From The Chattanoogan.com:
Two Chattanoogans say they may have bagged the mythical "Bigfoot".
Lindsay Lemmon and Austin McGee said after returning from a trip out west, they found that video shot out the window along I-40 in New Mexico has a glimpse of what appears to be a hulking furry figure walking.
Mr. Lemmon, a local contractor who specializes in historic homes, said, "I'm still skeptical, but it does look like a figure to me. If it was a prank, then it was awfully hot and it was out in the middle of nowhere."
Mr. McGee, who shot the footage, is much more positive. He said, "I believe it whole-heartedly. Every time I look at it on the VCR I see a figure with real long arms hanging below the knees. He is walking and swinging those arms."
He said a close examination of the figure reveals "a tan round face."
Mr. Lemmon, who went to Las Vegas for filming of a Discovery Channel show on drag racing, has contacted his CPA and is in the process of getting all rights to the video.
Mr. Austin said he contacted two groups that specialize in Bigfoot lore - one from Atlanta and another from Texas. He said, "They were ready to come to my house right then. They were freaking out. They were trying all sorts of ways to get to see it."
Mr. Lemmon said they plan to release the video after the copyright is in place.
A video is great–something not too grainy or out of focus, I hope. Some DNA would be better. A hair sample would be the best. Why?
In an article linked at Coast to Coast AM.com:
Hair is a better source of ancient DNA than bone or muscle, a new study involving woolly mammoth hair suggests. More than 90 percent of the DNA extracted from hairs taken from woolly mammoth specimens in the new study belonged to the extinct mega-mammals themselves as opposed to decomposing bacteria.
The article goes on to say that up to 50% of DNA recovered from bones can be from prehistoric bacteria–which is just part of the story about microscopic creatures..
(AP) -- It sounds like science fiction but it's true: A killer amoeba living in lakes enters the body through the nose and attacks the brain where it feeds until you die.
Even though encounters with the microscopic bug are extraordinarily rare, it's killed six boys and young men this year. The spike in cases has health officials concerned, and they are predicting more cases in the future.
"This is definitely something we need to track," said a specialist in recreational waterborne illnesses for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"This is a heat-loving amoeba. As water temperatures go up, it does better," he said. "In future decades, as temperatures rise, we'd expect to see more cases."
Yeeesh. And parents thought their only concern was making sure their kids waiting a half hour after eating before swimming. What else is in the water?
A gluttonous American pseudo-jellyfish, giant Japanese oysters, and an unidentified virus killing seals: strange intrusions are threatening Sweden's seas and fishermen are concerned.
The biggest threat is called mnemiopsis, an animal that measures about four inches and is not technically a jellyfish but has a gelatinous and translucent appearance. It is not harmful to humans.
The species could change the region's entire ecosystem.
"Officially it was first seen a year ago... We know they survived the winter. Suddenly at the end of July there were a lot of them," said Lene Friis Moeller, a researcher at Gothenburg University's marine ecology department.
It is now firmly established in the waters off Sweden's east and west coasts.
Originally from the United States, it has already shown just how much damage it can do in the Black Sea where it spread at the end of the 1980s, likely dumped there by ships emptying the water in their holds while in port.
Numerous fish species have already disappeared from Swedish waters, though pollution and overfishing have done their bit too.
Meanwhile, perhaps we have witnessed the birth of a new mutant species–that is, if it could reproduce!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070928/ap_on_fe_st/two_headed_turtle
NORRISTOWN, Pa. - (AP) A pet store has bought a two-headed turtle from a collector and plans to keep it on display, the store manager said. The 2-month-old turtle, actually conjoined red-eared slider turtle twins, fits on a silver dollar.
It has two heads sticking out from opposite ends of its shell, along with a pair of front feet on each side.
The turtle is apparently healthy, and the species can live 15 to 20 years. The turtle has not yet been named.
My vote for the name? "Harvey," in honor of Harvey Dent a.k.a Two-Faced.
Not two-headed, per se, but you get the idea.
And do you know what I wonder about when I see that photo of that two-headed turtle? Hang on to that question for a moment. First . . .
Did you catch a theme in those stories I just shared? If I had to name a theme, it would be the tension that exists between what we think is and what we know is.
Two guys from Nooga claim that they have video of bigfoot. Many people think that hairy beast exists, they just haven’t been able to prove it yet.
Woolly mammoths were unknown to exist for thousands of years–but they had been there all along, frozen in time, frozen in fossils and frozen in ice, just waiting to be discovered by proper science.
We know now that amoebas exist, microscopic single-celled creatures that are eating the brains of boys and men in various American lakes. We can prove it in a lab. But it wasn’t that long ago that an invisible killer would have been considered laughable to even the most educated scientist. We know now it exists but if six young boys and men had died mysteriously in one summer just by swimming in a lake, the accepted explanation would have been other-wordly: God did it, the Devil did it, a witch did it but not an amoeba.
God, the Devil, witches: these were thought of as some of the explanations for the spread of the Plague. We know now that just like in the story of the alien pseudo-jellyfish destroying native species wherever it goes, Black Death was spread by human shipping routes. We just didn’t know it.
What we think and what we know. In the case of bigfoot, wooly mammoths or killer amoebas, isn’t it more accurate to describe science as simply the state of what we think we know?
Which brings me back to that two-headed turtle. Here’s what I wonder. Since each head is on the opposite side of the shell, does one turtle know that the other one exists? As each turtle fights to move forward, does one side understand that there is another turtle that’s pulling in another direction that’s holding him back?
Maybe science is a little like a two-headed turtle. We think because we have a clear vision of what is in front of us that we can see the whole picture when in reality we don’t even know what we don’t know yet.
