美国国家公共电台 NPR--A new book for pre-teens explores Bigfoot through a scientific lens

A new book for pre-teens explores Bigfoot through a scientific lens

Transcript¹

NPR's A Martinez talks to Laura Krantz about her children's book: The Search for Sasquatch. Krantz hopes to model how to balance curiosity and exploration with staying grounded in the facts.

A MART?NEZ, HOST:

I know the journalist Laura Krantz to be a science-trusting, facts-first person. So I was fascinated when in 2018 she put out a podcast called "Wild Thing" where she journeyed into the world of Bigfoot. That's right, Bigfoot. That podcast has now become her first children's book, titled "The Search For Sasquatch."

LAURA KRANTZ: This is partially² a mystery. It's partially a little bit of science education. It is learning how to think about evolution and how we fit into the world.

MART?NEZ: Turns out Krantz had a relative who had done his own digging into Bigfoot.

KRANTZ: He was my grandfather's cousin. And he was a professor of anthropology³ at Washington State University. He was a scientist. And yet he also thought that Bigfoot was out there. And so, for me, it was sort of this question, how can you hold on to being a scientist and also onto this idea of Bigfoot at the same time?

MART?NEZ: And so Krantz went into the wilderness⁴ to find out for herself.

KRANTZ: I approached this from the standpoint of Bigfoot is a flesh-and-blood creature, the same as anything else on this earth. It's not magical. It doesn't have superpowers. And that's what I'm kind of hoping to encourage the readers to do, is say, OK, this is a really interesting idea. How can we look at this logically? How can we look at this through the lens of science?

MART?NEZ: I'm hoping Bigfoot had a little magic to it. I'm just hoping it has a little bit of mysticism to it. But I know. I know it probably wouldn't if it was real.

KRANTZ: Well, I mean, think of it this way. So people say Bigfoot vanishes. OK, so maybe Bigfoot doesn't turn invisible, but maybe Bigfoot is covered with so many twigs⁵ and leaves and hair that, like, if he stands really still, you can't see him anymore.

MART?NEZ: Ah.

KRANTZ: Like, there's a way to think about it like that.

MART?NEZ: But you know what, Laura? When I think about Bigfoot, it's never about whether I believe it's real, but more about how I want to believe that it's real. What do you think is at the bottom of that?

KRANTZ: Yeah. I think there are a lot of things. I think for some people, it's the idea of that the world is still wild enough and unexplored that something like Bigfoot could be out there. I think we all want that. I think we want that sense of mystery. I think, too, there's a sort of recognition that we need to preserve these wild spaces. It's almost an environmental mandate⁶ and desire to preserve the sorts of places that Bigfoot could exist in, even if Bigfoot doesn't really exist.

MART?NEZ: You wrote about people you spoke⁷ to who swear - who swear, swear, swear they've had an experience with something - either Bigfoot or at least something that they cannot explain. What were some of those stories that maybe started to convince you, Laura Krantz, that Bigfoot was actually real, maybe?

KRANTZ: The stories I heard came from people who were avid⁸ outdoors people that had spent a lot of time in the woods. They were wildlife scientists and wildlife biologists. They were hunters. They were people who really knew the environment and then had an experience that was so bizarre that they really couldn't figure out another explanation for it. And there's a really great story in the book from a guy named John Mionczynski. And I'm not going to tell it because it's just such a good story, and I want people to read it. But when he told this story, like, the hair on the back of my neck just kind of stood up. And it really gave me the creeps. And the next time I went camping after that, I was a little bit freaked out. I will be completely honest about that.

MART?NEZ: And it goes back to the poster that Fox Mulder had in his office...

KRANTZ: (Laughter).

MART?NEZ: ...In the FBI's underground that said I want to believe on the TV show "X-Files." I want to believe but can't take the dive unless I got some proof, some evidence.

KRANTZ: Yeah.

MART?NEZ: But that makes something like this difficult sometimes.

KRANTZ: Right. Oh, no. It totally does. But the way I was thinking about it from the standpoint of, you know - again, this is written for kids roughly between the ages of 8 and 12, 9 and 13 - in that range. And they are going to have all kinds of things come at them up through the news, through peers, through social media, all kinds of stories. And I'm hoping that this will help them learn how to parse⁹ some of that information.

So, yeah, this is a really great story. You want to know more, explore, ask questions, think about what the possibilities might be, but also stay grounded in, you know, the reality of the world. And part of this is trying to help kids maybe be a little bit more scientifically literate¹⁰, be a little bit more critical in their thinking about these kinds of stories and yet still realize that they can have fun with it and want to believe.

MART?NEZ: Tell us about the nests.

KRANTZ: Oh. The nests are weird¹¹. So I was invited to come take a look at these Bigfoot nests that had been found on private timberland on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state. And they were essentially¹² huge ground nests. They were like birds nests that were 10 feet across that were big enough you could lay down in. And, of course, we don't know what built them. And there are people who are pretty sure that Bigfoot might have built them, which might sound weird, except that gorillas¹³ also build nests - in Africa, of course, not in Washington state.

