Do Bigfoot Have A Language?

a reply to: Redheadhog

Ok I seen you guys answered my question before I could read all the posts lol. Yeah I think it was monster quest. Does anybody know her name?

a reply to: beautyfrompain

Bigfoot can have a language, but not a highly evolved one like man.
Our brain evolved a unique language structure about 100,000 years ago that makes Sapiens to be able to communicate technically.

a reply to: beautyfrompain

Yea they make grunting noises the way a human sounds
when they are trying to make Big Foot noises/lol

originally posted by: rigel4
a reply to: beautyfrompain

Yea they make grunting noises the way a human sounds
when they are trying to make Big Foot noises/lol

It seems at least one Ph.D in linguistics agrees with you.

This "Bigfoot" is likely human, and the Sierra Sounds a combination of hoax and misidentification, like all of the other evidence for Bigfoot.

Nelson has created a pronunciation key for these phonemes, and he uses the Latin alphabet, diacritics and various other symbols to represent these sounds. He calls this the Sasquatch Phonetic Alphabet (SPA), or the Unclassified Hominid Phonetic Alphabet (UHPA). It is unclear why he doesn't use the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), the standardized representation of the sounds of spoken language. Bilingualism (speaking two or more languages) and working as a translator doesn't qualify someone to identify or describe undocumented languages. This is an area of anthropological linguistics, although it appears as if many cryptozoological fans confuse "crypto-linguistics" as a field that researches the language of cryptids.

blogs.scientificamerican.com...

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

originally posted by: rigel4
a reply to: beautyfrompain

Yea they make grunting noises the way a human sounds
when they are trying to make Big Foot noises/lol

It seems at least one Ph.D in linguistics agrees with you.

This "Bigfoot" is likely human, and the Sierra Sounds a combination of hoax and misidentification, like all of the other evidence for Bigfoot.

Well, not really a scientist or a Ph.D in linguistics. The writer received a Ph.D in the area of Lexical Semantics defined as "noun. the study of the meaning of words and phrases and the relationships between them, such as synonymy, antonymy, and hyponymy".

It sounds like the writer took a class or two in linguistics as an undergrad and now makes her living as a skeptic. But, on the plus side, she is a "Research Fellow for the James Randi Educational Foundation". Impressive.

Hardly worth considering her point of view .

originally posted by: tiger_tts


Well, not really a scientist or a Ph.D in linguistics.

A rather average attempt at discrediting her credentials there tiger, as her resume shows. Sure, a Ph.D in proto bigfoot/elf/leprechaun language might be more impressive, but bigfooters have that area of academia sewn up so we'll have to take what we can get...lol.

University of New England
(Bachelor of Arts Linguistics, Anthropology & History 2001)
University of New England (Bachelor of Arts with Honours - First Class in Linguistics 2002)[2]

School of Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences, University of New England, Australia (Ph.D.) Linguistics 2007[3]

Re the underlined areas in above quotes, will wait for you to amend/retract your obviously errant claim (you know, based on the part that says Ph.D Linguistics?).

As she has academic qualifications in linguistics...has been involved in various research projects relevant to linguistics...with degrees and Ph.D in linguistics (despite your personal disapproval)...this could make her oh, I don't know...relevantly qualified in linguistics lol?

Obviously her opinion wouldn't hold the same sway as someone without relevant qualifications who can speak Russian, did a Navy course and now claims to speak bigfoot, within bigfootery itself...because that's how pseudo sciences operate.

Lots of Russians also speak Russian quite well, would that make them experts in bigfoot too? Only in pseudo sciences like bigfootery are the irrelevantly qualified/ unqualified so regularly built up as "experts".

Though the main qualification needed here is common sense (and an unwillingness to suspend disbelief). For those that have some and listen to bigfoot (after they stop laughing) they will realise that this is bs (like every other claim about bigfoot).

She might be a sceptic because she dislikes the anti science/ anti intellectualism and general lack of objectivity that abounds in such fringe subjects. Bigfoot is more a religion than a science.

originally posted by: Cogito, Ergo Sum

. . . she has academic qualifications in linguistics...

“Hardly worth considering her point of view.”

This is still pretty much the correct view on her opinion. Just not worth much of my time, but in the interest of conversation I will provide a thumbnail explanation.

The question we are presented with is, “What are we hearing on these tapes?” Can one of our experts tell us what these sounds are and what they are not? The important thing is the ability to listen and decipher. To do this well requires skill and knowledge obtained from experience, training, or study. If we were to voir dire these two experts for trial, we would probably learn some of the following information.

