a bear standing on two legs before. It is reasonable to suggest she may have not (what opportunity would she have had previously to see a bear standing on two legs?).

This point is crucial. The reason I referred to Messner’s book is because he discusses how native belief imbued bears with human-like attributes because of the ability of bears to stand, prolonged, erectly—like humans and unknown in any other local mammal. It is no stretch of imagination to suggest that Mrs. Chapman did not understand what she was seeing because it was foreign to her experience, and she simply compensated by understanding the event in terms of a handed down belief (lore) in giant wildmen.

Also, keep in mind that by all accounts the woman had a superstitious belief in wildmen and she even felt she was cursed by seeing such (she became addicted to drink and later died crossing a river). Remember too, her story was inconsistent, even according to an advocate, and more detail was “remembered” as the years went by commensurate with both her cultural belief in wildmen and her interviewers beliefs in anomalous apes.

Consider this: I had a cryptic sighting once of a giant Garden Spider. On a sunny summer day, I was hiking in a wooded area when I ducked under a low hanging tree limb. I was met with a face full of spider web (which always creeps me out). I looked straight ahead and saw a monstrous Garden Spider, its body as large as a 70 watt lamp light bulb and its legs at least a foot long each. I was really frightened and immediately moved as far away as quickly as I could.

Later, I thought: did I see what I thought I did? It was only a brief “encounter”; did I see such an enormous spider or did I imagine it? Did I mistake a leafy, gnarled tree-limb, as monster spider, suggested in my mind by a face full of spider web? Or did I really see a creature unknown to science, easily the largest spider existing—if it existed?

With my experience in mind, I can easily understand how Mrs. Chapman framed her encounter, which was made suddenly and frighteningly, by associating it with the fears and apprehension she must have felt whenever she was told giant wildman (sasquatch) stories in her youth. Despite your protest, a fearful glance at a tall standing bear could be reflected back as a monstrous hairy man, in the woman’s mind.

Importantly, it should also be mentioned that you take “sightings” as literally recounted, probably seeing such events in your mind’s eye almost exactly as recounted. What you do not take into account is the fact that the sighting report is not a virtual replay of events as they were unfolding, but instead are the MEMORY of the events, imperfect as we know they are.

As to the physical evidence that convinces you the Ruby Creek event was a bigfoot encounter, I am not so sure why you find such so compelling. Your language is a little unclear to me on this point, so I’ll just say: an overlapping bear trail gives the impression of having been made by two feet, left and right, and thus obscures the fact that the animal is walking on four feet. The track hence appears bipedal.

We do not know how much of the track appeared to be strictly bipedal, but there was a reason the tracks were recognized as bear tracks.

Now, it seems truly incredible to me that you cannot see how a large grizzly bear can negotiate a four foot wire fence. Do you think such an event is impossible? Or, are you imagining Yogi Bear stepping over such a fence and you’re thinking: “preposterous, he would catch his dingle-berries on the barbs if he tried”?

No, amigo, a bear can step over such a fence, without assistance I dare suggest. (I once owned a beagle that could literally, from the ground, climb over a five foot hurricane fence, a feat one wouldn’t believed if not witnessed). And, as you mockingly suggest, what alternative does a bear getting past a fence have—-flight?

One last thing. I have always thought your virtually unquestioned acceptance of “sightings” is blindingly naive. Now, I realize you are not alone. Upon reading other advocates, Moneymaker comes to mind, I realize you (and others) rig the discussion in your favor by accepting such evidence at face value and by making it illegitimate, in principle, to challenge such evidence by interpretative means. By this I mean, you accept Mrs. Chapman’s sighting without question, and will not accept any interpretation contrary to your acceptance of its literalism. You demand “evidence”, but such a clause is really just a resort to unrealistic demands; in this case, you would apparently want someone to have filmed Mrs. Chapman seeing a bear at this event, or another witness to say “I was there, and the lady saw my uncle Ned!” or some-such.

Let’s apply your defense insurance to my sighting. I had to have seen, unknown to science and to the rest of the world, a giant Garden Spider because I said I did. Any interpretation of the event that doesn’t square with what I said I saw, such as positing my mind was playing tricks on me, or that the contrasting play of shadow and sunlight projected an image I rashly assimilated as a monster sighting, is out of bounds conceptually as an explanation. You would want “evidence”—-such as film of the event or someone else having witnessed the event but seeing something else. This is your counter argument to interpretation, and it will always insure that you get want you desire—belief unmolested by doubt.

