Searching for Cryptids

title: Searching for Cryptids
author: Imaginary Worlds
contenttype: podcast
publication: Imaginary Worlds
published: 2025-12-03T20:01:00
sourceurl: https://pdst.fm/e/pscrb.fm/rss/p/mgln.ai/e/433/claritaspod.com/measure/traffic.megaphone.fm/QCD5808099417.mp3?updated=1770106728

word_count: 6727

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Shane Company, your friend and jeweler. You're listening to Imaginary Worlds, a show about how we create them and why we suspend our disbelief. I'm Eric Olinsky. And this is James Domick Jr. He is the host of the podcast Alaska is the center of the universe. The title of the show is reaction against the fact that Alaska's official nickname is the last frontier. To the indigenous people of the state, to the native people of the state, it's not a frontier. It's not the last one. It's our home and we're very comfortable in this wild place. Our people have lived here for thousands and thousands of years. James is from the Inupac tribe. His great grandfather was one of the last in a long line of Inupac storytellers. I always say that my people went through a time machine. We were the last indigenous people in the United States to have contact. And that didn't happen until very recently, just because we were so isolated, that generation went through a time machine and a lot of things got jumbled around. James says their traditional ways of life are still under threat from assimilation to climate change. But they do have a natural resource that is within their power to preserve their stories. In the Inupac people, we've known for a long time that there's something out there. The Inukans have been here too. They're not human. They dwell in the human realm and the spirit realm, which is their home. Many of the episodes of his podcast are dedicated to cryptids. Acrypted is a word for a creature that people believe is out there, but it hasn't been scientifically verified yet. For instance, Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster are examples of cryptids. And cryptids are having a moment now from podcasts to festivals to merchandise. But in Native Alaskan cultures, cryptids are not for tabloids, reality TV or scientific study. There's sacred stories. Although there is a range of stories and beliefs among the different Alaskan tribes. James had to travel all over the state to find people to interview, which was not easy. One guy was so reticent, James had to give him seal meat and tech support to encourage him to tell his story. What really surprised me is there's a lot of Alaskans who have seen incredible, unbelievable things that will not talk about them publicly. They talk to me, they've told me because they know that I believe and that I am a keeper of stories and that they know that I am a seeker. When it comes to stories about the fantastical, whether it's cryptids, ghosts or UFOs, my mind often turns into an episode of the X-Files. There's a Mulder and Scully in my head taking sides. My inner Scully usually wins, but then the debate starts all over again. Mulder is the same story I've heard since I was a kid. It's a folktale, a myth. I heard the same story when I was a kid too. Funny thing is, I believed it, thanks to me. I asked James where he stands on cryptids. I don't try to swing one way or the other. I'm not trying to make people believe one thing or the other about the stories that I tell. I like to tell people this. These are the stories that people talk about up north. Some of the people who have had encounters believe that they are spiritual beings that exist in a realm and in a frequency that our senses can't pick up. Other people believe they are flesh and blood. And I believe that the sightings that have happened up north in my area of the world have been flesh and blood. James did an episode that I couldn't stop thinking about. It was about a creature called the Kushdaka. These tales originate from the southeastern tribes of Alaska. It still is a very real fearful part of the culture. There was people who wouldn't talk about it because the sun was down. There were people who wouldn't talk about it just out of sheer, just out of just fright. And also just like it was a very real thing to not talk about and getting some of the people to talk about was very, it was like pulling teeth. But what I did find out about the Kushdaka is a lot of other cultures around the world have a similar situation. And the situation is you're out and about your somewhere. Usually out in the country and you see someone that you know, a familiar person, whose face is exactly like someone you know. They're usually at the tree line or at the edge of the water in these stories with the Kushdaka and this person who is familiar to you, ushers you in. It says come with me. If you go with them, you won't come back. And when I was doing my research on it, I realized that there was so many other cultures around the world who have had, who have this similar, exactly similar story. But the Kushdaka said it can change into anybody that it wants to. They say that when it's not deceiving people and trying to take people, it rests as a land daughter. When it's just chilling out, it's a land daughter. But when it wants to take a soul, it turns into whoever it knows who you are, our familiar