Bears in the Woods

The Bears in the Woods: Phony Scientific Skepticism from Intelligent Design to Cryptozoology

Written by Brendan Cook

Sunday, 19 April 2009

It’s said that imitation is the highest form of flattery, but I sometimes wonder whether this is always true. As far as I can tell, mimicry can be sinister as well as sincere. There’s an important distinction between a tribute and a rip-off. Take the parodies of respected hardware and electronics brand-names produced by fly-by-night companies. I once won a “Somy” DVD player, an ugly black box that broke down in a less than a month, and I recently received a flimsy Brazilian mp3 player made to look like an iPod. It goes without saying that this little device has a very limited memory, but the crowning touch was probably that the ‘wheel’ which operates a real iPod has been painted on! My wife swears she’s seen “Swiss Navy” products in the discount stores, and I’ve heard from friends about a television made by “Panaphonic”.

And then there are the cheap films that get released by distributors hoping they’ll be mistaken for a recent blockbuster. This particular swindle should be familiar to anyone who still rents movies from their local video store. A week or so before King Kong arrives on the shelves, someone releases a 1950’s ‘C’ movie about a big gorilla under the title the real KING KONG, with large font for what they want you to see and small font for the part they hope you won’t notice. Last year, Allan Quatermain and the Temple of Skulls was released at just the right time and with just the right cover art to help someone mistake it for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls. It doesn’t take much intelligence to distinguish these two films, it’s true, but then it doesn’t take much intelligence to rent an Indiana Jones movie in the first place.

But this tendency of the bad to adopt the appearance of the good isn’t just a commercial matter. It’s part of whatever people do: religion, politics, and everything between. For every Nelson Mandela who actually helps an oppressed nation find justice, there’s a Robert Mugabe who poses as a liberator while leading the people straight from their old prison into a new one. And ever since Martin Luther King made his mark as the greatest figure in American politics since Lincoln, the United States has been overrun with self-appointed successors: men like the Reverend Al Sharpton and the Reverend Jesse Jackson, professional screamers and podium-pounders who bear the same relationship to Dr. King that my Brazilian ‘iPod’ does to the real article. And what about all the poor deluded men and women, in generation after generation, who say that they’re Jesus in his second coming? What are they if not the spiritual equivalent of a “Somy” DVD player or a “Panaphonic” television? Some people make cheap knockoffs or sell them, but others are living counterfeits: walking, breathing, pontificating three-dollar bills.

But the particular ripoff that people have been trying to sell me lately isn’t a bogus product or person, it’s an attitude. It’s an attitude that counterfeits one of the most admired intellectual ‘brands’ of our time: keeping an open mind. Politics and religion are full of false saviors, and the shelves of the video store are stocked with false blockbusters, but in educated circles, the most popular racket involves false critical thinking. Intellectual ripoff-artists are selling phony examples of skeptical, scientific reasoning in the same way that “Swiss Navy” markets inferior watches and knives.

And in a sense, this is a compliment to genuine open-mindedness. It’s a recognition of the merits of a critical, rational attitude towards argument and evidence that people are trying to parody this way of thinking. Keeping an open mind has been essential to the achievements of Western science and the relative freedom enjoyed by citizens in a liberal society, so it’s no wonder that it’s become the pre-eminent intellectual ‘brand’ in North America, and arguably around the world. It’s no wonder that even the men and women who don’t see the use of critical thinking themselves are willing to profit from its prestige among their fellow citizens. Like a respected company or line of products, the skeptical attitude that has defined the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment is an inviting target for counterfeiters.

And while there are many smaller swindles, one of the best financed and most shameless is probably the Intelligent Design movement in the United States. Like Creationism in the twentieth century, Intelligent Design sets out to undermine the only remotely plausible explanation for the diversity of plant and animal life on earth: the theory of evolution by natural selection. But unlike the earlier creationists, who tried to forbid the teaching of natural selection, the proponents of Intelligent Design say that they’re merely providing an alternative to the standard theory. And instead of browbeating critics into accepting their conclusions on faith, intelligent designers appeal to doubt and skepticism: they say that they’re only asking us to keep an open mind.

