Bigfoot's New Name

November 6, 2007 6:09 PM

Bigfoot has a new name; Anthropoidipes ameriborealis (pdf). Coined by Jeff Meldrum, a professor of anatomy at Idaho State University, the term is derived from footprints, not a body. Meldrum’s outspoken Bigfoot advocacy has gotten him into hot water with his university colleagues. Previously anthropologist Grover Krantz proposed that Bigfoot was Gigantopithecus blacki.
posted by Tube (23 comments total)

Had a near-death experience?
Consult a chemistry professor!

Have a proof of the existence of God?
See a marine biologist!

Think you are psychic?
Check with an atmospheric physicist!
posted by DU at 6:15 PM on November 6, 2007

Megalopus hirsutus?
posted by rob511 at 6:47 PM on November 6, 2007

He'll always be Sasquatch to me.
posted by Sailormom at 6:52 PM on November 6, 2007

I'll tell you who took those lunches, that damn sasquatch.
posted by fusinski at 7:07 PM on November 6, 2007

If Sasquatch exists, why have Sasquatch bones never been found?
posted by ZenMasterThis at 7:29 PM on November 6, 2007

They all go by "Harry" for short.
posted by katillathehun at 7:36 PM on November 6, 2007

If Sasquatch exists, why have Sasquatch bones never been found?

The Greys hide them, duh.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:46 PM on November 6, 2007 [2 favorites]

If Sasquatch exists, why have Sasquatch bones never been found?

You mean...why haven't they been found yeti?
posted by greenskpr at 8:01 PM on November 6, 2007

He'll always be Sasquatch to me.

[singing mode=bad degree_of_badness=BILLY JOEL]

He's covered with hair and as tall as a tree,
He may look like a yeti, but he'll always be Sasquatch to me

[/singing]
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:02 PM on November 6, 2007

In the words of Mitch Hedberg :

"I think Bigfoot is blurry, that's the problem. It's not the photographer's fault. Bigfoot is blurry. And that's extra scary to me, because there's a large, out-of-focus monster roaming the countryside."

posted by revmitcz at 8:08 PM on November 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

Bullshitdipes Nonexistalis

posted by wfrgms at 8:08 PM on November 6, 2007

Iwantolope Believis
posted by uncanny hengeman at 8:22 PM on November 6, 2007

I still believe that in my lifetime a Sasquatch will play for the NBA.
posted by dhartung at 8:24 PM on November 6, 2007

If Sasquatch exists, why have Sasquatch bones never been found?

From what I've heard from Bigfoot believers -- and I am not making this up -- the "Bigfoots" (Bigfeet?) either destroy the bones of their dead or hide them very cleverly under rocks or way up in trees or something.

Its a pointless question, though. Its like asking a creationist where all the water from Noah's flood went. "Into the entrance of Hell in a cave beneath Jerusalem, of course! Isn't that obvious?"
posted by Avenger at 8:56 PM on November 6, 2007

Once again, we have proof that getting a PhD in many fields is more about discipline and persistence than having critical thinking. Or being sane.
posted by kjs3 at 9:08 PM on November 6, 2007 [1 favorite]

The remains of a dead forest animal—any animal, be it a bear, deer, rabbit, whatever—actually decay and are scavenged away by other animals quicker than you might imagine. Ask a hunter or someone who spends a lot of time in the woods if they’ve ever run across a deer skeleton, or just simply deer bones. You can spend a lot of time in the woods without ever seeing any bones or remains at all. Besides, even if Bigfoot’s bones have been found, since most folks don’t believe this creature exists, there likely wouldn’t be any “Hey, a Bigfoot femur!” type revelations.

/not a believer
//just playing devil's advocate
posted by zardoz at 9:28 PM on November 6, 2007 [2 favorites]

Any Alaskans (or western Canadians) here? How well-explored are the wilderness areas in north-west North America? Is it feasible for a population of a few dozen individuals to hide in there, and stay hidden, for the last three generations? That'd be where the Bigfoot are found, if they still exist (extremely doubtful); or where their remains could be found, if they used to exist.

As to what they are or were, without any credible evidence at all Meldrum's guess is just a guess. Personally I'd bet on them being somewhat closer relatives of homo sapiens, with thick fur and perhaps larger body mass, although not much extra mass is required to be significantly larger, given thick fur - compare with a fluffy cat or dog. I'd expect they were out-competed by homo sapiens north and south for living space, food supply, and probably reproduction as well, and were driven into the deep woods. If they were cut off in the North American continent, the influx of crowd-living homo sapiens (ancestors of Eskimos and Native Americans) would have exposed them to disease in a similar way that those humans themselves were exposed to disease when the very crowd-living Europeans arrived. If they're of comparable intelligence to ourselves, they probably have (or had) an entirely sensible terror of being seen by humans.

Given fur, they have no need for clothing and much less need for structures, so they can get by as bears do, by huddling, nesting in brush, and perhaps by hibernating. Given sharp teeth and fast movement (or alternatively, a herbivorous diet), they don't need spears to hunt. So, they wander, and don't develop any kind of technology. The guns, germs, and steel hypothesis, millenia earlier: spears, germs, and fire.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 9:52 PM on November 6, 2007

I'd expect they were out-competed by homo sapiens north and south for living space, food supply, and probably reproduction as well

For some reason, I read "reproduction" as "reputation" and imagined a Bigfoot doing something gauche at a cocktail party and the whole lot of them becoming social outcasts.

Explains why we don't see them anymore, I suppose. The shame. The shame.
posted by brundlefly at 11:54 PM on November 6, 2007 [2 favorites]

When a sasquatch dies, the other members of his or her tribe will gather the body, wrap it in a blanket made of leaves and cover it with a small pile of twigs. Up it goes in a pyre, and the sasquatch family sings a dirge so sad even the birds weep. There are no bones, just memories.
posted by billysumday at 6:59 AM on November 7, 2007

I've actually been out on a couple of expeditions with bigfoot hunters as research for my writing. I'm not a believer, but I respect the people who are. Some of them have had sightings that are very hard to explain away in any way other than calling them crazy. Which I am hesitant to do, because they're genuinely nice people. But...

There are some genuinely crazy theories to account for why a body has never been recovered. Some guys I was with up in Washington were telling me that they are not animals, but some kind of spirit that exists between two worlds. Also, that Bigfoot is telepathic.

It's all fun fodder for my fiction, though.
posted by JeremyT at 7:23 AM on November 7, 2007

I saw Bigfoot once. 1951 back in Sequoia National Park. Had a foot on him thirty-seven inches heel to toe. It made a sound I would not want to hear twice in my life.
posted by chuq at 7:42 AM on November 7, 2007

Ricky there's a samsquanch trying to get into my shed!
posted by Divine_Wino at 7:49 AM on November 7, 2007

Actually, bigfoot is the "5th Beatle"-- look at the wide stance in the classic bigfoot film and compare it with the stances on the cover of Abby Road.



&


posted by emanresubmud at 7:59 AM on November 8, 2007