one. In that episode, James talked with a tribal elder who got emotional when he told this story from his youth. The man was boating with his aunt and uncle. They got drunk. Things went haywire on the sea. His aunt and uncle couldn't or wouldn't save themselves. The nephew survived, but to this day he is haunted by that memory, partially because his aunt and uncle's behavior felt so out of character. This was one of the few moments in the show when James talked about cryptids as metaphors. He said the Kushdaka could be seen as a way to explain what happens when your loved ones are under the influence of alcohol, which is a long-standing problem in tribal communities. The stories remind you that sometimes, you need to be wary of people you might normally trust. They may not truly be themselves at that moment. There's a lot of changes that has happened with indigenous people, but one of the things that hasn't changed, one of the things that never gets forgotten within the people is the fear. It's survived this whole colonization and forced assimilation that we've experienced from first the Russians and then the Americans. Things have changed languages. There's been lost stories have been lost, but one thing that hasn't been lost is this generational tribal fear that gets passed down. And so these stories kind of reflect that. The Kushdaka is a great example of that. And fear keeps you alive too. Fear keeps you alive exactly. Fear has a way of keeping you alive, for sure. In Alaska, there's just a lot of ways to die in Alaska. There's no two ways around it. The land, it wants to swallow you up. The water does not care. And so you have to have a healthy fear that you are not the biggest in the area. There's other things that call the shots. Speaking of big things in the area, he also talks about Bigfoot or their version of Bigfoot. In our culture, in the Inupal culture, we call them, the word we have for them is called Inupisuk. I just find it fascinating if you just break that word down. Inuk, in the word Inuk, the first part of it. Inuk, it means person. The second part of the word Pisuk it means walk. And so my ancestors named this creature walks like a person. It's just well known that if we see them, we are to leave them alone. They're gonna leave us alone. Every culture in Alaska has these stories and has a name for this creature. And in Alaska, up north, the only description that differs from, say, a sighting in the Pacific Northwest, like British Columbia or Washington, is that the Inupisuk up here has red hair, reddish hair, and it has longer hair. It flows in the wind. They, the elders say that they don't waste anything that they drink the blood of animals that they kill. There's every culture, every culture in Alaska has a story of the harry man. And there's a word, every culture has a word name for it. We lived in such a hard place in a very nomadic life and you didn't have a lot of time to just sit around and think about though. And it was a very on purpose type of life, haunting and gathering. And so if they had a word for it, chances are that it was actually a thing because there wasn't a lot of words for nonsense things. You just didn't really have time for it. It was like life and death all the time, I think. These sightings still happen to this day on all of them all over Alaska. And people now know that I like these stories. I tell these stories. I'm not afraid to tell stories of Alaskan cryptids and I try to find credible truth and credible sources. I'm looking for photos. I'm looking for anything that's material. And a lot of people look at our native stories and our indigenous stories and say that's just a lot of, that's just a lot of made up stuff. That's a lot of woo, woo, superstitious. But like I said, when every one of these stories, there's a sliver of truth. James has another show on Audible called Midnight's Sun. It's categorized as an audiobook, although it sounds like a podcast. In fact, it sounds like a true crime podcast with supernatural elements mixed in. Midnight's Sun was also turned into a documentary called Blood and Myth, which is on Hulu. It's about an indigenous actor named Teddy Kyle Smith. He is currently incarcerated for first degree attempted murder. But he claims that he was being harassed by cryptids called Inukins. He says the Inukins were trying to lure him to his doom and they were messing with his mind when he shot these two brothers. Long ago, before the white people came to the Arctic, legend has it that we, the Inupak tribe of Northern Alaska, lived alongside another tribe, the Inukins. The Inukins were similar to us in some ways, except they were very, very short and they were extremely strong. It was said one little Inukin man could carry a whole caribou all by himself. Teddy Kyle Smith's defense, that he was being influenced by a long-lost race of humanoids, did not hold up in court. James investigated the story and this is personal for him. He and Teddy Kyle Smith are from the same tribe. And as I mentioned earlier, James's great grandfather was one of the last official storytellers of their tribe. He and his stories would talk about these, the Inukins, multiple times. I always knew because of, understood the way his stories were put together. I always understood that there was