Lake monster : Explanations

Many skeptics consider lake monsters to be purely exaggerations or misinterpretations of known and natural phenomena, or else fabrications and hoaxes. Most lake monsters have left no evidence of their existence besides alleged sightings and controversial photographs, and a large portion are therefore generally believed not to exist by conventionalzoologists and allied scientists. Misidentified sightings of seals, otters, deer, diving water birds, large fish such as giant sturgeons or wels catfish, logs, mirages, seiches, light distortion, crossing boat wakes, or unusual wave patterns have all been proposed to explain specific reports^{[citation needed]}. Social scientists add that descriptions of these creatures vary over time with the values and mood of the local cultures, following the pattern of folk beliefs and not what would be expected if the reports were of actual encounters with real animals.^{[citation needed]}

In Ben Radford and Joe Nickell's book Lake Monster Mysteries, the authors attribute a vast number of sightings to otter misidentifications: as Ed Grabianowski said,

"...a convincing argument based, again, on data mapping. He plotted the distribution of North American lake monster sightings. Then he overlaid the distribution of the common otter and found a near perfect match. It turns out that three or four otters swimming in a line look remarkably like a serpentine, humped creature undulating through the water. It is very easy to mistake for a single creature if you see them from a distance. "This isn't speculation. I'm not making this up," Nickell said. "I've spoken to people who saw what they thought was a lake monster, got closer and discovered it was actually a line of otters. That really happens." Clearly, not every lake monster sighting can be accounted for with otters, but it's an excellent example of how our perceptions can be fooled.

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Lake monster : Explanations 2016-06-03T07:11:00-07:00 Rating: 4.5 Diposkan Oleh: Unknown