This could just be coincidence, but there could be something else at play here. Which cryptids could be responsible?
Posted Oct 11, 2021, 12:25 PM UTC
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I’ve seen this before and the one thing that kinda makes it fall flat for me is, look at everything west of Texas. The correlation kinda falls apart. It’s a good example of “correlation is not causation” but then again, that’s no fun to speculate about.
You ever think there could be a predatory, subterranean species we haven’t discovered yet? Big enough to kill a human but no where in the fossil record? I personally doubt it but it does make we want to rewatch The Descent again!
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Don't forget about Tremors. :-)
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[deleted]
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Oh my god. I forgot about tremors and now I have to go find out where to stream it. Thank you!
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I'd love to see the same map with forested/wilderness areas and mountainous areas overlaid.
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I can tell you that the section in the Northeast runs right in line with the Appalachian trail. Lots of hikers go missing. But also plenty of mundane reasons for this. The maps are interesting but as a long-time resident of the Pocono Mountains, hardly compelling. YMMV
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Crab people don't have bones
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Thing about fossils is that we only see ones that are so old. Am I wrong in believing that the surface continues to essentially sink and cycle? There could be things so old we can’t fathom that have turned to magma by now, or be so deep in the earth it will never see the light of day again
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nah fam subfossils exist, and at least ordinary bones or some precense on the environment, You think that a superpredator can go around and not make any noticeable changes in the animal populations?
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So I’m just using this as a thought exercise. Not any actual belief here. But one could argue that this map is showing a noticeable change.
We are also talking about a hypothetical cryptid beast that hides in cave systems here. There’s no saying how it behaves or feeds. It could wake up every 5 years and wait for a big enough juicy mammal to feed off of and then go back into a hybernation cycle.
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season 1 of the x-files was fire.
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It could also only come to the surface rarely, maybe mostly at night when fewer people are around. If it hunted whatever was handy, then it'd be easy to think that people would chalk any changes in prey populations up to more typical predators like wolves or cougars. Some predators don't eat as often, too, so that could add to it. Like cougars will kill an animal once every week or 2. One or two rogue monsters with a similar feeding pattern could slide under the radar pretty easily imo.
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Oh sure but anything attacking people nowadays would still be in the fossil record somewhere.
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Unless there’s some sort of 1000 leagues thing going on in cave systems.
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They also completely left out Washington state.
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What if they're humans?
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Fuuuuuuuuuccck!!
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Doesn’t a lot of sex trafficking happen out west? A lot of the data could be from people being kidnapped too
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True but even if this theory were true it would have to be multiple types of monsters doing this because none really have the range of the full country.
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What constitutes a “mysterious case?” No one mysteriously disappeared in any major metropolitan areas?
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It is about people who disappear in wildernesses, not cities.
This map shows that the last known locations of people who disappear in wildernesses is extremely closely correlated with the distribution of wilderness areas.
It's a very strange and hard to explain coincidence don't you think?
(/s = because this is Reddit and there is a high correlation between Redditing and Autism in my observation.)
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It's actually not vaccines but Reddit that causes Autism /s
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How do they know exactly where the people disappeared (like around those caves)?
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It doesn’t say mysterious cave.
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I know, it says mysterious cases, that’s why I said mysterious case and not cave.
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Wow. Here I thought you read it wrong and needed some coffee…. Sorry lol not sure how this was made.
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It’s very early, I get it. :)
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A disappearance that happens close to a cave so you can make this map.
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Map of sewers vs urban disappearances go!! I bet that correlation would be pretty high.
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correlation versus causation.
scenario 1: People (over) confidently wander into various wilderness areas, get lost, and are never seen again.
scenario 2: people visit wilderness area filled with caves, cave monsters come out and drag unsuspecting visitors to their doom.
I'm tickled by both.
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Don't forget predation by local predators; natural, supernatural, and most often human.
Also dimensional portals and time slips. Lots of stories across the ages of unusual rock/tree/water formations being gateways for people and things to appear and disappear.
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Some of them totally could've been murdered by other humans.
Stories aren't enough for me, unfortunately.
I prefer to imagine higher dimensions abiding by string/brane cosmology, with time as a side effect of entanglement and measurement.