a sliver of truth in every one of these stories. And with midnight sun, I wanted to see if I could validate some of these traditional stories of what we've been telling ourselves and up north for thousands of years. Yeah, I don't think I was going to mention is that, you know, for me, when I hear stories about different versions of sort of human-like figures, whether they're really small or whether they're very large or whatever, I've always been fascinated by the stories of how, not stories, but the science of how hundreds of thousands of years ago have a million years ago, and I think there's other types of humans on the earth. It was almost like middle-earth. And I always wonder if these stories, there's a part of us that, you know, there's always this, when people are like what aliens, they say, you know, I want to know we're not alone in the universe. I feel there's a part of us that wants to know that we're not alone on this planet. And I wonder if that's part of it, too. I love Lord of the Rings. I think it's the greatest story I've ever told. I'm 100% obsessed with Lord of the Rings. I watch the extended versions. I've often wondered that if so, a lot of this tribal, a lot of tribes in this, because I've studied them from all over the state of Alaska, like obsessively, and part of me wonders if some of these stories that involve these little people or these big, tall, hairy people, if these are genetic memories of of Denisovians or Hobbit Floriancists type people, if these are genetic memories of Neanderthals, it's like we can't forget that there was others. And I believe that our own species, our own type is we are the only ones left today these days because of we're so adversarial in our nature. I think these other versions of humans, the Denisovians or the Neanderthals, I'm not quite as sure as they were as territorial or adversarial. I think that's one of the reasons why we are still here today because we fight. But yeah, I've often wondered if that is the case that we are remembering some of these stories and some of these different types of people. What do you think of a lot of these other towns, usually in the lower 48, where if there is a cryptid, a Rothman or something like that, they go all out with the merchandising, the tourism, the festivals. Do you just think that's kind of amusing? That's just another part of American culture or I don't know if you have any opinions about those. I mean, it's the way it is. It's America's a capitalistic society and it's the American way to try to make a buck off of anything. I imagine the last thing you want is to create some kind of big marketing festival to get a lot of people from outside Alaska to come to look for. No, I don't want any of that. Yeah. I've had people ask me very specifically where the coordinates are for certain things that I've talked about in my stories and I don't tell people. Number one, I don't want people going out there who don't know what they're doing and I don't want them getting hurt on account of a story that I've told. That's not the point with these stories. I think it would be frowned upon actually with from the people around here. But that's not even something I would even consider. It's more about just preserving the oral tradition of native storytelling. You know, the winter time is the time we tell stories. You know, it helps pass along the long winter months. So it's part of the culture up here. It's funny because I'm in here talking about how you don't like the Alaska being called the last frontier. But part of the idea of the frontier is the idea that there's still some mystery out there that we haven't quote-unquote conquered at all. But it sounds like part of... You feel like part of your culture is that that is the whole point. You know? Yeah, I think that we have a very interesting relationship with the land because we live off of it so much. And we understand that it's such a big place. The Western mindset is we know it all. And the indigenous mindset is there's... We don't fully understand some of these things. I've lived here my whole life. I've never lived anywhere else. And I understand. And I was part of respecting the land is letting the land know we don't fully understand here. And you do have your secrets. And we will never know all of them. And that's okay. I wanted to travel beyond Alaska to figure out why so many people are fascinated by cryptids. So I contacted JW Ocker. He wrote a book called The United States of Cryptids, the Tour of American Myths and Monsters. To research the book, he visited dozens of states. In fact, he's been to every state in the country except Alaska. So I told him about James' podcast. And he was intrigued. I love that because one of the biggest problems cryptid people do have is they don't feel their cryptidogenment until they tie it to Native American belief. So if they don't have a history that goes back to Native Americans, they believe in this. And by doing that, they often twist the beliefs and the mythologies to fit their narrative. But it's validation of them. If they can say, oh, this creature was here before we were. Because again, cryptids can't just up here. Bigfoot's around. It hasn't been around for a very long time, even before the colonial era of America's. But there's a danger in