1) no prima facie evidence that points to bear;

2) continued glossing over of the two-legged trackway. Overlapping tracks don’t look two-legged; they look like one track of a two-legged animal, kinda but not really. A bear can’t go on like that for any distance any more than you or I can run on one leg, so a trackway that looks two-legged, IS two-legged;

3) continued glossing over of the stepping over a four-foot fence…with the added fantastic claim that a bear can do that (it can’t…most other than record-size brown and polar – neither of which this was if it was a bear – cannot at all, and NONE can on two legs);

4) continued glossing over that the statements in 2) and 3) were made BY THE SCIENTISTS INVESTIGATING THE CASE (why shoot your own “analysis” in the foot like that?);

5) Absolutely incredible “mundane” explanations! “As to the stepping over a fence, you might find this just too incredible to believe of a bear. YOU might.” [Implied finish: someone determined to make the world think bear, no matter what, wouldn't put space flight beyond a bear. ]

6) “So, one piece of tangible evidence from this event has been determined to be bear [no matter what!!!!! ] by someone who should know [but knowledge and scientists become strange bedfellows when ol' biggy is the subject Read "This Can't Be A Bigfoot," Chapter 1. 190. 240. Oh, pick a chapter].

7) “Your suggestion that the hind print was toeless overlooks the fact that the tracing was just that: a tracing of the outer edges of the track.” Excellent! A great way to cover up that there aren’t two sets of toes in the track, so maybe the track isn’t two feet, and the apparent overlap just might be a midtarsal break marker! That assertion is no less valid than any you have made. And it is backed up by more evidence, to wit: mainstream “analysis” of cryptid evidence usually works just like that.

8 ) “The event demonstrated typical bear behaviour. You suggest such behaviour also indicates bigfoot. If you are correct, this makes it even more puzzling why we do not have conclusive evidence of bigfoot by now.” No it doesn’t. Why would it? “You ever wonder why?” No, I know why: bear, NO MATTER WHAT! Not hard for an ape to hide from ‘science’ like that.

9) “See, you and I know what a standing bear looks like. Now, I have never seen such a thing in person, but I have seen film and still photos galore of such an event. But what if Mrs. Chapman never had.” A native woman, in bear country. Absent evidence to the contrary, of which there appears none: SHE KNOWS WHAT BEAR LOOK LIKE.

I could go on. But I don’t see the picture changing. Once again, only one account. So what? I say. But once again: no reason to believe this woman saw anything other than what she says she saw.

You must be in the throes of a hive mentality. Such stinging remarks! I’ll try to address your emphatic criticisms.

As to prima facie evidence, remember the initial investigators thought this was a bear event. Remember too, when Green presented the tracing of the track to a zoologist, the scientist concluded it was bear spoor. (Now IF I were to argue in your own little special fashion, I would say that the scientist agrees with ME and therefore YOU are WRONG. But, I don’t like arguing in your fashion, so I won’t.) (Smile)

I’m sure you have actually seen this tracing, and except in size comparisons, it looks less like bigfoot spoor than it does an overlapping bear track. There are many web sites that will show you what overlapping bear tracks look like.

You no doubt are well stocked up in your man-ape library, so I refer you to Messner’s book on the Yeti where you will find an excellent example of overlapping bear track in mud. Dang if it doesn’t look almost like a human print!

So, one piece of tangible evidence from this event has been determined to be bear by someone who should know. Your suggestion that the hind print was toeless overlooks the fact that the tracing was just that: a tracing of the outer edges of the track.

Now your attempt to turn this evidence into non-evidence is to bring up “mid-tarsal break”.
Now, pray tell my dear Dr., where in this account do you find mention of a mid-tarsal break? Where is YOUR prima facie evidence for such an interpretation of the events? And I am curious to know, amigo, where did you find the evidence that led you to believe a zoologist, not biologist, “snow[ed]” Green?

I referenced the “two-legged” tracks and the “stepping over” a fence in order to honestly include what some might consider important information. I’m guessing these two factoids probably impressed Green and influenced his idea that this was a sasquatch event.

Of course, as you should know, bear tracks that are exhibiting overlap would look two-legged. This is not a controversial statement.
As to the stepping over a fence, you might find this just too incredible to believe of a bear. YOU might.

There is really no credulity involved in suggesting that to a child a bear walking on all-fours might look more like a “cow” than it would a giant bipedal ape. However, I’ll just have to accept your word that it is such a credulous idea that not even you would entertain it.

The event demonstrated typical bear behaviour.
You suggest such behaviour also indicates bigfoot. If you are correct, this makes it even more puzzling why we do not have conclusive evidence of bigfoot by now. You ever wonder why?

