US Scientists Invited To Russian Yeti Hunt

First time accepted submitter Lindan9 writes "After an apparent increase of yeti sightings in the Kemerovo and Altai region of Siberia, a group of scientists from around the world are meeting to examine evidence possibly proving yeti existence. The scientists suspect there is a population of several dozen living in the area. The team hopes to spot a yeti or still living neanderthal man during their search of the area's mountains." I hope they find two pristine horns faster than I did.

Comments

Yeti Hunt?

[SniperJoe]

Did anyone else think that it was going to involve a bunch of Russians sitting around in camouflage with vodka and firearms?

Re:Yeti Hunt?

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

That's ridiculous. These men are scientists!

They'll be drinking vodka from test-tubes and beakers, obviously.

Re:Yeti Hunt?

[Nidi62]

Did anyone else think that it was going to involve a bunch of Russians sitting around in camouflage with vodka and firearms?

That's called the Russian military

Pristine Horns are from WoW

[Anonymous Coward]

>two pristine horns

For anyone who missed the joke, this is a reference to a particularly obnoxious quest from World of Warcraft where the required items have a very low drop rate - meaning the player has to slaughter a preposterous number of yetis in order to complete it.

Re:Pristine Horns are from WoW

[billstewart]

Nah, he showed up today :-) It seemed likely that it was some kind of gamer reference, but normally Yetis aren't portrayed as something that would have horns - they're usually humanoid or ape-like. So maybe a yeti pelt would protect you against frost damage, or maybe eating a yeti corpse would get the gods angry at you for being a cannibal (if you're playing Nethack as some kind of human.)

Nyeti

[Lucas123]

I see crazy knows no borders.

Waste of time

[plsenjy]

Instead of paying a group of scientists to run around out there, why don't they equip a drone with an infrared camera to do a swath of the area and locate and photograph anything with a heat signature about the size of a deer or larger? Sure, you'll get a lot of deer, but you're more likely to sight the yeti this way than not.

Re:Waste of time

[AwesomeMcgee]

[...] you're more likely to sight the yeti this way than not.

Actually you're more likely not to sight the yeti this way, because there is no yeti. At least their way the scientists can drink vodka and have a story that might get them some tail in the future (so long as they leave out the part about the yeti and focus on the snow capped mountains).

Re:Waste of time

[WastedMeat]

Not that such a thing exists, but if it did, infrared may not be the way to go. If something has adapted to live in Siberia, it will be well insulated which means that the temperature of the outermost layers of skin and/or fur will remain close to ambient temperatures. Polar bears, for example, are not effectively detected on infrared cameras.

Re:Waste of time

[Fned]

Your average 10 year old has a 3 megapixel camera on their celphone.

You'd think we'd have a lot more pictures of muggers, but when presented with an unexpected, apparently dangerous situation, most people don't go for their camera.

That's why, for example, when there's, say, a fight on a city bus, where there have to be at least twenty cellphone cameras, you get, maybe, one actual video. Sometimes.

Re:Come on Slashdot!

[tmosley]

Yeah! Everyone knows there is no such thing as the lowland gorilla!

Oh wait, you mean the locals were right?

Re:Come on Slashdot!

[Genda]

I know what you mean... this is simply abominable!

The picture is fake

[jdastrup]

Did you see the measuring tape in the picture in TFA? 10 inches does not make a foot! If the measuring tape is wrong....

Re:The picture is fake

[jdastrup]

Sarcasm, perhaps?

Re:The picture is fake

[mr1911]

A simple rounding error when converting from Library of Congresses.

Re:The picture is fake

[PPH]

Surveyors tapes are marked in feet and tenths of a foot.

I doubt its metric (decimeters/centimeters). That would be a pretty small foot.

many people think this is madness

[wierd_w]

Many people think the search for cryptids is a waste of time, and not an area where any serious discoveries could be made, due to the large number of very unscientific crackpots.

The alarming number of such crackpots claiming to be cryptozoologists casts a very thick layer of tarnish on the more sincere and truly scientific in that speciality, but the assertion that nothing good can come from those few, due to the noise in the channel from the many, is not a sound assertion, and is a guilt by association rhetorical fallcy.