But it does raise a lot of questions. And when I saw them, I was kind of like, these are really strange. Like, what built these? And that adds to the mystery of it. And, you know, there's all kinds of exploration into what's happening here. There is some DNA¹⁴ analysis, which I get into in the book. And this is one of these little tidbits that sort of keeps cropping up in the world of Bigfoot that kind of makes you wonder, well, maybe.

MART?NEZ: One of my favorite Laura Krantz-isms is this. Even if Bigfoot isn't real, we as a species need him to be. Why?

KRANTZ: So this is kind of an interesting phenomenon that I came across. But if you think about it, for as long as we've been telling stories, for as long as we've been sharing information with each other, there has been some sort of creature on the periphery¹⁵, whether it's Grendel in "Beowulf," whether it is other monsters that we have sort of created on the periphery of our cities and in the - outside the line of vision around our campfire. There's always been something out there, and I think in some ways we have evolved with this idea of a creature, of an other out there, of something that is not us, that is not human and yet is drawn¹⁶ to us in the same way that we are drawn to it.

And I think that, you know, philosophically¹⁷ and emotionally and maybe even evolutionarily, like, this is something that has always been part of our existence. And so for it to not exist anymore - it'd be like losing a part of ourselves. And I think this kind of goes back to the idea of the world being wild enough and unexplored enough that something like Bigfoot can exist. If we lose that, we lose a fundamental part of what it is to be human.

MART?NEZ: That's journalist Laura Krantz. Her new book is "The Search For Sasquatch."

Laura, thanks.

KRANTZ: Thanks very much, A.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 partially   

adv.部分地，从某些方面讲

参考例句：

• The door was partially concealed by the drapes.门有一部分被门帘遮住了。
• The police managed to restore calm and the curfew was partially lifted.警方设法恢复了平静，宵禁部分解除。

3 anthropology   

n.人类学

参考例句：

• I believe he has started reading up anthropology.我相信他已开始深入研究人类学。
• Social anthropology is centrally concerned with the diversity of culture.社会人类学主要关于文化多样性。

4 wilderness   

n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠

参考例句：

• She drove the herd of cattle through the wilderness.她赶着牛群穿过荒野。
• Education in the wilderness is not a matter of monetary means.荒凉地区的教育不是钱财问题。

5 twigs   

细枝，嫩枝( twig的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Some birds build nests of twigs. 一些鸟用树枝筑巢。
• Willow twigs are pliable. 柳条很软。

6 mandate   

n.托管地；命令，指示

参考例句：

• The President had a clear mandate to end the war.总统得到明确的授权结束那场战争。
• The General Election gave him no such mandate.大选并未授予他这种权力。

7 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

8 avid   

adj.热心的；贪婪的；渴望的；劲头十足的

参考例句：

• He is rich,but he is still avid of more money.他很富有,但他还想贪图更多的钱。
• She was avid for praise from her coach.那女孩渴望得到教练的称赞。

9 parse   

v.从语法上分析；n.从语法上分析

参考例句：

• I simply couldn't parse what you just said.我完全无法对你刚说的话作语法分析。
• It causes the parser to parse an NP.它调用分析程序分析一个名词短语。

10 literate   

n.学者；adj.精通文学的，受过教育的

参考例句：

• Only a few of the nation's peasants are literate.这个国家的农民中只有少数人能识字。
• A literate person can get knowledge through reading many books.一个受过教育的人可以通过读书而获得知识。

11 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

12 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

13 gorillas   

n.大猩猩( gorilla的名词复数 )；暴徒，打手

参考例句：

• the similitude between humans and gorillas 人类和大猩猩的相像
• Each family of gorillas is led by a great silverbacked patriarch. 每个大星星家族都由一个魁梧的、长着银色被毛的族长带领着。 来自《简明英汉词典》

14 DNA   

(缩)deoxyribonucleic acid 脱氧核糖核酸

参考例句：

• DNA is stored in the nucleus of a cell.脱氧核糖核酸储存于细胞的细胞核里。
• Gene mutations are alterations in the DNA code.基因突变是指DNA密码的改变。

15 periphery   

n.(圆体的)外面；周围

参考例句：

• Geographically, the UK is on the periphery of Europe.从地理位置上讲，英国处于欧洲边缘。
• The periphery of the retina is very sensitive to motion.视网膜的外围对运动非常敏感。

16 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

17 philosophically   

adv.哲学上；富有哲理性地；贤明地；冷静地

参考例句：

• He added philosophically that one should adapt oneself to the changed conditions. 他富于哲理地补充说，一个人应该适应变化了的情况。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Harry took his rejection philosophically. 哈里达观地看待自己被拒的事。 来自《简明英汉词典》