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I work in a state park as a ranger and on our SAR team. I see #1 all the time. They think they can go in caves, climb, hike, camp, hunt, whatever and get lost or hurt. Of course they'll tell us, we'll say "eehhh probably not a good idea".
Then after two days in the forrest my happy ass shows up and says "Told ya it wasn't a good idea"
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Mole men
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Can you add population densities and urban development level maps next to these?
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Everyone disappearing around Salt Lake were taken by the Mormons
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Very true
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This was shown at the start of the Jordan Peele movie “Us” and was a major plot point in the movie. Great movie, pretty creepy.
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Yess!!!!
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It's complete nonsense but you might want to look into D.U.M.Bs (Deep Underground Military Bases). Supposedly, aliens are working with the US government and have a vast interconnected Underground system to monitor and expirement on the American populace. Again, total nonsense but it was the first thing I thought of.
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Nice! That would make a good story thanks. “The whole time, we were all looking to the skies…”
“Hey look at this map what could this mean?”
“Oh that’s dumb”.
“What?”
“D.U.M.B.”
“You’re an ass.”
“…”.
Later.
“I haven’t been hiding anything I told you earlier quite clearly.”
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Yeah, I've been expirementing with a story concept that pits humanity as a disease research colony for an alien race to develop better vaccines and treatments for their own people while they essentially treat us like cattle. Basically, all new diseases that just seem to come from nowhere is really an alien disease being tested on us. The aliens living in caves thing is dumb but would make sense for hidden Underground research facilities so they can better tag and track infected test subjects.
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Perhaps a cryptid with a morphology that doesn't show up in fossil records. Something perhaps worm-like? The humidity and darkness in caves could be ideal for something with lots of soft tissue, and a lack of bones could keep it from being discovered. Especially if there are any scavenging species cohabitating. If the creature was an effective burrower, perhaps with a cartilage protrusion on the head or a streamlined body shape, that could explain it.
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Hey, everyone, this is a CRYPTOZOOLOGY sub. Obviously there are other possible explanations, but OP specifically asked about cryptids.
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Caves are in forests. People get lost in forests.
People rarely get lost in populated areas.
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this exact map has been posted in this sub like 30 times since Ive joined. Might I suggest people going over to the r/missing411 for this stuff. Can mods weed out the constant reposts of this?
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Caves can be dangerous and full of toxic gas.
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Or it's just easy to get lost in caves...?
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That would be way too easy, it can't be true 😂 It needs to be something mysterious without any basis in reality
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You're right. Okay better idea: mole people?
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I think the most telling is that huge swath up the center of the state where essentially nothing is going on. Maybe people should move there eh?
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To play devils advocate, maybe it’s because these areas are easier for people to hide/dispose of a body if they need?
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For anyone interested in more about this, the group Planet Weird made a series about Hellier, KY and the insane cave systems surrounding it, along with all the anomalies following it.
Some stuff is compelling, some of it is kinda eh, but anyone interested in this stuff, I suggest you watch this series.
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It’s great and then ends with them thinking a tin can is mothman and like wtf kill me.
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Are you suggesting a hollow earth/ agartha situation?
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People get lost in caves?
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Makes perfect sense. Cave systems are usually located in wilderness areas. It's easy to disappear in wilderness areas.
Right, and without monsters.
Yeah. I’m aware that there are logical natural explanations. u/thatswacyo , I was more interested in theoretical creative solutions.
I enjoy writing and this idea sparked inspiration for a story. I am curious what types of beast exists already that could explain this, or if I should just invent my own
If your looking to write a story, start with a deep dive into local folklore, particularly First Nation traditions. Quite often wandering spirits, territorial "little people" and monsters go hand in hand around caverns, especially if they connect to a water source. The best stories start with a kernel of truth so basing it off of pre-existing folktales could add that little bit extra.
Excellent ideas. This will get me started I’m sure thanks.
Please, no. Native people already face enough non-natives turning their history into “oOoOoO spOoOoOky monsters”
Would love to hear what u come up with.
If you look along the east coast, much of that is Appalachian mountains, which caves or not are easy enough to get lost in. Then, if you do take caves into consideration, how many people try to explore these caves without telling anyone and end up dieing in one due to a mistake?
So people would have to be lured there.
Hellier does a good job discussing that briefly
Would it be a little more likely that said wilderness is the reason for disappearances?