tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16505569.post6781751842592246886..comments2024-01-05T05:02:20.353+00:00Comments on CRYPTOZOOLOGY ONLINE: Still on the Track: COMMENT FOR KARLUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16505569.post-8658326661091051572010-02-11T21:59:03.449+00:002010-02-11T21:59:03.449+00:00I have never had a problem pursuing cz topics acad...I have never had a problem pursuing cz topics academically. There is no public funding for my research but that does not bother me as frankly there are more important topics that should be funded using public money. <br /><br />Nor is it my experience that Forteana is frowned upon by academia. I know of several historians whose entire careers have been based around the study of "wonders"! <br /><br />But there is a big difference between good quality academic work and a lot of stuff that happens in cz. There is what I can only really call "a sense of omniscience" amongst much of the cz community which I find incomprehensible. Even amongst its most scientific representatives. For example Heuvelmans thought spotting hoaxed sightings of sea serpents was "absurdly easy" as I recall. Grover Krantz expressed similar sentiments about bigfoot reports. I just wish I was as gifted.Tullimonstrumhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18435597553695553040noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16505569.post-9126830332371180112010-02-10T13:28:24.651+00:002010-02-10T13:28:24.651+00:00Aye, this more or less sums up a lot of Academic w...Aye, this more or less sums up a lot of Academic work these days. The problem here is largely due to how a lot of research is funded: short term grants. A very great deal of research is now funded by three-year grants, meaning that researchers are under enormous pressure to produce papers inside these three years of work, and they are also under intolerable pressure to search for work after their current grant is up. <br /><br />Lecturerships are few and far between, and jobs such as mine (systems administrator for a University department) are scarce and mean abandoning all pretence at academic research for a technical position, albeit it one one on permanent contract and with good pay and conditions. So, if you deviate from the norm, if you stand out in any way (take heed, Mr Woodley!) that isn't linked to academic brilliance and if you venture into the more unusual realms of research then you can expect career-related repercussions.<br /><br />All this isn't a healthy way of working or of running research. A lot of our modern world is based upon "blue sky" research for the sake of research; monoclonal antibodies were one such line of enquiry and one which now underpins a huge range of modern bio-pharmaceuticals, and all because someone wanted to know how a mammalian directed immune system actually operates and wished to see if this mechanism could be harnessed in some way.<br /><br />Similarly research into cryptids and into the various UFOs and similar things is not useless. Sociological tie-ins abound, and links are now being found where none were thought to exist before. <br /><br />For instance, cryptids, ghosts and areas of high UFO activity all seem to be in the same general areas, leading to a suspicion that the same root cause might be triggering most of these phenomena. Then there is the oft-reported observation that all manner of electronics and mechanical devices seem to cease functioning in the presence of many UFOs and zooform phenomena or malfunction in a few specific manners (complete jams of cameras, electronic systems draining batteries at unusually high rates, cars ceasing to function as the phenomena occurs, then recovering as it fades out).<br /><br />Clearly there is something going on here, and understanding what is happening might prove useful in all sorts of fields, including mechanical efficiency of things.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16505569.post-75497579705253490062010-02-10T11:19:22.273+00:002010-02-10T11:19:22.273+00:00Unless you work in the academic world it is diffic...Unless you work in the academic world it is difficult to understand. Many academics including myself have been passed over for promotion or lost jobs because of their interest in fortean things.Roy Mackal I know suffered because of his interest in Loch Ness. When you have a family to provide for you have to protect your status and keep your job. It is only now after nearly 40 years That I have come out of the fortean closet as it were. I was a single parent and couldn't afford to lose my job nor as a woman in academia allow anyone not to take me seriously. You only have look at what happened after Jon posted his lakes video to know how the world views cryptozoology sometimes.Tabitcahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00685620846174596978noreply@blogger.com