Steve’s P-O-T Bigfoot Shenanigans

There are many ways that our man Steve likes to use his arguments to build up to a fairly disappointing conclusion. I mentioned last time that Steve goes into depth about Bigfoot as a literal, real thing/animal. He justifies this with his own experiences and throws in other’s experiences while never giving us a reason to believe that Bigfoot is more of a ghost/spirit with “powers”. This really upset me because if he had mentioned this from the very beginning, I would have believed this account to be an experience with something more supernatural or spiritual. This changes everything because you can’t use someone who uses an event for spiritual reasons to make claims on their argument. But... since Steve used these words at the end of his blog, I’m going to use the information that he gave us in the ‘meat’ of the writing, because it is still perfectly good information for me to dissect. 

The Normal

Although in the end of his story, Steve mentions that we will “never be able to scientifically prove their existence...”, he uses his own experience and justifies those experiences with those around him to further solidify his claims. He, the people in his town and his own students apparently have had a special story with Bigfoot. He wouldn’t mention this if he didn't want the readers of this blog to be open to the mysterious possibility that Bigfoot is real enough to be recognized. He says that the people living near his residence “do not question its existence” and that “many” of his students “have had a Bigfoot encounters” (his words exactly, not mine). So he is using what he sees as “universal” group experiences to make us feel more connected with the idea that Bigfoot is out there.  

Superlative 

“the second thing that came to my mind was “Bigfoot”. It could be nothing else.” In this quote by our lovely Steve, he is explaining that this “cry” that he heard was completely unique and he rules out every logical answer to what it could have been in favor of Bigfoot, whom he has never really seen. He does eventually compare what he heard to the sound of how Howler monkeys, which of course are not indigenous to the United States of America. It’s funny that his mind won’t land on anything except Bigfoot, my personal theory was that is was a human. But by doing this, he is not allowing this random “cry” to be deeply analyzed, he instead uses it to further build his ramshackle argument. 

Probability

Here, I want to use the comparison of bears and bear sightings to Bigfoot sightings. I know I used this in our fallacies, but if probability is, “comparison by reducing choices to some form of data or number...” Then Steve saying, “in reality bear sightings on the Lummi reservation or far less frequent than Bigfoot sightings” Which we already literally proved to be untrue, but by doing this, Steve is not letting readers have depth to his accounts, we’re just supposed to trust the Bigfoot ‘expert’. 

Import

If import is an ‘event that calls attention to a rules possible applications’, then I would say Steve’s experiences with Bigfoot have created a way for him to make a rule that doesn’t clarify whether or not Bigfoot exists, but it gave him a bad path to go down. A way to cheat by saying that Bigfoot isn’t necessarily a ‘material’ or ‘physical’ being but a spiritual entity. This prevents him from scrutiny in a shitty way without discrediting him and I hate it. 

Justifications

Steve uses justification in an interesting way. He has all of these experiences with Bigfoot, using words like ‘encounter’ or ‘visit’. This gives us enough information to believe that Steve is trying to say that Bigfoot is a real and literal thing/animal... But here it comes... We’re hit with the “spiritual” entity shit and it throws all of his implicit claims out the window. This event invites readers to question and may create a bit of confusion because of the apparent hypocrisy... but it does give Steve a way to make an argument without suffering the repercussions of a hearty analysis. 

So the question is... Is this an effective argument? Who’s to say... But I think with all the amassed evidence that Steve gives us about Bigfoot as a physical being, that we are meant to believe by Steve that Bigfoot is real, but he uses his last words to ground himself and make his argument subjective.