I understand these stories can seem strange and explanations can appear logical, but to me they are trying to put a fence around the unknown. It's the fear of the simple vastness of our world that compels us to create tales that tie up "the strange" into nice packages. Hundreds of years ago when ships on the sea went missing, they were the victims of krakens, sea dragons, and various other monsters of the deep. The idea that men simply went out into the open water and never returned home was unnerving, so surely they met some sort of dramatic fate. But we know they weren't eaten by dragons or marooned with mermaids. Their ships capsized, they got lost, disease incapacitated them. Look at the Malaysian Air plane that went missing, all the theories of what happened. How could a plane that size disappear? Well a plane that size in the Indian Ocean is the equivalent of losing an object as long and as wide as the thickness of a credit card on a football field. Now shatter than into thousands of pieces and good luck finding it. That's hard to wrap your mind around. A conspiracy is a soothing solution. It defines the unknown.
It's a strange juxtaposition to see people piled on top of each other on the Gatlinburg strip, and know that not too far away is a forest you could get lost in and never be see again. A week and half ago two women died at Cummins Falls, one a hiker and the other searching for the first. It's not hard to get into a lot of trouble quickly in the woods. It's even easier for a small child. Slip down a bank and hit your head on a rock, if no one sees you that's game over. Come to and it's dark and your family has left, what chance would a small kid have? A forest(or any natural setting) can be dangerous enough, the spectre of hill people and roaming lunatics is just the product of minds attempting to rationalize bad things happening in a large unknown space.
