The Ketchum File II: Melba on “The Conspiracy Show” (6-21-15) with Richard Syrett

WARNING: Contains Ketchum Koolaid. Please drink responsibly. Use an informed designated driver.
 

What a perfect radio show for Melba to appear on. While claiming that she’s a victim of a mainstream science “conspiracy” to deny her a place in the sun, Melba Ketchum continues to spin her yarn of having proven the existence of bigfoot. And don’t you know that the likes of sensationalist radio host Richard Syrett drank the Koolaid up. But you’re smarter than that.

First, some of the obvious falsehoods:

1. “The mtDNA is completely human,” she said. Some of the samples were. Others had too many mutations to fall nicely into the human mtDNA phylotree. Any sample with seven or more extra mutations has a less than 1% chance of actually being a real human sample. Several of her samples failed in this. One had 17 extra mutations. Average is only about three in the human population. The most likely explanation is contamination and degradation, which she continues to deny.

2. “The nuclear DNA is a mosaic of unknown and human.” - The three published sequences did not show that. I found that one is a black bear, one is completely human, and one is a dog.

3. “nDNA BLAST gave no hits at all.” - She doesn’t know how to do a proper search. See 2. above. Previously, Melba claimed on Facebook that she got 13 different species hits and still counting, and therefore the sample was unknown. Only a very few relatively short specific gene sequences gave no hits, I found. She claims they’re a hybrid, which would show both human and primate hits, but presented no evidence to support that claim in her paper. She can’t even stick to the same story.

4. “Passed peer review.” - The e-mail which she touts says “Accepted with revisions.” She did not make the requested revisions, but purchased the journal (with Wally Hersom’s funding) instead when the journal cancelled its so called “acceptance.”

Some pure speculations represented as facts:

5. “Crossbreeding is in the historical record. Maidens were stolen and came back with a hybrid baby. Offspring were not always healthy. Others lived normal lives.” - For “historical record” read “legend and mythology.” None of this was documented from personal experience by reputable civilized-world historians in a written language (not nebulous pictographs and totems subject to interpretation).

6. “The human was ‘bred out’ as the weaker species.” - Sample 31 nDNA was completely human. She concluded in her paper that the nDNA showed a “mosaic” pattern of a human hybrid. Furthermore, she continues to campaign against capture or killing because they are “human, just like us“ (she said previously). Just more inconsistencies.

7. “They bury their dead.” - Nobody has ever found verifiable skeletal remains, above or below the ground.  She claimed the government has some.

8. “Some are cannibalistic.” Evidence please?

A few other points. She claimed to have samples of Zana (the wild woman from Russia) and her son Kwit. These were shown by Bryan Sykes of Oxford to be of African origin (haplogroup). I doubt she has samples, and I doubt even more that she will add anything to this.

She claimed to have both samples and funding for her “Giants” study, but has not begun work because she is waiting for more of each. Why hasn’t the work begun on existing samples with existing funding? Even her believer, Chris Noel, asked this question on her Facebook page.

Finally, she continues to label her critics, including me, as “haters.” “The haters don’t give up… So many haters have torn it down,” she says. I don’t know anybody (including me) who has said that they hate Melba Ketchum or her coworkers. Personally, I reserve my hatred for more important people, like Hitler, Stalin, and a few other living dictators. The paper was “torn down” because it contained false conclusions, not because people hate her. 

 “The Galileo Effect?” I don’t think so.