Cryptozoology and the "High Table" of Science

I recently read over a copy of the following paper (thanks to Kevin for locating it for me), and am pleased to see a positive response to the late Bernard Heuvelmans' writings in an academic journal. The paper is:

Cryptozoology, Archaeology and Paleontology: Histories Near the High Table
Keynyn Brysse
Annals of Science
January 25, 2010, iFirst article

This is actually an essay review of three books published in 2007. One is on O'Connor's Finding Time for the Old Stone Age: A History of Palaeolithic Archaeology and Quaternary Geology in Britain, 1860-1960, another is Turner's Making Prehistory: Historical Science and the Scientific Realism Debate, and the third is Heuvelmans' The Natural History of Hidden Animals. The perspective of this journal is more history of science than actual science (which may be one reason it is a bit more objective about cryptozoology), and the review underscores both the reluctance of anthropology to accept archaeology, and that of evolutionary biology to accept paleontology. It also points out the foibles of certain historical scientists who were averse to self-critique, as well as highlighting the value of historical (vs experimental) sciences in scientific endeavors.

Now, I don't have the Heuvelmans book in question. It's on my list... but as I have most of his other English material, I'm familiar with his arguments, and of course as the "father of cryptozoology" these should be carefully considered by all cryptozoological investigators. I don't necessarily agree with everything Heuvelmans wrote, however, specifically when it comes to separating cryptozoology as a distinct discipline from zoology itself. Cryptozoology is methodology, not a discipline. That, I think, is what may confuse Dr. Brysse when she writes:

"The designation of cryptozoology as a unique scientific discipline distinct from zoology proper is, however, more problematic. Heuvelmans lambasts critics of cryptozoology ... for thinking cryptozoologists are only interested in monsters. Such accusations may be unfair, but if Heuvelmans' s own definition is used instead, then every zoologist who ever discovers a new species of animal, however small, unexciting, and similar to known species, is doing cryptozoology, whether he or she knows it or not. This definition is so broad as to be virtually useless."

The confusion comes because Dr. Brysse doesn't recognize here that cryptozoology is the investigation of "ethnoknown" mystery animals. Heuvelmans usually pointed this out in his material, and as I said, I don't have this volume, so I don't know how well he emphasized the point. But in order to be of interest to (and within the purview of) cryptozoology, the mystery animal (whether strange and monstrous, or small and uninteresting) had to have enough salience to be recognized as unusual, strange, or different from known and recognized species, prior to its discovery.

In other words, if a field biologist in Madagascar catches a brand new lemur out of the blue in a field trap, that would not be cryptozoology. If that same biologist hears rumors of another possible new lemur, and deliberately searches out and finds that it is a new species, that is cryptozoology. Cryptozoology, as a discovery science, is a targeted-methodology for ethnoknown species. It is well within the boundary of mainstream zoology as a methodology (regardless of the weirdness of its potential targets), and has been used (if unrecognized as distinctive) since the beginnings of modern natural history.

In any case, this is a positive mention of cryptozoology within academia, and hopefully will lead to more informed interest by those in the history and philosophy of science, if not science itself.