Other people will assert that any large macrofauna like "sasquatch", or "yeti" would surely have been discovered by now, but that is also an erroneous assertion. (Not that far removed from the false assertions made by several prominent politicians concerning the closure of patent offices during the 1900s, basing such rhetoric on the assertion that "everything worthy of a patent has already been invented." History clearly shows this is not the case.)

If these are *real* scientists looking for evidence of a cryptid, then I wish them well, and hope they find something. The methods they report in their field journals will surely be useful, even with a null result.

If however, this is just a bunch of poorly trained "enthusiasts" claiming to be crytpozoologists, but lacking any measure of proper scientific method, then this expidition is a colossal waste, and I hope they get frostbite of the penis for wasting resources and time.

Sorry.. I felt I needed to clarify that issue.

Re:many people think this is madness

[geekoid]

If you are a cryptozoologists, you are a crackpot.

Seriously, you are. We have a branch of science about animals and discovering species. They do actual scientist.
Since there is no proof of Yeti, or bigfoot, or lochness monster.

They might as well be looking for Frankenstein's monster.

When a person is so attached to an idea, that they wont let it go even with continuous lack of evidence,, they invent there or science; which would be fine if they applied the scientific method, and proper research, but they don't. anything like looks like maybe it s afoot print, is taken as 'proof'. Stick stacked up are taken as proof. Weird sounds at night are taken as proof. ON and ON.

You can't ahve a tribe and not have poop, food remains, and hair.

They aren't practicing science.

Re:many people think this is madness

[wierd_w]

Untrue.

Real cryptozoologists research things like Orang Pendek.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orang_Pendek

This is a cryptid, since has not yet been officially "discovered", but is widely reported, leaves footprints and nests, and has a sensible basis for existence.

Crackpots look for magical creatures.

Scientists look for mundane creatures.

Re:many people think this is madness

[sdguero]

Wikipedia begs to differ:
"Cryptozoology is not a recognized branch of zoology or a discipline of science." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptozoological

Cryptozoologists are not scientists (there is no such thing as a cryptozoology degree). They are ALL crackpots.

Re:many people think this is madness

[sdguero]

Western science, for hundreds of years, insisted such a fanciful creature not only didn't exist, but also couldn't exist.

Citation?
As I recall, biologists weren't sure whether or not to classify Giant Squid as a new species or jsut write them off as just larger versions of already classified species up until the 1990s. It wasn't a matter of biologists saying "There's no, nor could there ever be, such thing as a squid over 10 feet long!" Rather, it was some scientists doubting if the deep ocean in today's world could provide enough food for creatures to grow that large. And do you really think that giant squid attacked Japanese fishing boats? Seriously?

This is a really good example of what I'm talking about in my previous post. You are obfuscating real science (should these rarely occurring larger than normal squid that live in deeper water be classified as a new species?) with mythology (ZOMG, we finally found the giant squid that were fighting whales and attacking ships 500 years ago!). By continuing down this path, you only serve to confuse people (yourself included) and obfuscate the real science.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Seems doubtful

[Belial6]

It seems doubtful that there is undiscovered fauna the size of a man, although not impossible. That being said, the impact of discovering a tribe of Neanderthals still alive would produce profound effects on society. Would they have 'Human' rights? Can they breed with humans? How would you feel about your sister dating one? What is the status of a human/neanderthal hybrid child? Depending on their intelligence level, it would be one step shy of meeting sentient aliens.

Re:Seems doubtful

[bill_mcgonigle]

Unless you're a negroid African, you probably have neanderthal DNA in you (remember to tell the white supremacists they're all half-breeds).

And, what happens if Global Warming turns out to be good for the Yeti population?

Re:Seems doubtful

[bill_mcgonigle]

Modern non-African humans are up to 4% Neanderthal (by DNA). So, that would be five generations in breeding terms (1/32nd). That used to be the threshold for being sold as a slave in Louisiana (1/32nd black).

I would hope we would not treat them any different than an Amazon tribe.

Putin

[Anonymous Coward]

They should send Putin. Putin could catch a yeti with his shirt off.

Re:Putin

[ukemike]

They should send Putin. Putin could catch a yeti with his shirt off.

why would we care if the yeti is wearing a shirt?

Re:Wow, that's a pretty loose

[internerdj]

There have been a couple of scientists that I've called poop and hair, but I've never felt the need to generalize that to a definition of the entire group.