Crop Circles!!...truth or fiction?

Originally Posted by astroboy

All of them are perfected in every detail.

Some are clearly done by amateurs.

Originally Posted by astroboy

Some of the designs (blueprints of a tetrahedron) are so intricate that they will beat the Mona Lisa and Whistler's Mother. How could anyone make it over night? Thanks for the music too, Mind's Eye.

Look at the Circlemaker's site. Look at sites for other crop circle organizations. There are even videos on Youtube showing how they can make these circles overnight. They work from a design usually generated on a computer and tools that help them keep the design precise.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Prokopton

The big, interconnected crop circles with new age geometry are man-made... and since they have so many admirers they are probably a tidy moneyspinner for someone.

But a couple of much older crop circles... I have no idea. They were different, not so spectacular, and they actually appeared as far back as the 17th c. A few of the very beginning circles in the current craze seemed to be of that type. On those, it's anyone's guess (although it's not aliens IMO). But now the fake ones are all you see.

Some records of those older ones here.

oops..............

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Prokopton

The big, interconnected crop circles with new age geometry are man-made... and since they have so many admirers they are probably a tidy moneyspinner for someone.

But a couple of much older crop circles... I have no idea. They were different, not so spectacular, and they actually appeared as far back as the 17th c. A few of the very beginning circles in the current craze seemed to be of that type. On those, it's anyone's guess (although it's not aliens IMO). But now the fake ones are all you see.

Some records of those older ones here.

There are soil scientists biologists and physicists that investigate these things and they can't explain some very strange phenomena, so if you are interested in the actual findings then check out this site.

http://www.bltresearch.com/

Originally Posted by astroboy

Amazing find, Prokopton.

It is interesting I think... this one for example from 1880:

Visiting a neighbour's farm on Wednesday evening (21st), we found a field of standing wheat considerably knocked about, not as an entirety, but in patches forming, as viewed from a distance, circular spots.

Examined more closely, these all presented much the same character, viz., a few standing stalks as a center, some prostrate stalks with their heads arranged pretty evenly in a direction forming a circle round the centre, and outside these a circular wall of stalks which had not suffered...

... etc. from a lawyer of the day.

Originally Posted by Gem

There are soil scientists biologists and physicists that investigate these things and they can't explain some very strange phenomena, so if you are interested in the actual findings then check out this site.

Interesting Gem... I don't suppose you'd give a quick summary would you? Site big, time small... :)

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Prokopton

It is interesting I think... this one for example from 1880:

Visiting a neighbour's farm on Wednesday evening (21st), we found a field of standing wheat considerably knocked about, not as an entirety, but in patches forming, as viewed from a distance, circular spots.

Examined more closely, these all presented much the same character, viz., a few standing stalks as a center, some prostrate stalks with their heads arranged pretty evenly in a direction forming a circle round the centre, and outside these a circular wall of stalks which had not suffered...

... etc. from a lawyer of the day.



Interesting Gem... I don't suppose you'd give a quick summary would you? Site big, time small... :)

Plants seem effected by microwave radiation and seed collection exibits genetic damage, soil has peculiar chemicals and high magnetizm ... evidence of lots of heat... and such of the like...

Gem -

Thats what Ive read too. Its not enough to say aliens are doing it IMO, but its more then enough to say something is going on we dont really get ( in some, theres tons made by people every year)

Honestly I think this is just another example of people wanting believing something fanciful, (Crop circles are made by aliens, UFOs, energy vortexes etc.) over the more likely, and mundane explanation. (The are made by people.).

I never really have grasped this concept, and certainly not embraced it (Starting to think that is why I am not very spiritual; I refuse believe in outlandish things without proof and won't delude myself that they exist without credible evidence.). At any rate, I think that is a far bigger mystery, than the origin of the crop circles themselves.

But I will save that discussion for another thread.

Originally Posted by Scibat

I refuse believe in outlandish things without proof and won't delude myself that they exist without credible evidence.).

Exactly my attitude too, and I stick to it -- even when others would prefer I didn't, as in this thread! :) And that hasn't prevented me being extremely "spiritual", because as it happens, there's a lot of 'credible evidence' for a lot of interesting stuff, and then there's experience, some of which can change the mind in a big hurry.

But microwave radiation and genetic damage could be interesting. I don't exactly know what they're credible evidence of yet (not aliens for sure in my view, and notice the poll agrees broadly with you that the vast majority of modern circles are man-made), but they are points of real evidence. Since you investigate NDE evidence, you must know the process of actually collecting the data is extraordinarily painstaking... in the absence of something experiential, we often need to reserve judgment rather than prematurely bloodying everything with Occam's razor!

Originally Posted by Prokopton

Exactly my attitude too, and I stick to it -- even when others would prefer I didn't, as in this thread! :) And that hasn't prevented me being extremely "spiritual", because as it happens, there's a lot of 'credible evidence' for a lot of interesting stuff, and then there's experience, some of which can change the mind in a big hurry.

But microwave radiation and genetic damage could be interesting. I don't exactly know what they're credible evidence of yet (not aliens for sure in my view, and notice the poll agrees broadly with you that the vast majority of modern circles are man-made), but they are points of real evidence. Since you investigate NDE evidence, you must know the process of actually collecting the data is extraordinarily painstaking... in the absence of something experiential, we often need to reserve judgment rather than prematurely bloodying everything with Occam's razor!

I quite agree. My problem with a lot of research about things like crop circles is that the researchers set out with the intent to find something unusual. So the research is biased from the start and of course, because of this it does indeed find something unusual.

Not to say that is always the case, but in my own investigations of the paranormal I find a vast quantity of the supposed research done is done in this way, hence my overall skepticism when people make claims about proof. There may have been a study or research, but that doesn't mean it is necessarily credible.

PS: I like the Occam's razor comment, and agree. The problem is that it seems a lot of people dismiss lex parsimoniae, even with evidence, over a far less likely and more unrealistic one.