Post by MoMo on Mar 4, 2014 13:35:15 GMT -6
Karl Shuker chimes in on the Human-Rabbit Hybrid Photo.
So what is the truth about this contentious photograph and, most of all, what precisely does it portray? If we ignore for the time being the entity's bizarre head, and concentrate upon the rest of its body and what we can see of the person holding it, I think it most plausible that what we are looking at is either a newborn male human infant (possibly delivered by caesarean) or an extremely late aborted male human infant. The streaks of blood on its body would be normal and expected in either case, and the white waxy substance also present on its body would thus be vernix caseosa – a substance composed primarily of sebum, which begins to form upon the human foetus from around the eighteenth week of pregnancy. The infant's umbilical cord is readily visible hanging down the left side of its body (and thus seen on the right side in the photo, in which we are viewing the infant from the front), and using the size of the hand of the person holding it as a scale, the infant is the correct size for a newborn or late abort. In addition, the blue attire of the person holding the infant corresponds with hospital attire, as does the blue surgical glove worn by the person's hand.
So far, so straight forward. When examining the infant's head, however, matters become rather more complex. The infant's face is very distorted and/or mis-shaped, leading to two possibilities. This is either the result of photo-manipulation, i.e. a deliberate attempt to create a monstrous visage by computer-generated trickery; or, tragically, the infant's face is truly deformed, with maldeveloped eyes, nose, and mouth (fellow Fortean researcher Bob Skinner has opined that its mouth may be exhibiting a bilateral hare-lip condition, and I agree with him). One of its ears is also clearly visible, but apart from seeming a little large, this appears quite normal – in stark contrast to the grotesque length of what seems to be fleshy tissue emerging just above it and hanging downwards in a gross parody of a rabbit's ear. It is of course this grotesque structure that is responsible for the 'human-rabbit hybrid' claims – made by persons who evidently hadn’t noticed the infant's real, normal human ear!
What could this long fleshy expanse of tissue be? It is possible that it is not actually part of the infant's head at all, but is merely a section of the detached placenta that subsequently became attached to the infant's head during its delivery/abortion. Alternatively, it may be a portion of the infant's cranial tissue or even a portion of its brain if the cranium has been damaged during embryonic development and/or the brain has not developed correctly. There is a condition known as anencephaly, in which a sizeable portion of the brain, cranium, and skull cap do not develop, due to the rostral (anterior) neuropore - the temporary opening at the embryonic forebrain's extreme cephalic (rostral) pole - not closing during early embryogenesis (at approximately Day 25 in humans). Consequently, the portion of the brain that does develop is exposed and thus can theoretically emerge from the open, unprotected top of the skull, together with associated nervous tissue. However, the amount of flesh visible in the photograph seems more than might be expected if this were the case. Conversely, it is of course conceivable that part or all of this flesh is merely the product of photo-manipulation, to yield something reminiscent of a rabbit ear.
Finally, but most tragic of all: the positions of the infant's limbs (its right hand, incidentally, seems to have malformed digits), and also the expression on its face (if not added by photo-manipulation), are highly suggestive of the prospect that it was alive when the photograph was taken. This in turn makes the extremely rough, callous way in which it is being held even more heart-breaking.
Still requiring assessment is the location portrayed in the photograph. Might the latter have been snapped at a makeshift, impromptu field hospital in some remote tropical zone, which could also explain the presence of the bottle on the ground in the foreground? If not, then what else but photo-manipulation can plausibly reconcile the apparent presence of a correctly-attired hospital worker holding a newborn/late aborted infant in the middle of a jungle? (In the latter scenario, the bottle could have also been added via some deft, digital manipulation.) In any event, the stories of encountering this and similar entities in the jungle are obviously complete, nonsensical inventions that have been supplied to the media by person(s) unknown, as indeed has the photograph itself. I have been unsuccessful in tracing this controversial photograph's origin, and also in tracing any photos online that contain either the precise jungle scene in this photograph or the person standing behind the infant in it. So if, as seems most likely, these aspects of the photograph have indeed been incorporated into it from other sources, their origins currently remain unknown too.
However, I do feel it likely that the identity offered here by me for the entity is the correct one – a probably deformed newborn/aborted male human infant, alive when delivered but likely to have died from its condition shortly afterwards. I have no idea who could possibly have thought it novel or amusing to have created such a disturbing image, but I wholeheartedly believe it high time that this photograph be seen by all for what it truly is - a terrible indictment of humanity's inhumanity.
