Oriental Yeti? Pull the other one

[Cain]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/apr/06/mystery-of-oriental-yeti

A mysterious hairless creature, dubbed the "Oriental Yeti", has been trapped by hunters in a remote region of central China. Apparently, it emerged from ancient woodlands. Described by its finders as "a bit like a bear but with a tail like a kangaroo", it reportedly makes a noise like a distressed cat. Chinese scientists are hoping that DNA tests will prove it to be the zoologists' equivalent of the Holy Grail – a mammal new to science. Could it be? Time to examine the facts.

First, its size. The Yeti is, according to legend, a mysterious bear-like beast, standing well over the height of a man. The mammal discovered in China is a small, possum-like creature, perhaps two feet long at most. Next, its appearance: particularly its hair, or in this case the lack of it. Photographs reveal a wrinkled, pink animal, sprouting a few tufts of hair and several nasty looking lesions on its exposed skin.

Far from being naturally hairless, this is, according to Oxford scientist and TV presenter George McGavin, a very sick animal indeed. "It looks like a shaved civet, and to be honest I think it probably is. You can immediately see that it has lost its hair, probably through illness." And McGavin is highly sceptical about the idea that this animal may be new to science, as has been claimed. "If this truly is a new discovery I would be very surprised."

McGavin can speak from experience, having led the recent expedition to the jungles of Mount Bosavi in New Guinea, featured on the BBC series Lost Land of the Volcano. While there, McGavin and his team did indeed discover a mammal new to science: a giant rat, provisionally named the Bosavi woolly rat.

Such findings are becoming increasingly infrequent, as the vast majority of the globe has now been explored, meaning that most large or medium-sized mammals have already been discovered and named. If you still want to find a creature new to science, and even have it named after yourself, there is still plenty of scope - but you would be best advised to focus on the smaller stuff. In the last decade alone almost a quarter of a million new species have been described – though most are micro-organisms rather than mammals.

And, so far at least, there have been no confirmations of a miniature hairless Yeti.

It's not a well looking or happy animal, it's true.

[Jasper]

Actually, it's not a yeti.

That is what you get when you take a possum with malignant cancer, and give it chemo and a cocktail of mutagenics.  The possum dies, and the tumor evolves into a symbiote that takes the form of the dead, now hairless possum.

This is actual science, do not argue.

[Cain]

So you're saying this is John Carpenter's The Thing, only set in China and without Kurt Russell?

[Mangrove]

Uhh, I thought that:

a) Yeti was Tibetan, thus already 'Oriental'.

b) The Chinese equivalent of Yeti/Big Foot/Sasquatch is called 'Yeren'

[Jasper]

So you're saying this is John Carpenter's The Thing, only set in China and without Kurt Russell?

Hah!  Figures there would already be a movie.  Yeah, pretty much.

[Cain]

Uhh, I thought that:

a) Yeti was Tibetan, thus already 'Oriental'.

b) The Chinese equivalent of Yeti/Big Foot/Sasquatch is called 'Yeren'

I suspect they were using "Oriental" in its specifically Chinese meaning, and figured no-one had heard of the Yeren.  I mean, I haven't.

So you're saying this is John Carpenter's The Thing, only set in China and without Kurt Russell?

Hah!  Figures there would already be a movie.  Yeah, pretty much.

Still worth watching though, one of Carpenter's better films.

[Mangrove]

Yeren:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeren

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqWXgDqlCY8

http://www.slashcontrol.com/free-tv-shows/destination-truth/3737944856-the-jersey-devil-the-yeren

[Nast]

Named, of course, for the common utterance:

"Yeren trouble if you see it coming atcha."

[Freeky]

It looks a bit like a red panda. Cept with a shorter snout.

http://z.about.com/d/gonyc/1/0/7/R/red_panda.jpg

[LMNO]

MASTER SHIFU!
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