that where you're using somebody else to store these mythologies as true history to connect to your story, to make your story valid. That's so interesting that there's a form of cultural appropriation that happens. Thank you. That's the word. That's literally happening a lot of cryptids. And it's like, you see why it's happening. There's a logical reason. Practical reason why it's happening. But you also have to be super careful about that. In his book, JW taught with people who like cryptids just because they think they're a fun and quirky part of pop culture. And he taught with other people who think that cryptids are real or potentially real. They call themselves cryptozoologists. So the beautiful thing about the word cryptid is, it is a legit scientific phenomenon, right? We have discovered creatures that we thought to think exists anymore. We've discovered creatures that are only rumors from locals before, right? The silacanth, the ocopi platypus, right? The platypus, nobody believed the platypus was a real animal. And even when they had like taxidermy creatures in their hands, they'd be like, you made this yourself. You put a duck on a beaver. Obviously, it's what you did. So they had to have live specimens there. So the idea of a cryptid is completely 100% legitimate. Some of the more extravagant cryptids, however, there's a whole spectrum of how believable they are, right? So some, there's some cryptids that know even like the most ardent cryptid believer would say, no, no, no, that's kind of a fable or that never happened or as a hoax. And there are some that are more biologically plausible, right? That, you know, bigfoot is one of those where it's not too hard on the imagination to be like, oh, it's me, but like two feet taller at Harrier, right? That's going to, it doesn't strain the imagination. You know, anything in the water. Because we're not in the water, right? It's very mysterious thing water. Giant bodies of water. So it's easy to say, it doesn't strain the imagination back. There's something in there that we haven't discovered yet, right? So it's just a, it is a spectrum. I hate that answer usually. But like, it is. There is our one end. There is the yokapi. And there's the silo camp. And the other end, there is, you know, laser shooting teradactyls, which there is out in the Iowa. So for those people who go to those conventions where they do believe, this is all just, these are just fables. These are myth. This is folklore. Why did they love cryptids so much? Why do they still think this is the funnest thing to be into? I didn't know the answer going into the project. But I think I, I have an answer that satisfies me coming out of it. And that is, it's just an exercise of wonder. Is what it is at the end of the day, right? It's people saying, you know, wouldn't it be awesome if there are more discoveries left in this world, right? Sometimes, especially in the modern world, and us having access to every single channel of communication, it seems like we've kind of figured all out. We've seen everything. Every square inch has been GPS and satellite and all those things. And also, there's also this because they are a category of monster. Like we call cryptids monsters all the time. You know, there's a whole category of people that love monsters, whether it's, you know, universal studios monsters, horror monsters. So this is a brand new category of monsters, where it is giant furry things, flying reptiles, lizard men, all kinds of things that are conventional monsters and loovies. But they might be real. Or there are stories in real life about them. It's another way to phrase it. There also a great fit for merchandise. Unlike King Kong or the creature from the Black Lagoon, there is no official version of these cryptids that you need to reference or get permission from a company. Artists can use their imaginations fully. And they do. When you want your spring break to feel like... ...and your kids pool day to feel like... ...and your hotel bed to feel like... ...ooh, and room service to feel like... ...because at Hilton, hospitality feels like... Your cabana is ready. Would you like fresh towels? It matters where you stay. Book now at hilton.com. Hilton, for this day. As I mentioned earlier, JW Aucker traveled across the country... ...to visit towns where they're encrypted sightings. And I was surprised to learn... ...how many towns have made their local cryptids... ...into part of their identity. Part of the biggest trick I did was the Dakotas... ...because it's middle and nowhere. It was COVID. It was middle of COVID. And I'm here in the Dakotas... ...drying between North Dakota and South Dakota. Nothing around. Snowing. And I'm looking for bigfoot statues... ...and thunderbird sites. And it's just like... ...you know, that's where the closest I felt to actually journey. The rest of these times, because I'm looking for towns that celebrate cryptids... ...it's mostly me just belly up the bar... ...and ordering whatever cryptideme... ...locobruri beer on tap. That's going to how I explore. So when you go to one of these towns... ...like, what qualifies as a great visit? Because I imagine myself going to these towns... ...and being like, so I hear this cryptid exists here... ...and they're like, yep, yep, it does. You want