Thursday, August 18, 2011

Is that Bigfoot in Washington County?



Joe Nickell, PhD, author of Tracking the Man-Beasts, says he is "the world's only full-time professional paranormal investigator." With forty years studying "mythological, folkloric, and literary monsters" in remote regions of the world, including carnival midways, Nickell releases a slide show "to track the man-beasts - to separate fact from fancy." And Nickell's efforts and those of several other skeptical researchers are spotlighted by Sharon Hill in her tribute to a change she says is taking place within the science that seeks unknown animals, as you'll see in New Cryptozoology: Less Credulous, More Scientific. Will this new wave change cryptozoology for the better? Or is it just more debunkery in disguise? Says Hill: "No more credulous collecting of stories. We examine the culture (the popular depictions of monsters, the psychology of monster hunting, and the activities of people who search for them) and the events (sightings, purported evidence) in books, magazines, blogs and podcasts." Seems to us they are forgetting to investigate the real subject matter of cryptozoology, the reported "hidden animals." Elsewhere, some out-of-place animals are making the news in the reports Capybara Caper! The Bigfoot of Rodents Spotted in California and Mountain Lions Turning Up All Over. Meanwhile, a creature we first saw in this news footage has been identified according to Maryland "Chupacabra" ID'd as Fox with Mange.

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