Monday, July 16, 2007

Scientists Don't Know Everything


As you might suspect, I spend a great deal of time watching television shows that profile various members of the cryptid community—creatures, such as the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot, and Chupacabra that the scientific community contends are mere myths. To make the reporting seem fair and balanced, there’s always a skeptic or two thrown in for good measure. You don’t even need to hear them speak to know which side they’re on—you can always recognize a skeptic by the self-satisfied smirk on his face.

It’s silly, he’ll say, to think that there might be a large primate species that remains unknown to science. It’s ridiculous to wonder if animals long thought to be extinct might still inhabit remote forests. And anyone who thinks there could be something big lurking in Loch Ness should stop sniffing Wite-out.

That’s why I bring you the following news with a great deal of pleasure. The skeptics have been proven wrong once again. Another creature whose reputed existence was once ridiculed by scientists has been discovered. This time, it’s the giant, lion-eating chimps of the magic forest.

The people who inhabit the dense, virtually inaccessible forests of the Democratic Republic of Congo have long told stories of enormous apes that feed on lions and howl at the moon. Some suggested they were a cross between gorillas and chimpanzees. Others thought they might be a new species of primate. But many in the Western scientific community simply refused to acknowledge their existence.

Now, there’s undeniable proof. A team of scientists from the University of Amsterdam spent months living in a part of the Congo that’s so inaccessible and pristine that it’s known as the magic forest. There, they studied—and photographed—a previously unknown group of extraordinarily large chimps. And while the apes haven’t been heard howling at the moon, they do like to snack on a panther from time to time.

It just goes to show you. There are things out there that we don’t know about yet. And that's just the way I like it.

(Below: The creature that hid from science.)


4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Poor panthers.

LittleChar said...

I love it when scientist are proven wrong!! To prove that somethings is entirelly extinct is practcally impossible, you would have to everywhere on earth to the very depthsof the sea, under every mountain, every bush,every tree, everywhere at exactly the same time to prove it. people say this isn't true since most "extinct" creatures could only have survived in two or three different biomes, but throw science's own philosophy of evolution into the mix and any number of senerios that have been written into 8th grade science books as facts about the way the things work on this earth and you have to ask yourself about common sense and an innumerable amount of "what if's"
It's one of those love/hate relationships between the media and scientific fact (and scientific fact didn't start as fact did it? no, it started as theroy and was devveloped proven wrong and advised until a majority of other scientists agreed with it, but there are always the few who conradict what seems is common knowledge, and those few are sometimes the ones who are right...)sorry for the long comment, you probably didn't want to hear/read the rantings of a conservative nut...

Alexxis said...

Well you arent the only one..

Kendall said...

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, dumb scienctists! There's 2 much proof of exisiting animals that we are ignorant of for them to be right!