to buy the beer or the cryptid name on it? You know, like, what more... ...like, what do you... ...what qualifies as a great visit... ...that you made it out there? That's a really good question. That nobody's asked me. I'm glad you did. It is, you need a centerpiece. And that centerpiece, ideally, would be a museum. You have a museum dedicated to your cryptid... ...or cryptid in general. That's enough for me to... ...that's enough, right? Even folk Arkansas, which is literally the middle of nowhere. You would never go there on purpose or an accident. You've got to like... ...bigfoot to go to folk Arkansas. And they have a museum. And it's beautiful. And they have like... ...recreations. And like, it's really cool. So you need a museum... ...barring that... ...the best time to see these towns is festival time. Like, when they... ...all the vendors are out... ...and there's tons of stuff to do... ...and they're celebrating. Those are the best times. Because otherwise... ...using a town as celebrating a cryptid... ...it's because... ...they're in their last phase of existence. They've already lost their industry. People are moving out. The economy of the town is collapsing. So you have to find a way to... ...pull people in. And as long as there are ways you pull people in, right? Geography and history and stuff. And everybody has that one... ...soldier statue in the middle of the town green, right? Come see our lakes, come see our mountains, come see our shores. But if you have like a giant turtle in your past... ...a 50-foot-long turtle in 1952... ...you're probably the only one to have that. So then, you know, in marketing terms... ...you have a differentiator. So now, in order for you to have that experience... ...they have to come to your town. Point Pleasant West Virginia... ...I got to set up this model of... ...or a tiny town... ...you would never come to our town ever. We lost industry a million years ago. However, we have this one year in our past... ...that has strange enough for us to build statues... ...and museums and plaques to. And now, you know... ...10,000 people come every September to that festival. What is this festival about? The Moth Man. The Moth Man allegedly... ...looks like a giant moth human hybrid... ...with red eyes. It was first sighted in 1966... ...near a former munitions plant... ...that locals called the TNT area. The sightings increased for almost a year... ...and then they tapered off... ...after a tragic bridge collapse. But the story picked up again... ...in the 1970s with a popular book called... ...The Moth Man Prophecies. The book was turned into a movie starring Richard Gear... ...and today, the Moth Man appears in video games... ...like Fallout in Fortnite. ISJW, if point-pleasant West Virginia... ...was the first town to figure out... ...how to turn their local creature into a cash cow. If it wasn't the first town... ...it is the most influential town. Multiple, multiple times I was told... ...we started this festival because... ...the Moth Man festival was so successful. If you can do it there... ...you can do it anywhere. And it's true to a point... ...I mean, the Moth Man is pretty special. Why is the Moth Man special? I don't get why this is... ...of all the cryptids that are... ...it's weird, he's like up there... ...there's like the pantheon of like... ...bigfoot and lockness monster. And Moth Man is like the most... ...I know, he's like the equivalent of like... ...a musician's musician or an artist's artist. Like most people don't know who he is... ...but the people who know cryptids all know who he is. Like, how did he end up there? Yeah, I have a craicer analogy than that one. He's Wendy's, right? You know, this Burger King versus McDonald's... ...but every once in a while you just want to go to Wendy's, right? Is that cool? Like you said, the cool band... ...the way it's listening to you yet? I think it's a few things. I think one is... ...it is a unique design that's very important... ...if it was too big-footish, if it was too tear-adactylish... ...it wouldn't be as unique. And the second one of that is... ...it's the only cryptid... ...with an arc, an actual story arc, right? Every single cryptid starts the same way. There's... ...drunk or high teens in the backroads of town... ...in the dark, red eyes. That's kind of... ...every single cryptid story starts. And it's not the mouth-man story starts. In this case, though, every single cryptid story ends with... ...no proof, no pelt, nobody... ...it just gets away. In this case, though, because the tragedy of the Silver Bridge collapse... ...the story kind of stops there. It doesn't really... ...if you dig into the sightings, that's really... ...but as far as cultural narratives, it goes... ...for one year, this creature is all over the place... ...and it's more than ever, actually. But this creature is all over the place... ...and then tragedy happened, and he disappeared. So I think that's one of it. And then the third thing is... ...point-plus, it has embraced that myth... ...like no other cryptid town has. They have that giant, unique stainless steel statue... ...if that thing was made of stone or wood... ...it probably wouldn't be as cool. stainless steel, they have the museum... ...and very unique. You can go explore the area where