You suggest Mrs. Chapman should have known what a bear looked like. Maybe. She said she did. But, can we not reasonably suggest that she may have never seen a bear in standing position.

See, you and I know what a standing bear looks like. Now, I have never seen such a thing in person, but I have seen film and still photos galore of such an event. But what if Mrs. Chapman never had.

If you have read Messner’s MY SEARCH FOR THE YETI you might not be surprised to know Himalayan aboriginals believed in an animal sometimes called man-bear, and sometimes mixed up in local lore as a wild man. They described this animal in human terms; for instance, they would refer to this creatures offspring as “children”. In truth, this animal was a bear. Because it would sometimes walk on two legs, a feat only seen in humans, the bears would elicit awe and superstitious beliefs among the locals.

So, we can suggest (but of course never know for sure) that Mrs. Chapman may have glimpsed a standing erect bear, a sight she may have not seen before, and was thoroughly frightened at the proximity of this huge, bidedal hairy thing. She remembered the sighting as a sasquatch because it was the only entity she “knew” of that would fit the description of a giant, hairy two-legged entity. Later years, in later interviews, she changed her story somewhat and it is not beyond reason to suggest she may have “remembered” more details to placate later advocate investigators.

Despite your “thumbs down” review of my post, there really isn’t anything unreasonable or credulous about my interpretation of the events in question. Sorry your hive mentality came into play, but just remember:

Come to repect the skeptic; He is your friend!

Note that in everything you’ve said, there isn’t one piece of prima facie evidence that says “bear.”

I’d expect this woman to know what a bear looked like. (It’s not possible for any two things on two legs to look more different than a bear and a sasquatch, as described, except maybe a bear and a bluejay, although those two are not much more different.) “The behaviour of the animal in question is known bear behaviour.” It has also been described in many sasquatch reports. Tracks with a midtarsal break marker – they happen a lot – would be a prima facie excuse for a biologist to try to snow a non-scientist by saying “representing a bear spoor, with front paw and back paw overlapped.” Never mind that the bear appears to have NO TOES on one of its feet!

And as so often happens, look at what just gets discarded from the pseudo-analysis, utterly:

“…even though the tracks seemed two legged and whatever made them seemed to have stepped over a four foot fence.”

So. If you are concluding bear, I basically wouldn’t trust you. You didn’t analyze all of the evidence available, actually, didn’t really analyze any of it AT ALL, even though most of it says, tellingly, “NOT BEAR.”

And this is only one account. You have a few thousand more to debunk, not so good for you given that you couldn’t even put a rational dent in this ONE account.

(Doesn’t even include the utter literal credulity a skeptic (?) displays in the face of a CHILD’S story. Shoot, the proponents may be a lot of things, but no proponent I respect is anywhere near that credulous. Tut tut there, amigo.)

I exhibit one of the most famous bigfoot sightings ever, the sighting that forced John Green to take the subject of bigfoot seriously.
It is the Ruby Creek (BC) 1941 sighting (investigated by Green over a decade later) and it is generally considered in advocate lore as a solid bigfoot account. I’ll give the highlights.

Jeannie Chapman, a First Peoples descendant, on a sunny afternoon was informed by her child
that an animal was approaching their cabin.

She looked and saw some hairy animal lurking in the bushes beyond the field by their home. She called her two children to come to her.

The creature came out of the brush and, according to I.T. Sanderson’s retelling, Mrs. Chapman “saw to her horror that it was a gigantic man covered with hair, not fur.”

The animal advanced and the woman took her children and fled into nearby brush. Later, it was found that the animal had scattered salted salmon and/or busted a 55-gallon barrel of salted fish in the Chapman’s shed.

Investigation by local authorities found huge tracks around and about.

OK, so why is this an account of a bear?
I left out some details. The child who saw the animal first claimed there was a “big cow” or just a “cow” (depending on sources) coming down the mountainside. This, of course, makes the creature advancing on four legs and we could reasonably accept a child mistaking a bear for a cow (and we do not know if the child was familiar with bears at all). It is less likely that a bipedal giant ape or huge hair covered man would inspire such a cow sighting.

Mrs. Chapman was apparently familiar with local First Peoples “sasquatch” lore and had a superstitious reaction to the sighting. She believed it was bad luck and she would be haunted by it.

Her testimony changed over time. The first investigation by a local newsman revealed that
she claimed she “got one glimpse” of the manlike being before she retreated to hide. Over a decade later she told Sanderson she had “much too much time to look at it” before she hid.
According to Green, while he accepted the account as a saquatch sighting, “I did not consider her story reliable as to detail” because it was not always consistent, and “I have since read accounts in which she is quoted as having said things that do not agree with some of the things she said to me.”