Mr. Nelson spent his career in the U.S. Navy and has over 30 years experience in Foreign Language and Linguistics, including the collection, transcription, analysis and reporting of voice communications. He is a two time graduate of the U.S. Navy Cryptologic Voice Transcription School (Russian and Spanish) and has logged thousands of hours of voice transcription.

Ms. Stollznow received her PhD in 2007. Wikipedia states she has “a PhD in the area of Lexical Semantics.” If this is in error she should correct it. If this is her area of expertise, it is really the wrong focus for this subject because it appears to be the study of related words and word groups, e.g. synonyms and antonyms. In her time since graduation I see that she has worked on the Script Encoding Initiative (again written word and not much help with determining what is on a tape). Stollznow is also a Research Fellow for the James Randi Educational Foundation a.k.a. a former magician who now makes his living as a professional skeptic.

In her 2014 book “Language Myths, Mysteries and Magic” she re-uses her 2013 Scientific American guest blog almost verbatim. Self-plagiarism is a serious matter. If she made no attribution (I could find none in a quick perusal), she is violating some important ethical, academic, and/or legal standards. “In a research atmosphere such as Queens University, self-plagiarism can lead to charges of scientific misconduct, firings and fines. For students in an academic atmosphere, self-plagiarism is often treated with the gravity of a standard case of plagiarism, resulting in suspension or expulsion.” (www.ithenticate.com/plagiarism-detection-blog/bid/52948/Self-Plagiarism-Is-it-Really-Plagiarism#.VgwUjn3itEM) At best the practice is lazy and smacks of deception or fraud.

Is she even a reliable witness? Did you see that Scientific American Mind de-published her article about being sexually harassed? Stollznow made accusations of stalking, harassment and sexual assault against another well-known professional skeptic, he fought back and sued her for defamation and she has now retracted the accusations. This behavior casts serious doubts upon her credibility, so much so that Scientific American Mind removed the article.

So while Ms. Stollznow might qualify as an expert witness, an average trial attorney should get her laughed (literal laughs) out of a court room (figuratively) before she even gets to voice her opinion.

[post]originally posted by: tiger_tts

Mr. Nelson spent his career in the U.S. Navy and has over 30 years experience in Foreign Language and Linguistics, including the collection, transcription, analysis and reporting of voice communications. He is a two time graduate of the U.S. Navy Cryptologic Voice Transcription School (Russian and Spanish) and has logged thousands of hours of voice transcription.

You are conflating crypto linguistics (re military intelligence) with the academic study otherwise known as "linguistics" when they are not the same thing. This does not qualify someone to make such claims. When bigfoot starts sending messages in Russian that need intercepting, interpreting for intelligence purposes, his opinion will be more relevant. Until then the opinion of someone with graduate, post graduate and Ph.D academic credentials in genuine linguistics (the scientific study of language/speech itself) is credible in assessing the "claimed" proto language of a mythical creature. That you mightn't like it, doesn't change that.

Though anyone can produce good science. So what should be done (but never is re bigfootery) is that such amazing discoveries should be submitted to relevant peer reviewed literature so they can get scrutiny from real experts in the field (such as Anthropological linguists, acoustic analysts, anatomists etc.). The reason this doesn't happen is quite obvious.

What is also relevant is that many bigfoot claims cover more than one discipline (as do these claimed bigfoot sounds). The lack of genuine critique this way allows claims to avoid scrutiny and thus perpetuate indefinitely, consistent with the pseudo science it is and boosts nothing other than it's comedic value (outside of the fringe study itself).

We see a "University Professor" give opinion that the "Sierra sounds couldn't have been faked and are beyond the range of any human to make". Sounds impressive until we find he is a "Prof. Electrical Engineering" lol. Claims of a bigfoot genome...not from a biologist/geneticist but from a vet. We have claims of documented bigfoot predation by another "University Professor"...who specialises/teaches classes in social media...None of it submitted to the scientific community.

The pseudo nature of bigfoot study and the way unrealistic claims circulate within this subculture without ever having been given scrutiny, makes it look like the folklore that it is. The shame there is that it could have been a genuine study, though now it's probably too far gone to ever be taken seriously. Until someone provides a bigfoot.

The "Latin alphabet" component of his proto language is interesting though. Perhaps bigfoot sit around quoting Horace..."Credat Judaeus Apella, non ego" (which non literally means, tell it to someone more gullible).

Until these claims get relevant scrutiny, will have to go with the obvious. Here is another scientific opinion that raises good points that bigfooters are unlikely to ever consider. This is because they start out with a firm belief in bigfoot, then try to make what they find fit that belief.

www.livescience.com...

Crypto linguistics.

www.military.com...