the mouth-man was first found... ...the TNT area. And it feels like you're there. Like, normally you go to town and you're like... ...where was this big-foot scene? It's across that road there. Or it's out in the woods somewhere. It's a vague sight that's not interesting. The TNT area has these giant house-sized concrete igloos... ...that house munitions, that house chemicals... ...that have all these things over the years. And now they're all empty in the middle of this park... ...overgrown, and it feels like you're actually exploring... ...and then you can see the mouth-man any second... ...even though it's... ...whatever, 60, 70 years later. Is there something uniquely American about this? Like, are there other towns around the world... ...where they do the same thing? Or is it just very American to just... ...merchandise the hell out of your cryptids? That's what it is. So there is cryptids all over the world, right? And even in our definition of cryptid as a monster... ...that science doesn't believe in... ...all over the place, right? But we are the best at marketing. We invented marketing. So the way I always talk about this... ...this isn't obviously a cryptid town... ...but Salem, Massachusetts. It's which city, however... ...wasn't the first city in America to hang which is... ...wasn't the last city. The biggest witch trials happened over in Europe. It is not unique in most ways... ...and yet of all the places... ...not the cut-tired planet, it is witch city... ...because it grabbed marketing first. So it is marketing. Again, Bigfoot is being marketed constantly. That's why he's in commercials. That's why his festival is the most exciting. That's why all the stickers you see on cars... ...are shaped like that Bigfoot walking whenever. So it's exactly that. We market like no other person... ...like no other people on the planet market. So you mentioned as well that you were disappointed... ...that Bigfoot was everywhere. I was surprised. Again, to me, Bigfoot is like... ...in the 1980s or 90s... ...there's a supermarket tabloid Bigfoot citing... ...haha, this rag is a joke. Or it's even ironic. Why is he so popular? I don't understand. Is it the missing link idea? So the joke I always do when I'm doing talks... ...is that I asked Lauren Coleman. He's like the founder of the International Biology Museum. I've been doing it for decades. And he believes we love Bigfoot so much... ...because we're narcissists. Because he looks like us. Like a reptile creature, a flying creature doesn't. We, you know, we are our biases, our prejudices... ...our work at all times. We're always, oh, you look like me... ...even the superficial differences. You look like me. You're on my team. You don't look like me. You're not on my team. But practically, something happened at some point... ...and we all realized, oh, to look for Bigfoot... ...you just walk in the woods. That's all you do. You don't mount an expedition to the bed. You don't learn how to do side-scan sonar... ...and locks in Scotland. All you do is walk in the woods... ...and you hit trees the sticks. And you're looking for Bigfoot. It's kind of like the ghost hunting craze, right? When those shows came out back in the early 2000s... ...they were like, oh, that's all you do. You look for ghosts. You just take a paper quarter... ...and you wander around an empty house in the dark. Suddenly, everybody was doing that. Suddenly, everybody was a ghost hunter... ...because the tools were accessible... ...and the process was easy. Unfortunately, that's why you know it's not science... ...because it's an easy process. Same with cryptids. Bigfoot. You just wander around the woods... ...and even though you don't find a Bigfoot... ...it's still Bigfoot hunting, right? So, you mentioned two before that... ...in some of these towns... ...some people are not happy that... ...of all that our last ditch effort... ...or Hail Mary attempt to save this town... ...is celebrating some monster. How often did you find that to be the case? Regularly. And usually, again, it depends on the timeline, right? Right when they first start doing it... ...there's always kind of people pushing back in it. We're going to be a laughing stock. We don't want to be known for this. We're going to be known across the country... ...as the town that has a python running around it. Do we want that? That's a beer world? But I think over time... ...they eventually lose. They almost never win. The people that are more conservative about that... ...because there's no other option... ...like they're not bringing some of their options to replace that. And in the end, it is a lot of fun. Like, once you go to a Bigfoot convention... ...you realize, oh, it doesn't matter that I'm... ...there's certain conventions that you should... ...they're giving papers and talks. And it's really all about that... ...but most town celebrations are just fair, right? Theened fairs. So once you go to those... ...oh, this is a lot of fun. And it's good for the town. Look who all is here. Look at all these stores. So once you're starting seeing it work... ...you're using the commodities come around, I think. I've also read that there are also people... ...creationists who are really into cryptids... ...because they want to believe... ...like, oh, look, we