Bigfoot FOUND

Various types of creatures have been suggested to explain both the sightings and what type of creature Bigfoot would be if it existed. The scientific community attributes non-hoaxed sightings to misidentification of known animals and their tracks. While cryptozoologists explain Bigfoot with an unknown ape, some believers in Bigfoot attribute the phenomenon to even less mundane sources such as UFOs or other paranormal sources.

Bears

When standing on their hind legs, bears are roughly the same size as Bigfoot is supposed to be. Along with their prevalence in regions said to also be inhabited by Bigfoot, they are a likely candidate to explain some sightings. Similarly, a tale presented in Theodore Roosevelt’s 1900 book Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches about two hunters encountering a violent bear, is sometimes used by Bigfoot proponents as historical evidence of the creature’s existence.

Gigantopithecus

Bigfoot proponents Grover Krantz and Geoffrey Bourne believe that Bigfoot might be a Gigantopithecus. Bourne points out that most Gigantopithecus fossils were found in China and that many species of animals migrated across the Bering land bridge, arguing that it is not unreasonable to assume that Gigantopithecus might have as well.

The Gigantopithecus hypothesis is generally considered entirely speculative. As the only known fossils are of its mandible and teeth, there is some uncertainty about Gigantopithecus’s locomotion. Krantz has argued, based on the shape of its mandible, that Gigantopithecus blacki could have been bipedal. However, the mainstream view is that Gigantopithecus was quadrupedal, and it has been argued that Gigantopithecus’s enormous mass would have made it difficult for it to adopt a bipedal gait.

Bernard G. Campbellin wrote: "That Gigantopithicus is in fact extinct has been questioned by those who believe it survives as the Yeti of the Himalayas and the Sasquatch of the north-west American coast. But the evidence for these creatures is not convincing."

Extinct hominans

A species of Paranthropus, such as Paranthropus robustus, with its crested skull and bipedal gait, was suggested by primatologist John Napier and anthropologist Gordon Strasenburg as a possible candidate for Bigfoot’s identity.

Some Bigfoot proponents suggest Homo erectus to be the creature, but Homo erectus remains are not found on the North American continent.

View among the scientific community

Scientists and academics overwhelmingly “discount the existence of Bigfoot because the evidence supporting belief in the survival of a prehistoric, bipedal, apelike creature of such dimensions is scant.” In addition to the lack of evidence, they cite the fact that Bigfoot is alleged to live in regions unusual for a large, nonhuman primate, i.e., temperate latitudes in the northern hemisphere; all recognized nonhuman apes are found in the tropics of Africa and Asia. Great apes are not found in the fossil record in the Americas, and no Bigfoot remains have ever been found. Indeed, scientists insist that the breeding population of such an animal would be so large that it would account for many more purported sightings than currently occur, making the existence of such an animal an almost certain impossibility.

Most scientists do not give the subject of Bigfoot’s existence serious attention, given the history of dubious claims and outright hoaxes. Napier wrote that the mainstream scientific community’s indifference stems primarily from “insufficient evidence … it is hardly surprising that scientists prefer to investigate the probable rather than beat their heads against the wall of the faintly possible.” Anthropologist David Daegling echoed this idea, citing a “remarkably limited amount of Sasquatch data that are amenable to scientific scrutiny.” He advises that mainstream skeptics take a proactive position “to offer an alternative explanation. We have to explain why we see Bigfoot when there is no such animal.”

In a 1996 USA Today article titled “Bigfoot Merely Amuses Most Scientists”, Washington State zoologist John Crane is quoted as saying: “There is no such thing as Bigfoot. No data other than material that’s clearly been fabricated has ever been presented.”

George Schaller is one of a few prominent scientists who argue that Bigfoot reports are worthy of serious study. A 2003 Los Angeles Times story described Schaller as a “Bigfoot skeptic,” but he also expressed his disapproval towards other scientists who do not examine evidence, yet “write [Bigfoot] off as a hoax or myth. I don’t think that’s fair.” In a 2003 Denver Post article Schaller said that he is troubled that no Bigfoot remains have ever been uncovered, and no feces samples have been found to allow DNA testing. Schaller notes: “There have been so many sightings over the years, even if you throw out 95 percent of them, there ought to be some explanation for the rest. I think a hard-eyed look is absolutely essential.” Napier argues that some “soft evidence” (i.e., eyewitness accounts, footprints, hair and droppings) is compelling enough that he advises against “dismissing its reality out of hand.” Other scientists who have expressed guarded interest in Sasquatch reports include Russell Mittermeier, Daris Swindler, and Esteban Sarmiento.

Although most scientists find current evidence of Bigfoot unpersuasive, a handful of prominent experts have offered sympathetic opinions on the subject. In a 2002 interview on National Public Radio, Jane Goodall first publicly expressed her views on Bigfoot, by remarking, “Well now, you’ll be amazed when I tell you that I’m sure that they exist… I’ve talked to so many Native Americans who all describe the same sounds, two who have seen them. I’ve probably got about, oh, thirty books that have come from different parts of the world, from China from, from all over the place….”

Anthropologist Carleton S. Coon’s posthumously published essay Why the Sasquatch Must Exist states, “Even before I read John Green’s book Sasquatch: The Apes Among Us, first published in 1978, I accepted Sasquatch’s existence.” Coon examines the question from several angles, stating that he is confident only in ruling out a relict Neanderthal population as a viable candidate for Sasquatch reports.

Krantz and others have argued that a double standard is applied to Sasquatch studies by many academics: whenever there is a claim or evidence of Sasquatch’s existence, enormous scrutiny is applied, yet when individuals claim to have hoaxed Bigfoot evidence, the claims are frequently accepted without corroborative evidence.

In 2004, Henry Gee, editor of the prestigious magazine Nature, argued that creatures like Bigfoot deserved further study, writing, “The discovery that Homo floresiensis survived until so very recently, in geological terms, makes it more likely that stories of other mythical, human-like creatures such as Yetis are founded on grains of truth … Now, cryptozoology, the study of such fabulous creatures, can come in from the cold.”