There are several ways that Intelligent Design counterfeits the skeptical, rational attitude that we associate with modern science, but the first and most basic involves the presentation of the theory itself. Although supporters of Intelligent Design are drawn predominantly from evangelical and fundamentalist denominations associated with biblical literalism, they resist grounding their theory on Christian scripture. Even the intelligent designers who supported Creationism in the 70’s and 80’s avoid invoking the Bible to refute evolution by natural selection. Instead they borrow the critical language of modern science: Intelligent Design isn’t a dogma demanding assent but a hypothesis open to debate. Elaborate theories about the complexity of the human eye or a bacterial flagellum are invoked to cast doubt on the notion that these organs and structures developed gradually. Impenetrable mathematical models demonstrate the sheer improbability that random chance could have produced such a variety of organisms. And in perhaps the best touch of all, intelligent designers maintain an agnostic position regarding their own arguments. While most of its advocates belong to churches that reject evolution by natural selection out of hand, Intelligent Design is still presented as a legitimate secular theory, to be confirmed or refuted as evidence comes to light. And so the first act of intellectual forgery is accomplished. A fundamentally religious conclusion – natural biological diversity the work of a supernatural creator – is decorated with an appearance of reasoned argument and even critical self-doubt. Intelligent design is dressed up and disguised in something like the way a wheel is painted beneath the screen of my counterfeit ‘iPod’ or the cover of the Allan Quatermain DVD is modeled on the colors, the visual patterns, and even the lettering of an Indiana Jones cover.

But if the very premise of Intelligent Design is a forgery, the real masterpiece of substitution, the fake Rolex of intellectual deception, as it were, has got to be the strategy for promoting Intelligent Design in American schools. The creationists didn’t have much luck keeping evolution out of textbooks, and intelligent designers have tried to learn from that mistake. They don’t even propose forbidding other theories: they merely ask for equal time in the classroom. They ask whether it makes sense to teach students only one explanation for the variety of living creatures that inhabit our planet. How could it be wrong, say the advocates of Intelligent Design, to give competing models a hearing and explore every possibility? Of course the theory of Intelligent Design may be false, but kids should be able to decide that for themselves. The intelligent designers have even adopted a truly brilliant slogan – teach the debate! – which sows confusion just like the ‘swoosh’ logo on fake “Nike” sneakers. Teach the debate! is so effective because it appeals to intellectual fair play by implying that the very principle of free debate is at stake. If you’re against including Intelligent Design in the curriculum, you’re not just rejecting a specific theory, you want to limit students’ access to knowledge, you’re afraid of letting them hear both sides of the question. Never mind that Intelligent Design is about as credible as the geocentric model of the solar system, to oppose it is to oppose intellectual freedom. If you say it has no more business being taught to children than alchemy or astrology, you’re sinning against scientific inquiry and reasoned debate, you’re against keeping an open mind.

But perhaps I’m being unfair to Intelligent Design in singling it out this way. It’s certainly not the only intellectual counterfeit of recent times. There are plenty of other movements that abuse the spirit of agnosticism which makes real social and scientific progress possible. There are countless cases where men and women present an argument which is frankly impossible, and then, when you reject it out of hand, ask you to keep an open mind. Sometimes this is overtly religious or mystical, as when people hold on to the hope that the erroneous teachings of a favorite guru may yet be vindicated by further evidence. Many Mormons, for example, still wait for archeologists to stumble upon traces of the fabulous ancient cities described by their prophet Joseph Smith. And sometimes religion is hiding just beneath the surface, as in the statements of certain Catholic leaders on the value of condoms in preventing AIDS. It’s clear in the latter case that the real objection of the pope and his circle is religious: they believe that the use of condoms is a sin. But when Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo pretends there’s a serious scientific debate regarding the potential of the HIV virus to penetrate the latex of a condom, this is an obvious case of intellectual piracy. Here Cardinal Trujillo isn’t marketing his anti-contraceptive message under the old, discredited name of blind faith in religious authority. Too many defective teachings have been peddled using that brand for the discriminating consumer to trust it. Instead the worthy cardinal appeals to the skepticism and doubt which are essential to secular studies like history, medicine, or physics. He invokes the enlightened reluctance to conclude too hastily that one side in a debate must be right and the other must be wrong. His church once tormented Galileo, but Cardinal Trujillo has repackaged his stale sexual prohibitions in the same modern, scientific wrapping that, thanks to Galileo and his successors, is now associated with intellectual integrity.

