First, let me note that your posts below essentially answered some of the Tennessee questions I asked you above. I had not visited this board in a week or so, and had not seen the information below when I responded to your and Jan's posts. In a nutshell, I take it you saw what you regarded as compelling evidence of the presence of these animals, but did not see or hear them.
Allow me to explain why I remain skeptical of the claim of intelligent and knowing human language use, even though you accept the claim. There is good reason that claims are never accepted scientifically without adequate verification. With experimental results, verification is attained through the requirement of repeatability. Where observational data alone are involved, the data is not typically accepted without corroboration by multiple and INDEPENDENT qualified observers.
Let's look at the possibilies concerning the claim of knowing and intelligent use of human language. Such a claim may be: (A)True and correct; (B)A misinterpretation of mundane animal vocalizations; (C)A misinterpretation of unintelligent mimicry of human sounds; or (D)Fraudulent.
Without even considering possibility (D) (I do not accuse people of lying unless they give me good reason to believe the accusation is correct) it seems to me that (B) and (C) are inherently more probable than (A). Bias and predisposition are substantial problems. Just one example is the cold fusion claims of the Pons team at the University of Utah. I think that these physicists made their cold fusion announcement in absolutely good faith. The problem is that the entire team became infected with "cold fusion fever" and misinterpreted their data to support what they wanted to see. Sadly, these people will be forever tainted by that ill-judged press release. The moral is that it is easy to allow one's biases to cause misinterpretations of ambiguous data.
In our case, Mary cannot adequately corroborate Jan's claims of human language use, and the reverse is also true. They have been collaborators and, just as at Utah, there is the possibility that their individual biases have cross-contaminated each other. Nor can you provide corroboration, as you heard nothing. And other anecdotal reports by unknown people aren't much help either. There are similar reports of bigfoots climbing out of UFOs. Should we accept them with demanding anything more solid?
Not only are Mary and Jan not independent observers, but it is far from clear to me that either is a qualified observer, at least so far as the claim of BF language consisting of a "mixture" of Sioux, Cheyenne and Chippewa is concerned. As I stated above, I speak no Amerind languages, but I know enough about them to be dangerous. They tend to be difficult to native English speakers. Each language tends to have multiple dialects which have varied greatly over time and location (and over which linguists will argue even today)owing to periodic splintering and fusion of tribal groups, and alternating periods of isolation from and contact with other language groups. Chippewa (or Ojibwa) and Cheyenne are part of the Algonquian language family, but if I recall correctly, the Dakota family to which the Siouan dialects belong is entirely unrelated. I seriously doubt that there are many people who command all three languages on even a superficial level. What evidence has Jan provided to you that she is one of these people?
In the end, David, Jan's and Mary's claims may or may not hold up, but I think it pays to remain objective until the evidence is in.
Posted on Jan 16, 2003, 11:40 AM from IP address 64.6.105.6