Groucho Marxism

Bigfoot, also commonly referred to as Sasquatch, is a large, hairy creature said to inhabit forests in North America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. Proponents for the existence of Bigfoot have offered various forms of evidence to support the creature’s existence, including anecdotal claims of sightings, as well as photographs, video and audio recordings, and casts of large footprints. Bigfoot is usually described as a muscular, bipedal human or ape-like creature covered in black, dark brown, or dark reddish hair. Common descriptions include broad shoulders, no visible neck, and long arms. The enormous footprints for which the creature is named are claimed to be up to 24 inches long and 8 inches wide.

I have always been sceptical about the existence of these creatures. Recently, though, I have been wondering whether my scepticism was warranted. In this blog post I will go through some of the evidence put forward in support of Bigfoot’s existence, starting with the claims of sightings. According to the website Live Science, there have been over 10,000 reported Bigfoot sightings in the continental United States. Of course many, perhaps even most, of these sightings will be misidentifications. But even if 90% of them were misidentifications, that would still leave over 1,000 sightings unaccounted for. That figure seems too large to me to simply be ignored and suggests there is something out there that cannot be readily explained by mainstream science.

We don’t have to take people’s word for it though, as there are many videos that purport to show these creatures in the wild. The most famous of these is the so-called Patterson-Gimlin film, a 1967 short motion picture which depicts an unidentified animal that the filmmakers claimed was a Bigfoot. Like most people my initial reaction on seeing this film was that the subject was a man in a gorilla suit. The more I watch it, however, the less convinced I am of this. In particular, the creature displays anatomical features that go way beyond what would be expected if the film was a hoax. For example, the creature’s foot seems to have something called a ‘mid-tarsal break’, a feature that is not present in humans but is present in non-human primates.

We also have audio evidence. Bigfoot vocalizations such as howls, screams, moans, grunts, and whistles have been reported and recorded. Perhaps the most famous of these are the so-called Sierra Sounds, audio recordings from the early 1970s apparently capturing Bigfoot vocalizations in the Sierra Nevada mountains which are claimed to be a form of language. Retired U.S. Navy cryptographic linguist Scott Nelson analyzed the recordings and concluded, “It is definitely a language, it is definitely not human in origin, and it could not have been faked.” No formal studies have been conducted on the Sierra Sounds so we cannot say anything definitive about them. But having listened to these recordings myself, I find it hard to disagree with Nelson’s conclusion.

Then there are the footprints, after which Bigfoot takes its name. Hundreds of alleged Bigfoot footprints have been reported and cast. Many of these are probably fakes; but just as with the Patterson-Gimlin film, some show anatomical features that go way beyond what would be expected from a hoax. For example, may of these prints show evidence of ‘dermal ridges’: patterned, raised corrugations of the skin found on the hands and feet of primates and other animals, more commonly referred to as fingerprints. It does not seem conceivable that a hoaxer would be able to fake these, or even that they would think to fake them. Then there is the fact that these prints are remarkably uniform in size and shape. If these footprints are the result of a hoax, it must be a very well-organised one.

Many indigenous cultures across the North American continent tell tales of mysterious hair-covered creatures living in forests. According to anthropologist David Daegling, these legends existed long before contemporary reports of the creature described as Bigfoot. It’s also notable how consistent these stories are, even between cultures that historically would have had little to no contact with each other. We with our western chauvinism tend to dismiss such stories as nothing more than folklore, arrogantly assuming that if something cannot be explained by known science then it can’t possibly be true. Perhaps we ought to pay more attention to the people who were living North America for thousands of years before Europeans arrived. They might actually be trying to tell us something.