Cryptozoology





Cryptozoology is the study of rumored or mythological animals that are
presumed by many to exist, but for which proof does not yet exist. Those who
study these as-yet undiscovered animals hold that such animals do exist, and
are either rare, or once existed but have become extinct. Those who search
for such animals are called cryptozoologists.

Scientists have shown that some creatures of mythology, legend or local
folklore were rooted in a real animal or phenomenon. Thus, cryptozoologists
hold that people should be open to the possibility that many more such
animals exist.

The invention of the term is usually attributed to the zoologist Bernard
Heuvelmans. The hypothetical creatures involved are referred to by some with
the slang term of cryptid. Some cryptozoologists align themselves with a
more scientifically rigorous field like zoology, while others tend toward an
anthropological slant or even forteana. The fringes of cryptozoology are
considered pseudoscience by mainstream biologists, but the general idea of
searching for new animals is a legitimate area of biology. Thus
cryptozoologists searching for dragons would be considered on the lunatic
fringe; those searching for animals now considered very unlikely to exist
such as Bigfoot are considered fringe scientists.

While many cryptozoologists strive for legitimacy and many are already
respected scientists in other fields, cryptozoology has never been fully
embraced by the scientific community. A cryptozoologist may propose that an
interest in such a phenomenon doesn't entail belief, but a detractor will
reply the illusions of sightings are a form of belief. Cryptozoologists tend
to be responsible for disproving their own objects of study. For example,
cryptozoologists have largely been responsible for collecting statistical
data and studying witness accounts that have just about disproved the notion
that bigfoot sightings have any legitimacy.

A common example among cryptozoologists for why their field is important is
the coelacanth, a prehistoric fish. Believed to have been extinct for 65
million years, one was caught in a fishing net in 1938 off the coast of
Africa. Cryptozoologists point this out to demonstrate that there are many
unexplored regions of the world left, and that remote exotic locations or
specialized ecosystems untouched by man can contain life we didn't expect to
find. Along similar lines, the emblem of the Society for Cryptozoology is
the okapi, a shy, forest-dwelling relative of the giraffe that was unknown
to Western scientists prior to 1901.