But even this may be missing the point. The Catholic Church has certainly dabbled in bogus science, but it would be unfair to say that this happens consistently. And in any case, the size of the organization isn’t what matters. For the real connoisseur of intellectual deception, the most compelling cheats aren’t the biggest or the best funded. It’s true that the climate change skeptics, to give only one example, have a good deal of money behind them, but their scam is too obvious to be interesting. The melting of the polar ice caps is too easily verified: there’s either more ice or there isn’t. And so the oil interests who sow controversy by suggesting that the Antarctic ice shelf may actually be growing have trouble creating reasonable doubt in their own minds. In the end, the purest and most beautiful examples of false objectivity aren’t found among the professionals. As with so many pursuits, the place to look is with the amateurs, the men and women who don’t have any vested political, religious, or economic interests, people who do what they do out of love. No commercial bakery can produce pies like the ones your grandmother used to bake in her old cast iron stove, and so no large, moneyed operation can match the enthusiasm of the part-timers and the hobbyists. And for my money, the best of these are undoubtedly the Bigfoot hunters. The men and women who comb the backwoods of North America for evidence of an enormous ape unknown to zoology are rarely rich or famous, but their dedication to phony scientific rigor puts professionals like Cardinal Trujillo or the intelligent designers to shame.

To start with, it’s worth observing that the Bigfoot hunters, especially the serious ones, rarely present themselves as Bigfoot believers. Few boast of getting a good look at Bigfoot themselves, and even those who claim to have seen or heard something aren’t always sure of what it was. The best Bigfoot hunters adopt an agnostic posture worthy of the advocates of Intelligent Design. Bigfoot is a theory for them, like the complexity of the bacterial flagellum, and they say they’re willing to test it, and even reject it if necessary. Most will concede that there may be nothing to discover, just as Cardinal Trujillo might admit that not every micro-organism gets through the condom’s skin. Like the better funded climate change skeptics, many Bigfoot hunters have scientific training, and they know how to impersonate a dispassionate investigator impartially weighing the evidence on either side. Take the man from Florida – by training he’s a medical doctor – who spends his spare time searching the swamps of the Southeast for the legendary ‘skunk ape’. There’s a clip on YouTube where he explains his philosophy with a clarity which most of us couldn’t achieve while staring into a camera in the middle of the sub-tropical wilderness. Between knocking pieces of wood together and bellowing into nearby bushes – both proven methods for attracting Bigfoot – this man finds time for an eloquent defense of scientific principles.

I get asked a lot if I believe in a large North American ape, but I think belief isn’t really the question. That stems more from something you think is true when you really don’t have the facts or evidence to support it. And that’s more faith-based. I think in science what we have to do is develop a hypothesis and develop data and evidence to support or refute that hypothesis.

I don’t think I could say it better myself. But apart from this passionate defense of pseudo-scientific objectivity, Bigfoot hunters are instructive in another sense. They reveal something important about every person who pays lip service to the notion of keeping an open mind. They reveal the dogmatic interior behind the carefully cultivated appearance of fairness and skepticism. And in this way, they offer a similar lesson to that of the morally irreproachable politician caught in a tawdry sexual scandal. Just as the people who shout loudest about family values in public are often caught violating these values at home, many who demand a fair hearing for their own theories privately dismiss possibilities which they seem to consider. They pretend to keep an open mind the way a hypocrite pretends to practice virtue. Most of the professionals know how to hide this, but the amateur is interesting because he pulls back the curtain. It’s the Bigfoot hunter, who invests years of his life in a creature whose very existence he claims to doubt, who shows us how the game is played.

