Opinion of Skepticism

[136or142]

The problem is, and this is basically what I've been saying about 'debunkers' is that you are nowhere near as skeptical of the supposed explanations as you are of the original claims.  A true skeptic should be skeptical about both the claims and the purported explanations.

For instance:
1."Some place claims a bunch of people missed choir practice one night and the church happened to blow up that night."  

This was not a 'claim' this was a well documented occurrence. The odds of this incident occurring are at least 1 in a million (according to Snopes) and probably much higher.  Again, does it prove anything? No. In this case, I'd agree I'm not sure what can be investigated.

2." Videos of a dude in a monkey suit walking through the woods is not proof of big foot."

This suggests to me you are a 'debunker' and not really a skeptic.  You are obviously referring to the Patterson/Gimlin video, but it is highly unlikely it was a person wearing a 'monkey suit'.

A.A suit like that could not be bought off the shelf when that video came out.  And, I was told by a film buff friend of mine, that the movie Planet of the Apes was supposed to have a whole bunch of additional things in it, but that the budget was shot in making all the ape costumes.  Planet of the Apes came out several years after the Patterson/Gimlin video, so the technology to make a suit like that would likely have even been more primitive. The estimates I've read I believe were that to make a suit like that would have cost at least $10,000 in 1968 dollars. It's hard to believe Patterson and Gimlin would have gone to that much trouble (and where would they have gotten the money from?  Maybe the guy in the suit was wealthy, there is that possibility.)

B.The biggest evidence put forward by the 'debunkers' is that many years later, a person came forward and said they were the person wearing the suit and the 'debunkers' said 'well there you go, it was a hoax.'  This was my first encounter with so-called skeptics (who I now refer to as 'debunkers') not holding purported explanations to the same standard that they hold the initial claims to.  I mean, if an anonymous person comes forward claiming to be the someone completely covered up in a suit, he couldn't be lying, right?  

I have the book 'The Straight Dope.'  I've read parts of it from time to time.

wait wait wait....you actually believe that big foot video?  Do you know how I know it's a guy in a monkey suit?  Because it looks like a guy walking in a monkey suit.  The fact that the guy that did it admitted it and that they bought a monkey a suit before the video was released and that they had a history of being con men just further proves it.

but lets say it didn't look like a human male walking in a cheap monkey suit and all the other evidence proving it was a couple of bad guys trying to make money off of morons was gone, it still wouldn't prove a large bipedal primate was undiscovered in western North America.  It's not odd to you that a guy who wrote books on big foot and who was making a "documentary" about big foot has created the "best" proof of big foot?  Do you have any idea how many hunting cameras are out there?  None have ever captured a big foot.  No body ever recovered, no skat, no hair on a tree, none hit by a car.

There are no large (bigger than a beagle) undiscovered land mammals, anywhere.  I wish there were, but there are not.

Now you're doing what you accused me of doing earlier.   I believe the Big Foot video is evidence of something. The strongest argument for both sides is that it's too grainy to determine much of anything.   It doesn't look like a guy walking around in a 'monkey suit' to me.

However, there is zero reason to believe that the person who came forwarded and claimed to be in the 'monkey suit' was telling the truth.  To believe this person is at least as absurd as believing Big Foot exists on the sole basis of the video.

That I haven't commented on your claims on Patterson/Gimlin is because I don't remember much about them, I'm not agreeing with or disputing what you say there.

the Tapanuli Orangutan was only discovered in 1997.
https://newatlas.com/new-species-discovered-2017/52761/

Hard to tell from just a still picture with nothing to provide context, but it looks bigger than a beagle to me.  Of course, not proof that Big Foot exists, but if it is bigger than a beagle, it certainly means your claim there is inoperative.

[136or142]

Several isolated unlikely events do not debunk anything. If there's a clear, connected chain of such events, then we can talk.

I don't know about you personally, but from the comments of 'unexplained things happen all the time.':

Alien space ship lands on White House Lawn.

'Debunker': "Since this event only happened once it can't be taken as extraordinary evidence of the existence of space aliens."

A genuine skeptic is somebody who weighs evidence in an even handed manner in a genuine search for 'the truth.'

A 'debunker' is somebody who takes any counter claim, no matter how ridiculous, as evidence (or proof)  that a paranormal claim can't be significant.  Ultimately a 'debunker' and a 'true believer' are two sides of the same coin.

I think that many people who claim to be skeptics, are, in fact 'debunkers.'

[dead0man]

Now you're doing what you accused me of doing earlier.   I believe the Big Foot video is evidence of something.

yeah, that video cameras existed in the 70s. It is NOT evidence of big foot.  It's not evidence against big foot existing either.....liars lying isn't proof that what they are lying about isn't true.

[All Along The Watchtower]

I'm Skeptical about it.