Is the beastie lurking in the watery depths of Loch Ness?
This is the famous – and fake – photograph of the Loch Ness monster, taken near Inverness, Scotland, on April 19, 1934. The photograph was later revealed to be a hoax.
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Michael A. Little, Binghamton University, State University of New York
The idea of a creature like the Loch Ness monster fascinates people. But does the scientific evidence say it’s a prehistoric beast or total fake?
The so-called ‘surgeon’s photograph’ taken by gynaecologist Robert Wilson (actually made from a toy submarine) first published in the Daily Mail in 1934.
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The latest medical scanning technology revealed details of a plesiosaur’s inner ear, showing the extinct marine reptiles swam with their head slightly lowered – unlike the Loch Ness ‘sock puppet’.
Superstition or wishful thinking could trick you into thinking you saw one of these mythical creatures.
AP Photo/Eduardo Munoz Alvarez
Scientists are left with two conclusions. Either Nessie is an eel, or she never existed at all.
With the help of environmental DNA, scientists are compiling a census of life in Loch Ness, which should establish if there is any scientific basis to the centuries-old legend of the Loch Ness monster.
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Scientists are using environmental DNA to compile a census of life in Loch Ness and to establish if there is any scientific basis for the centuries-old monster legend.
If you’re convinced Nessie’s real, would science unconvince you?
AP Photo/Norm Goldstein
Artūrs Logins, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
If you’re committed to a belief, it’s hard to let go. Psychology and philosophy provide different ways to think about how skeptics respond to counterevidence.
The Loch Ness Monster and other folk tales might not be pure fiction, but actually based on memories of events our ancestors once observed.
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Essays On Air: Monsters in my closet - how a geographer began mining myths
So you think the Loch Ness Monster never existed? Think again. Traditional myths from our ancestors might actually reveal important clues about the geological history of the world.
Mount Mazama, a volcano in Oregon. Indigenous stories preserve tales of its eruption more than 7,000 years ago.
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Old stories from around the world tell of drowned islands, volcanic eruptions and upheavals to the land around them. Increasingly we are realising these tales preserve actual memory, often from thousands of years ago.