So what is the truth about this contentious photograph and, most of all, what precisely does it portray? If we ignore for the time being the entity's bizarre head, and concentrate upon the rest of its body and what we can see of the person holding it, I think it most plausible that what we are looking at is either a newborn male human infant (possibly delivered by caesarean) or an extremely late aborted male human infant. The streaks of blood on its body would be normal and expected in either case, and the white waxy substance also present on its body would thus be vernix caseosa – a substance composed primarily of sebum, which begins to form upon the human foetus from around the eighteenth week of pregnancy. The infant's umbilical cord is readily visible hanging down the left side of its body (and thus seen on the right side in the photo, in which we are viewing the infant from the front), and using the size of the hand of the person holding it as a scale, the infant is the correct size for a newborn or late abort. In addition, the blue attire of the person holding the infant corresponds with hospital attire, as does the blue surgical glove worn by the person's hand.
So far, so straight forward. When examining the infant's head, however, matters become rather more complex. The infant's face is very distorted and/or mis-shaped, leading to two possibilities. This is either the result of photo-manipulation, i.e. a deliberate attempt to create a monstrous visage by computer-generated trickery; or, tragically, the infant's face is truly deformed, with maldeveloped eyes, nose, and mouth (fellow Fortean researcher Bob Skinner has opined that its mouth may be exhibiting a bilateral hare-lip condition, and I agree with him). One of its ears is also clearly visible, but apart from seeming a little large, this appears quite normal – in stark contrast to the grotesque length of what seems to be fleshy tissue emerging just above it and hanging downwards in a gross parody of a rabbit's ear. It is of course this grotesque structure that is responsible for the 'human-rabbit hybrid' claims – made by persons who evidently hadn’t noticed the infant's real, normal human ear!
What could this long fleshy expanse of tissue be? It is possible that it is not actually part of the infant's head at all, but is merely a section of the detached placenta that subsequently became attached to the infant's head during its delivery/abortion. Alternatively, it may be a portion of the infant's cranial tissue or even a portion of its brain if the cranium has been damaged during embryonic development and/or the brain has not developed correctly. There is a condition known as anencephaly, in which a sizeable portion of the brain, cranium, and skull cap do not develop, due to the rostral (anterior) neuropore - the temporary opening at the embryonic forebrain's extreme cephalic (rostral) pole - not closing during early embryogenesis (at approximately Day 25 in humans). Consequently, the portion of the brain that does develop is exposed and thus can theoretically emerge from the open, unprotected top of the skull, together with associated nervous tissue. However, the amount of flesh visible in the photograph seems more than might be expected if this were the case. Conversely, it is of course conceivable that part or all of this flesh is merely the product of photo-manipulation, to yield something reminiscent of a rabbit ear.
Finally, but most tragic of all: the positions of the infant's limbs (its right hand, incidentally, seems to have malformed digits), and also the expression on its face (if not added by photo-manipulation), are highly suggestive of the prospect that it was alive when the photograph was taken. This in turn makes the extremely rough, callous way in which it is being held even more heart-breaking.
Still requiring assessment is the location portrayed in the photograph. Might the latter have been snapped at a makeshift, impromptu field hospital in some remote tropical zone, which could also explain the presence of the bottle on the ground in the foreground? If not, then what else but photo-manipulation can plausibly reconcile the apparent presence of a correctly-attired hospital worker holding a newborn/late aborted infant in the middle of a jungle? (In the latter scenario, the bottle could have also been added via some deft, digital manipulation.) In any event, the stories of encountering this and similar entities in the jungle are obviously complete, nonsensical inventions that have been supplied to the media by person(s) unknown, as indeed has the photograph itself. I have been unsuccessful in tracing this controversial photograph's origin, and also in tracing any photos online that contain either the precise jungle scene in this photograph or the person standing behind the infant in it. So if, as seems most likely, these aspects of the photograph have indeed been incorporated into it from other sources, their origins currently remain unknown too.
However, I do feel it likely that the identity offered here by me for the entity is the correct one – a probably deformed newborn/aborted male human infant, alive when delivered but likely to have died from its condition shortly afterwards. I have no idea who could possibly have thought it novel or amusing to have created such a disturbing image, but I wholeheartedly believe it high time that this photograph be seen by all for what it truly is - a terrible indictment of humanity's inhumanity.