I’m thinking of another clip now: I’m not sure if it’s on YouTube, but it’s part of a cable show I saw on an Air Canada flight a year or two back. Two young men were camped out in a small patch of forest in some Southern state – I think it was Tennessee but I could be wrong. As Bigfoot hunters go, they weren’t very impressive. They jumped at each unexplained noise and decided that every odd impression in the ground was some sort of track. But in the process of making a fool of himself before a modest cable audience, one of the men made a valuable admission which I doubt he intended. He revealed the trade secret of all Bigfoot hunters and indeed of phony skeptics everywhere. He gave voice to something more practiced hands know better than to speak out loud: he mentioned the one thing he’s sure can’t be true.

It happened this way. The young man is gathering evidence, suspicious tracks, hairs, markings and so forth. And then a producer speaking off camera asks him if the signs he’s found could be the work of bears. Keeping with the agnostic pretence of the classic Bigfoot hunter, the man admits this as a possibility. The claw marks five or six feet up the side of a tree are in the right spot to have been made by bears. And the hairy biped reported by a local child? This could certainly have been a bear standing on its hind legs. All of this is possible, admits the young Bigfoot hunter, but he knows better – and here his eyes narrow as he prepares us for the moment of truth. “It could have been a bear,” he explains in an ominous tone, “except for one thing: there are no bears in these woods.”

And there you have it! A bear can’t have made these marks or been seen by this child for the self-evident reason that there are no bears. And how do we know this? Because the man tells us so. The same man who suspects that Bigfoot may be hiding behind the next tree is certain that the woods are free of bears. This is so memorable because it’s a rare admission of the inner conviction which most would-be skeptics try to conceal. It’s a reminder that the person who tells you to avoid deciding too quickly has often made up his own mind long ago. Behold a man open to the possibility that a race of eight-foot-tall apes has been living in the woods of Tennessee for centuries! He believes that these animals could have maintained a breeding population without being clearly photographed or filmed, without being captured alive or discovered dead, and he’s not discouraged by the fact that their bones have never been found or that their DNA has never been analyzed. When confronted by critics, he tells them to keep an open mind. But present him with the possibility that those same woods may be home to bears, and the situation is simple: he knows that there are no bears and he expects you to take his word for it.

But the last thing I would want to do is suggest that the poor Bigfoot hunter is especially pernicious. He’s only notable, as I said earlier, because he’s so typical. He’s typical of everyone who uses the language of doubt and skepticism to lend a veneer of science to conclusions which really arise from faith. Because if you give the question a moment’s thought, you‘ll see that all of the counterfeiters I’ve mentioned here have their own ‘bears in the woods’. There’s always something which each of them has rejected out of hand while claiming to keep an open mind. Behind the common facade of objectivity, there lies some explanation, some idea, some possibility, or perhaps some uncomfortable fact, which they will never concede to be true. The Bigfoot hunter won’t admit that bears could have made the marks on the tree or frightened the child, but the professionals are no better. Would an Intelligent Design advocate really give serious consideration to a scientific theory rejected by his church? Or would Cardinal Trujillo feel any better about condoms if he was certain that they could help prevent the spread of AIDS? Do EXXON and Chevron fund studies on climate change because they care about scientific truth? If anything, the antics of the doctor who spends his weekends chasing monsters behind his house seem more pardonable in this light. In maintaining a theory against all likelihood or even reasonable probability, he’s doing for personal fulfillment what others do every day in defense of their political, religious and economic interests. He may be crazy, but he’s also in good company. And if he’s a fraud, he’s a relatively harmless one. As one amateur cryptozoologist explains on YouTube, holding out hope in the existence of a giant North American ape isn't the worst abuse of the spirit of rational inquiry. “There’s all sorts of things we believe that doesn’t have any proof behind it,” the man tells his handheld camera, “why not monsters?