Bigfoot, the famous North American sasquatch was spotted in Washington state, US in the late 1960s, and these sightings were investigated in by a formal scientist (Grovern Krantz) and some amateur laymen who fell for a hoax (or maybe even created it!).
The article mentioned below shows how hoaxes and fake cryptozoology can mislead scientists who refuse to adopt a healthy skeptical attitude and apply critical scientific methods to their investigations.
Read the article here: What a Bigfoot Hoax Teaches Us About Public Mistrust of Science
Bigfoot evidence or hoax?
A paper by Brian Regal (2006) had alread addressed this issue, its title: "Entering dubious realms: Grover Krantz, science, and Sasquatch" although it is behind a paywall, its abstract is revealing, it paints Krantz as a good intentioned a scientist attempting to legitimate bigfoot, and rejected by orthodoxy and also by the amateurs whom he was working with:
"Physical anthropologist Grover Krantz (1931-2002) spent his career arguing that the anomalous North American primate called Sasquatch was a living animal. He attempted to prove the creature's existence by applying to the problem the techniques of physical anthropology: methodologies and theoretical models that were outside the experience of the amateur enthusiasts who dominated the field of anomalous primate studies. For his efforts, he was dismissed or ignored by academics who viewed the Sasquatch, also commonly called Bigfoot, as at best a relic of folklore and at worst a hoax, and Krantz's project as having dubious value. Krantz also received a negative reaction from amateur Sasquatch researchers, some of whom threatened and abused him. His career is best situated therefore as part of the discussion about the historical relationship between amateur naturalists and professional scientists. The literature on this relationship articulates a combining/displacement process: when a knowledge domain that has potential for contributions to science is created by amateurs, it will eventually combine with and then be taken over by professionals, with the result that amateur leadership is displaced. This paper contributes to that discussion by showing the process at work in Krantz's failed attempt to legitimize Bigfoot research by removing it from the amateur sphere and repositioning it in the professional world of anthropology."
An interesting paper by Lewis and Bartlett (2024) suggests that bigfoot exists, but only as a cultural object created by bigfooters (those who seek it and investigate it): "Bigfoot exists. If not as a biological creature, then as a cultural object about which people know with a high degree of stability. It also exists as an object which some people organise their lives around. Those who collect evidence of Bigfoot’s existence as a biological creature are known as Bigfooters" The paper is worth reading, it is skeptical and gives a short historical introduction to bigfoot, and then explains how rational, people get involved in bigfooting, constructing the creature with seemingly logic evidence.
As U.S. Defense Secretary (1961-1968), Robert McNamara, said: “We see what we want to believe.” (source), this applies to bigfooters and the credulous audience that backs them.
So, what is Bigfoot?
I tend to agree with Foxom (2023) whose paper, with a genuine scientific method, suggests that bigfoot sightings are actually misidentified black bears.
Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall ©
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