What I find interesting in reading through this conversation is seeing the spectrum of people's beliefs and understandings, and what they are willing to discuss. I think it's great.
some points that need to be made regarding what I am seeing in this thread concern "show and tell". I've seen a lot of statements that have been made over the years of people claiming to have found certain things, and others demanding proof and evidence of these things.
"Prove" that you've solved the "Beale cipher", Is a good example. I personally don't have the answer to this cipher. But I know that if someone has solved it, there is no way for them to prove any of it without giving up their entire position on it. The solution is the solution tho the cipher, and you can't prove part of it.
Another would be that someone matches up information that places the find in national parks, or personal property. It would make sense that in the matter of privately owned land, again you have to give up your entire position in order to try and obtain a treasure that you have zero rights too the find in the first place.
When I've read people making claims on this website over the years, it's hard to tell the difference between someone that is placed in these positions and have actually found what they were looking for, versus someone that thinks they've found something on property that is not theirs, and therefore having no right to claim it. It doesn't mean they didn't find it, they just can't retrieve it without giving up their information.
i see claims that are made on this site, and I like to be happy for people making the claims. I know better than to ask them to prove their claim, because it would be naive for them to actually do it, and unless they have already fully recovered the find, it would be ignorant for them to give up their position on it. Even if they have recovered everything, revealing your position would be to also give away your position and become a target of government and nefarious people.
Having said these things, lots of people have made claims throughout history, and some of these are now our legendary hunts. Without these historical claims we would have little to none trial to follow, or markers to use chasing them. In the modern day, it doesn't make much sense to make public claims of finds, but I'll still read them with interest when I see them.
Someone on this site recently made the claim of starting a hoax related to a legendary hunt, and was trying to prove they were the origination of the hoax. They are essentially trying to claim giving this hunt it's legendary status, from my perspective. I have an issue with this. Why purposefully insert false information into an already difficult task? Whether or not you find a legendary treasure is neither here nor there. It's the hunt that we take pleasure in. We require these old claims to sift through trying to find relevance in some of the information. To introduce hoax information purposefully, is ignorant, and useless.
Luckily, this particular hoax information doesn't affect me. But rather than easily and pursefully create a hoax, try finding the target instead. You will find things not related to your target by default. Maybe you will get really lucky.
