Texas Monthly’s Lauren Larson visits the annual Texas Bigfoot Conference and asks the important question.
Steve Austin knows the truth
[Michael Mayes, a schoolteacher and author of Valley of the Apes: The Search for Sasquatch in Area X] introduces a question that has preoccupied investigators for decades but has become more complicated in recent years: What will it take for people to believe Bigfoot exists? Mayes believes a specimen must be collected—the world will have to see a Bigfoot, a “holotype,” to accept that they exist—but he has changed his mind about who should do the collecting. He used to think, and even hope, that it might be him, but now he feels that “citizen scientists” such as himself should focus on gathering photographic evidence and leave the job of bagging Bigfoot to experts with institutional affiliations. If just anyone hauled in a Bigfoot carcass, he says, the blowback from animal rights groups and beyond would be ruinous.
The next speaker, Daryl Colyer, focuses his entire presentation on the question: Should we kill Bigfoot? Colyer had asked an AI chatbot about the implications of collecting a Bigfoot holotype. AI warned against it: the public outcry if Bigfoot were to be killed, the service replied to Colyer, would be swift and extreme—particularly if the species does bear a resemblance to humans, as many investigators believe. Social media would compound the rage, Colyer explains, and the person who felled the first Bigfoot would be ruined. (I think of Walter Palmer, who in slaying Cecil the lion in 2015 became the most hated dentist in America, which is saying something.) What if, Colyer asks, Bigfoot were declared endangered and retroactive laws against hunting were applied? And what if the holotype turned out to be the last of its species? Colyer, like Mayes, believes that someone will have to kill a Bigfoot, but it won’t be him, either.
[…]
A dead holotype has not always been necessary to prove the existence of a species. The next speaker, primatologist and star of the Travel Channel show Expedition Bigfoot Mireya Mayor, has experience discovering new species: she was part of an expedition that found three new species of mouse lemur. (Prior to pivoting to primatology and television, Mayor was a Miami Dolphins cheerleader, and her presentation is flawless, each moment well choreographed to corresponding high-budget video footage and photography from her travels.) Mayor proposes that the mouse lemur could be an example of how photos, coupled with samples of DNA and other material, can suffice. She does note that some mouse lemurs are now in captivity—a feat slightly more difficult with Bigfoot, who many believe is extremely large and, if the rock throws are any indication, can be violent when feeling fussy.
I’ve blogged about Bigfoot a few times, because it’s my blog and the subject amuses me. Looking back on the archives, I like using Bigfoot as an analogy for voter fraud, in that they’re both pretty hard to actually find out in the real world. My answer to this question, which I’ve indicated in some of those posts, is that some combination of DNA, bones, or other fossil evidence like with dinosaurs and other extinct animals, would suffice if there were enough of it and it were compelling.
The problem with that is obvious as well. The Bigfoot community is full of fraud and grifters, and that tends to cast a lot of doubt on those who have more sincere motives. It’s going to take a lot just to overcome the natural skepticism that comes with the “fool me once shame on you, fool me a thousand times shame on me” essence of it all. The much bigger problem is that there’s tons of evidence against the existence of Bigfoot, which raises the bar for how compelling any new evidence would be that much higher. I mean, when we speak of “Bigfoot”, we’re not talking just one creature but an entire population of them, in numbers sustainable enough to perpetuate themselves and avoid extinction. Given their size and their need for food and shelter and living space, how is it remotely possible that no one has ever found a legitimate Bigfoot carcass, let alone had a real encounter with one?
Anyway. The story is a fun read, and it discussed things like where Bigfoot stands now in a world with real discussions of UFOs, and how AI might affect the landscape. Check it out. Oh, and if you want a thrilling book that explores the, um, downside of Bigfoot, go read Max Brooks’ Devolution. He’s the same guy who wrote World War Z, so that should give you some idea of what you’re in for.