Ms. Stollznow received her PhD in 2007. Wikipedia states she has “a PhD in the area of Lexical Semantics.” If this is in error she should correct it. If this is her area of expertise, it is really the wrong focus for this subject because it appears to be the study of related words and word groups, e.g. synonyms and antonyms. In her time since graduation I see that she has worked on the Script Encoding Initiative (again written word and not much help with determining what is on a tape). Stollznow is also a Research Fellow for the James Randi Educational Foundation a.k.a. a former magician who now makes his living as a professional skeptic.

Randi is retired. Who better placed to understand bs than a magician? Scepticism is very common among such people, they understand how easy it is to fool them. It's also a very basic component of science (and like kryptonite to charlatans), yet you seem to take issue with scepticism, why is that?

Why would she correct it when it is true? It's not her sole area of expertise, it is her specialty (and is still relevant). The basics of "linguistics" are below, out of obvious necessity including "Phonetics" (which seems quite relevant).

Phonetics - the study of speech sounds in their physical aspects
Phonology - the study of speech sounds in their cognitive aspects
Morphology - the study of the formation of words
Syntax - the study of the formation of sentences
Semantics - the study of meaning
Pragmatics - the study of language use

A basic explanation for..."What is Linguistics?"

linguistics.ucsc.edu...

In her 2014 book “Language Myths, Mysteries and Magic” she re-uses her 2013 Scientific American guest blog almost verbatim. Self-plagiarism is a serious matter. If she made no attribution (I could find none in a quick perusal), she is violating some important ethical, academic, and/or legal standards. “In a research atmosphere such as Queens University, self-plagiarism can lead to charges of scientific misconduct, firings and fines. For students in an academic atmosphere, self-plagiarism is often treated with the gravity of a standard case of plagiarism, resulting in suspension or expulsion.” (www.ithenticate.com/plagiarism-detection-blog/bid/52948/Self-Plagiarism-Is-it-Really-Plagiarism#.VgwUjn3itEM) At best the practice is lazy and smacks of deception or fraud.

Lol.

Such (slightly feigned?) moral outrage!

O tempora! O mores!

(that's bigfoot for "Oh the times! Oh the morals/manners/customs!" as noted by another expert in proto bigfoot/Latin- Cicero lol).

This amounts to the academic version of a "faux pas" where someone didn't source properly. Has she made ridiculous and unverified claims about a folkloric creature while telling herself (and others) that it is science? Really if you are hinting at charlatanry, you could do no better than studying the claims of many within bigfootery itself. It is a feild that thrives on hoaxing and psuedologia fantastica, the ability to suspend disbelief, is usually lacking intelectual integrity and avoids genuine objective scrutiny.

It's not as though she uses her credentials to sell dubious foot casts or makes large sums telling "pork pies" about the PG film at conferences.

Nelson wouldn't be in this category, he seems honest enough, though honest people can still be wrong in their opinions.

With respect, the rest of your points (amounting largely to gossip) is typical of the irrelevant, opinion stated as if it were fact claims we see in bigfootery.


ps. Are you persisting with your claim that Stallznow doesn't have a Ph.D in Linguistics (despite the obvious fact that she does)?

a reply to: Cogito, Ergo Sum
This is a very specific and discrete issue about your proposed expert, so let’s see if we can get back on point.
A few Google clicks show the following:

• She had 6 years of post-graduate experience at the time she wrote the linked article. I see no evidence that she has any real world experience with listening and deciphering unknown modern or proto languages. You assume she received some training in school. (I am not really interested in further speculation on this matter.) Most likely, she passes muster to be deemed your linguistics expert.

Now, if we were opposing sides in Court, I would be secretly hoping that she gets to be your expert. In fact, would gladly stipulate to letting her testify as your expert based on what a few more Google clicks reveal of her.

• She is a professional de-bunker which means her conclusions are always the same. This is far from unbiased scientific inquiry. Debunkers start with a conclusion and create arguments in support of them. The pattern would be shown over and over until it was painfully obvious that she was prejudicially biased. Jurors do not like that.

Do you know what else jurors do not like? People without ethics.

• She self-plagiarizes, and this is a serious matter. Your response to this is flippant - “This amounts to the academic version of a "faux pas" where someone didn't source properly.” Please tell me you did not just make that up, or perhaps you learned this in the Cogito School of Ethics!?! If it is not something you made up, please provide some legal, ethical, academic, professional support for this gem. And please do not accuse me of me false outrage – the fact that she is a hack writer makes me laugh.

Being unethical is bad, but do you know what jurors really hate? And judges too? Liars!

