Bigfoot and the so-called "Bigfoot professor" have found their way into the news a few times the last few days.

Jeff Meldrum, aka the Bigfoot professor, was the focus of a couple of articles that made some headlines recently. Both seem to make the same point that I have before, namely, that as long as he's doing real science, and searching for the truth, why is it that his fellow professors are so against him?

The first article, while I don't completely agree with it, centers around these three main points:

One, unlike the study of, say, intelligent design and other forms of creationism, researching bigfoot does not come burdened with a political or religious agenda that trumps the scientific method or leads a researcher to distort data. Meldrum is not hell bent on using his status as a public university professor to promote a sectarian agenda or “prove” some right-wing point.

Two, Meldrum’s research is not hurting anyone. Dr. John Mack, the late, controversial psychiatrist who taught at Harvard, became convinced that alien abductions were real and wrote several books on the topic. I think Mack committed a form of malpractice. The people who believe they are being abducted by aliens suffer from a form of neurosis, and Mack, instead of helping them, fed their delusions by saying, “Yes, you really are being sucked out of your window at night and probed by evil gray aliens.” This is irresponsible. Harvard never cracked down on Mack, but in my view the university would have been justified in doing so. Meldrum’s work looks harmless by comparison.

Finally, there is a small possibility that Meldrum’s research could result in significant findings. I believe the possibility that the sasquatch exists is very remote — but there is a case for the creature, and Meldrum should have the right to make it. By contrast, people who try to debunk Darwinism, prove that the Grand Canyon is only 6,000 years old or deny the Holocaust are wasting their time since there is no possibility their “research” will ever add anything of value to science or history.

So, by this author's definition, Professor Meldrum practices science.

The second article takes a very similar tone. What Professor Meldrum does is science in its purest form. He's searching for unknown answers to questions.

Recently in the media, a particular academic at a university in the United States has been called to task by many of his peers for his support of a Sasquatch event that was held at the university. Indeed, many of the comments from his peers were pretty disparaging to sat the least. The gist of their comments was that the investigation of the Sasquatch was not a topic for "serious" science, and any scientist who did such an activity was not a scientist at all but a quack. I have always been bothered by this attitude of most academics and scientists, as from my point of view, it seems to be in opposition to what their professions are all about, namely the searching for facts within the natural world to produce useful models of reality.

Well said, I believe. At least, in the end, while Professor Meldrum may have to deal with pretentious colleagues who refuse to believe what he's doing has any scientific merit, the dean of sciences at ISU believes in what he's doing, and that should keep Professor Meldrum at the university doing exactly what he's been doing for a long time to come.

While Professor Meldrum is getting most of the press in the Bigfoot research realm lately, there are other professionals looking into the phenomenon. Stanislaus National Forest's archaeologist Kathy Strain is, literally, digging for evidence of Sasquatch. While she's never seen a Bigfoot herself, she's collected countless eyewitness accounts, cast footprints, ancient pictographs and other evidence, and calls herself a believer. She has spent hundreds of off-work hours dedicated to researching the animal, and believes that eventually rock-solid proof will be found.

If proof is ever found, it will be because of hard work from professionals like these two dedicated scientists.

Over at Earthfiles Linda Moulton Howe has an interesting interview with Idaho State "Bigfoot professor" Jeff Meldrum, who has had a new book out since September; Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science. In it he discusses many of the reasons why he is involved in research of this kind, and even takes the infamous "skeleton" question head on:

WHY DO YOU THINK WE DON’T HAVE A BODY OR A SKELETON?

It still is perplexing that we haven’t, that someone hasn’t stumbled on something. But we’re making discoveries all the time. In paleontology, new species are found. If this is a large body omnivorous primate, it probably has no natural predators. It would be at the top of its food chain. If it’s a large ape, it probably has a very long life expectancy of 40 to 60 years perhaps. It reproduces rarely, if we can extrapolate from the great apes. Births are rare and infrequent and widely spaced. An adult female orangutan may give birth to only 4 individuals in her entire lifetime with anywhere from 4 to 8 years between births.

So, given a very rare population with long life expectancy, with infrequent reproduction and no natural predators – when death occurs, it’s a rare event. Two, it’s going to be a natural event. Therefore, animals that die natural deaths as they become old and decrepit and ill, they secret themselves off and once they pass away, insects and other predators eat the remains and the skeletons are carried off by scavengers, by porcupines and rodents.

People don’t realize that a porcupine can make in very short order gnaw a large bone to nothing. I’ve found elk bones which have been chewed by porcupines and there is just not much left even to identify which particular bone it is. They are just chewed down to almost nothing.

Anyway, the second factor then is the physical environment. That is where these Bigfoot animals are most reported are wet, coniferous forests. Particularly in the Pacific Northwest, these are soils that are largely volcanic-derived that are notoriously acidic. Acidic soils and conditions are not conducive to preserving bones. So, what scavengers haven’t eaten, the physical environment quickly deteriorates and decomposes. In a short time, there is not much left.

If you stop and think that every year, literally thousands of deer die of winter kill from predators and succumbing to the rigors of winter. Yet, when you go out for a hike in the springtime, you don’t find the floor of the forest littered with deer carcasses. The carcasses are very efficiently recycled.

Be sure to check the entire interview out right here.