The island of Doctor Moreau

 

This will never happen and is probably just another scam to part rich people and governments with their money. But nice try! 

"Closer than people think": De-extinction 

Thomas Jefferson: Vampire Hunter?

 

Was Thomas Jefferson (who also served as US president) the first cryptozoologist, at least in North America? He collected stories about surviving mammoths, mysterious giant lions and lake-monsters in the American wilderness. 

None of these ideas were necessarily fringe at the time. I think the idea was that since all animals were created by God, divine providence would never let them go extinct. Ergo, mammoths must still be around. 

Jefferson wasn´t particularly credulous either, sometimes skeptically pointing out that some observations of unknown beasts were probably just mountain lions (cougars).  

When camels roamed the Arctic

 

“Hunt for the Oldest DNA” is a recent release from PBS-Nova. The documentary discusses the biggest scientific breakthrough of 2022. A team of scientists headed by Eske Willerslev from Denmark managed to extract DNA from a soil sample taken at Kap Köbenhavn on Greenland. The DNA turned out to be over 2 million years old! The previous record holder was one million years old DNA from mammoth bones. Or, to be more precise, the oldest *accepted* ancient DNA.

During the 1990´s, even more sensational claims were published, including a supposed discovery of 80 million years old DNA from dinosaur bones (the creationists are still talking about that one). This virtual “Jurassic Park” territory was soon abandoned, however. As for Willerslev, he tried for 15 years to extract DNA material from the Kap Köbenhavn samples, without success. His samples were even known as “The Curse”, since grad students who tried their hand on them always failed (sometimes with detrimental results for their careers). Then came the 2022 breakthrough, and here we are.

Apparently, certain kinds of minerals can “bind” ancient DNA and make it less prone to degrade. The clay and quartz at the Greenland site have this effect. The discovered DNA is from the Pliocene, the last warm period before the onset of the ice ages. The most surprising find was the DNA of a mastodont. The docu also discusses Greenland camels, known from the fossil record but not yet from the DNA samples. The ecosystem uncovered was vast and complex. Despite the warm climate, half of the year was still Arctic night, raising questions about how the animals or plants survived.

Since the Pliocene was much warmer than today, the issue of current climate change inevitably comes up. Willerslev and his team believes that the quest for ancient DNA could have practical applications. Apparently, scientists have managed to identify an ancient poplar gene that made that particular tree adapted to growing in the darkness of the long Arctic night. This gene has been successfully implanted in barley, perhaps giving rise to a specimen that could be grown on Greenland if it ever becomes ice-free again due to man-made climate change. Similar experiments with wheat and other food crops are underway.

And yes, one of the US scientists featured sits in meditation posture on a chair throughout the interview. A real weirdo, if you ask me. The expert on camelids, I believe.

Slow-paced, and I had to watch it twice to really get it. But yeah, probably worth the research grants. Even so, most people probably prefer “Jurassic Park”…

The Soviet Sasquatch

 

An interesting video about Soviet cryptids. I was struck by how unoriginal they were. Yes, it´s essentially the same kind of cryptids as reported from North America or Western Europe: hairy humanoids, lake monsters, sea serpents and extinct charismatic mega-fauna still supposedly lurking somewhere in the far corners of Siberia. In this case the Steller´s sea cow, the wolly mammoth, and the giant short-faced bear (never heard of that one). 

There are two possible explanations for this curious fact. One is that the cryptids are actually real. After all, why *would* people behind the Iron Curtain see exactly the same kind of unknown animals as in the rest of the world? Another possibility is that Soviet cryptozoology was influenced by its Western counterpart. That´s not as far-fetched as it sounds, since one prominent Soviet cryptozoologist, Boris Porshnev, was a friend of Bernard Heuvelmans! (A book by Porshnev has been translated to English: "The Soviet Sasquatch") The same transformation of older folklore into "unknown real animals" - typical of much Western cryptozoology -  may have transpired in the modernizing Soviet Union, too. 

Misidentification is another factor. The Mongolian Death Worm (which was searched for by Soviet scientists) is often depicted as the monstrous Shai-Hulud from Frank Herbert´s science fiction novel "Dune". In reality, the Death Worm is only said to be about one and a half meters long. And it took me about five minutes to find *exactly such a creature* living in Mongolia: the desert sand boa. Case closed.

The Soviet Union was one of the few nations (if that´s the word for it) that launched several scientific expeditions in search of cryptids, both on its own territory and in Mongolia. Soviet scientists also participated in Chinese expeditions to find the Yeti. The fact that these official projects had as little luck as lay cryptid hunters in the US or Scotland is perhaps suggestive. 

The creatures don´t exist. Or maybe they do exist, but since they are ghostly in nature, Communists feared reporting what they had *really* found...

Lost lineage

 

This dude definitely suffers from ADHD, ha ha, but he does say some interesting things in these clips. Very interesting, in fact. I´m old enough to remember when saying stuff like this would get you attacked by Skeptics (TM) on the web as a dangerous pseudo-scientist...

First, we have the idea that humans aren´t descended from Australopithecus, since these creatures were adapted to a more arboreal lifestyle. Instead, Australopithecus is a side branch on the hominin family tree. Humans would then be "directly" descended from Sahelanthropus and Orrorin, who lived prior to the australopithecines and were bipedal. Note also the implication that the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees would be - relatively speaking - more human-like than ape-like. 

Second, there is the famous Cerutti mastodon kill site in California, which has been dated to 130,000 years BP. The mastodon may have been killed by humans, which according to standard accounts didn´t live in the Americas at that time. Indeed, Homo sapiens had hardly left Africa! So either Homo sapiens sneaked into the New World much earlier, searching for tender proboscid flesh, or some other Homo did it. 

Of course, ideas like the above have been entertained for a long time by Theosophists, Anthroposophists, creationists and my man prabhu Michael Cremo.

Which doesn´t mean their world-views or methods are right. Mere guess work based on religous scriptures doesn´t count in science. Purely by chance, some religious group somewhere will turn out to be right about something. Still, it is kind of funny that people whose religious convictions made them predisposed to doubt Australopithecus as a human ancestor or Clovis First, may have been on the right track all along. And, of course, there have always been minority reports in science they could "quote-mine"...

But the nerds on the web, who seem to live in an eternal now, will never admit any of this. If somebody finds Atlantis, they will probably act as if Graham Hancock never existed, either.

Thomas Jefferson Mastodon Killer

Not sure what to think of this, but here is a thought. Let´s say elephants or mastodons did live in the territory today called the United States during historical times (but before Columbus). Would it be possible to prove this in any other way than through Native stories or art? 

After all, the elephantids wouldn´t fossilize, but nor would their soft tissues be preserved (as in the case of mammoths in the Arctic). Or am I wrong? But if I´m right, the purported eye-witness accounts and traditions is all the evidence we ever gonna get. 

And that isn´t entirely conclusive...

American Elephant

Earlier than you think

The cartefacts are increasing...

This is from 2017, but somehow I managed to miss it! 

A 130,000-year old mastodon threaten to upend human history