• Your expert accused a prominent skeptical writer of “stalking, sexual harassment, and both physical and sexual assault” in a Scientific American Mind blog. He denied these claims and sued her. She now says those accusations were not true and released a statement to that effect. As one writer states, these were “spurious and demonstrably false accusations of sexual harassment and sexual assault.” In other words she lied. And she did it to hurt another skeptic and to increase her own “victim cred.” After this comes to the jurors’ attention, they will ask themselves, “Is this the truth or another lie you will later retract?” This will get hammered home again and again. So when you ask, “Has she made ridiculous and unverified claims . . . ?” The answer is YES! She is a LIAR!

So look, this lady is rubbish. It is not your fault that she has wiped out her professional credibility. But you should drop her from your team. Of course I hope you fight on for her just because that kind of stench always rubs off on those around her.

Bigfoots may actually have a verbal way to communicate. For example, young gorillas use whimpers and screams to get the attention of their mothers. Also, silverback males communicate a lot verbally

a reply to: tiger_tts

Yes, lets break down your claims, probably for the last time unless you can support them with something resembling relevance.

She (Stallznow) might be better off using her obviously highly credentialed expertise in semantics on such attempts at rebuttal, there is some heavy duty irrelevance and "a grade" horse pucky being proposed in that lot lol.

Firstly your preoccupation with so called plagiarism, in context.

The notion of "self plagiarism" itself is not only a contradiction in terms, but quite obviously an impossibility. The implication that it is in any way commensurate with genuine "plagiarism" in any real sense of that word, is a fantasy. In this instance promoted disingenuously with the implication that it somehow detracts from the contents of the article itself, which amounts to a further irrelevant and ad hominem fantasy. Do you have any genuine rebuttals to her points (without resorting to ad hominems and gossip?).

Incorporating a relevant blog article in a book in this context is probably something her readers who mightn't have seen the article itself, would be grateful for (if not the original publishers). A very different thing to submitting redundant works for peer review to an academic journal under pretext of being an original study.

That you somehow also conflate jurisprudence with science is also quite a falsity, though at least consistent(ly inconsistent). It might be a good idea to ask someone from a science discipline to explain why they are different and how science as a field, operates. So that you won't continue operating under such false equivalence fallacies. For example trying to irrelevantly besmirch someone's character would be considered not only irrelevant fallacy, but is usually discouraged and frowned upon. Unless the scientific claims and considerations were about harassment of course. Which they aren't.

Your personal preferences likes/dislikes of people are noted but have no relevance to the points under discussion.

The differences between the scientific study of "linguistics" and the military intelligence field, not only in relevance to the topic, but in terms of required study and areas of understanding has been shown (with links provided). If such claims found support among anthropological linguists, it might be different. They don't. The claims are amateurish and in key areas inconsistent with scientific linguistics to begin with (as pointed out). That you ignore this and continually confuse such fields of study, only points to your belief that such a situation exists.

Quite consistent with pseudo sciences in general.

It's doubtful she is a professional debunker. This would imply something was in need of debunking to begin with, which isn't so. What such claims need, are some science to back them up with. This is always absent. This is perhaps why within almost the entirety of the scientific community such claims as "bigfoot language" has never been with merit enough to be taken seriously.

She is simply stating the obvious (from pov of a relevant academic).

The rest of your points (and many of the former) have quite an element of the "drama queen" to them and would be better off in a gossip column, where they belong.

Though it is as interesting that personal "harassment" claims, which you know little about...are what you largely base your rebuttal on....to pretentiously defend claims of her not having a "Ph.D in Linguistics" (despite that being clearly wrong) and claims of a "bigfoot language". Have you any concept at all, in the slightest, of the terms "non sequitur" or "irellevant"?

She retracted a harassment claim...ergo you feel she is a liar...ergo all her academic appraisals are worthless (to you)...ergo bigfoot have a language lol? If you could point out where another relevantly qualified person disagreed with her specific points (or why you do), that would be relevant and worthy of discussion.

Simple diversionary arguments along this line are irrelevant enough that you might have to take them up with someone with the slightest interest in soap operas, from here on in.

Speaking of intellectual integrity, are you prepared yet to withdraw that clearly errant claim, as has been repeatedly pointed out to you, that Stallznow doesn't have a Ph.D in linguistics, yet?

So, back on topic...


So far we have claims of a "bigfoot language" by various non scientists/academics, with comparatively very little relevant training, with various mentions of being discredited by genuine experts (read the links)...and not taken seriously enough by anyone in general to merit publication...or to rate a serious mention in any scientific context.

In support of a mythical species (or three) of creature running the length and breadth of the USA with no verifiable existence...ever...at any time in history. Yeah, sounds like bigfoot...