found living dinosaurs Darun was wrong. So I grew up Christian. I grew up Christian. I grew up in this world where... ...yeah, it's very... ...if they can have a live dinosaur... ...in their minds. Oh, yeah, I say this just for my personal experience... ...back when I used to be that way. Then it... ...terives up the entire timeline of evolution, right? It's not 600 million years ago, 200 million years ago... ...whatever it is it is. No, no. These creatures are all built... ...or created the same time. And so obviously they're sharing the same space. You just said you used to be that way? Was there a time that you also believed... ...that the Earth was five, six thousand years old... ...and dinosaurs and humans? Oh, yeah. Is there... ...can we make a connection between... ...that those beliefs... ...and then your interest in the beliefs and cryptids now? Because there's an anti... ...there's an anti-connection, right? ...where I was a joke. I'm kind of... I'm not a skeptic in the sense that I'm out to disprove anything. I can care less about what people believe. But I don't believe a lot of things. I don't really believe in the more extravagant cryptids... ...I don't believe in ghosts. I don't believe in true love. I don't believe in predestination. But ghosts and true love are two very different things. I'm all around cynic of all things, right? But when I was a Christian, I believed in everything. I believe in witches and ghosts and demons... ...and gods inside of hearts... ...and like, creators of the universe. I believed in some extravagant things... ...and that's one of the reasons why I think my belief... ...mechanism broke. You know, one day I believed it, and the next day I didn't. And if I can be... ...if my beliefs can be that elastic... ...and if I can be that wrong, whichever direction I was wrong, who knows. Then I can never trust myself again about anything, right? So I think it is. I think my fascination with belief. It's kind of not the belief, right? I think that's what you nailed. Right now, cryptids. Most cryptids, it's a belief. We don't have hard evidence of all the most extravagant ones. You know, it's been 75 years since we named Bigfoot... ...and we haven't found a body, right? That's very important. To the point where some cryptosoologists, the non-biology ones... ...they're switching ideas. Like, what if... ...what if it's a ghost? What if he's ultra-terrestrial? What if he's anything to make him... ...not with the thought form? Anything to make him still exist... ...without leaving a body behind or anything like that. So the elasticity of human belief is my biggest fascination of life, right? Just because... ...I don't understand how we trust ourselves. Like, let's say you sit down like that... ...that Charles Dick and everybody's just a screwdriver. Like, you're just a bit of undigested mustard. Like, half the time, I can't trust my eyes. Well, how can I have such firm beliefs about... ...very important things in life, you know? So I have to do it in a way that I make sure I'm not making fun of people... ...that believe differently than me or... ...being condescending, because... ...that's not the point. The point is, these beliefs exist. Like, when we were talking about earlier, these beliefs exist. And that means something. In some fantasy books, comics, movies, TV shows, or games... ...when there are mythical God-like beings living among us. The explanation is often that these beings have come into existence... ...only because people believe in them. Even their appearance is shaped by the collective imagination of the believers. And if people believe in them less, these beings become less powerful. I think this spills over into real life, because if people believe in cryptids... ...or just celebrate them to the point where it affects the way they think, behave, or feel... ...then these cryptids are a part of our reality. Does that make them real? Or is that just a matter of semantics? We'll explore this idea further in the next episode... ...my annual holiday audio drama. That is it for this week. Thank you for listening. Special thanks to James Domick Jr. and J.W. Acker. James' podcast and audiobook are both available on Audible. I included links to those and J.W.'s book in the show notes. My assistant producer is Stephanie Billman. We have another podcast called Between a Imaginary Worlds. It's a more casual chat show that's only available to listeners who pledge on Patreon. In one of the recent episodes, I talked with a podcaster Bodelaire about a show The Voodoo Project. We discussed why pop culture tropes around voodoo, like pin dolls and witch doctors, are damaging to the real religion of voodoo. Between Imaginary Worlds comes included with the ad-free version of the show that you can get on Patreon. You can also buy an ad-free subscription on Apple Podcasts. If you support the show on Patreon, at different levels, you get either free Imaginary Worlds stickers, a mug or a t-shirt, and a link to a Dropbox account, which is the full length interviews of every guest in every episode. Another way to support the show is to recommend it to a friend, post about it on social media, or leave a nice review wherever you get your podcasts. You can subscribe to the show's newsletter at ImaginaryWorldsPodcast.org.