Authorities who first responded to the event thought it was a large bear event. They believed the tracks were bear tracks, even though the tracks seemed two legged and whatever made them seemed to have stepped over a four foot fence.

A tracing of the track was later shown by Green to a BC zoologist who recognised it as representing a bear spoor, with front paw and back paw overlapped.

The behaviour of the animal in question is known bear behaviour. The animal was apparently hungry and broke into a stash of salted fish, in broad daylight and with people mulling about. This type of event is almost common in certain locations, for bears, and if equally representative of sasquatch, would have eliminated sasquatch as a cryptid long ago.

One can read between the lines here. A bear approaches a cabin in search of food and is spied approaching by a child, who mistakes it for a cow. The child tells his/her mother who looks outside a cabin to see a hairy animal moving about in the brush. Alarmed, she calls
her children together. The bear hears human activity and stands on its hind legs to get a better take on the cabin and the humans moving about.

Mrs. Chapman looks out again and is totally freaked by a very large animal standing on two legs looking directly at her and her children. She remembers all the “sasquatch” stories she has heard over the years, relating to giant hairy humans and thinks she sees one in the flesh.

Advocates interview her years later and her description of the animal is given more detail by the questions asked. Did the animal have a bear like snout? No, it had a flat face. (Never mind that a bear looking directly at you would its muzzle obscured by the angle). You know what a bear looks like? Yes. (Never mind that, before tv nature shows, a person living in remote areas may have known what a bear looks like, but also may have never seen a bear on two legs. Only humans stand on two legs—right?) Did the animal have shoulders? Yes. (But did it, or is this a later “false” memory held in conjunction with her belief in “sasquatch” and in her interrogators belief she did not see a bear?)

And it should be noted that the tracing of the animal’s track is reasonably recognizable as bear, and, except for size, little resembles the bigfoot track we have come to know and love.

“DWA – the plural of anecdotes is not evidence.” Um, sure is, guy! This just bespeaks the classic bigfoot skeptic’s misunderstanding of the difference between evidence and proof. The anecdotal evidence for the sasquatch is truly compelling, industrial grade, scientifically valid EVIDENCE. If you don’t understand that, you need to take your complaint to the scientists who have agreed with me. Because we’re right.

“if I saw that through the trees, I’d be thinking “OMG! Bigfoot!” And I’d post about it here, and I’d be saying “I know what I saw, and it wasn’t a bear!” and you’d be defending me, saying as you always do that whatever anyone says they saw is what they saw.”

Spoken like someone who never reads sighting reports! Well done there! If you described that, I’d be telling you, whatever you saw, it sure doesn’t sound like a bigfoot to me. Or if it was one, could you tell me what tied its legs together so it could hardly do better than a hobble?

“People look for things that conform to their existing belief systems (or cultural belief systems).”

Spoken like someone who never reads sighting reports! Well done there! They sure do look for conformance with what they know; and when they’ve seen a sasquatch, that search utterly FAILS, and it’s obvious in the report; they tried to make what they saw fit everything they are aware of, and because they saw a sasquatch, it didn’t.

“We filter our experience through our belief systems and “mental maps”. In fact, I can show you several optical illusions where our subconscious brains will fill in what it “expects” to see in an image.”

Same thing. That effort to do that filtering comes back TILTTILTTILTTILT when the person saw a sasquatch; the mental map gets burned, because the effort to fill in doesn’t work. They’ve never seen anything like this; they didn’t know anything like this existed; and they finally have to admit that.

“In short, in my opinion it is more likely for a genuine Sasquatch sighting to be written off as a bear rather than for a sighting of a bear to be misidenified as a Sasquatch.”

m_m: you are absolument correctomundo. And alcalde: thanks for confirming it, man! (Bigfoot skeptics get me in stitches sometimes!) Why is m_m correct? Let alcalde tell you, better than I can. They see a sasquatch, and think bear, precisely because, wait for it now:

“”People look for things that conform to their existing belief systems (or cultural belief systems).”

AND

“We filter our experience through our belief systems and “mental maps”. In fact, I can show you several optical illusions where our subconscious brains will fill in what it “expects” to see in an image.”

While alcalde attempts to think his way out of THAT cell, let me just point out that if skeptics and scoffers could agree more often like this, we’d have confirmed the sasquatch by now.

alcalde explains, precisely, why the Manitoba hunter in 1941 killed, with one shot, a bigfoot that he identified, immediately on seeing it, as a COW MOOSE he had wounded, as seen from behind. Classic. Nice job!